[gore3000]

nearly circular orbits of the planets,

Where did you go to school? The orbits of the planets are wildly elliptical. Some of the planets that we think of as nearer to the sun are at times further out than those we consider farther from the sun. You clearly do not know beans about astronomy.

[Doctor Stochastic]

The orbits of the planets are wildly elliptical. Some of the planets that we think of as nearer to the sun are at times further out than those we consider farther from the sun.

Please post the orbital elements of the planets to show from whence you got the above statment.

Where did you go to school? You clearly do not know beans about astronomy.

[RadioAstronomer]

Where did you go to school? The orbits of the planets are wildly elliptical. Some of the planets that we think of as nearer to the sun are at times further out than those we consider farther from the sun. You clearly do not know beans about astronomy.

Remember, all planets move in ellipses. A planet that moves in a perfectly circular orbit is actually an ellipse with its eccentricity (e) = 0, a parabola has e = 1 and a hyperbola the e > 1. So the closer to zero the planets eccentricity, the more circular its orbit.

For the planets, the furthest point from the sun in its orbit is called aphelion and the closest is called perihelion.

All of the planetary distances from the Sun are measured in Astronomical Units (AUs). One AU is the average distance from the Earth to the Sun, which is approximately 93,000,000 miles.

Mercury: e = 0.2056 and its AU = .39
Venus: e = 0.0068 and its AU = .72
Earth: e = 0.0167 and its AU = 1
Mars: e = 0.0934 and its AU = 1.52
Jupiter: e = 0.0483 and its AU = 5.20
Saturn: e = 0.0560 and its AU = 9.54
Uranus: e = 0.0461 and its AU = 19.18
Neptune: e = 0.0097 and its AU = 30.06
Pluto: e = 0.2482 and its AU = 39.44

If you notice only two planets have a high eccentricity; Mercury and Pluto. Only one of them cross the mean distance of another planet from the Sun and that is Pluto and Neptune. Briefly Pluto is closer to the Sun than Neptune when its orbit is at perihelion.

The eccentricity of our planet's orbit is mild; aphelion and perihelion differ from the mean Sun-Earth distance by less than 2%. In fact, if you drew Earth's orbit on a sheet of paper it would be difficult to distinguish from a perfect circle and that is with e = 0.0167.

[Junior]

No. The only orbit "wildly elliptical" is that of Pluto. The eccentricities of the other worlds are extremely small. While those orbits are not quite circular, they are not "wildly elliptical" either -- and one can do back-of-the-envelope calulations on those orbits and arrive at a ball-park figure by assuming they are circular.

[longshadow]

The orbits of the planets are wildly elliptical. Some of the planets that we think of as nearer to the sun are at times further out than those we consider farther from the sun. You clearly do not know beans about astronomy. [emphasis added to demonstrate your profound ignorance]

It is statements like this that form the basis for the reason why no educated person on FR takes anything you write seriosly. The orbits of Mercury and Pluto are modestly eccentric; the rest have eccentricities that are less than 0.10. And Pluto is THE ONLY planet that comes closer to the sun during PART of it's orbit than the next closest planet.

The only thing that is close to being "wildly eccentric" is your behavior on FR.