I saw a comic about this once (xkcd, probably?) and going by the scene in the movie, where Legolas has human sized eyes, they deduced that Middle Earth must have an exotic atmosphere
Lord of the SCIENCE
Submitted 3 months ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to science_memes@mander.xyz
https://mander.xyz/pictrs/image/d71254fe-943f-4f83-8474-d69616c62c08.png
Comments
poweruser@lemmy.sdf.org 3 months ago
Zorcron@lemmy.zip 3 months ago
It was a Minute Physics video. Only 2 minutes, and a great watch.
FozzyOsbourne@lemm.ee 3 months ago
Gives any what? Sorry I can’t read that heavily obscured text.
Blum0108@lemmy.world 3 months ago
Sounds like you need some anime eyes
FozzyOsbourne@lemm.ee 3 months ago
From what I’ve heard there’s a serious need to be able to see past tiny censor bars in Japanese media, maybe this explains it
marcos@lemmy.world 3 months ago
Can he do interferometry and just have a 3rd but normal eye?
socsa@piefed.social 3 months ago
Legoland actually vibrates very very quickly and is actually performing synthetic aperture Interferometry, multiply the size of his effective optical aperture.
tetris11@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
Also he’s transmitting and recieving imagery from other elves, using the very long baseline kept in his pants
socsa@piefed.social 3 months ago
It depends on the atmosphere. On earth, the average 'size' of the atmospheric distortion experienced by a photon over 15 miles would far exceed the angular resolution of any pupil-sized aperture. This is a very simple explanation which groups a number of propagation effects broadly under the term "distortion." Even without atmospheric distortion, there is a limit to the "information" a given aperture can resolve due to purely thermal noise. In theory, of you have an aperture temperature of absolute zero, the thermal resolution is infinite, but also then there is no process by which information can be generated by an I cident photon.
anindefinitearticle@sh.itjust.works 3 months ago
No, even without an atmosphere you have to contend with the diffraction-limited resolving power through an aperture (pupil), which is related to the diameter of the aperture and the wavelength of light.
A diffraction process is, mathematically, a fourier transform. A fundamental mathematical feature of a fourier transform is what’s known as the uncertainty principle.
Side note: you’ve probably heard of the special case of an uncertainty principle encountered in quantum mechanics frequently misattributed to the head of the Nazi nuclear program (Heisenberg), but this mathematical principle was actually well known for centuries beforehand, and the misattribution is mostly because of Nazi propaganda. We see it anywhere a fourier transform is used, from optics to orbital dynamics to quantum particles. This mathematical phenomenon is frequently miscited as quantum “weirdness” even though there’s nothing quantum (or all that weird) about it.
The pupil restricts the possible positions of incoming photons. A restriction in position increases the variance of momenta (for a photon, speed never changes, but the momentum vector can still change direction). A smaller pupil is more restrictive and causes the image to be blurrier as the incoming photons from each object you are trying to resolve. If you want to be able to resolve smaller angular sizes (small objects at large distances), you need a large aperture that reduces position restrictions on incoming photons and therefore diffraction-induced blurring due to momentum uncertainties.
Look up Airy diffraction for the special case of a circular aperture (e.g. a pupil or telescope).
Akasazh@feddit.nl 3 months ago
Is the unit ‘one league’ used in LOTR (esp in elvish) the same as in our universe. Just asking as nobody here questions the units.
sness@sh.itjust.works 3 months ago
Yes. The books are all carefully translated from elvish and would have accounted for unit conversions.
Akasazh@feddit.nl 3 months ago
I thought they were written by Bilbo and Frodo in Westron
NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone 3 months ago
I remember asking my dad how far a league was when I first read the book, and then repeatedly questioning whether that could be right in the context of the writing.
jabathekek@sopuli.xyz 3 months ago
Orland-Legolas doesn’t need science to look cute.
flicker@lemmy.world 3 months ago
I forgot that was the actor’s name and for a second thought he’d gotten married.
jabathekek@sopuli.xyz 3 months ago
I don’t think Gimli has a last name. 🤔
tromars@feddit.org 3 months ago
Not a scientist myself, so I’m wondering: shouldn’t that technically say „hypothesis + evidence“ instead of „theory + evidence“? Which is of course nitpicky (if I’m even correct) in the context of a tumblr post, but I’m still curious
fossilesque@mander.xyz 3 months ago
A hypothesis is a theory, one that is being tested.
GiveMemes@jlai.lu 3 months ago
A theory in the scientific world/literature/common understanding is significantly stronger than a hypothesis.
DharkStare@lemmy.world 3 months ago
I could be entirely wrong about this but isn’t it in universe lore that Elves don’t see the curvature of the world and that’s how they can see so far?
WolfLink@sh.itjust.works 3 months ago
That would fall under “nonvisual” (meaning not light-based) perception.
oxideseven@lemmy.ca 3 months ago
✨magic✨
grrgyle@slrpnk.net 3 months ago
These are the kinds of problems I want our species solving
_stranger_@lemmy.world 3 months ago
Image
sik0fewl@lemmy.ca 3 months ago
🎵 They’re taking Hobbit-chan to Isengard! 🎵
Buddahriffic@lemmy.world 3 months ago
Biyakugon!
tetris11@lemmy.ml 3 months ago
*intense air-slapping ensues*