Solving the Riddle of the Aurora

Known for its advantageous persona of a snake radiating in vast arctic skies, the Aurora Borealis is far superior to humans -and in ways which still to this day we find enormously mystifying. Some say that the ends of land and sea are bound by an immense abyss. And, if you listen ever so closely...ancient molecules have been documented to whisper back.  

Join us as we procure a quaint midnight session exploring a curious little book; Akasofu's Aurora Borealis: The Amazing Northern Lights. I packed the following: a cloud sandwich, a soft pillow, hot mushroom tea, bubble machine, spooky sunflower spell, and a shēngrì hat for my pet bunny.

Stay until the very end of our monologues for music by Sasha Vinogradova, Passiflorez, The Arctic Chamber Orchestra of Alaska and other songs for levitating accordingly into the milky way.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:50

And the trees would bear fruit of gold or silver, and teardrops shall instead be diamonds, and the rocks of the field shall become alabaster and amber. Welcome to episode number 133.

SPEAKER_00 1:11

We have a little visitor tonight. He's he's huge. So I'm gonna use this little guy as my good luck tonight. I see you, little dragonfly. Thank you for joining me. Just in time. It's midnight and I do have some books.

SPEAKER_03 2:00

Oh yes, we do. And if you like these, you can visit my book zoo.

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Some of these illustrations are just so beautiful. An occasional gleam of light. The aurora has reached as far south as the middle latitudes. Okay, so I'm gonna start off with Akasofu's Aurora Borealis, the amazing northern lights. The ends of the land and sea. In appearance, they resemble a vast flame of fire viewed from a great distance. Virtually every northern culture has its oral legends about the aurora. Tribes who were familiar with these mysterious lights in the sky. The ends of the land and sea are bounded by an immense abyss. Some people once thought of the Aurora as a radiating snake dancing in the sky. Oh, I gotta get a picture of that. From the cry in the midnight, E.M. Handel, 1883. Hmm. Yeah, 1883. Ooh, the whistling, crackling noise, which sometimes accompanies the aurora, is the voices of these spirits trying to communicate. Trying to communicate with the people of the earth. They should always be answered. In a whispering voice. Youths and small girls and boys dance to the aurora. The heavenly spirits are called uh sky dwellers. If one happens to be out alone at night when the aurora borealis is visible and hears this whistling sound, one has only to whistle in return. Out of curiosity. What time is it? What time? The train at howls. The train always calls out your name, you know. Conclusions. So uh Chief Morning Star and his only son, uh, who got into so much mischief that the the that Morning Star had to go out and search for him. And he ended up in this very strange country that had no sun and no moon and no stars for some reason. And everybody spoke a language that he he didn't understand. And the only language that the people in this little town were engaged in w what he writes about as a wonderful game of ball. And the players all had lights on their heads and wore very curious belts called the Menquan, or the rainbow belt. And after many days of searching for his son, he met a man who finally spoke his his own language. And says, Oh, he brought to the morning star over to the Northern Lions. And there were two great birds and uh guided Morningstar to his son. And uh so that's just one legend about the Aurora Borealis. They say no man is sure what those lights can be. Flames up in the sky. And when these rays are at their highest point, you go outside and wander about and go hunting. And then it has been reported. People have seen large sparks of light shooting out from this glowing source that have been taken from the forge as night declines and the light begins to fade and went to light. The King's Mirror. Oh, nineteen seventeen. I guess that's another borealis. I guess that's oh yeah. Translated from the Norwegian. The King's Mirror. Some hold that fire circles about the ocean and all the bodies of water that stream about on the outer sides of the globe. I think it's possible that these lights shine for us from the fires that encircle the outer ocean. On many occasions, uh, in historical times, the aurora has reached as far south as the middle latitudes. What a fascination into the populations. People in Italy and France. A typical Chinese description of the red aurora is a deep red cloud spreading. Ten odd bands of white vapor gloss penetrating it. February 11th, 1958. So even even in 1958, there were reports of fire engines being sent out to capture and extinguish the red aurora, thinking that it was dangerous. Not dangerous at all. Yeah. Solving the riddle of the aurora. Solving the riddle. And the rata. Well, it has now become clear that the aurora of lights appear when atoms and molecules in the upper atmosphere are hit by high-speed electrons. Gigantic electrical phenomena. Even as early as the 19th century, people were quite smitten by the aurora. People began to realize that they could harness this energy, to use the steam as a way to water their gardens. And they really felt that not only would this source of power allow for plant life to really uh grow at this di dynamite level, you know. But they also felt that somehow our brains would develop in this way, where we would become wiser and more practical. That's really something. Yeah, they felt that the hens would lay more eggs and they would give their cows cream instead of milk, and the trees would bear fruit of gold or silver, and teardrops shall instead be diamonds. And the rocks of the field shall become alabaster and amber. Wonderful things will be done when we get the electricity of the aurora under our control. Babies shall be taken from the nursery and reared on electricity, which will be far more nutritious than their ordinary food. When the world is filled with giants nourished from the aurora, ordinary mortals will tremble. That's written by Thomas W. Knox from the voyage of Vivian in 1884. I love it. Just imagining viewing the Aurora in real life. But you don't want to be so far away. You want to be right up close. You want to be right there. You want to be right under it. You want to be right under the rainbow of those lights. Ethereal plasma. Why? Page 91, Alaska Meridian Chain of Auroral Observations. Photographing the Aurora, page 94. Wind the film slowly. Wind the film slowly to reduce the possibility of static electricity, which can lead to streaks on the film. To ground the camera, hold it against a water pipe. Follow these basic rules. Experiment with exposures. And you should obtain, you know, uh decent really fascinating. I'd say results. Aurora! Aurora. The sun gods. There's magic in the Arctic. There seems to be a relationship between the Aurora and the weather, or most strictly speaking, the wind. If it is calm and very cold, the arch is slow. As the wind comes up, the arch rises as if approaching a gale. These fragments drift about overhead like gigantic crimson draperies. Appearing as waving sheets of white light, but on occasions color appear in the same area. Becoming so intense. Becoming so intense. These colors rival the brightest rainbow and sometimes the heavens overhead are literally alive with these dancing fragments flashing. Only to burst out a spasm of color in some other sector. Probably the most interesting and unbelievable phenomenon. No doubt the muffled sounds heard in the silent Arctic night are actually reverberations of tremendous collapse of auroral thunder many miles, many miles above the earth. Well then there's uh there's so much to say. Snow on the ground reflections of the great red aurora of February 1958. It's uh I I'm just yeah. I am just so sticky. My arm is stuck with the pages of the book. Sorry, little moon. Sunrises are also affected by the Arctic magic. Red hot gods from another universe having a look see at our frozen panorama. Then it stretches its frozen neck. That is only one of the moon's uh strange antics. And some nights it comes up as red as fire and pulled out of shape like a Japanese lantern or a watermelon on end. We should get to some music. Is it that time I team? I think it is. I mean, I could go through that was just an excerpt from Ekistofu's Aurora Borealis. The amazing Northern Lights. This is a Alaska Geographic release, volume six, number two, quarterly. A quarterly for members of the Alaskan Geographic Society. Oh, is it time for the music? You know, I have three other books here, four or five. I can just go through all of them. But I'm gonna save, I'm gonna save it. Yeah, I'm gonna save these two for our next episode. So stay tuned. Uh-huh. I've got this great old uh uh Czech children's book. It's really beautiful. But it's from 1957, so I'm gonna get uh into that one over the next few weeks. Prepare. And then I'm also gonna get into the Candlemaker, um, which is uh some fairy tales from the 1980s. And so I think that'll be fun for our next episode. A lot of fun, it's a good one.

SPEAKER_03 47:09

When your eyes start closing, I wish I have never seen. When your hands start touching, I wish I have never been.

unknown 47:31

Come back to me.

SPEAKER_05 47:36

Come back to me. Come back to me.

SPEAKER_03 48:04

I'll shy and never try. I'm sure I have no bear stop smiling. I'm sure.

SPEAKER_02 52:32

In my room, in my room, she comes to see me. She comes to see me.

SPEAKER_06 1:11:35

The gallery of four nation with the seed of the ship must grow. The storage of the wall in the temple stream.

SPEAKER_07 1:15:46

I wish that was the mind. You probably must have three over three The love expectations of the stewardship.