khat's comment is dead, but replying to it here:
> It's very odd they would assume a typo in the writing but not an error in their calculations or possibly no correlation whatsoever.
They didn't assume a typo, they concluded that a typo makes the most sense if the story is true.
The facts:
- The original story (as published) claims the event occurred on 18 October 1841 on a line that didn't exist at that time (not until 1846).
- The original story was specific about the train (a 10:05 express train) and the month and day (18 October)
- On 18 October 1848 there was an express train with that time and there was a recorded geomagnetic storm
Under the assumption the story is true, given the details that do line up and the one detail that can't line up with anything, a typographical error where one number was changed makes a lot of sense.
EDIT: @khat, if you read this, it seems you've somehow become shadowbanned. Both your comment here and your earlier comment from today are [dead]. This means admin moderation or auto-moderation was involved, these weren't [flagged][dead] which would have indicated users flagged it to death. Nothing in either looks like a reason to get shadowbanned so you may want to reach out to the mods (there's a contact link at the bottom of most pages).
I raised this the other day as I've been seeing more cases of this lately <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49820254">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49820254
Jtsummers · · focus · HN ↗
> It's very odd they would assume a typo in the writing but not an error in their calculations or possibly no correlation whatsoever.
They didn't assume a typo, they concluded that a typo makes the most sense if the story is true.
The facts:
- The original story (as published) claims the event occurred on 18 October 1841 on a line that didn't exist at that time (not until 1846).
- The original story was specific about the train (a 10:05 express train) and the month and day (18 October)
- On 18 October 1848 there was an express train with that time and there was a recorded geomagnetic storm
Under the assumption the story is true, given the details that do line up and the one detail that can't line up with anything, a typographical error where one number was changed makes a lot of sense.
EDIT: @khat, if you read this, it seems you've somehow become shadowbanned. Both your comment here and your earlier comment from today are [dead]. This means admin moderation or auto-moderation was involved, these weren't [flagged][dead] which would have indicated users flagged it to death. Nothing in either looks like a reason to get shadowbanned so you may want to reach out to the mods (there's a contact link at the bottom of most pages).
mattm · · focus · HN ↗
fragmede · · focus · HN ↗