On Tuesday, January 22, 2019 at 12:09:35 PM UTC-7, Jibini Kula Tumbili Kujisalimisha wrote:
JBI wrote in :

Kudos to anyone who does, but I think it's
a failing effort.

If there's anyone who does, they should take their meds, too. Gerry
is . . . not quite right in the head.

Oh, dear. Because I had engaged in debate with him until he broke it off, some
time ago, I believe I *do* understand what he's on about. I certainly don't
blame anyone for thinking it's not worth the effort to read enough of what he
has written to find out, though.

But it's not that complicated.

He is full of praise for the accomplishments of Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler,
who showed that the Earth orbits the Sun and not the other way around.

But he draws the line at Newton.

Newton explained how the Solar System works with his law of universal
gravitation, and by applying the same mechanical laws as govern Earthly objects
to the Sun, the planets, and their moons.

He is dead set against that.

From his point of view:

- The celestial realm follows its own rules, and these are, basically, heavenly
mysteries. Instead of trying to figure them out, astronomers should simply enjoy
and appreciate the beautiful spectacle.

- The Earth rotates once every 24 hours (*not* once every 23 hours, 56 minutes,
and 4 seconds) and the Moon does not rotate (rather than rotating once every 27
1/3 days).

The rotation of a body is properly referenced to its primary, not to something
outside the system - the Moon is not to go over the Earth's head to relate to
the Sun or the stars, and the Earth is not to go over the Sun's head to relate
to the stars.

And of course he is impervious to the facts - the Equation of Time in the case
of the Earth, and libration in longitude in the case of the Moon - that show
that only by referencing the rotations of those bodies to the stars does one get
a rotation that is uniform (except for small variations with known physical
causes).

If gravitation is a fiction, and the heavenly bodies don't follow laws like
conservation of angular momentum, how then does one explain the discovery of
Neptune? Again, he will hear none of it.

John Savard