May 2, 2010

  • Question 246 – Proof that the earth indeed rotates about its axis

    Dear Robert,

     

    I spoke with a Traditional Catholic Pilot, and he told me that planes have navigational inertial computers such that longitude and latitude are entered and the rotation of the earth about its axis is compensated for in travel calculations.

     

    R. Sungenis: Roger, vague and ambiguous claims don’t mean anything. Before you make any conclusions about this, ask the pilot what he means when he says “the rotation of the earth about its axis is compensated for in travel calculation.” What is being compensated for, and how is it compensated, and by what means is it compensated? If he is merely talking about the different rates of rotation he must calculate at the equator as opposed to other latitudes, then that doesn’t prove anything for you. See below.

     

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    Roger: This can be demonstrated by comparing the time it takes to walk the same distance at the same speed, against a tread mill compared to walking with(opposite direction) the tread mill.

    R. Sungenis: Analogies with tread mills don’t prove the earth is rotating, since tread mills don’t have gravity and centrifugal forces significant enough to affect your body. A plane traveling east or west is heavily influenced by both.

     

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    Roger: Also he said that the earth's rotation about its axis is calculated for, in re-entry of space craft such as the space shuttle, into the earth's atmosphere to determine landing position.

    R. Sungenis: But it doesn’t prove the earth is rotating. It only proves that the space shuttle has to calculate where the landing spot will be before it lands. Whether the earth is rotating (against the shuttle) or the universe is rotating (with the shuttle) is not something that can be determined by the space shuttle. If the universe, with the space shuttle in tow, is rotating around the earth, it will appear to the astronauts in the space shuttle that the earth is rotating.

    Moreover, the same centrifugal, Coriolis and Euler forces will be present whether the universe is rotating with the shuttle around the earth or the earth is rotating in fixed universe against the shuttle. There is no difference between the two systems. Unfortunately, you are not grasping that fact, and this misunderstanding leads to your use of tread mill analogies that don’t prove your point.

     

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    Roger: If the sun were orbiting the earth, then the earth's gravity would have to be so tremendously strong to keep the sun in orbit, causing the moon to orbit around the earth at a phenomenal rate (faster than one orbit per hour) and no one would be able to walk but people would collapse into the earth.

    R. Sungenis: No, and unfortunately, this is the most misunderstood aspect of the whole discussion. Granted, if you had only the sun and the earth in the system, the sun could never revolve around the earth. That’s called a “two-body system” in physics. But our universe is not a two-body system. There are trillions of stars, each with its own gravitational pull, that affect our earth-sun system.

    Popular science has already admitted this, since it believes the sun revolves around stars in the center of the Milky Way galaxy, and the Milky Way revolves around other systems. Hence, if the center of the Milky Way galaxy affects the sun, you can depend upon it that the stars surrounding the sun & earth in the geocentric system greatly affect the sun & earth.

    As such, the stars can be strategically placed so that the earth can serve as the center of mass of the universe. Newton already admitted this. In his Principia he writes: “That the center of the system of the world is immovable. This is acknowledged by all, although some contend that the Earth, others that the sun, is fixed in that center” (Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Book 3: The System of the World, Proposition X, Hypothesis I)

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    Roger: This can be demonstrated by swinging a tennis ball attached to a string around with one's arm and finding that by pulling the string inwards, the tennis ball orbits at a much faster rate due to centripetal and centrifugal force.

    R. Sungenis: The tennis ball will revolve around the center of mass, whatever occupies that position. The center of mass is determined by the mass and distance among ALL the bodies in the system, not just two or three. Centrifugal and centripetal force for each body will then be calculated once the center of mass is known. Again, when you have more than a two-body system, the center of mass will be determined by balancing all the remaining masses in the system. Any point or body can serve as the center of mass (sun, earth, Jupiter, Pluto, etc). It all depends on how the masses of the universe are distributed.

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    Roger: Also, seasons are caused by the angle at which the rays of the sun strike the earth. The tilt the rotation of the earth about its axis is on, is what causes the angle of the suns rays to change the way they strike the earth in its orbit around the sun causing the four seasons.

    R. Sungenis: That’s only one possibility. The upward or downward movement of the sun in its horizontal plane going around a fixed earth can also cause the seasons.

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    Roger: It is not De Fide, part of the Deposit of the Faith, that which was Divinely Revealed before the death of Saint John the Apostle, whether the sun goes around the earth, or the earth goes around the sun.  I believe that there never has been an Ex Cathedra pronouncement about something concerning Physics.  We are not bound under pain of mortal sin to believe one way or the other about the earth and the sun.

    R. Sungenis: But you are bound to believe that what Scripture says is true, under pain of mortal sin. You are not permitted to depart from the literal interpretation of Scripture unless you have good and sufficient reason to do so.

    As such, Scripture never says the earth moves. It always says the sun and moon and stars move.

    This was the very argument that St. Robert Bellarmine gave to Galileo, and which was endorsed by Pope Paul V.

    So, if you want to conclude that you can dismiss the literal meaning of Scripture and are convinced instead that science has proven that the earth moves, then what you will need to do is prove that the earth moves. So far you haven’t done so, since each scenario you pose above can be equally explained by a fixed earth in a rotating universe. If you have proof, Roger, then it must be irrefutable and incontrovertible, otherwise you are bound not to depart from the literal meaning of Scripture, under pain of mortal sin.

    Moreover, if you call yourself a “traditionalist,” the tradition of the Church is against you: the Fathers in unanimous consent, the medieval in unanimous consent, the Pius V catechism, numerous popes, with one pope in 1633 approving a judgment by the Sacred Congregation stating that to say the sun revolves around the earth is “formally heretical,” and no pope or council afterward officially endorsing heliocentrism or stating that the Catholic Church no longer officially believes in geocentrism. The official decrees against heliocentrism have never been rescinded.

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    Roger: If we were bound to believe under pain of mortal sin in a particular way concerning the earth and the sun, then many would be condemned.  For example, my Mother (a devout Traditional Catholic) was taught in elementary school in Colombia, Long before Vatican II, Colombia being one of the most Truly Catholic Countries of that time, in science class by Truly Catholic Nuns, that the earth goes around the sun.

    R. Sungenis: Your mother is not responsible for what her ecclesiastical authorities told her. That is why St. James tells us in James 3:1 “Let not many of you be teachers, brethren, since we will sustain the harsher judgment.” There are many ecclesiastical authorities today who have sinned against God and the Church by reinterpreting Scripture to their own liking. God will judge them for that breach. For example, there are popes and cardinals who personally believe that Scripture contains errors, yet this was never taught in the tradition of our Church. It only came into vogue in the 20th century, a time of great apostasy. So it doesn’t surprise me today to see high ranking clerics teach that we can ignore the traditional and literal meaning of Scripture.