Contrabang! #20 Saturn's Electric Storms

Saturn, Not Earth Or Jupiter, Has The Largest Storms In Our Solar System (link)

Saturn is an enigma to astrophysicists. While someone like Ethan Siegel would assure us that everything about Saturn would be predictable by standard cosmology, that it not so, and as new observations come in, they normally affirm the theories of electric universe proponents at the expense of the mainstream scientists.

Most obviously, nothing in standard cosmology would predict the enormous - yet wafer-thin - rings for which Saturn is famous. Scientists struggle to find any model for the formation of the rings and to maintain their gravitational stability.

Another is that Saturn emits over twice the energy that it receives from the sun. That is quite interesting. So far, the reigning standard theory is that the heat is generated by helium rain falling down from the high clouds of the planet, which is another way of saying they don't know.

Now we learn that Saturn, not the much larger Jupiter, had the largest storm ever observed, which roared for nearly a year encircling the entire planet and glowed in infrared. It is not explained why the smaller planet would have larger storms. Also, he makes reference to a permanent storm at Saturn's north pole.

Atop Saturn’s north pole lies a hurricane centered inside a hexagonal-shaped vortex.

The linked article has images of the storm and its hexagonal vortex, but no explanation as to why there would be a permanent vortex at the Saturnian north pole, why it would maintain a complex geometric shape, or why it should also glow in infrared. It also omits that its discovery was a huge success for the electric universe people. In 2005, Earth-based observations showed a warm polar vortex at the Saturnian south pole, which was at the time pointed towards Earth and the Sun. It was said to be a consequence of the planet's equivalent of the midnight sun. At the time, electric universe people made the counter-intuitive prediction that the north pole would also exhibit a polar hot spot, because they believe the phenomenon to be electrical in nature, not a result of solar or internal heating. In 2008, Cassini confirmed a hot spot at the north pole. Cassini also detected great electrical activity in the Saturnian system, and even received a 200-volt shock when it flew near the moon Hyperion.

From the electric universe perspective, all the strange features of Saturn are explained by the strong electrical activity of the planet: the rings, the heating, and the hexagonal atmospheric vortex (see here). Even the jets of Saturn's moon Enceladus are said to be the work of electric currents, similar to those that power the Earth's aurora, but stronger. Mainstream scientists believe the jets must be conventional geysers, thus they hint at a large subterranean ocean on the planet that could even support life. The life angle is beneficial. While the well-funded researchers won't spend money to confirm unconventional theories, they will be compelled to further explore any areas where life is postulated to be possible. We expect that any future exploration of Enceladus and other moons with jets (like Jupiter's Io) will indicate a cold, icy surface being etched away by electrical discharges.

Ask Ethan: Where Is The Center Of The Universe? (link)

Ethan is asked if we know where to find the center of the universe - the site of the big bang.

There’s a misconception that an expanding Universe can be extrapolated back to a single point; this isn’t true! Instead, it can be extrapolated back to a region of finite size with certain properties (i.e., filled with matter, radiation, the laws of physics, etc.), but then must evolve according to the rules that our theory of gravity lays out.

Boy that clears it up. Fortunately, he also fields a different but more pragmatic answer.

The reason we cannot know the true nature of the Universe — the entire, unobservable Universe — is because the portion that we have access to is finite. There’s a finite amount of information we’re capable of gleaning about our cosmos, even if we develop arbitrarily powerful instruments and detectors.

Since we can't see to the edge of the universe, we can't say where the center would be, just as pre-Columbian sailors could not have pointed to the center of the Atlantic. In short, we know too little about the universe to even compose an intelligible answer (as Ethan demonstrated above).