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It's real question how dark these planets would ever get. With 416 planets reflecting light, the closest ones would be pretty bright all the time. Maybe even vi

It's real question how dark these planets would ever get. With 416 planets reflecting light, the closest ones would be pretty bright all the time. Maybe even visible discs from the surface, although I'm not sure. Brighter than Venus is on Earth though, and lots of them. You'd have to take that into account when doing your global warming models too.

Retric 9y ago
Venius is a long way from impacting earths climate. The scale is 2.512^(x-y). Sun −26.74, Moon −12.74 (average full moon), Venus -4.89 to −3.82. So sun is around 400,000 times as bright as the moon, and the moon is ~1500 times as bright as the Venus which is bright largely because it's so close to the sun. Mars is −2.91 at it's brightest. So 1/2 as much light as Venus because it's further from the sun even if it's closer. These might be closer than Mars, but not closer than the moon.
- bmcusick 9y ago
  Venus all by itself is minimal. These planets would be closer and there'd be a lot more of them. If they're supposed to be Earth-like they'd also have clouds, making them reflect more like than airless worlds like the Moon does. I bet there would be a measurable effect.
elihu 9y ago
The moon is about one light second away from Earth. The sun is about 600 (10 light minutes)). 52 evenly spaced planets in an Earth-like orbit would be about (2pi600)/52 light seconds apart, which comes out to about 72 and a half light seconds. So, the closest neighbor planets would appear a lot smaller than the moon, but a lot bigger than, say, Venus. I'm not sure how widely the adjacent rings would be spaced, so you might sometimes have neighbors that are closer than 72.5 light seconds as they zip by in the opposite direction. The article also talks about arranging the planets as binary pairs, in which each planet might be very close to its neighbor, possibly appearing bigger and brighter than the moon from Earth.

Retric 9y ago

Venius is a long way from impacting earths climate. The scale is 2.512^(x-y). Sun −26.74, Moon −12.74 (average full moon), Venus -4.89 to −3.82. So sun is around 400,000 times as bright as the moon, and the moon is ~1500 times as bright as the Venus which is bright largely because it's so close to the sun. Mars is −2.91 at it's brightest. So 1/2 as much light as Venus because it's further from the sun even if it's closer. These might be closer than Mars, but not closer than the moon.

bmcusick 9y ago
Venus all by itself is minimal. These planets would be closer and there'd be a lot more of them. If they're supposed to be Earth-like they'd also have clouds, making them reflect more like than airless worlds like the Moon does. I bet there would be a measurable effect.

elihu 9y ago

The moon is about one light second away from Earth. The sun is about 600 (10 light minutes)). 52 evenly spaced planets in an Earth-like orbit would be about (2pi600)/52 light seconds apart, which comes out to about 72 and a half light seconds. So, the closest neighbor planets would appear a lot smaller than the moon, but a lot bigger than, say, Venus. I'm not sure how widely the adjacent rings would be spaced, so you might sometimes have neighbors that are closer than 72.5 light seconds as they zip by in the opposite direction. The article also talks about arranging the planets as binary pairs, in which each planet might be very close to its neighbor, possibly appearing bigger and brighter than the moon from Earth.