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I'm imaging an age of discovery-esque expeditions to the center of the Solar Plane. They'd likely have radically different definitions of poles. One hot enough

I'm imaging an age of discovery-esque expeditions to the center of the Solar Plane. They'd likely have radically different definitions of poles. One hot enough to melt lead, one cold enough to freeze C02.

thaumasiotes 10y ago
> They'd likely have radically different definitions of poles. One hot enough to melt lead, one cold enough to freeze C02. Well, in a certain sense the West Pole and East Pole would exist in the manner you describe, but the behavior is not similar to that of the north and south poles. The stars will still rotate around the north-south axis, and east-west still won't affect that. It's not obvious that both phenomena should be called "poles".
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  > The stars will still rotate around the north-south axis, and east-west still won't affect that. It's not obvious that both phenomena should be called "poles". Note that "north - south" poles already refers to two distinct phenomena, the axis of rotation and the axis of the magnetic field (these happen to be closely-enough aligned on Earth that the latter has historically been used as a proxy for the former, though this is by no means a universal feature of all planets.) The axis of orientation to the sun, for a tidelocked planet, seems no less plausibly described as "poles".
  - thaumasiotes 10y ago
    North and south magnetic poles are named after the north and south celestial poles because they seem to coincide. That doesn't apply to the solar poles. People always make use of local geographic features when describing directions; river communities use "upstream" and "downstream" and island communities use "inland" (away from the sea). Those aren't termed poles (even though "inland" is defined by reference to a line perpendicular to the ground!), and while I agree that the axis of orientation to the sun is more pole-like than they are, it's still different enough that I don't see that it would necessarily be referred to in the same terms.
    - dragonwriter 10y ago
      > North and south magnetic poles are named after the north and south celestial poles because they seem to coincide. Sure, and that's why the axis-to-the-star probably wouldn't define "north" and "south" poles, but not a reason it doesn't make sense to call that the points where the surface intersects that axis through the planet "poles".
      - thaumasiotes 10y ago
        That all depends on how some not-particularly-advanced people feel about it when the terms are determined. Having thought a bit more, I tend to think it's unlikely that both axes would be significant to the same people (and therefore that they are particularly unlikely to share terminology): - One important aspect of east-west historically is that east is sunrise and west is sunset. This wouldn't matter to anyone on Tidelocked World, but it corresponds pretty well to the idea of having a Day Pole and a Night Pole. The Day Pole would be apparent to anyone who lived in an area where the sun was visible, and the Night Pole would be totally unapparent to everyone else; it is significant only in that the Day Pole is on the opposite side of the world. - Historically, north is cold and south is hot. This would apply, I believe, only to the day side of Tidelocked World. It reinforces the idea of a Day Pole while doing nothing for the Night Pole (everything beyond the terminator should (?) be equally cold). - North and south are also defined by reference to the stars, which rotate around the polar axis (this is the origin of the word "pole", and would definitively rule out a Sun Pole if "poles" had to be defined that way, which they don't). This would be apparent to everyone living in the night, but probably not to anyone in the day. If you believe all that, then we have the sun as a navigational aid that guides us toward the hottest part of the world, and the stars as a navigational aid to indicate the North and South Poles, but no concept of a Night Pole, because that concept is useless on the night side and there are no local indicators for where it is. Day people would be likely to refer to "sunward" and "darkward" in the manner of islanders, and night people would likely refer to "north" and "south", but day people would be unlikely to recognize "north" and "south", and night people would be unlikely to recognize "lightward".
        10y ago
room271 10y ago
Check out Proxima by Stephen Baxter: https://www.amazon.com/Proxima-Stephen-Baxter/dp/045146771X https://www.amazon.com/Proxima-Stephen-Baxter/dp/045146771X It's a Sci-fi book about life on Proxima Centauri and includes the idea you mentioned. (Also a really good read!)
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  God damn it! I have this annoying habit of impulsively buying books recommended on HN. Never been disappointed by one though. So thanks! :).
AdamN 10y ago
Until the 20th century, no human had been on either pole of Earth either.
- raverbashing 10y ago
  But differences of temperature between Earth poles temperatures and those temperature differences in tidal-locked planets is much smaller
aaron695 10y ago
We haven't explored the bottoms of the oceans very well yet. So that'd be more advanced than us I think.
TeMPOraL 10y ago
> They'd likely have radically different definitions of poles. One hot enough to melt lead, one cold enough to freeze C02. Think of the industrial applications! You'd have early metalworks near the hot pole, and when they'd finally figure out thermodynamics, I could imagine a planetary thermal engine created by bridging the hot and cold areas...
- xg15 10y ago
  You could pretty easily imagine a planetary thermal engine on earth as well though - between the poles and the equator. In fact, we do have one. It's called "weather".
wlievens 10y ago
Who says they have poles? Maybe they only have austrians and hungarians.
- bitwize 10y ago
  A Polandball planet would definitely have poles.

thaumasiotes 10y ago

> They'd likely have radically different definitions of poles. One hot enough to melt lead, one cold enough to freeze C02. Well, in a certain sense the West Pole and East Pole would exist in the manner you describe, but the behavior is not similar to that of the north and south poles. The stars will still rotate around the north-south axis, and east-west still won't affect that. It's not obvious that both phenomena should be called "poles".

dragonwriter 10y ago
> The stars will still rotate around the north-south axis, and east-west still won't affect that. It's not obvious that both phenomena should be called "poles". Note that "north - south" poles already refers to two distinct phenomena, the axis of rotation and the axis of the magnetic field (these happen to be closely-enough aligned on Earth that the latter has historically been used as a proxy for the former, though this is by no means a universal feature of all planets.) The axis of orientation to the sun, for a tidelocked planet, seems no less plausibly described as "poles".
- thaumasiotes 10y ago
  North and south magnetic poles are named after the north and south celestial poles because they seem to coincide. That doesn't apply to the solar poles. People always make use of local geographic features when describing directions; river communities use "upstream" and "downstream" and island communities use "inland" (away from the sea). Those aren't termed poles (even though "inland" is defined by reference to a line perpendicular to the ground!), and while I agree that the axis of orientation to the sun is more pole-like than they are, it's still different enough that I don't see that it would necessarily be referred to in the same terms.
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
    > North and south magnetic poles are named after the north and south celestial poles because they seem to coincide. Sure, and that's why the axis-to-the-star probably wouldn't define "north" and "south" poles, but not a reason it doesn't make sense to call that the points where the surface intersects that axis through the planet "poles".
    - thaumasiotes 10y ago
      That all depends on how some not-particularly-advanced people feel about it when the terms are determined. Having thought a bit more, I tend to think it's unlikely that both axes would be significant to the same people (and therefore that they are particularly unlikely to share terminology): - One important aspect of east-west historically is that east is sunrise and west is sunset. This wouldn't matter to anyone on Tidelocked World, but it corresponds pretty well to the idea of having a Day Pole and a Night Pole. The Day Pole would be apparent to anyone who lived in an area where the sun was visible, and the Night Pole would be totally unapparent to everyone else; it is significant only in that the Day Pole is on the opposite side of the world. - Historically, north is cold and south is hot. This would apply, I believe, only to the day side of Tidelocked World. It reinforces the idea of a Day Pole while doing nothing for the Night Pole (everything beyond the terminator should (?) be equally cold). - North and south are also defined by reference to the stars, which rotate around the polar axis (this is the origin of the word "pole", and would definitively rule out a Sun Pole if "poles" had to be defined that way, which they don't). This would be apparent to everyone living in the night, but probably not to anyone in the day. If you believe all that, then we have the sun as a navigational aid that guides us toward the hottest part of the world, and the stars as a navigational aid to indicate the North and South Poles, but no concept of a Night Pole, because that concept is useless on the night side and there are no local indicators for where it is. Day people would be likely to refer to "sunward" and "darkward" in the manner of islanders, and night people would likely refer to "north" and "south", but day people would be unlikely to recognize "north" and "south", and night people would be unlikely to recognize "lightward".
      - 10y ago

room271 10y ago

Check out Proxima by Stephen Baxter: https://www.amazon.com/Proxima-Stephen-Baxter/dp/045146771X https://www.amazon.com/Proxima-Stephen-Baxter/dp/045146771X It's a Sci-fi book about life on Proxima Centauri and includes the idea you mentioned. (Also a really good read!)

TeMPOraL 10y ago
God damn it! I have this annoying habit of impulsively buying books recommended on HN. Never been disappointed by one though. So thanks! :).

AdamN 10y ago

Until the 20th century, no human had been on either pole of Earth either.

raverbashing 10y ago
But differences of temperature between Earth poles temperatures and those temperature differences in tidal-locked planets is much smaller

aaron695 10y ago

We haven't explored the bottoms of the oceans very well yet. So that'd be more advanced than us I think.

TeMPOraL 10y ago

> They'd likely have radically different definitions of poles. One hot enough to melt lead, one cold enough to freeze C02. Think of the industrial applications! You'd have early metalworks near the hot pole, and when they'd finally figure out thermodynamics, I could imagine a planetary thermal engine created by bridging the hot and cold areas...

xg15 10y ago
You could pretty easily imagine a planetary thermal engine on earth as well though - between the poles and the equator. In fact, we do have one. It's called "weather".

wlievens 10y ago

Who says they have poles? Maybe they only have austrians and hungarians.

bitwize 10y ago
A Polandball planet would definitely have poles.