27 February 2011

Galileo was wrong. Vive la Bible! [Part II]

Several months ago, I posted something cynical about a conference organised by geocentrist creationists. It is unbelievable that such idiots can exist. Religion and irrational thought produces all kinds of vegetables. Unfortunately.

The particular movement is headed by a certain Robert Sungenis, who believes that
physics and the Bible prove that the sun and all the planets orbit the Earth and that the Earth does not rotate. In support of his beliefs, Sungenis published the book Galileo Was Wrong in the hope that people will "give Scripture its due place and show that science is not all it's cracked up to be."
This guy lives in the US where he can find lots of similarly-minded deluded morons who "believe" that the earth is still and the centre of the Universe. There are other idiots who believe that the earth is a few thousand years old. Others, believe that the earth is flat. Others believe that the people who wrote the Quran were engaged in embryology. The amount of stupidity in this world is unbounded.

I was reminded of this nonsense this morning, thanks to James B. Phillips who posted the following in my blog:

James said...

Childish name calling is the typical caliber of those who offer their non-substantive denigrations of geocentrism. Often they mock religion in general and Christianity in particular -- the very same people who make a god of and place their materialistic blind faith in science which has a history of making countless errors.

Most moderns who reject geocentrism do so out of an ignornance of the true science involved and or because they are philosophically pre-disposed to refuse to accept the possibility of a God who not only has placed our earth at the center of the universe, but who actually has the entire matererial universe go around that heavaenly body which Jesus Christ lived on in the flesh some 2000 years ago.

See www.galileowaswrong.com and galileowaswrong.blogspot.com.

James B. Phillips 

The reason that the world is full of problems is because there are uneducated, deluded, irrational individuals like the aforementioned individuals. They pose a threat to civilisation itself because they can easily attract supporters who are ready to believe anything irrational as a substitute for possible real problems. People use irrational behaviour as a drug. And these people are as dangerous as drug dealers. Perhaps more so.

12 comments:

  1. Well, for a fellow who arrogates to himself the claim to advance rigor and rationality, you seem awfully quick on the invective and ad hominem button, Mr. Takis.

    In the altogether admirable interest of advancing "rigor and rationality", would you be so kind as to provide us the specific scientific experiment which demonstrates that Einstein has it wrong below:

    "The struggle, so violent in the early days of science, between the views of Ptolemy and Copernicus would then be quite meaningless. Either CS [coordinate system] could be used with equal justification. The two sentences, 'the sun is at rest and the earth moves', or 'the sun moves and the earth is at rest', would simply mean two different conventions concerning two different CS [coordinate systems]."---"The Evolution of Physics: From Early Concepts to Relativity and Quanta, Albert Einstein and Leopold Infeld, New York, Simon and Schuster 1938, 1966 p.212

    Since you are a man of rigor and rationality, I expect we will have an answer long on substance and short on vituperative hand-waving bluster.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Rick DeLano:

    Please formulate your request more accurately/rigorously.

    Thanks

    ReplyDelete
  3. Takis, Robert Sungenis here. Here's a good way to prove your point: since you are a "professor of science," give us just one proof of heliocentrism, and we'll go away. Promise. Make sure the proof is one that can hold up under scrutiny, because we are going to run it through scientific rigor to make sure you're right and then post it on your blog. By the way, the earth is round. Perhaps you can start your proof from there. Looking forward to hearing from you.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Takis,

    At http://randomprocessed.blogspot.com/2010/11/galileo-was-wrong-vive-la-bible.html you assert that the Catholic Church acknowledged that it was wrong on geocentrism. I hate to disabuse you of that notion, but contrary to popular myth and whatever you may have read or heard on the subject, the Catholic Church has never acknowledged that it was wrong on geocentrism. Furthermore, no one in all of history has ever proven -- actually proven -- that the Earth moves in space. If you want to be the first to prove it be my guest.

    James B. Phillips

    ReplyDelete
  5. James:
    My information comes from articles such as:
    http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg13618460.600-vatican-admits-galileo-was-right-.html
    Whether that fellow, namely Karol Józef Wojtyła, also known as John Paul, actually said that Galileo was right or not is a matter of recent history and can easily be verified. What I said, however, is that whether an arbitrary, scientifically illiterate individual, such as Karol Józef Wojtyła, said so or not is irrelevant.

    Robert:
    What is most hilarious in your case is that you base your beliefs in the Bible! Why not in Odyssey? Or the Quran? Or the Avesta? If you knew Greek, I'd refer you to people like Dimosthenis Liakopoulos
    http://www.liako.gr/intro/
    whom you would find a like-minded fellow.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Why, Mr. Takis. Imagine. You have no answer to my challenge.

    This ought to embarrass your followers no end.

    Provided of course you have any.

    Perhaps they will come to recognize in you an hypocrite much more ignoble than an honest work-a -day drug dealer, who at least gives value for value received, unlike you, who cannot even answer a simple question.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Rick DeLano:

    I repeat that I asked you above to formulate your request more accurately and rigorously, because I have no clue what you are saying or why.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Takis, the article you refer to, the likes of which you admit to relying on states: "Pope John Paul II officially declared that Galileo was right." That sir is a damnable falsehood. John Paul II never declared any such thing.

    Perhaps, now you might wish to promote rigour and rationality by actubg in a "properly scientific way" by showing the language in and the proper identity of any official Papal document whatsoever upon which your supposed claim exists.

    JBP

    ReplyDelete
  9. James:

    I heard it on the news at the time (BBC) and also read it on newspapers as well as the article I quoted above. It's also written on wikipedia. Unfortunately, I have no direct access to the Vatican to verify it.

    You claim that all these sources have lied. OK, let me then temporarily accept what you say. Since you seem to be so upset you must have a proof.

    So, what?

    Who cares what the Pope said?

    It still remains major crackpottery to try to believe that the Earth is still and only a few thousand years old. Regardless of whether the Pope says so or not.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Takis, if you don't care what the pope says you shouldn't have made an issue of it in the first place. As for not having access to the Vatican that is one more falsehood. Anyone with access to the Internet can view Papal documents online via the Vatican's website as well as various other Catholic websites.

    As for where you may have heard your falsehood about what you stated about the Catholic Church that is irrelevant unless the source is credible. The BBC is blatantly anti-Catholic and as such is notoriously unreliable as a source of information on what is actually happening or has happened in the Catholic Church. (Don't let the facts get in the way of your obvious anti-Catholic prejudices!)

    As for the Wikipedia which you cite, it does not say what you claim it says about John Paul II and even if it did as a scientist who supposedly promotes "rigour and rationality" you should be ashamed of relying on such a bubble gum source of information as that Judaic censoring misinformation/disinformation entity.

    You go on to state: "It still remains major crackpottery to try to believe that the Earth is still and only a few thousand years old." These type of continual statements on your part indicate that your mind is closed to an examination of the underlying facts supporting geocentrism and refuting heliocentrism. That is particularly sad coming from a supposed scientist who claims to promote "rigour and rationality." THUS IT IS THAT YOU WON'T BE HEARING FROM ME ANYMORE.

    You can now go back to burying your head in your obvious contempt of the Catholic Church which by the way has actually done more to support science than any other entity in the history of the human race.

    JBP

    ReplyDelete
  11. James:

    I told you what my references are.
    Explicitly.
    If you think that BBC, Reuters, the New Scientist, etc, are lying about what Karol Józef Wojtyła said, then, I agreed to take your opinion into account.

    However, the entry in my blog was not about Karol Józef Wojtyła, but about creationists who come up with incredible nonsense such as that the Earth is still. And they quote the anachronistic Bible as a credible source. The discussion is about this kind of idiocy.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Robert:

    I took a look at your credentials here and here. You tried to study in accredited institutions but you were rejected. You then found a non-accredited institution, Calamus Extension College, which offers degrees (by correspondence) on such crackpottery subjects as Holistic Studies, Homeopathy, Contemporary Spirituality, Regression and Reincarnation Studies (!!!), Parapsychology, Metaphysics, Hypnotherapy, Healing Studies, Transpersonal Psychology (including reincarnation, psychosynthesis and spirit release), Esoteric Studies, and Consciousness Studies, among others. Every possible bogus subject is mentioned. I have never seen a place offering so much junk altogether. You got your PhD from this institution in 2006 on geocentrism.

    Your credentials are not just zero, but negative: anyone who comes in contact with subjects such as the ones mentioned above is probably brain-damaged. Despite the very likely fact that you do not know elementary algebra, you have the guts to speak about Relativity in relation to your theological claims. How can anyone understand, not relativity, but even elementary Euclidean geometry, with a degree from Calamus Extension College? Impossible!

    ReplyDelete




T H E B O T T O M L I N E

What measure theory is about

It's about counting, but when things get too large.
Put otherwise, it's about addition of positive numbers, but when these numbers are far too many.

The principle of dynamic programming

max_{x,y} [f(x) + g(x,y)] = max_x [f(x) + max_y g(x,y)]

The bottom line

Nuestras horas son minutos cuando esperamos saber y siglos cuando sabemos lo que se puede aprender.
(Our hours are minutes when we wait to learn and centuries when we know what is to be learnt.) --António Machado

Αγεωμέτρητος μηδείς εισίτω.
(Those who do not know geometry may not enter.) --Plato

Sapere Aude! Habe Muth, dich deines eigenen Verstandes zu bedienen!
(Dare to know! Have courage to use your own reason!) --Kant