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JUST MOONING AROUND

by Ann Lehman
SAS Institute Inc.

The name of this article, Just Mooning Around is the same as an article published by Dr. Isaac Asimov in
1975, in which he conjectures that our moon is not a satellite of the earth, but rather "a planet in its own
right, moving about the Sun in careful step with the earth." He supports this conjecture admirably with a
dozen or so pages of explanation, formulae, and things to visualize (if you can). The central support is a
computation he called the tug-of-war (TOW) value, which is the ratio of the gravitational pull by a
satellite's parent, Fp, to the gravitational force between the satellite and the sun, Fs.

You can picture this ratio (Fp/Fs) as a tug of war going on for a satellite with its planet on one side of the
gravitational rope and the sun on other. If this ratio is greater than 1 the parent planet is winning, if less
than 1 the sun is winning. You expect all satellites to have a TOW value greater than 1. If a TOW value is
less than 1, the moon wannabe falls away from its parent planet and into the sun or into its own orbit
around the sun. Dr. Asimov shows that the formula to compute a satellite's TOW value is:

where mp is the mass of the parent, ms is the mass of the sun, dc is the distance from the satellite to the
sun, and dp is the distance from the parent planet to its satellite child.

Asimov computed this TOW value for all the planetary satellites for which distance and mass data were
available at that time-there were only 22 satellites that had both a name and physical information. (These
did not include Pluto's moon Charon, which was not discovered until 1978.) We were able to match these
computations within reasonable limits and also compute a TOW for Charon and several other newer
satellites.

Another factor Asimov used to examine satellite properties is the Roche limit. The Roche limit was first
described by Edouard Roche in 1848. It is the closest distance an object can come to another object
without being pulled apart by tidal forces. If a planet and a moon have identical densities, then the Roche
limit is 2.446 times the radius of the planet. The Roche limit for the Earth is 11,470 miles. If our Moon
ever ventured this close to the earth, it would be pulled apart by tidal forces and the Earth could end up
having rings. The four gaseous outer planets do have systems of rings inside of their respective Roche
limits. On July 7, 1992, comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 broke into 21 pieces when it approached to within
Jupiter's Roche limit. On subsequent passes, each of the pieces of the comet impacted Jupiter.

The Roche limit defines the closest a moon can exist to a planet, and the TOW can be used to compute a
maximum distance a moon can be from its parent before it is captured by the sun. For example, Mars'
Roche limit is 5,160 miles above the surface and the distance defined by its TOW value is 15,000 miles.
Both Diemos with a distance of 14,569 miles from Mars and Phobos at 5,824 miles fall within this
interval and can be classified as true satellites.

5,160 < (both 5,824 and 14,569) < 15,000

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Another interesting example is Mercury, which has a Roche limit of 3,706 and a maximum distance
defined by its TOW value of 2,675, which falls within its Roche limit. This means it is highly improbable
for Mercury to ever have a satellite.

What about Earth and Luna?

For starters, the TOW value computed for the Earth and Luna is .455, which implies that Earth is losing
its tug of war with the sun to keep Luna as a satellite. Next, for earth a minimum distance defined by the
Roche limit is 9,734 miles, and the maximum distance defined by the TOW is 29,000. An earth satellite
should lie in the small band between 9,734 and 29,000 miles from the earth's center. But as we all know
the distance of the moon from earth is 237,000 miles!

So what's going on here? According to Asimov, if you draw a picture of the orbits of the Earth and Moon
exactly to scale as they orbit the Sun, you would see that the Moon's orbit is everywhere concave toward
the Sun; it is always falling toward the sun. All the other satellites fall away from the sun through part of
their orbits and are contained by the superior pull of their parent. So it seems Luna does not orbit the earth
as its satellite, but rather the earth and Luna orbit the sun together as a binary system .

You can find the details of these observations and a couple of other arguments Dr. Asimov uses to
question the cosmic relationship between the earth and its moon in his article.

What about Pluto and Charon?

Although Dr. Asimov didnÕt have data on Pluto and Charon he would have been pleased when his neat
logic supported the moonness of Charon; Charon is nearly half the size of Pluto, and its TOW value
computes as a respectable 601.66. Further, it is 12,196 miles from Pluto, nicely outside Pluto's Roche
limit of 1,784 miles and inside the maximum allowable distance of 54,619 miles. Nevertheless,
astronomers today prefer to view Charon and Pluto as a binary system because:

They are so close together and so nearly the same size that they both orbit the center of mass that
lies between them, and that center of mass orbits the sun. Although this is true for all planets and
their moons, the relative sizes of the bodies and the distances between them places their joint center
of mass near the center of the planet.
Further, they orbit each other with the same sides permanently facing each other, which is also like
double-planet systems.

A JMP Look at Moons and Planets

This brings us to a JMP view of the solar system. Exploring the moons data and plotting the ratio of a
child mass to its parent reveals a simple relationship that puts both the Earth/Luna and Pluto/Charon pairs
into the same category, which seems to support the astronomers and might give Dr. Asimov food for
thought (most everything did).

It's easy to create a JMP table that has one row for each moon and planet in the solar system, and using
readily available information you include its mass, giving the table shown in Figure A.

Note: In this example mass is transformed by ln(cube root), which makes for a more readable plot later in
the discussion.

We want to compare two groups of mass ratios: the ratios of all planets and moons to their respective
parent body (call this the Child group) to the group containing only the ratios of the planets to the sun
(called the Parent group). Note that planetary satellites all fall only into the Child group and the sun is
only in the Parent group. But the planets fall into both categories and need to be included in both groups-
as children of the sun and parents to their children.

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To compare these two groups of mass ratios we first stacked the child and parent columns using
Tables:Stack. The new stacked column name is body and the new ID column name is type, as shown in
the bottom table in Figure A. There are now a pair of rows (a child row and a parent row) for each single
row in the top table in Figure A. However, the mass row duplicates the mass of the "child" for each pair.
This is fine for all the "child" rows but is incorrect for the "parent" sun, and also whenever a planet is in
the "parent" role. So, the computation of the correct mass ratio for each row can be found with a (not for
the faint hearted) calculator formula, which does the following:

For the purpose of the example the sun is considered its own parent and has mass ratio of one (1).
When body is a planet, compute its mass ratio to the sun.
When body is a moon, compute the mass ratio to its parent planet.
This appears to be a lot to ask of this data table, which doesn't tell you whether a body (other than the
Sun) is a planet or a moon. However, a calculator formula can figure that out by using the summation
operator to scan the values of body and type, and thus find the correct denominator to compute the ratio
column shown in the bottom table of Figure A. The Calculator Corner article in this newsletter explains
how the summation operator scans a column to find a specific value.

The final step is to plot the child-parent pairs of ratios. To do this the we used Analyze:Fit Y by X with
ratio as Y and type as X (the one-way Anova platform). The Matching Variable option from the Analysis
popup menu used the ID column to match the children to their parents, giving the plot in Figure B. This
plot clearly shows that all the children look up to their parents except Charon and Luna.

The following formula computes the ratio column, which is used as the Y variable in Figure B.

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References:

Asimov, Isaac (1975), Of Time, Space, and Other Things,pgs 87-98, Avon Books, New York

Back to Table of Contents

Next Article

In the above reference you'll find one of several hundred

books by Isaac Asimov. This particular book contains his
essay titled "Just Mooning Around". This is where you will
find several of these reasons explained by him. And this is
where you can find more detail on the following reason.

6) The Moon's position being far too distant to be a satellite.

(Copyright law allows us to reprint brief excerpts of works

without infringing upon the rights of the author. This post is
designed more to "wet your whistle" and get you even more
in love with astronomy. So i suggest that you read Asimov's
"Just Mooning Around" article to get all the details.)

In this essay, Asimov came up with a fascinating idea. He

reasoned that since the Sun is much more massive than the
rest of our Solar System (everything... all the planets, and
satellites, planetoids, comets, meteoric matter, all of it put
together is only 1/750th of the mass of the Sun), then the
Sun must be in a "tug of war" with each planet that has
satellites. The Sun must pull considerably on those moons,
but just *how* considerable is "considerably"?

To find out, Asimov came up with what he called the "Tug-

of-War value". He used the mass of the Sun and the mass of
each planet calculated with the distance of each satellite from
its planet, and from the the Sun. It's obvious that the Sun
would win the tug of war when only mass is figured, but since
the satellites are so much closer to their primary planets than
they are to the Sun, we can expect the Sun to ultimately lose
out in the tug of war. But let's check it out.

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We'll look at satellites of Neptune first, Triton and Nereid.

Here is a table of Tug-of-War values...

NEPTUNE
SATELLITE TUG-OF-WAR VALUE

Triton 8,400
Nereid 34

So Neptune's hold on Triton is very strong, but it pulls on

Nereid only 34 times as strongly as the Sun does. Keep in
mind that these are average figures. Nereid's orbit about
Neptune is highly eccentric. It comes as close as 800,000
miles at one end of its orbit, but at the other end it gets as
far away from Neptune as 6 million miles! So when Nereid
is that far away from its primary, the Tug-of-War value is
only 11.

Astronomers feel that Nereid may only be a temporary

moon of Neptune. Perhaps the Sun's influence might help
snatch it away one day.

Asimov figured the Tug-of-War value for several other

satellites, and i've listed a few here...

URANUS
SATELLITE TUG-OF-WAR VALUE

Miranda 24,600
Ariel 9,850
Umbriel 4,750
Titania 1,750
Oberon 1,050

We can see that all of Uranus' moons are securely tied to

their orbits.

SATURN
SATELLITE TUG-OF-WAR VALUE

Janus 23,000
Rhea 2,000
Titan 380
Iapetus 45
Phoebe 3½

As massive as Saturn is, and as far away from the Sun as

Phoebe is, we can see that the Sun still doesn't lose the tug
of war by much. Saturn's pull on Phoebe is only 3½ times
as strong as the Sun's.

JUPITER
SATELLITE TUG-OF-WAR VALUE

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Amaltheia 18,200
Europa 1,260
Callisto 160
X 4.3
XII 1.3
VIII 1.03

Jupiter's grip on its outer satellites is feeble indeed.

MARS
SATELLITE TUG-OF-WAR VALUE

Phobos 195
Deimos 32

From here, Asimov talks about two types of satellites...

"true satellites" and "captured satellites". The true ones
are believed to have formed along with their primary
planets way back when the Solar System was very
young. And the captured ones were, well, captured.
They were passing by and were caught in the planets'
gravitational fields much later, and they then became
part of the planets' satellite systems.

Up to now, i've left out the Tug-of-War value where our

own Moon is concerned. You'll see why in a few
moments. And now for an excerpt from "Just Mooning
Around"...

Among the true satellites the lowest Tug-of-War value is

that of Deimos, 32. On the other hand, among the
satellites listed as captured, the highest Tug-of-War value
is that of Nereid with an average of 34.

Let us accept this state of affairs and assume that the

Tug-of-War figure 30 is a reasonable minimum for a true
satellite and that any satellite with a lower figure is, in all
likelihood, a captured and probably temporary member
of the planet's family.

Knowing the mass of a planet and its distance from the

Sun, we can calculate the distance from the planet's
center at which this Tug-of-War value will be found. That
will be the maximum distance at which we can expect to
find a true satellite.

(Note that Isaac left planet Pluto out of all this because
little detail was known about Pluto at the time.)

We can also set a minimum distance at which we can

expect a true satellite; or, at least, a true satellite in the
usual form. It has been calculated that if a true satellite is
closer to its primary than a certain distance, tidal forces
will break it up into fragments. Conversely, if fragments
already exist at such a distance, they will not coalesce

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into a single body. This limit of distance is called the

"Roche limit" and is named for the astronomer E. Roche,
who worked it out in 1849. The Roche limit is a distance
from a planetary center equal to 2.44 times the planet's
radius.

So, sparing you the actual calculations, here are the results
for the four outer planets:

DISTANCE OF TRUE SATELLITE

(MILES FROM THE CENTER OF THE PRIMARY)

MAXIMUM MINIMUM
PLANET (TUG-OF-WAR=30) (ROCHE LIMIT)

Neptune 3,700,000 38,000

Uranus 2,200,000 39,000
Saturn 2,700,000 87,000
Jupiter 2,700,000 106,000

As you see, each of these outer planets, with huge masses

and far distant from the competing Sun, has ample room for
large and complicated satellite systems within these generous
limits, and the 22 true satellites all fall within them.

Next we can try to do the same thing for the inner planets.
Since the inner planets are, one and all, much less massive
than the outer ones and much closer to the competing Sun,
we might guess that the range of distances open to true
satellite formation would be more limited, and we would be
right. Here are the actual figures as I have calculated them:

DISTANCE OF TRUE SATELLITE

(MILES FROM THE CENTER OF THE PRIMARY)

MAXIMUM MINIMUM
PLANET (TUG-OF-WAR=30) (ROCHE LIMIT)

Mars 15,000 5,150

Earth 29,000 9,600
Venus 19,000 9,200
Mercury 1,300 3,800

Thus, you see, where each of the outer planets has a range of
two million miles or more within which true satellites could form,
the situation is far more restricted for the inner planets. Mars
and Venus have a permissible range of but 10,000 miles. Earth
does a little better, with 20,000 miles.

Mercury is the most interesting case. The maximum distance at

which it can expect to form a natural satellite against the
overwhelming competition of the nearby Sun is well within the
Roche limit. It follows from that, if my reasoning is correct, that
Mercury CANNOT have a true satellite, and that anything more
than a possible spattering of gravel is not to be expected.

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Venus, Earth, and Mars are better off than Mercury and do have
a little room for true satellites beyond the Roche limit. It is not
much room, however, and the chances of gathering enough
material over so small a volume of space to make anything but a
very tiny satellite is minute.

And, as it happens, neither Venus nor Earth has any satellite at

all (barring possible minute chunks of gravel) within the indicated
limits, and Mars has two small satellites, each less than 20 miles
across, which scarcely deserve the name.

It is amazing, and very gratifying to me, to note how all this

makes such delightful sense, and how well I can reason out the
details of the satellite systems of the various planets. It is such a
shame that one small thing remains unaccounted for; one trifling
thing I have ignored so far, but--

WHAT IN BLAZES IS OUR OWN MOON DOING WAY

OUT THERE?

It's too far out to be a true satellite of the Earth, if we go by my

beautiful chain of reasoning--which is too beautiful for me to
abandon. It's too big to have been captured by the Earth. The
chances of such a capture having been effected and the Moon
then having taken up a nearly circular orbit about the Earth are
too small to make such an eventuality credible.

There are theories, of course, to the effect that the Moon was
once much closer to the Earth (within my permitted limits for a
true satellite) and then gradually moved away as a result of tidal
action. Well, I have an objection to that. If the Moon were a
true satellite that originally had circled Earth at a distance of,
say, 20,000 miles, it would almost certainly be orbiting in the
plane of Earth's equator and it isn't.

But, then, if the Moon is neither a true satellite of the Earth nor
a captured one, what is it? This may surprise you, but I have
an answer; and to explain what that answer is, let's get back to
my Tug-of-War determinations. There is, after all, one satellite
for which I have not calculated it, and that is our Moon. We'll
do that now:

SATELLITE TUG-OF-WAR VALUE

Moon 0.46

The Moon, in other words, is unique among the satellites of

the Solar System in that its primary (us) LOSES the tug of war
with the Sun. The Sun attracts the Moon twice as strongly as
the Earth does.

We might look upon the Moon, then, as neither a true satellite

of the Earth nor a captured one, but as a planet in its own right,
moving about the Sun in careful step with the Earth. To be sure,

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from within the Earth-Moon system, the simplest way of

picturing the situation is to have the Moon revolve about the
Earth; but if you were to draw a picture of the orbits of the
Earth and Moon about the Sun exactly to scale, you would see
that the Moon's orbit is everywhere concave toward the Sun.
It is always "falling" toward the Sun. All the other satellites,
without exception, "fall" away from the Sun through part of their
orbits, caught as they are by the superior pull of their primary--
but not the Moon.

No... not our Moon, Earth's sister planet?

In the next and final post of this series i'll summarize all of this
for you, and i'll give you one more tiny reason why we might
want to consider our Moon to be a full-fledged major planet.

happy days and...

starry starry nights!

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