Reopening the case against Galileo

Astropolis

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I have to confess that I'm mildly concerned by some of the opinions expressed on this forum.

The problem is that once there were people who, quite sincerely, believed that God was calling them to attack Galileo, even threaten him with violence, because they believed that scripture commanded a geocentric model of the universe. This of course we now know to be seriously false, and Galileo's work combined with Kepler's was used by Newton to develop a system of mechanics which in the end took us to the moon.

(An aside on this is that I have once personally had a moon rock, a golfball sized lump of Lunar Basalt, in my hand, a strange and very moving experience.)

The point is that the attack on Galileo was conducted by people who completely sincerely believed that scripture commanded them to believe in a geocentric universe.

What concerns me is that the same kind of people now believe that scripture commands them to attack the idea of evolution, on the same quality of evidence.

If you believe that scripture commands you to believe in special creation, you should also, on the same grounds, believe that the earth is the centre of the universe, discard every astronomical observation made since the 17th century, and believe that satnav and satellite TV simply don't exist.

Any takers?
 

ananda

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If the earth is alleged to spin on its axis at approximately 1,040 mph at the equator, and the earth is alleged to move around the sun at 67,062 mph and the solar system is alleged to spin around the galactic center at 514,000mph, and the galaxy is alleged to be moving at 2.24 million mph ... Altogether, when added together, if the Earth is alleged to move at multi millions of miles per hour in a careening fashion across the universe ...

1. Why do I observe that the stars stay in the same position night after night, year after year? They should be in different places all the time;
2. Why don't airplane pilots have to make 1,040 mph compensations when flying east to west? Why are their flight calculations (to my knowledge) based on a fixed, unmoving earth? Why is it possible for airplanes to fly west to east? If an average airplane is traveling at 600mph, and it travels eastward, then according to the heliocentric theory, it is actually losing ground westward hour by hour because the earth beneath is traveling 1,040mph eastward (400mph faster than the airplane can travel!);
3. Regarding point 2, if the response is because the atmosphere is (allegedly) rotating along with the earth at 1,040mph, then why can clouds travel in various directions? Why can a little mosquito fly in whatsoever direction against this alleged immense gravitational pull which pulls along the atmosphere? How do satellites stay in perfect synchronous orbit around the earth when the earth is drunkenly traveling millions of miles per hour around the universe? How far up must one go before one is no longer pulled in any significant way by the earth's gravitational pull?

IMO geocentricity makes more sense.
 
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loveofourlord

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If the earth is alleged to spin on its axis at approximately 1,040 mph at the equator, and the earth is alleged to move around the sun at 67,062 mph and the solar system is alleged to spin around the galactic center at 514,000mph, and the galaxy is alleged to be moving at 2.24 million mph ... Altogether, when added together, if the Earth is alleged to move at multi millions of miles per hour in a careening fashion across the universe ... why do I observe that the stars stay in the same position night after night, year after year? They should be in different places all the time. Geocentricity makes more sense.

Parallax, as it currently is, we can barly see a shift in stars a few dozen light years at different times of the year with our best telescopes. Most of the stars in the sky we see are in our galaxy so are moving relative to us, and it's only the yearly shift of the planet that really has much of a effect on the parallax. And the positions do change it's just so barly noticable because of how slow it is, if you were to live in the time of the dinosaurs, you barly if at all be able to reconize any of the constelations we have now.
 
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Chriliman

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It makes complete sense to me for us humans to "evolve" into spiritual beings who will live for eternity with God. Did the early hominoids have any idea what today's society would be like? Nope. Do we have any idea what an eternal spiritual life is going to be like? Nope, except for what scripture attempts to describe. God intended for us to "evolve" from dust of the earth to son's of God. The word "evolve" is just an under-defined term that actually applies to much more that just natural evolution. It can apply to the evolution that will take place when we meet our creator.

1 Corinthians 15:52
"in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed"

Proof of evolution, right there in the Bible.

God bless!
 
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AV1611VET

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Any takers?
Should we believe the earth is flat as well?

The thing with Galileo is that the ruling ecclesiastical organization of the time was slow to accept geocentrism -- as it should have been.

During this incubation period, when science was in probate over this issue, Galileo was placed under house arrest -- a move that, in my opinion, was the LORD's doing.

Under house arrest, free from distractions, and having plenty of time on his hands, Galileo finished two of his most important works.

Let me ask you this:

Do you expect me to believe that Galileo's contemporary astronomers all bought his heliocentric model?

Or did Galileo stand practically alone among his educated contemporaries?

Let's not just lay this at the church's feet.
 
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marvmax

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The point is that the attack on Galileo was conducted by people who completely sincerely believed that scripture commanded them to believe in a geocentric universe.
You should actually do some study on the actual reasons that Galileo was opposed by the Catholic Church. It was due as much to political concerns and personality conflicts with Galileo as it was the science, which is exactly the same situation today. Any questioning of accepted scientific dogma is attacked for all of the same political reasons that Galileo was attacked. It is amazing to me that those who do the attacking don't see the resemblance.
 
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sfs

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You should actually do some study on the actual reasons that Galileo was opposed by the Catholic Church. It was due as much to political concerns and personality conflicts with Galileo as it was the science, which is exactly the same situation today.
Which is to say, it was both.

Any questioning of accepted scientific dogma is attacked for all of the same political reasons that Galileo was attacked. It is amazing to me that those who do the attacking don't see the resemblance.
I don't see the resemblance because it wasn't scientists who attacked Galileo; it was church authorities. And he wasn't attacked for misrepresenting or ignoring scientific data.
 
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marvmax

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marvmax

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I don't see the resemblance because it wasn't scientists who attacked Galileo; it was church authorities. And he wasn't attacked for misrepresenting or ignoring scientific data.
So when a judge sides with the "scientific consensus", just like the Catholic Church, and says that a state must stop saying that there might be some problems with evolution, not that it must stop teaching that there are problems, just saying there might be, that not similar? I find your reasoning astounding.
 
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sfs

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Soyeong

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Galileo's contemporaries had good reason to reject heliocentrism because if heliocentrism were true, then they should have been able to observe parallax in stars, but a telescope powerful enough to obverse that didn't exist during his time, so he couldn't prove it, which is what the Pope asked him to do. His house arrest was not because he went against the consensus, but because he insulted the Pope.
 
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joshua 1 9

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2. Why don't airplane pilots have to make 1,040 mph compensations when flying east to west?


How far up must one go before one is no longer pulled in any significant way by the earth's gravitational pull?.
That is an interesting thought. Maybe we can invent a whole new way to travel.
 
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joshua 1 9

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Galileo's work combined with Kepler's was used by Newton to develop a system of mechanics which in the end took us to the moon.
Any takers?
But was not good enough to get us to Mars.
 
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dgiharris

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Here's a pretty good article that explains the Catholic Churches side of things http://www.catholic.com/tracts/the-galileo-controversy. It does a pretty good job but the key thing in it is that many of the Jesuits agreed with Galilleo.

I find some of the claims in the article a bit hard to believe. The article reads to me as a bit of retroactive apologetic revisionism.

It reminds me of Executive level white washing after a huge mistake was made and the Executive who made the mistake is trying to cover his butt.

However, what I can rightly believe (which was mentioned in the article) is that the geocentric model does make a lot of scientific sense simply because the technology and science at the time would have had a difficult time disproving it.

What I can't believe from the article is how the article places the blame for Galileo's imprisonment on Galileo because he insulted the Pope.

When Galileo wrote the Dialogue on the Two World Systems, he used an argument the pope had offered, and placed it in the mouth of his character Simplicio. Galileo, perhaps inadvertently, made fun of the pope, a result that could only have disastrous consequences. Urban felt mocked and could not believe how his friend could disgrace him publicly.

Sorry, I just can't buy it. Galileo knew the truth and he wanted to get the truth out there and the Church was mad that he would have the audacity to call the Church out for being wrong or tell the Church how they were in error in interpreting biblical passages.
 
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dgiharris

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But was not good enough to get us to Mars.
We've had the technology to get to Mars and back for decades. It is simply a matter of cost and priorities. Unfortunately for mankind, the US/USSR(former) Defense Industrial Complex makes more money with Defense spending than Space related ventures. So they had shifted the focus from Space to the Cold War. So instead of having a Space Station and Lunar Colony and mining Asteroids, we have trillions of dollars worth of nuclear missiles pointed at each other.

As a former scientist, it makes me incredibly sad to see the State of our Space program. The difference between where we are vs where we should be breaks my heart.

There are trillions of dollars in profit in Space. When most people think of money in Space, they think of Space Tourism. But there is so much more. Manufacturing in Space would have a lot of advantages that are just not available on Earth. Then there is mining in Space. Lastly, there are a host of unanticipated discoveries and technological advancements that would have been made from solving Space related problems once the industry started developing.

There are tons of various Space engines on the drawing board, some really cool Star Trek type stuff.

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/enginelist.php

Basically, if we had devoted 25% of the resources that we spend on War and instead invested in Space, things would be remarkably different now. We'd have a Lunar Colony and Space Stations and Space Manufacturing facilities and our technology level would be much higher based on all the ancillary technological discoveries that you simply can't predict.

*sigh*

but you don't know what you don't know and we have no idea on all the cool stuff we are missing out on :(
 
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dgiharris

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That is an interesting thought. Maybe we can invent a whole new way to travel.

I think you missed the spirit of his post. Basically, he is arguing that from an observational point of view, geocentricism makes more sense especially when one does not have Newtons Laws to fall back on.

As for inventing whole new ways to travel. I would recommend that you become a Science Fiction reader. You'd be amazed how much thought has gone into Space travel.

One of my favorites is a concept called the Space Elevator or Beanstalk. Essentially, it is an elevator that goes from the Earth all the way to Geosynchronous Orbit!!!!
 
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ananda

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We've had the technology to get to Mars and back for decades. It is simply a matter of cost and priorities. Unfortunately for mankind, the US/USSR(former) Defense Industrial Complex makes more money with Defense spending than Space related ventures. So they had shifted the focus from Space to the Cold War. So instead of having a Space Station and Lunar Colony and mining Asteroids, we have trillions of dollars worth of nuclear missiles pointed at each other.
It would only take a drop in the bucket - 4% of the 2014 US budget ($153 billion) - to go (allegedly) back to the moon, using the 1969 budget factored for inflation.
 
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