tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post5879735852633528238..comments2024-02-27T14:15:43.978-06:00Comments on Modern Medievalism: The wrong kind of modern medievalism: GeocentrismThe Modern Medievalisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07238571174836044412noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-69501262565215721562013-12-16T14:33:00.182-06:002013-12-16T14:33:00.182-06:00"whose faith in God would be shattered if the..."whose faith in God would be shattered if they accepted the idea that a judgment from Rome in the 17th century, outside its purview of faith and morality, could be wrong."<br /><br />Which is why they are usually sedevacanists. I'm convinced that the cause of sedevacanism is a view of papal authority that is exadurated as a sort of hyperauthority. When a recent pope does something silly (like JPII kissing the Koran) or is wrong about something they conclude he isn't a real pope. Since geocentrism (outside of the churches authority) was taught in the past either everyone now is wrong, or the seat has been empty for a long long time.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-68904685339369590082013-12-08T02:01:58.392-06:002013-12-08T02:01:58.392-06:00I don't subscribe to either geocentrism or hel...I don't subscribe to either geocentrism or heliocentrism. I hold to an egophallocentric cosmology. I know, I know, it may seem like it moves, but that is not the case. It is in fact a fixed point around which everything else moves. Since other people are moving along with everything else, (and the fact that true scientific observation this brobdingnagian celestial body is precluded by follicular eclipse and considerations of modesty) their error in this matter is quite understandable. Nevertheless, Ptolemy, Aristotle, Sungenis, Galileo, and Copernicus are all incorrect in their marriage of Heaven and Hell. The only great philosopher who got anywhere close to these complex Oedipal truths was Freud, but when you take a face from the ancient gallery, you only get so close to the end. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-36639379269082023702013-12-06T17:49:36.233-06:002013-12-06T17:49:36.233-06:00Sir,
Sungenis has not been respected in the Catho...Sir,<br /><br />Sungenis has not been respected in the Catholic community, even most trad circles, for a while. He now only attracts the sort of people who seriously believe that the Holy Father is part of a Judaeo-Masonic conspiracy to subvert the Church. I mean even several of his former employees have been running back to Rome and sanity faster than you can say "Oremus".Al Javierhttp://law.uci.edunoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-90743907632147562522013-11-14T22:18:32.827-06:002013-11-14T22:18:32.827-06:00Yes, it's interesting that in Dante's Cosm...Yes, it's interesting that in Dante's Cosmology actually Satan is at the center of the Universe. It's the point furthest away from God, Who exists in the infinite periphery. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-19898009049538368672013-11-03T19:51:18.673-06:002013-11-03T19:51:18.673-06:00The purpose of this article isn't to prove the...The purpose of this article isn't to prove the heliocentric model, since there's an overabundance of materials about that already in existence elsewhere on the Internet. The purpose is to be amusing, and, in a roundabout way, state that insisting upon geocentrism as an article of faith because "it is necessary for God to place the earth at the center of the universe" is missing the point of why the earth is at the center in medieval models like the Divine Comedy.The Modern Medievalisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07238571174836044412noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-36832536054690702392013-11-03T01:48:52.412-05:002013-11-03T01:48:52.412-05:00If one is going to challenge another's theory,...If one is going to challenge another's theory, is it necessary to lose one's dignity by hurling a hundred insults? Calm down. It seems that all you can do is put your hands on your hips and demand an explanation for Pluto's speed. Either you know the earth revolves around the sun or you don't. If you claim to know, prove it. If you don't, admit it. All I've really learned here is that geocentrists embarrass you. But that's not science; it's probably closer to revealing the frustrations of a social climber. Hugh Beaumonthttp://www.google.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-26339859524412558622013-11-01T19:00:39.701-05:002013-11-01T19:00:39.701-05:00To be fair to the "new atheists," though...To be fair to the "new atheists," though, what they are more interested in pointing out is that the Church itself clung to the literal, scriptural account when confronted with the scientific theories that contradicted it. Vetus Ordo's excellent summary on the first page of that thread is worth reading.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-3006241732871675272013-11-01T00:04:56.224-05:002013-11-01T00:04:56.224-05:00In truth, I have my own sorts of doubts about how ...In truth, I have my own sorts of doubts about how well scientific models really correspond to "objective" reality beyond a certain point, or rather I perhaps doubt whether we can even meaningfully speak of a reality outside such products of consciousness and interpretation and organization of information BY consciousness. The equations of physics "extrapolated backwards" suggest a universe that started in a singularity that underwent a "big bang." Did that "really" happen. I'm not sure what "really" even means at that point, but I'd suggest that it doesn't matter. That is the result of "rewinding" our equations backwards until they break down entirely. But in some ways I wonder if it's not like watching a guy walk towards the horizon: you see him get smaller and smaller (ie, you get less and less information) until he disappears entirely. I sort of wonder if the "Big Bang" isn't similarly just sort of something like "the limit of our ability to process information any further" because we reach a mathematical horizon. And yet, outside the horizons of consciousness or of information available TO consciousness, what even is reality?<br /><br />But we need to be careful. There is a philosophy that would suggest that scientific empiricism is not merely a very useful tool for making sense of the material world and creating models with great practical success and application, but some sort of gold standard of Truth itself (as if material science has a right to dictate philosophy or epistemology.) No. Science's usefulness does not make debate invalid about the nature of truth, or which modes of subjectivity (of which empiricism is only one) are more or less valid. There are plenty of non-empirical modes of knowledge which can still be affirmed as valid (especially those involving non-quantifiable human realities) and which the Church needs to defend against a "scientism" epistemology which would view ONLY empiricism's information-model as True or Real or deserving of our ontological commitment. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6574198575168538104.post-17795850724390963672013-11-01T00:04:35.787-05:002013-11-01T00:04:35.787-05:00I'm not a "geocentrist," but it'...I'm not a "geocentrist," but it's unclear what exactly we're talking about here, scientifically. <br /><br />Relativity reminds us we can pick any frame of reference. Geocentrism is, ultimately, "just as valid" as heliocentrism because neither is an objective or absolute frame of reference, because there isn't one. Robert Sugenis is as nuts as the "heliocentric absolutists" in some ways, because both are trying to impose objectivity on something that, ultimately, is relative. <br /><br />Using an unmoving sun as the frame of reference makes calculations regarding the planets much easier, but using an unmoving earth as the frame of reference makes calculations regarding the Moon much easier (not to mention everything going on on earth!) <br /><br />Newton's laws explain why your question about why a bigger body would rotate around a smaller body is not exactly an argument "against" so-called "geocentrism." In truth, what's bigger or smaller doesn't matter because for every force there is an equal and opposite force. Gravity does not originate from one mass and get applied to the other, like some sort of tractor beam. Rather, it exists BETWEEN two bodies, is a product of the masses of BOTH bodies involved. The sun does not "hold the earth in orbit with its gravity" as if there is a clear directionality in the relationship like that, but rather the earth and sun are in a mutual gravitational relationship whereby the earth pulls back on the sun as much as the sun is pulling back on the earth (if you don't believe me, remember your basic physics: http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/102/is-gravity-a-force-and-if-so-what-is-its-opposite), though of course the sun is contributing much more mass to the equation. But it is a single equation between the two, shared by both. <br /><br />Ratzinger wrote a good article on this back in 1990: <br />http://ncronline.org/news/ratzingers-1990-remarks-galileo<br /><br />The geocentrism/heliocentrism question, I'd posit, retains emotional force for some not even because of the "the Church can never have been wrong idea!" and retains importance not even so much as a "scientific" question...but rather, I'd argue, as concretely exemplifying certain philosophical debates about epistemology itself. "What is truth?" A "hard" heliocentric opinion (opposed to relativity) assumed that the fact of easier equations (at least as regards the planets, though not the moon, whose motion is most intelligible with reference to an orbit around a stable earth) renders something "more true," as if truth is a question of explanatory efficiency or some sort of mathematical occam's razor.<br /><br />I think the Creationism versus Evolutionism debate shows this too. Creationists (especially of the "Last Thursdayism" variety) can't really be "disproven" in the sense that, sure, it's possible all my memories were created Last Thursday and that the world too was put here "in medias res," but as you say about Aquinas finding this nonsense...this requires an epistemology that is problematic in other ways!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com