Re: Sun's distance

[Leigh Palmer <palmer@SFU.CA>]

> If asked to guess cold, I would not be surprised if students'
> guess of the light time to the Sun was off by 4 to 8 orders of
> magnitude, so 17 s off is a huge improvement.

I try to get students to learn a few numbers. I think it is of
considerable value to have these at hand at all times. The
"eight minutes" is not sufficiently accurate to use for the
kind of calculations I like to be able to do without a reference
so I adopted the 499 second figure instead.

I saw an exhibit on the topic of time at the Smithsonian Museum
of American History on Saturday. I learned that the speed of
light is very great, indeed: 186,000 feet per second according
to one video. That same museum has the first computer I ever
used (the very same machine) on exhibit. It is a Bendix G-15
which I used in the home of its designer back in 1956.

Leigh