February 22, 2007

Down With Copernicanism

Apparently, not only is evolution evil and bad, but Copernicus was evil as well. Quoting from the Fixed Earth site:

The Bible and all real evidence confirms that this is precisely what He did, and indeed:

The Earth is not rotating...nor is it going around the sun.

And on, and on, like that. I love these rant sites. They are always formatted to be almost completely unreadable. In the old days, before the Interweb Tubes, this is the kind of stuff that insane people would hand you as a couple of photocopied sheets. Inexplicable rants typed on a Royal typewriter by a nut job and passed around as a way to see The Truth™.

These were always fun little rants to read on the train on the way home from work. It was always some wacky nonsense about evolution being demonic, or the early being flat. What's sad is that nowadays some of these things that used to be just the domain of lunatics are now mainstream political ideas.

What happens when we given into this notion that self-proclaimed religious zealots can say this science is wrong because it contradicts our thousand year old screed? What if the right is actually succesful in banning the teaching of evolution? Is teaching that the Earth doesn't rotate around the Sun next? How far do we take it? The bible doesn't say anything about TVs, should we destroy all those? It doesn't say anything about electricity, should we all live in the dark?

And what is it about Copernicus with this guy? Fundamentalists believe elvolution is evil because it implies that no intelligent creator fashioned man as a special act, thus un-hooking man from the notion of a divine creator and thus potentially alleviating a lot of sin. But the Earth rotating around the Sun? Why is that so important? I just don't get it, but then I really don't understand fundamentalism either.

Posted by jherr at February 22, 2007 01:28 PM
Comments

Snopes has your answer about rotation:

http://www.snopes.com/religion/lostday.htm

Posted by: Eric at February 22, 2007 03:02 PM

The link you provides goes to a fascinating story about a supposed missing day in the past found by NASA engineers looking to avoid future collisions (?).

It doesn't talk about this nutcase's theory which is that the Earth is currently standing still (not even rotating) and that the Sun, planets and the stars all rotate around it.

Posted by: jherr at February 22, 2007 09:21 PM

The verses from the Book of Joshua quoted in the previous link are key. Here's Martin Luther talking about Copernicus:

"There is talk of a new astrologer who wants to prove that the earth moves and goes around instead of the sky, the sun, the moon, just as if somebody were moving in a carriage or ship might hold that he was sitting still and at rest while the earth and the trees walked and moved. But that is how things are nowadays: when a man wishes to be clever he must . . . invent something special, and the way he does it must needs be the best! The fool wants to turn the whole art of astronomy upside-down. However, as Holy Scripture tells us, so did Joshua bid the sun to stand still and not the earth."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliocentrism

A web search on "joshua rotation earth sun" will turn up lots more of what you are talking about.

Posted by: Eric at February 23, 2007 12:13 AM

ok the link you really want is

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_geocentrism

Posted by: Eric at February 23, 2007 08:23 AM

I think I get it now. What's clear to me is that some Christians are being pick and choosy about what they decide to take umbrage at. All of the Christians I know fail to follow 100% of the teachings of the bible (e.g. most wear leather, etc.).

They don't like science though, so this is just a way of making an enemy out of science by finding some a place where science doesn't match up with the bible. And in this case the passages that relate to the relation of the Earth and the Sun are really vague.

Posted by: jherr at February 23, 2007 11:54 AM
Post a comment

Thanks for signing in, . Now you can comment. (sign out)

(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)


Remember me?