A Symmetrical Cosmic Red Square

Remember the hexagon surrounding Saturn's north pole? Now for our delectation Ano_Nimass Coward sends us to Space.com for a look at a nebula with near perfect bilateral symmetry surrounding a dying star. The so-called Red Square ranks among the most symmetrical objects ever observed by scientists. "If you fold things across the principle diagonal axis, you get an almost perfect reflection symmetry," said the leader of a study of the object, recently published in Science. A possible explanation for the structure's glow, if not its shape, was advanced in a paper appearing in PNAS, which attributes the glow of a similar object — dubbed, confusingly, the Red Rectangle — to exotic space-hardened organic molecules called Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons. PAHs are normally unstable but may occur in places like the nebula in question, in nanostructured clusters that are extremely stable and radiation hardened.

Re:Geometry

[adrianmonk]

How is it confusing?

The difference between Red Rectangle and Red Square is confusing because, if you read the article, they are different things. From the article:

The researchers propose that similar conditions are contributing to the extreme symmetry of another system, the Red Rectangle, whose central star is cooler than that of the Red Square.

Re:Optical illusion?

[barakn]

There are some artifacts in the image. Notice the stars with 6 rays. The rays are created by support structures holding the secondary mirror of the telescope in front of the primary mirror. The fact that the square doesn't have hexagonal symmetry argues for its existence as a real object.

Re:Optical illusion?

[RyanFenton]

But it highlighted star still does show the six-ray spikes the other starts do... the white light in the center just seems to have an hourglass shape that matches with the hexagonal spikes (also likely an artifact) that makes a square as it radiates out. Is it possible that the core of this star is collapsing into a quasar-like object, radiating in two opposite directions, each mostly perpendicular to our viewpoint? Those two narrowing radiating jets of light could match the hexagon thatches to make that white hourglass in the center, making the red square on the outside.

Ryan Fenton

Re:Optical illusion?

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop overanalyzing a particular picture of it. The Red Square has been imaged thousands of times by hundreds of instruments over the past decade. The square *is there*.

It's Another Hourglass Morphology

[pln2bz]

Observant space enthusiasts will notice the excessively large number of hourglass morphologies that continue to appear in NASA's press releases. These hourglass morphologies can only be awkwardly called the result of gravitation. A cursory familiarity with laboratory plasma physics will help people to recognize that the most likely explanation is that these are in fact z-pinches wich result from Birkeland Currents. In a zoomed image, you can see the filamentary Birkeland Currents on two opposing sides of the red "square" being pinched down to a central point. These same filaments are also observable, but in cross-section, in the 1987A supernova remnant. Which components are visible varies from image to image, but the general morphology of the hourglass remains discernible.

Here are some additional hourglass morphologies with pictures that have been observed:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4953165/ [msn.com]
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/0510 05eta-carinae.htm [thunderbolts.info]
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/0504 26bug-nebula.htm [thunderbolts.info]
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/arch05/0504 15milkyway.htm [thunderbolts.info]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Supernova-1987a .jpg [wikipedia.org]

Since hourglass morphologies are somewhat disconfirming to traditional mainstream cosmologies (ie, the Big Bang), the fact that they continue to be observed all over the universe escapes the notice of professional astrophysicists, whose primary concern is to prove the Big Bang Theory and Stellar Evolution Theories. Objectively interpreting these shapes for what they most likely represent means dropping complicated, mainstream astrophysical explanations, and accepting the notion that electricity flows through space over plasma as we know it does within the laboratory. In these particular instances, at least, it is clear that the electrical force is dominant to gravity. We can opt to devise all sorts of gravitation-centric explanations for hourglass morphologies, but in doing so, we consciously opt to violate Occam's Razor.

The implications of such strong evidence of electricity in space are overwhelming -- which provides all of the explanation necessary for avoiding abandonment of the traditional, more popular gravity-centric theories. When astrophysicists eventually accept that plasma in space has electrical resistance just like the plasma we observe in the laboratory, then they will begin to re-interpret all of our observations in terms of Maxwell's Equations rather than fluid and gas laws. And the enigmas of dark matter and dark energy will forever disappear, as this substitution can provide the exact forces necessary to explain things like how spiral galaxies can spin as if they are solid plates and how matter might repel other matter. The fact that we as a culture currently prefer to consider imaginary forces and particles to explain these "anomalies" rather than forces that we already understand will forever paint us to future generations as people who decided to favor the mathematicians and theories over our observational data and decades of experimental laboratory physics work.

The evidence for electricity in space is not a sparse patchwork here and there. It is a flood of data that is only allowed to escape the notice of the public with the help of overconfident astrophysicists and a mob mentality within the space enthusiast community. Anybody who is intellectually curious about the universe and less concerned with what the people around them believe than what in fact appears to be true should consider learning more about plasma physics and the electric universe we live in. Don Scott

Re:Looks like a lot of things

[Derling Whirvish]

When I first looked at it I two 90 degree cones of ejecta blasting from a central point along the rotation axis of the original star.

http://msnbcmedia2.msn.com/i/msnbc/Components/Phot os/040511/040511_hubble_bcol_10a.jpg [msn.com]

Re:Optical illusion?

[barakn]

Anonymous Coward is quite wrong. All the news articles about the Red Square are referring to it as a new nebula. It hasn't been "imaged thousands of times by hundreds of instruments over the past decade." It has only been imaged by two intruments over the last several years. It wasn't imageable until recent advance in adaptive optics, as AC should have known had AC read any of the articles. Mod parent uninformative.

Re:Optical illusion?

[Derling Whirvish]

The Red Square has been imaged thousands of times by hundreds of instruments over the past decade. The square *is there*.

You are confusing the "Red Rectangle Nebula [google.com]" which has been imaged hundreds of times over the past decade with the newly-discovered "Red Square Nebula [google.com]" which this article is about.

Re:It's Another Hourglass Morphology

[barakn]

There's just one problem with your argument. The stuff in the Red Square image is relatively cool uncharged dust and gas (it's an infrared image after all), not a hot plasma, and therefore can't carry a current. Typical Birkeland Current/Electric Universe fanboy spouting off without having a clue...

Hurricane pictures show same shapes

[flyingfsck]

Here are pictures of Isabel:
http://goes.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/goes/030913.isabel.g if [nasa.gov]
http://www.enterprisemission.com/hurricane1.htm [enterprisemission.com]
http://www.enterprisemission.com/Hyperdimensional% 20Hurricane_optimized/16.jpg [enterprisemission.com]

here is Ivan:
http://www.enterprisemission.com/Hyperdimensional% 20Hurricane_optimized/30.jpg [enterprisemission.com]

and here is Jean:
http://www.enterprisemission.com/Hyperdimensional% 20Hurricane_optimized/jeannani2.gif [enterprisemission.com]

More info

[ByteSlicer]

NewScientist has an article with an explanation here [newscientist.com].

Re:Geometry

[Stormx2]

Ah, that bit is a tad unclear. The reasoning "as it has four right angles and parallel sides." is the reason it is a rectangle, not a special case of a rectangle.

Re:It's Another Hourglass Morphology

[ruiner13]

Typical Birkeland Current/Electric Universe fanboy spouting off without having a clue

You, sir or madam, just made soda squirt out my nose.

Re:More info

[Anonymous Coward]

This link has a 3D model:

http://abc.net.au/science/news/stories/2007/189542 2.htm?space [abc.net.au]

Re:It's Another Hourglass Morphology

[barakn]

How you're able to determine charge density on the basis of temperature is somewhat of a mystery. We can't even do that for our own Sun.

Using the spectrum of a star, not only can the densities of various ions and electrons be calculated, but also the relative abundances of the elements. It's unfortunate that you are unaware of an entire branch of science, but not unexpected. I'd also like to know why you think that a large current in space would z-pinch in only one central point along the length of the current rather than along the entire length. Even if one were to accept the possibility of large currents forming the structures of nebulae, an X shape is not what one would expect.

Anyway, if the ions and electrons were at a high enough density to carry a large current, they would also be at a high enough density to recombine, in which case they would be releasing a large quantity of visible and ultraviolet light, which they aren't What you neglected to explain is that a dark mode plasma at extremely low densities is not going to carry much of a current at all.

Critique of "The Electric Sky"

[TapeCutter]

"The explanation has been provided."

But has failed to convince these guys [plasmas.org] who correctly categorise "The Electric Sky" as a popularization [google.com.au] and point to an excellent critique of the book [tim-thompson.com].

If you are so eager to be a skeptic then start testing YOUR ideas and acknowledging their known flaws. If you do have the courage to test your convictions you will also notice that these "established scientists" are actively looking at alternatives to the big bang that involve plasma, including those that appear in popular science.