Religious fundamentalists host seminar on geocentrism and how Galileo was a liberal fool

[ck4829]

It took some 350 years for the Roman Catholic Church to finally admit it was wrong to have found pioneering astronomer Galileo Galilei "vehemently suspect of heresy" in 1633 for affirming Nicolaus Copernicus' groundbreaking 1543 theory that the earth and planets revolve around the sun. But there remains a strain of "radical traditionalist" Catholics who basically tore up Pope John Paul II's 1992 acknowledgement and is still adamant that the Bible's accounts of an earth-centered universe are literal truth — and that the church was right to convict the old stargazer all those years ago.

Eight of the world's leading proponents of neo-Dark Ages cosmology (with one token dinosaur-age conspiracy theorist thrown in) met here on Nov. 6 for the First Annual Catholic Conference on Geocentrism — the theory that the earth sits motionless at the center of the universe. The one-day seminar was entitled, "Galileo Was Wrong: The Church Was Right."

"Seminar" might be generous phrasing: The presentation was a mind-numbing, 15-hour-long sermon-cum-pep rally for radical traditionalist Catholic apologists desperate to debunk any science that suggests the Bible shouldn't be interpreted literally. Numerous biblical passages describe the earth as at rest, with the sun in transit around it.

About 90 mostly Catholic devotees, curious skeptics and feisty college students who converged on South Bend endured a series of one-sided monologues declaring that theorists from Copernicus and Galileo to Einstein and Hawking were wrong about celestial physics. Though much of it was difficult for mathematical mortals to follow, the presenters' gambit was clear enough: Can anyone really prove the earth isn't sitting still? That's tougher than it sounds: Even though astrophysicists tell us that every body in the universe is in motion, it will always appear that the thing you're on is standing still relative to everything else.

http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-report/browse-all-issues/2011/spring/geocentrism-seminar-hosted-by-radical-traditionalist-catholics

I wonder if the Texas Board of Education attended this event.

[demmiblue]

1. Yet another, "I thought this was going to be from the Onion" moment!

[Angry Dragon]

2. It really is not their fault in what they believe

Their brains are only 10% the size of an average brain and they only use 1% of that.
It has been proven that they have trouble walking and chewing gum at the same time.

[Dappleganger]

3. Will O'Reilly be a keynote speaker?

Okay, how did the moon get there? How'd the moon get there? Look, you pinheads who attacked me for this, you guys are just desperate. How'd the moon get there? How'd the sun get there? How'd it get there? Can you explain that to me? How come we have that and Mars doesn't have it? Venus doesn't have it. How come? Why not? How'd it get here?

[steve2470]

4. *facepalm* , what's next, the flat earth society was right ?? nt

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. Or their state senator who ran for Speaker, and now wants to be in charge of Texas oil and gas

Warren Chisum:

http://amarillo.com/news/local-news/2011-01-12/chisum-backs-bid-be-speaker

http://lubbockonline.com/local-news/2011-02-19/chisum-roots-parallel-role-commission

He advocated a geocentric website that a Georgia state senator, Ben Bridges, supported:

http://www.texscience.org/news/chisum-bridges.htm

Notice that the geocentric website was anti-semitic; the Catholic weirdos in the OP tend towards anti-semitism; and there were anti-semitic aspects to the race for Speaker. It's as if no part of their thinking has evolved since the Middle Ages.

[Motown_Johnny]

6. Can anyone really prove the earth isn't sitting still?

yes


Because if it isn't then the entire visible universe (and beyond) is spinning around us (all 27.5 billion light years diameter of it) every day which is a ridiculous notion. Plus it means that every object in the solar system other than the Sun, Moon, Mercury and Venus (and Earth) sometimes reverses course for a while and then reverses again a while later (retrograde motion).

This would include all the man made objects sent out into the solar system too. The Voyager craft would be chief among these since they are already far beyond the orbit of Pluto. How can these people explain the retrograde motion of objects we sent out and know to be traveling in a straight line (relative to the curvature of space itself and minor fluctuations from the gravity of other objects)?


If that doesn't do it you can simply put a camera on the moon and watch the freaking Earth rotate. Maybe in a couple decades they can pay to travel to the Moon and stand there and watch it rotate themselves.

Yes, there is proof that the Earth isn't sitting still. Just as much as there is that the chair you are sitting in actually exists. If you are able to reject all of the evidence in favor of the Earth moving around the sun as well as rotating on it's axis then you are capable of rejecting reality itself.

[Recursion]

7. We don't even need Einstein; Newton killed the concept of "sitting still"

Nothing is or anything is. The non-moving earth is simply a frame with a specific centrifugal (yes, centrifugal) force and some not-terribly-useful dynamics at points distant from the Earth.

[Motown_Johnny]

13. hell, I was so outraged I forgot about the Foucault Pendulum

http://www.animations.physics.unsw.edu.au/jw/foucault_pendulum.html

^snip^


The observation of Hipparchus and Ptolemy that one cannot feel the rotation of the earth is correct. However, the rate of rotation required for the heliocentric picture (0.0007 revolutions per minute) is so slow that one would not expect to feel it. How can one measure such a slow rotation? In 1851, Jean-Bernard-Leon Foucault suspended a 67 metre, 28 kilogram pendulum from the dome of the Pantheon in Paris. The plane of its motion, with respect to the earth, rotated slowly clockwise. This motion is most easily explained if the earth turns.




(S)omeone put a pendulum above the South Pole and sets it swinging in a simple arc. To someone directly above the Pole and not turning with the earth, the pendulum would seem to trace repeatedly an arc in the same plane while the earth rotated slowly clockwise below it. To someone on the earth, however, the earth seems to be stationary, and the plane of the pendulum's motion would seem to move slowly anticlockwise, viewed from above. We say that the pendulum's motion precesses. The earth turns on its axis every 23.93 hours, so to the terrestrial observer at the pole, the plane of the pendulum seems to precess through 360 degrees in that time.









I shouldn't post angry, it makes me forget things.

[Recursion]

14. We had one of those at my college

The pit made an excellent beer garden. But, that only proves the earth's motion if all frames of reference have to be inertial (but this kills Maxwell's equations).

[sudopod]

23. "but this kills Maxwell's equations"

wat?

[Recursion]

26. Requiring only inertial frames of reference kills them

It's hidden in the fact that J and B ultimately have to go in circles; if we stick with only inertial frames of reference we're left with a force being magnetic or electrostatic depending on what frame of reference you're in (this ends up becoming the argument for special relativity).

[Ikonoklast]

17. Parabolas don't exist.

And if they do, they are the work of the Devil.








I see they already got to you.

[Motown_Johnny]

22. I included "capable of rejecting reality itself"

not much you can do at that point except have them declared insane and have them committed

[struggle4progress]

8. Article contains some interesting info on who these folk are: a gaggle of anti-semitic wackos,

who are busily trying to reach out to other wackos

One could, of course, develop a geocentric astronomical theory, if one thought it would be worthwhile -- but the physical laws would become mind-bogglingly complicated, and it seems today that one can get very very accurate observational predictions (with much less effort) by first appealing to the Newtonian scheme (or its relativistic successor) and then transforming coordinates to obtain the picture "as it looks from Earth"

[kenny blankenship]

9. Oh yes, the Islamist Pansexual Communist Heliocentric conspiracy WILL BE exposed

Its days under the orbiting Sun are numbered, in Roman letters.

[NoPasaran]

19. !

:rofl:

[Dogtown]

10. K&R n/t

[rrneck]

11. Confrence held in one giant room

because they have trouble with doors and corners.

[steve2470]

12. Does this article inspire despair in anyone else ?

Granted, this is the HEIGHT of stupidity and ignorance but to lesser degrees, this goes on constantly.

Society and government founded on science vs. ignorance and religion, etc.

[slackmaster]

15. I think the SPLC has been taken in by a clever snow-job. This is a scam operation to sell books....

...to highly gullible people.

Try reading the gobbledy-gook that one of the principal speakers told a reporter from the Chicago Tribune:

http://www.galileowaswrong.com/galileowaswrong/features/2.pdf

Look at the bio of "Dr." Sungenis (is he actually a SubGenius???) here:

http://www.galileowaswrong.com/galileowaswrong/

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. That doesn't mean that their views on Jews aren't real

and thus it would still be a suitable subject for the SPLC to look at. They don't get a pass on such view because they're trying to make a buck in the process; just like Pat Robertson etc. don't get ignored just because they're trying to make money from gullible people.

[BobbyBoring]

20. OMFGHM!

I could only read the first couple sentences.

These crazy fucks really want us to revert back to the dark ages.

[sudopod]

24. Oh no, he's very sincere.

He's been around for a loooong time.

[slackmaster]

25. It looks to me like he's made a business of writing, publishing, and selling crank literature

:shrug:

[sudopod]

27. That doesn't mean that he can't believe it. :D nt

[white_wolf]

18. These people can't be real can they?

This flies in the face of the basis of Church teaching. I mean isn't the whole point of a strong church hierarchy to keep ideas like this from being brought up in the name of the Church? The Catholic Church does not support a literal interpretation of the Bible and hasn't for years. I mean I expect this crap from backwoods fundie protestants, but I really did expect better from the Catholic Church.

[ellie]

21. What the hell?

Is this a joke?

[social_critic]

28. The Devil is rolling on the floor laughing outloud

It's sort of a joke. Or something like that.