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Old 07-March-2008, 03:05 AM
Hornblower Hornblower is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JimP View Post
I’m confused. If the Sun has a wobble and we identify other suns with planets by looking for a wobble, then why is it such a big stretch of the imagination that the planets in our solar system are some how influencing sunspots? Planets can cause there stars to wobble but not influence their sunspots?
In my opinion "wobble" is a poor choice of a word. It is orbital motion, nothing more and nothing less.

The gravitational action of the planets causes the Sun to move in a complex looping path that sometimes carries it upwards of half a million miles from the barycenter, but as I pointed out earlier, the Sun "feels" nothing but a vanishingly small amount of tidal action. It is the nature of the rather gentle gravitational beast. I would be flabbergasted if this is enough to affect the electrodynamics of its innards significantly, and so far no one has offered a plausible effect from anything else related to the planets.