{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3134",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 3134,
    "subject": "More on textual reliability, lack of",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "2002-04-09T15:44:47+00:00",
    "last": "2002-04-09T15:44:47+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0204-566@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes",
        "address": "ddanehy at siebel.com"
      },
      "date": "2002-04-09T15:44:47+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) More on textual reliability, lack of",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Okay ... we have two textual data from SHORT SUN:\n\n1) We have the third-hand report that Green at conjunction is\n   30,000 leagues away from Blue.\n2) We have the direct report that Lune appears much bigger in\n   Urth's sky than Green does in Blue's\n\nNow, add this to the mix:\n\n\tNot a glimmer showed upon the waters of the lake,\n\tsave for the green, reflected light that fell from \n\tthe myriad leaves of the Forest of Lune, fifty\n\tthousand leagues away.\n\t\t-- THE SWORD OF THE LICTOR\n\t\t   Timescape h/c, p. 253\n\n(n.b., as has been noted, the Moon currently orbits at a\n mean distance of 238,877 miles, or a smidge under eighty\n thousand leagues from the Earth. Not that that's \n particularly relevant, though it means that Lune is rather\n bigger in Urth's sky than Luna is in Earth's...)\n\nOkay, so _if_ we stipulate that Green is Lune, then one of \nthree things is true:\n\n1) the third-hand 30K league figure is wrong;\n2) the 50K league figure is wrong;\n3) Green, to appear smaller when 40% closer, is _much_ smaller\n   than Lune.\n\nNow, the third of these is contra hypothesi. We know that\nthe 30K league figure is third-hand and have no especial reason\nto trust its original source; contrariwise, we know (see his\nnight on the mountain after escaping from Thrax) that Severian\nhas had at least some minimal education in astronomy. Ergo, _if_\nLune is Green, the thirty-thousand league figure is wrong.\n\nMarc, take your pick; I don't think you can save both."
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}