Donald Wilgus wrote:
If one takes the "Northern View" of the orbits of the planets (around
the
Sun), are all the focus points biased to one side. Or is this not a
valid
question??
If you're asking about the orientation of the major axes of the planets'
orbits, or the positions of the foci not occupied by the sun, they're
quite scattered. Moreover they all precess slowly over time (at rates on
the order of a degree per millennium). In the Planetary Fact Sheets
indexed at
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/planetfact.html
look for the J2000 Orbital Elements table for each planet; its 'empty
focus' will be in the opposite direction from the listed "longitude of
perihelion". For example Jupiter's perihelion is at about 15° ecliptic
longitude, so the major axis of its orbit runs from there through both
foci towards 195°; the figure for Uranus is nearly opposite, its major
axis running from about 171° to 351°.
--
Odysseus