
Two suns? No, it's a supernova drawn 6,000 years ago, say scientists - robin_reala
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/10/two-suns-no-its-a-supernova-drawn-6000-years-ago-say-indian-scientists
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dogma1138
That or it’s: no no no this isn’t how you draw a sun.... (grabs chisel) Now
this is how you draw a sun!

The scientists themselves say that there isn’t anywhere near the amount of
evidence needed to back the theory, this looks to be the same as the “Viking
bracelet with Islam written on it” only later when someone one actually looks
into it we find out that those characters weren’t even used in Arabic at the
time when that bracelet was made.

~~~
jschwartzi
We could just search the sky for nebulae in the vicinity of the given
constellations. That would provide evidence for the authors' theory.

~~~
davidcuddeback
The article says they attributed it to HB9, which I was able to find in a
catalog of supernova remnants (warning, PDF:
[http://www.mrao.cam.ac.uk/surveys/snrs/table-
IV-l.pdf](http://www.mrao.cam.ac.uk/surveys/snrs/table-IV-l.pdf)). On page 63,
it gives the coordinates for the remnant to be 5h01m, +46°40', which would put
it right around the brightest star in Auriga in this sky chart:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Perseus_IAU.svg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Perseus_IAU.svg).
The catalog gives the size as 140x120 arcmin (2.3x2.0°), which is huge and
probably means its very faint by now, which explains why it wouldn't be
included in the sky chart by S&T. Curious if any astrophotographers have
managed to capture it, I searched astrobin.com and found one photo:
[https://www.astrobin.com/229090/B/](https://www.astrobin.com/229090/B/)
(edit: and a second:
[https://www.astrobin.com/73794/B/](https://www.astrobin.com/73794/B/)).

Edit: Looks like another designation for HB9 is Sh2-221, which turns up much
more results in a search engine.

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plopilop
Soooo... This 6000 years old carving depicts two suns and the constellations
of Orion and Taurus.

Yet these constellations were invented by the Greeks, inspired from the
Egyptians, and should be at most 4000 years old.

I'm not an astrophysicist but I'm pretty sure something is off.

Edit: reread the article and the stone comes from Himalaya. Yet the Indians,
the Chinese and, well, pretty much every civilization had their own
constellation map, that did not include either Orion or Taurus.

~~~
pavlov
Orion and Taurus are "obvious" constellations: regardless of the name, the
stars form a pattern.

The myth of a hunter and an animal seems to have been associated with these
constellations everywhere, including India [1]. Even some Native American
tribes call Orion "Hunter" [2]. I suspect this association is way older than
4,000 years.

[1]
[http://www.tifr.res.in/~archaeo/papers/Astronomy%20and%20San...](http://www.tifr.res.in/~archaeo/papers/Astronomy%20and%20Sanskrit%20literature/Astronomical%20Myths%20in%20India.pdf)
[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orion_(constellation)#Americas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orion_\(constellation\)#Americas)

~~~
nkrisc
I don't think there is anything "obvious" about any constellation. They all
seem like a stretch, to me. Why is Orion "obviously" a hunter and not Elvis
swinging his hips?

~~~
Rooster61
That's not what I got from his reply. He didn't say that Orion and Taurus are
obviously a hunter and animal, he said that they are obvious patterns in the
sky, which is correct.

He did say that the hunter/animal relationship is everywhere, but I took that
as a bit of hyperbole.

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stephen82
Have they thought the possibility that the people who draw this tried to tell
a story that it took them a whole day (two suns) to kill their prey?

~~~
morganvachon
That was my first thought as well; this is depicting a hunting mission and
their concept of the progression of time.

While a supernova visible from Earth in daytime is not impossible (when
Betelgeuse finally dies we'll likely see it during the day; SN 1006 was seen
during the day and at night was about as bright as a quarter moon), it
certainly wouldn't be bright enough to be considered a "second sun" unless it
was close enough to irradiate us with gamma rays that could do vast damage to
existing life.

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foo101
I am curious why this kind of speculation is taken seriously.

I mean it's just a sketch on a stone without any further documentation.

Could it not be that these were just two kids playing and drawing something
random on a stone?

~~~
fragsworth
It's not "just a sketch on a stone" \- I think you didn't read the whole
theory?

1\. They found a specific nebula in the position of the stars depicted by the
constellations on the stone.

2\. The supernova that created the nebula would have been daytime-visible (and
brighter than the moon at night).

3\. The time that the supernova happened lines up with about the time that the
stone etching was been made.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Re: #1 the constellations of Orion and Taurus are relatively modern - 6000
years ago they would have had some other name.

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michaelsbradley
It's much more likely, I think, to have been a drawing of a high-current
z-pinch aurora. See the meticulous research of Dr. Anthony Peratt:

 _Characteristics for the Occurrence of a High-Current, Z-Pinch Aurora as
Recorded in Antiquity_

[http://plasmauniverse.info/downloadsCosmo/PerattTPSv31-2003c...](http://plasmauniverse.info/downloadsCosmo/PerattTPSv31-2003clr.pdf)

 _Characteristics for the Occurrence of a High-Current Z-Pinch Aurora as
Recorded in Antiquity Part II: Directionality and Source_

[http://plasmauniverse.info/downloadsCosmo/Peratt,et,al,TPSv3...](http://plasmauniverse.info/downloadsCosmo/Peratt,et,al,TPSv35n4-2007.pdf)

More...

[http://plasmauniverse.info/NearEarth.html](http://plasmauniverse.info/NearEarth.html)

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giarc
Would a supernova actually be visible like that? The article says it would
have been brighter than the moon and visible during the day? How long would it
have been visible for?

~~~
delbel
I've seen two in my lifetime one in 2008 and one in 2013, both at night. they
lasted about 3-5 seconds and both were at night

~~~
giarc
Were you looking through a telescope or were they visible to the naked eye?

~~~
delbel
visible to the naked eye

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kule
Interesting - I wonder if this also fits with the binary research going on:
[http://binaryresearchinstitute.com/bri/](http://binaryresearchinstitute.com/bri/)

~~~
grkvlt
No?

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bluedevil2k
Scientifically, how do we know there was a super nova in 4000 BC? Is there
still star remnants to observe? How do we trace that back to a date?

~~~
Finnucane
From the article: "They settled on Supernova HB9, a star that exploded around
4,600BC."

It is possible from observed supernova remnants to have a pretty good estimate
of when the star exploded, esp. when it is relatively 'recent', astronomically
speaking.

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pvaldes
New theory. Those are clearly the car lights of a Winnebago.

Or maybe a careful plan for a hunt trip lasting for two whole days. Who
knows?.

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intrasight
The article says "drawings". How many such drawings were found they did not
say.

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starchand
What about the flying dog?

~~~
qbrass
The guy on the right was throwing dogs into the air for the archer to shoot,
the two _suns_ are actually dog gibs. How shooting dogs with a bow caused them
to explode is still a mystery, but the deer was trying to save the last dog by
attacking the archer.

