The Elk Mountain pilot., 1899-05-02
OLD SOL NOT A BALL OF FIRE.
Scientist Says 1t Furnishes Heat to the
En.4l, i,x EiactrIc Gurrantx

Scientist Says 1t Furnishes Heat to the
Earth by Electric Currents.
From the Boston Transcript: Henry
Raymond Rogers, NJ. D., of Dunkirk,
N. l., has evolved a new theory of the
universe, which, IL adopted generally,
will revolutionize astronomical science,
or at least that part of it relating to
the sun. From the days of the star
gaZers of Palestine almost the popular
notion regarding this central ruler of
our family of planets has been that 1t
is a great whirling globe of molten
material in a constant and perpetual
state of combustion. Now comes the
man from western New York with the
information that this idea is false, and
that the conventional picture repre-
senting the sun with bright lines ra-
dating in all directions into space,
thus implying that actual heat ana
light are produced within, and of the
body itself, is an utter absurdity.
This view of the SUM-" he says, lis
strangely inconsistent with and antaS-
onistic to certain well-known cosmical
facts. Science teaches and demon
strates to be true that the universal
space is inconceivably cold and utter
darkness. A burning fire ball sun
thus becomes an impossibility. an alb
surdity.". Rather should the sun be
represented. this philosopher main
tains, as a huge planet, like unto the
earth, only many times larger, perhaps
even fit for habitation, surrounded by
darkness and the stars, not on fire but
tremendously electrical in its actiyi-
ties; in other words, a vast celestial
dynamo producing currents of cleo
tricity which pass invisible and free
through all the ninety-odd millions of
miles of cold and darkness, until they
meet their resistance at the earth and
its atmosphere. Such resistance is all
that is needed, in the mind of this
twentieth century scientist, to develop
the so-called sun-heat and sunlight,
just as light and heat are produced in
the electric current by the resistance
offered by carbon or other material.
Arc lights, such as stud our streets,
are in effect the planets fed by the san.
After exciting our atmosphere to these
and other activities, the electric sun
currents pass into the earth, awaken
ing in 1t gravitation and other electric
al effects, thence completing the circuit
by returning to the sun and arousing
in it identically the same functions as
on its humble satellite. 1t follows that
If the sun emits neither light nor heat,
but simply electric currents which pro-
duce these phenomena, it can no longer
be said that the moon borrows from it
its gentle effulgence, and the poet loses
a subject for some of his daintiest con-
ceptions. What has been with him
heretofore a 'full-orbed glory" be-
comes simply prosaic electrical ma
chine whose currents act on out at
mosphere as do those from the sun,
though to less degree on account of
difference in power. Science, with its
newly found facts and progressive the
ories, has always been destructive OF
old imagery. but the old delusions are
far less poetic after all than their sue
cessors when the poets minds have be-
come readjusted to them. But, says
the practical reader, What shall we
say of the suns dazzle, which is so real
and so painful to the human eye?"
Simply an optical illusion, answers the
new theory. Such dazzling bright
ness cannot be located at the sun;
neither is 1t found in the black of in
finite space nor in our atmosphere;
therefore it can be found only in the
depths of the eye of the beholder-i e.,
upon the retina." So, too. there is no
longer such a thing as a moonbeam;
that which seems such is simply an
Illusion and is no more real than the
existence of actual spots upon the sur