Professor Bickerton in Reply. (To the Editor, Progress)

Progress, Volume III, Issue 11, 1 September 1908, Page 370

Professor Bickerton in Reply. (To the Editor, Progress )

Sir,- — T have to thank Dr Kennedy foi* taking the trouble of tiyiiis; to understand impact. That so able an astionomei should have misunderstood so much, tells me that his asseition is right, that the theoiy is far fiom being as simple as I think it is. I suppose that it is a natural error that an originatoi should think his woik simple; clearly it must be simple to himself, or it would not have occurred to him. I will try to make some of the ideas plainer, but many of Dr Kennedy's misconceptions are clearly due to oversights in his own reading 1 . Thus of the spectra of temporary stars he says I only explain two, yet I fully explained the cause of the black line spectrum ; the cause both of the broad blaze bands, and of their dark companions I showed in detail why the black lines died out without lessening displacement, and why the blaze lines lasted months without lessening width, and the cause of the final planetary nebular spectrum. Dr. Kennedy suggests that shells expanding under pressure, would not continuously expand, but I show the expansion of the shells is due to atom sorting, not to pressure, and I showed clearly why the velocity will not appreciably diminish. I did not explain why some of the bands had dark lines down their centre. This is a common peculiarity of spectra, and due to several causes. I did not explain it, as it is not especially characteristic of new stais I, however, suggested a revolving molecular swarm. A bright nucleus shining through a revolving shell of vapour, would be ono w a v m winch such a result would be produced.

With this exception, so easily explained, there is no single case of the many sequences of spectra that Dr Kennedy lefers to, but was actually described in detail in Progress. For dynamical reasons they were placed in different articles, and this is probably the reason my critic has overlooked some of them. Dr. Kennedy objects to the illustration of the term ' ' Kinetol. ' ' Prom the definition he gives, it is clear he nrsses its meaning altogether. Had he read carefully, he could not possibly have called the exact lllustiations I gave iti Progress "absurd." Energy is half the square of the velocity multiplied by the mass. Kinetol is half the squaie of the velocity — in other words, the energy of unit mass. Tl c distance a body can travel against uniform giawtation is the kinetol; hence the examples I gave of doing work against gravity. Molecules ot hydrogen and oxygen at the same temperature have equal eneigy, whilst the kinetol of hydrogen is sixteen times that of oxygen, that is to say, a hydrogen atom will travel sixteen times as far as oxygen against uniform gravity. A hydrogen atom, at the same temperature as an oxygen atom, although it has the same energy has four times the velocity, yet it has sixteen times the chance of escape, that is sixteen times the kinetol. Kinetol is a new dynamical term of supreme importance in simplifying problems of proieetiles and in making molecular astro-physics plain. Kinetol explains the persistence of the speed of hydrogen in temporary stars, a continuity of uniform speed that is pro\ed by the constant displacement of the black bands and the constant width of the blaze bands. Although this persistence was foretold thirty years ago, it has puzzled, and is still puzzling, other astronomers, besides Dr. Kennedy, perhaps more than any other discovery connected with temporary stars. For any given elementary gas, the kinetol is proportional to the temperature. In different gases at the same temperature, kinetol is inversely proportional to their atomic weight. At the same temperature hydrogen has about ten times the mean velocity of the other elements. In a small ratio third body, the hydrogen may have one hundred times as much kinetol as will caase it to escape, hence it will have a final kinetol of one ninety-ninth of the whole. Each atom will keep this permanently unless it loses it by doing some kind of work. The whole theory of selective molecular escape, that is, of atom sorting, depends on kinetol. The time it takes to occur depends on the velocity, but the actual separation depends on the varied kinetol of the elements at the same temperature Consequently, almost all the sequences of the varied phenomena of the spectra of new stars, being phases of atom sorting, depend on kinetol. The actual displacements and widths of the bands depend on velocity, but the primary cause is the unequal distribution of energy between equal masses of different elements. In other words, on the different energies of unit masses, that is, on the kinetol. With legard to the diffeient widths of the bands, due to diffeient elements lef erred to by Dr Kennedy, photographs show that the different widths of the band actually are in the spectra What elements they belong- to, I do not know. I have sent scores of letters, asking people, bvtt I do not get answers I suppose my communications do not appears simple to them, and as they come from a "nobody" they go into the waste paper basket. I believe the respect Dr Kennedy's good work has gained foi him in the astronomical world would enable him to get the lines identified Of course, if as Loekyer thinks, calcium and other elements break up at stellar temperature, then these "proto" elements will have higher kinetol than those calculated fiom our present idea of indivisible atoms. That is where a eoireet theory comes in. It correlates knowledge As Sir David Gill suggests, astronomers will give such information about molecules to physicists when once the spectra of new stais is read aright, as to over-repay the debt we now owe them. We can deduce the kinetol from the speed identified by the width of band. From that deduce the atomic weight of the "proto" elements. Is it possible that this tremendous piessure of hundreds of millions of atmospheres and temperatures of many scores of millions of degrees may cause the elements of small atomic weight to absorb energy, and be locked into "proto" elements, which, as the temperature cools, become the elements themselves? It would be a wonderful correlation if it were so. Besides these points discussed, Dr. Kennedy says, that before I can consider the theory demonstrated, there are many things I must explain. I have read everything I can find about new stars, yet there is absolutely no point that I know of that the theory is not competent to explain. — Yours, etc., A. H. BICKERTON. Wainoni Pavk, Clmstchurch.