Sunday, January 14, 2007

What the Sun Told Me





I just love this picture of the sun. Thanks, Bee, for reminding me of it.

I was hoping that it would inspire a nice Sunday sermonette about the Source or some such thing, but it just didn't come.

Then I thought it could maybe bring out some hellfire and brimstone, but that failed me too. (you know something's wrong when I can't even get some hellfire and brimstone going)

The Sun shared some thoughts with me, but I just don't feel like giving away my secret wisdom today. Sorry. ;-)

So in lieu of a sermonette today, I'll leave it up to anyone else who feels inspired to share what the Sun tells them.

I really mean it. I would love to hear someone else's thoughts for a change. ;-)

13 comments:

Sabine Hossenfelder said...

Hi Rae Ann,

why's your post labeled with 'illness'?

I don't have much wisdom to share either. I admit, I am more a fan of moonlight. Even if it's only a reflection, it sheds a different light on things. I can identify myself with that.

What is kind of interesting: historically the moon is associated with women (for obvious reasons), and the sun with men (power and all). In most languages which distiguish genders of objects one finds this. E.g. in French one has 'la lune' (female) and 'le soleil' (male). I'm not completely sure, but I think this is also the case in Italian and Spanish.

Interestingly, just in German it's exactly the opposite. We have 'Die Sonne' (female) and 'Der Mond' (male).

Best,

B.

Guy said...

Interestingly the Sumerians characterized the powers of the world with sets of personifications. So there was a female sun and a male sun, a female moon and a male moon. etc. etc.

Anonymous said...

You're right, Bee. In both Italian and Spanish, the sun is male and the moon is female in gender. Funny thing, though...there's a man in the moon. ;-)

Rae Ann said...

Hi Bee,

Sorry about the "illness" label: it was an error while editing. And that is fascinating that German switched the genders of the words. I wonder why that is since it seems the Sun is generally a male symbol across cultures. Maybe the early Germans knew that women are the real source of power... ;-).

Guy, lately I've been thinking that there really is no such thing as a "singularity" but instead a "pair". But I guess it's kind of misleading to say "singularity" anyway because it's probably actually describing a singular moment of time instead of a 'thing'. Well, I don't know what I'm saying. ;-)

dh, man *in* the moon. hehehe, good one. ;-)

Anonymous said...

Rae/Bee

What about 'earth' in german? I've been told can be both 'Die' and 'Der'. So both male and female. Is that correct?

Dh

I'm still laughing. Man in the moon. Very good

Rae Ann said...

Hi rafa!

I'll have to leave that one to Bee since I don't know anything about German. But that's a really good question that I hope Bee will come back and answer.

Sabine Hossenfelder said...

Hi Rafa,

The German word for 'earth' is 'Die Erde' and it's definitly female. However, the word for planet 'Der Planet' is male, and so is the word for ground 'Der Boden'.

Hi Rae Ann,

I wonder why that is since it seems the Sun is generally a male symbol across cultures.

Yeah, but what is also funny is how the colors associated with that have changed over the time. E.g. the color that comes with male sunny-ness is red, whereas a moonlike blue belongs to women. You find that in many old paintings, esp. in churches (see also the picture in Lubos post). The color for Holy Mary is blue, whereas the Jesus is clothed in red. Now why then do we buy pink socks for baby girls and blue ones for boys?

Best,

B.

Anonymous said...

Even people working in physics worries about the colour of the sun. Not because the flares or the sunspots. Not because solar oscillations. Just because Van Gogh. See this

http://www.discover.com/issues/oct-06/rd/van-gogh-turbulence-painting/

Where two guys (Aragon and Torres)found that Van Gogh's eddies and colours matched the Kolmogorov statistical model of turbulence.

See the sunny moon colours on the upper right hand corner (starry night) or the sun on the 'cypress star'. It seems old Vincent liked both sun and moon light. So no male-female controversy anymore
;-)

all the best

Anonymous said...

P.S. Ps notice the statement under the headline (.... bees prefer it, too) ;-)

r.

Rae Ann said...

Wow, thanks, rafa, for that link! I had no idea and that is so fascinating that Van Gogh expressed such things through his artwork. One has to wonder if somehow he saw or sensed these things and was tormented by them and the only way he could process them was through painting. It's not too hard to imagine that he would be tormented by visions of turbulence that he couldn't explain. You might have given me material for a future posting. Thanks! By the way, are you a physicist? And how is the weather in Spain?

PS I did notice the subtitle, too.

Rae Ann said...

Bee, that is odd about the colors for boys and girls. Seems I've read something else about that somewhere, but right now my memory isn't helping. ;-)

Anonymous said...

Rae Ann

about the weather here. Warm fall, warm winter for now. No snow. No need to say all the hysteria about 'global warming' re-appeared in the media. I take the battle for lost. The leftists at the current government support heavily the kyoto protocol and similar stupid stuff. The problem is people which hardly can add or substract two integer numbers say loud and clear that global warming is a fact. My children questioned
this conventional wisdom at school. No need to say the rest of the classroom mates think they are quite strange guys.

Of course everything is about weather not clima. But people jumps into the clima blah blah blah immediately.

My brother is a professional cook. He owns a restaurant. He says weather (and the pretty sun of this post) is like food. No matter how you cook. The food that your lovely mother cooked for you when you were 12 years old, healthy and happy, is always better. Because you were 12 years old and very happy and very hungry, not because the food.

So current weather cannot compete with the weather when you were young. Snow then was better than snow today. Sunny days were better than sunny days today. Of course the rain was better then. What was better, no question, is we were much younger than now. No way to fight against this feeling.

ooops! too many lines. Thanks for your patience.

r.

Rae Ann said...

Hi Rafa!

No apologies necessary. Long comments are as welcome as short ones. :-) Your family sounds much like mine. And your brother is very wise and correct.

Speaking of childhood memories, I used to know a very nice boy named Raphael when I was about 11 or 12. In fact you're the only other Raphael I've ever 'met' since then.