Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2021 July 20

= July 20 =

A wind from 4 sides simultanously - possible?
Wind from 4 sides simultaneously - possible? I'm asking this question due to the reading in the bible, the first chapter of Job (1;18-19): "While he was still speaking, yet another messenger came and said, “Your sons and daughters were feasting and drinking wine at the oldest brother’s house, 19 when suddenly a mighty wind swept in from the desert and struck the four corners of the house. It collapsed on them and they are dead, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!”. Could it be any scientific explanation for this story?--ThePupil (talk) 02:36, 20 July 2021 (UTC)
 * The commentaries I've read suggest it would be a whirlwind. Given a "house" in that context it likely mostly just fabric and sticks, more like a tent, a strong swirling wind could easily cause it to collapse in on itself. DMacks (talk) 02:47, 20 July 2021 (UTC)
 * You must remember that any version of the Bible that comes to you in contemporary English is the result of numerous revisions and translations over the course of millennia, the result of which is a very great amount of idiomatic phrases arising out of anachronism and translational idiosyncrasy. (see Bible, Biblical Canon, Authorship of the Bible, Bible translations, Bible translations into English, and Dating the Bible for just a summary of this immensely complicated subject). Further, often times these outmoded linguistic structures and the accreted peculiarities come to get codified somewhat because they are simply perceived, by way of the liturgical context in which they are learned, as the most appropriate and sanctified wording for the statements. As a consequence, you have every cause (in addition to the question of whether you are looking to take the actual events of the Bible to be considered apocryphal vs. factual) to not view the wording of biblical passages in their most literal possible interpretation here. I am no biblical scholar, so I cannot assist you with tracing backwards through versions of the work to arrive at the likely meteorolgical intent of "struck the four corners", but I rather expect you would find somewhere along that heritage that the phrase that was communicated was meant to convey a rather similar meaning to "shook it to its foundations" rather than "the wind came from four directions at once".


 * But to answer your query more directly: I know of no principled reason (owing to climatological principle or physical law governing air pressure) why four separate observable winds could not converge on one structure. Mind you, the idea of "a wind" as a unidirectional force pressure moving along a strict vector (as opposed to a rapid contoured change in pressure propagating in a non-uniform matter) is something an oversimplified mental construct.  Unfortunately, I cannot supply you with a source which states expressly that it would be possible for four people standing in alignment with the corners of a structure to each perceive the wind to be coming from their cardinal direction, and in such amount that it causes said structure to collapse inward.  The best I think you may get here is the observation that it does not seem to be contravened by any particular aspect of atmospheric dynamics.  Snow let's rap 05:19, 20 July 2021 (UTC)
 * If the air comes in from different directions, converging on a small area, you get a pressure build-up that makes the accumulated air seek a way out. If there is no way out, the air will stop coming in when the local air pressure is equal to the wind pressure. The most obvious way out is in a vertical direction, the opposite of a downburst. But we could also have air flowing in from say 0°, 90°, 180° and 270°, with a horizontal outflow at 45°, 135°, 225° and 315°. This is unlikely to arise naturally, but you never know what a God will do who does not want to lose His bet with the Opponent. --Lambiam 08:49, 20 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Similarly, a god (not being subject to the laws of physics) could make some of the air in the house disappear. This would create a partial vacuum which would be filled by wind from all directions and clearly could destroy the structure if the size of the effect was large enough.  He could make it a sustained wind by continuing to destroy more air for some time. --184.147.181.169 (talk) 22:11, 20 July 2021 (UTC)


 * There is nothing in the Hebrew text suggesting the sudden wind coming from different directions. It is a (rúakh gədoláh), a "big wind" (singular), coming  (mê'êbér hamidbár) "across the desert". This does not sound like the description of a tornado to me. If we interpret this as a report on an actual event, keep in mind that the reporter is the sole survivor of the collapse of the house, managing to escape from the rubble, so this eye witness then apparently was attending the party inside and presumably had other things on their mind than delivering a accurate report of meteorological observations.  --Lambiam 08:32, 20 July 2021 (UTC)


 * I'd read "struck the four corners of the house" as "damaged the entire property" e.g not even one corner was left standing. The Living Bible even has: "engulfed the entire house so the roof fell in on them". The outcome is the same. Martinevans123 (talk) 09:03, 20 July 2021 (UTC)


 * For a physics answer, wind is simply air motion. At any given location, wind speed can be represented as a vector (think: an arrow), and this vector can vary across space (think: a field of arrows). Some complicated equations govern how the wind vector can change across space and time, but there is nothing in theory that would prevent it from taking four different directions at four different positions, such as the corners of a house. Imagine, for instance, that the house is located in the center of a counterflow burner (which requires to blow only from two directions).
 * There are also boundary conditions that limit fluid motion; an extremely pedantic reading of "struck the four corners of the house" could be deemed impossible, because fluid cannot "strike" a solid boundary, because wind near an impermeable surface must be parallel to it. Frankly, if you are looking for physical impossibilities in the Bible, other passages are much better: the one that implies pi is 3, the ones used against heliocentrism, etc. Tigraan Click here for my talk page ("private" contact) 12:48, 26 July 2021 (UTC)