Dragaera

Speculative Planetary Statistics for Dragaera (Math help?)

Jon_Lincicum at stream.com Jon_Lincicum at stream.com
Fri Apr 7 13:04:43 PDT 2006

Howard Brazee <howard at brazee.net> 
Sent by: dragaera-bounces at dragaera.info
04/07/06 12:39 PM

To

cc
dragaera at dragaera.info
Subject
Re: Speculative Planetary Statistics for Dragaera (Math help?)





>The first issue we have here is that Dragaera is probably not natural - 
>and possibly the whole planet was Terra-formed.    Many technological 
>solutions can be imagined for some of the problems that prevent Venus 
>and Mars from being suitable.

While I'll agree that it's possible that Dragaera is "not natural" or has 
been terraformed, I'd say we don't have enough to go on to say that it is 
"likely". I'd be interested in hearing your reasoning for this. 

While we have a number of solutions we can "imagine" for terraforming 
worlds, they all involve tremendous expenditures of energy and/or time 
that are, at present, beyond our technological abilities. 

Some of the suggestions I've seen for Mars are quite fascinating--but even 
the most ambitious of these (which required attaching large rockets to 
push dark-colored asteroids onto the polar icecaps of Mars) would require 
about 1,000 years to result in anything close to a breathable atmosphere. 
(And with no natural magnetic field, it probably wouldn't last, anyway.) 
(Kim Stanley Robinson's "Red Mars/Green Mars/Blue Mars" cycle has some 
interesting ideas in this area.)

Venus is harder, since even building a lander that can survive on the 
surface for more than a few minutes is beyond our current abilities. 
Add to that the fact that the planet's (lack of) rotation speed would 
become a major problem if enough of the atmosphere was somehow removed to 
bring the temperatures down.

>For some reason, I picture Dragaera as being pretty polar.   It does 
>have day and night, but diffused.    That diffusion may have been part 
>of the plan - especially if someone intended to duplicate Faerie.   Or 
>it could be coincidental.   Or our Faerie might be based upon Dragaera.

We know that Dragaera has seasons. Whether these are caused by axial tilt 
or orbital eccentricity is not clear. Can anyone cite any textev that 
shows that the days are shorter on Dragaera during the winter than they 
are during the summer? This would nail down the fact that it has a 
significant axial tilt.

>And we don't know anything about its sun.   We don't know how much 
>magnetic protection is needed - whether it has lots of solar wind - or 
>much of anything about it.

We know that it is too bright to look at with the naked eye. We know that 
during the day, in the east (where there is no enclouding), it is bright 
enough to drown out the light of the stars. It is likely to be a main 
sequence star, probably somewhat smaller and cooler than Earth's sun (with 
therefore, a longer potential lifespan, since larger stars burn hotter and 
faster), or else the year would be a lot longer. 

Majikjon