Christmas Books 2021

Around this time of the year I like to mention the books that I have been given for Christmas. This varied bunch is from my sons, my wife and my father-in-law. The one on the Universe accompanied a beautiful gemstone collection representing the planets of the solar system. I have read that now and started on the Cromwell biography and the book of Paul McCartney. The one on the Heath is about nearby Hampstead Heath by Hunter Davies, while the other two (Christmas Carol and The Great Gatsby) are novels in the beautiful Chiltern series.

HMDUK 12 How many planets are there?

How many planets are there? There are eight chief planets which revolve about the sun and comprise what is called the solar system. The names of these planets in the order of their distance from the sun are Mercury, Venus, the Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Mercury and Venus are called the inferior planets because the lie between the earth and the sun. Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are known as the superior planets. The inferior planets move about the sun, faster than the earth and the superior ones more slowly. All the planets belong to one family, but they differ in size and temperature. Some are smaller than the earth, some hundreds of times larger. Some are very hot, others very cold. Jupiter is the largest of all the planets and Saturn one of the most famous because of its beautiful luminous rings. In 1930 a new planet called Pluto was discovered. Some astronomers consider it to be a major planet, but this has not yet been proved and is possibly merely an unusual minor planet.

Relative size of planets

Our Holiday Bible Club on creation set me thinking about the size of planets adn their relative distances.

Clyde W. Tombaugh, the discoverer of Pluto, had a famous model. For scale, the Earth's polar diameter of 7,900 miles is represented by one inch. So

The Sun is 9 feet in diameter.
Mercury is a pea 385 feet away.
Venus is a one-inch ball 700 feet away.
Earth is a one-inch ball 970 feet away.
Mars is a half inch marble 1,470 feet away (1/4 of a mile).
Jupiter is a ten-inch ball 5,030 feet away (approx. a mile).
Saturn is a nine-inch ball 1.67 miles away.
Uranus is a four-inch ball 3.5 miles away.
Neptune is a four-inch ball 5.5 miles away.
Pluto is a pea 7 miles away.
The total solar system fits within a circle 14 miles across.

See here for more.

See also here and here.