Jan 13 2013

Video recommendation….geocentrism?

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Yeah, geocentrism.

I wasn’t aware that that was much of a thing, either. But a new youtube channel, CoolHardLogic, is making some fantastic videos about it, debunking it, and I gotta tell you – watching him do it turns out to be a great way to learn a thing or two about the many wonderful things that very clever people know about the universe and stuff. My eyebrows keep going up and down while I watch this amazing space science.

Today, episode three of this series came out, but I’ll start you off at the beginning. Here’s episode one. Check out the rest and sub for more if you want.

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24 comments

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1

Lofty

January 13, 2013 at 10:46 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Not a bad little astronomy primer. Who’da thought there were geocentrists left on this planet? The education system has failed dismally for these fools.
2

CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captain

January 13, 2013 at 11:13 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

His illustrations are fantastic.

But too much time wasted on name-calling and bemoaning ignorance IMO.
The implications and rationalizations alone are enough to make the subject hilarious.
3

Rodney Nelson

January 13, 2013 at 12:38 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Geocentrism still exists? My flabber is ghasted.
4

jamessweet

January 13, 2013 at 2:01 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

@lofty, I don’t think it’s at all fair to blame “the” educational system for geocentrism, at least not for those who have an active belief in geocentrism. (There are many people who are very confused about basic astronomical facts, and one might arguably blame the educational system for this problem, but there’s a difference between casual and willful ignorance, and I assume we are talking about the dedicated geocentrists here…) It’s not like evolution, where there are (sadly) a lot of people advocating for each side and so a lot of people wind up believing the wrong thing because their critical thinking skills are too poor to properly evaluate competing claims. Almost nobody is advocating for geocentrism, so those few who are dedicated to it are pretty frikkin’ serious about it.
5

sheila

January 13, 2013 at 2:46 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

I thought the astronomy was very well explained indeed. I wasn’t so keen on the insults either. I think I’ve seen enough insults online lately.
6

gfeltham

January 13, 2013 at 3:26 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Yeah, me too…unfathomable that such a position can be put forth. I especially liked Rodney’s ‘ ghasted flabber’ comment. But, there are some indications that this thinking is not about to become too much of of bur under the saddle of human progress.
1. After viewing the elegant CoolHardLogic video, I absolutely had to find how pervasive geocentrism has become today. A quick google search seemed offer rather limited choices, many of the hits seemed to reference the ‘First Annual Catholic Conference on Geocentrism’, held in late 2010. And since then, I have not been able to find any references at all to a following 2nd Annual (or any other kind) Conference on GeoCentrism. Not a lot of steam in that engine!
2. Even Ken Ham over at ‘Answers In Genesis’ has a lengthy piece dismissing geocentrism. Now that’s something!
And, as long as I’m at your site NSC, my Kudoes to you and all your animated efforts, even my 90 year-old mother gets a big kick out of work. She very deliberately rations out your ‘episodes’ to herself, to be enjoyed like candy.
Thanks!
7

CoolHardLogic

January 13, 2013 at 7:08 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Thanks to NonStampCollector for the recommendation!

Those who found the “insults” a bit much will find the subsequent parts milder. Whilst Part 1 deals with some initial concepts, it is essentially acting as an introduction to the series as a whole. Part of its purpose is to introduce the typical geocentrist and to illustrate the degree of willful ignorance that such views require. The essence of the series is very much about examining the implications of those views and comparing them to reality, so it gets more into the meat of that once the introductory stuff is done.

Thanks for watching.
8

James Phillips

January 13, 2013 at 7:12 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

For those who have not got drunk on the Kool Aid offered up by the high priests of modern science you may wish to take a good hard look at http://www.galileowaswrong.blogspot.com. Please try to set your prejudices aside before going there. You will then be in a much better position to evaluate the evidence for geocentrism and the refutations of the standard arguments for heliocentrism.
9

hjhornbeck

January 13, 2013 at 9:08 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Thanks for the link, Phillips! I was looking for something to cheer me up, and I found:

In fact, even General Relativity and Newtonian mechanics requires 95% more matter in the universe other than the stars, although they say we can’t see it.

1. Observations suggest dark matter is 400% more.
2. General Relativity and Newtonian mechanics do not predict dark matter.
10

CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captain

January 14, 2013 at 5:35 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

@CoolHardLogic #7:

Those who found the “insults” a bit much will find the subsequent parts milder.

My objection was primarily, not with harshness of ep 1, but with generic name-calling. Irrelevant filler of the sort geocentrists could just as easily use to poison the well.

My initial reaction was also affected by this:

FB100: “Why would Polaris stay in the same place if the earth is tilting?”
[ Five long minutes ]
CHL: “During the course of the year, the orientation of earth’s axis remains virtually constant.”

I guess having been given something to wait for, I wound up paying more attention to things that could’ve been edited out.

The subsequent episodes are better, punchlines and all. : )
11

BradC

January 14, 2013 at 5:48 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Good similar rebuttal by the BadAstronomer. A key excerpt:

Some geocentrists assert the Earth doesn’t move because it’s just plain obvious. The stars appear to go around us, so maybe they really just do. And that makes things simple. But it doesn’t. I mean, it makes calculating the times of sunrise and sunset easier, but it makes it a lot harder to send a space probe to Saturn, since according to them it’s moving at 1/3 the speed of light around us. Far easier to use a heliocentric coordinate system there.

And Geocentrists have to assume that all local phenomena are caused by cosmic motion. For example, the Coriolis effect, which makes hurricanes spin different ways in the northern and southern hemispheres, is relatively easy to explain if you assume a spheroidal rotating Earth. For a Geocentrist, you have to assume that the Universe itself is revolving around us, and affecting the weather here. Again, the math works out, but it’s standing a pyramid on its tip: you have it precisely backwards. And with one poke the whole thing falls over.

We also know earthquakes can affect the rotation of the Earth. That makes sense since they shift the mass around on the surface, and that changes how the Earth spins. To a Geocentrist, though, that earthquake affects the entire Universe.

That’s simpler?
12

CoolHardLogic

January 14, 2013 at 5:54 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Greetings Sky Captain,

Thanks for watching! The 3 minute segment you mention also deals with FB’s first remarks about the seasons and tilting, so is really geared towards explaining the silly solar motion required for the geocentric version of the seasons and explaining why it’s rubbish compared to observations, which then leads naturally towards explaining what’s actually going on.

This then feeds into the point about Polaris which you refer to, which is being used to start off the next segment of the video. Had I merely addressed the Polaris point in the clip it would have missed out a lot of info which later stuff builds on within that part and indeed subsequent parts. I appreciate that different people will already know different amounts so it tries to cover the basics quickly whilst adding in some extras for those who are already familiar with them. Likewise I appreciate that people will get different things out of it as you can’t please all of the people all of the time

Anyway, glad you’re enjoying them in the main, and I hope that explains a bit of the rationale behind that segment within Part 1. I’ll be covering other subjects too of course in future, both as series and also as single episodes like the 2012 doomsday.

Thanks for watching, and also to everyone who’s watched and subscribed so far.

CHL
13

Abdul Alhazred

January 14, 2013 at 6:15 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Nothing is ever settled once and for all. There will always be hold outs.

Geocentrism?

How about this then:
http://khalas.wordpress.com/2007/03/01/a-flat-earth-the-islamic-perspective/
14

CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captain

January 14, 2013 at 10:54 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

@CoolHardLogic:
Some of the distances in ep 3 I think were predicated on heliocentric astrometry.

Which got me wondering how it would operate in bizarro world. I nearly commented to suggest the topic: astrometry and how measurements (or lack thereof) affected the debate historically (and Aristarcus at least managing to make estimates within the solar system).

But then I realized modern luminaries like Fernie, with his ‘inverted gravity’, must have moved on. *grin*
A recent vid demonstrated his… spotty familiarity with parallax, so you’re no doubt already on it.
15

sosw

January 15, 2013 at 6:46 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Good similar rebuttal by the BadAstronomer.

And I thought the comment threads following global warming -related articles on Bad Astronomy were bad…
16

cag

January 16, 2013 at 2:56 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

I would ask the goes to explain geostationary satellites.
17

cag

January 16, 2013 at 2:58 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Preview, you are my friend. Why did I ignore you? Not goes, geos!
18

Sacha Dobruk

January 16, 2013 at 4:20 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

jesus h. christ if there’s a problem posting don’t delete the whole fucking post when I click the damn back button Fix your code!

I am NOT going to type all that wonderful info in AGAIN. I was trying to recommend The Debunkers Handbook. so go look it up on google if you think you’re interested.

AND AGAIN – I log in and my comment field is ERASED! (this time it was clipboarded)

Do ya hate commenters or something?
19

Useless

January 16, 2013 at 8:09 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Thanks for giving us something new to play with.
20

steve oberski

January 16, 2013 at 10:02 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

geocentrist web shites – love it.
21

owlglass

January 17, 2013 at 2:47 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

Thanks for sharing Nonstampcollector (your stuff is awesome, by the way), and big thanks for making it CoolHardLogic! Greatly enjoyed the other video on doomsday as well. There are many things I like, you explain things well, demonstrate how theories must “mesh in” with observation and other theories, how the math works and more. Pacing and animations are great as well. People underestimate that videos don’t come together automatically. But what I really liked was the way you used music in a leitmotif fashion. The goofy tune, MacLeod’s Music to Delight, really did just that. It cracked me up the whole day, and I now hear it everytime I read or listen to certain people

Looking forward to see more of you guys!
22

thorgolucky

January 24, 2013 at 10:51 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

I love the background music when the geocentrist view is presented.
23

Reginald Selkirk

January 25, 2013 at 10:30 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment

It’s easy taking on an ignoramous like Fernieboy100. But why not step up a bit, and see what a geocentrist with degrees in astrophysics ans astronomy has to say.
Testimony of Gerardus Dingeman Bouw
Bouw is very clear that his geocentrism is motivated by his Christianity.
He’s got some videos on Youtube you might look into.
24

Oakley Gascan

March 16, 2013 at 1:46 am (UTC 0) Link to this comment

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