MovieChat Forums > The Principle (2014) Discussion > Logically flawed and dishonest

Logically flawed and dishonest

posted 10 years ago by zig-fiedorowicz
9 replies | jump to latest

The whole premise of this movie is logically flawed and fundamentally dishonest. Sungenis and his followers are cherry picking from Einstein and the physics derived from his work. On the one hand they claim that Einstein's theory of relativity is an utterly wrong-headed attempt to explain away the Michelson-Morley experiment, which in their view demonstrates that the Earth is absolutely immobile.

But then they argue that their geocentrism is consistent with relativity. But if relativity is utterly wrong, how can they use this to support their premise? The so-called axis of evil in the cosmic background radiation, which seems to be the focus of their film, is an even more egregious example of their style of argument. It follows from Einstein's general relativity that the cosmic background radiation is the afterglow of the big bang, and the axis of evil is a very subtle anisotropy in this radiation. The analysis which underlies finding this anisotropy is entirely based on Einstein's theory. But according to Sungenis, general relativity is entirely wrong and the big bang never happened. So why does the cosmic background radiation tell us anything about the universe? Why does he believe the analysis that reveals this axis of evil, which he claims gives convincing evidence of his geocentric hypothesis?

[–] AureliusBady 10 years ago

I suggest you read the material on http://galileowaswrong.com/ and http://galileowaswrong.blogspot.it/to have a clearer and in depth explanation on what exactly Sungenis' position is.

[–] zig-fiedorowicz 10 years ago

Here is an example of his position:

Dear Robert, what in your judgment are the ‘waters above the heavens’ of Genesis 1?

In Domino, Hugh

R. Sungenis: Hugh, taking Scripture at face value, I believe it teaches that there is a huge mass of water above the material heavens, that is, water that surrounds the material universe completely around the perimeter of its spherical shape. This water is used to cool and humidify the universe. This water originated from the primordial water that surrounded the earth on Day One. The depth of this water was millions or billions of miles with earth in the center like a tiny seed. When the firmament was created on Day Two, it began to expand and thus took the water above the firmament with it, and there it has remained unto this day. (Some of the water remained on earth and was then divided into land and seas). The expansion of the firmament continued on Day Four when the stars were created in the firmament, thus carrying the stars to their various locations in the universe (some near, some far away), and this expansion also explains how starlight could continually shine on the earth from Day Four until the present time, since the firmament expanded in accord with the speed of light.

I have cut and pasted excerpts from GWW, Vol. 2 that gives the scientific, biblical and patristic evidence for these things and put them in a PDF file for you.

[–] AureliusBady 10 years ago

I meant regarding General and Special Relativity, which you find "logically flawed" and "dishonest".

[–] zig-fiedorowicz 10 years ago

My point was that Sungenis is being disingenuous when he claims that, in his view, astronomy went astray with Copernicus and Galileo. Since "waters above the firmament" are not part of Ptolemy's geocentric model of the universe (or Tycho Brahe's), he must believe that astronomy went off the rails long before.

In that case astronomers/cosmologists are either completely deluded at best, or malicious charlatans at worst. So there is no point in using their views on the cosmic microwave background radiation to buttress his own views on cosmology. He might as well have had interviews with astrologers or psychics.

[–] 10 years ago

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[–] jedimcarr 10 years ago

I wouldn't bother with reading that nonsense. It is 100% proven that the earth revolves around the sun. Unless you want to believe we have faked going to space. Our space ships have proven without a doubt the earth is moving. Of course, the telescopes proved that first. Almost nobody believes in this theory, the Catholic Church has declared it nonsense. You probably think the world is flat to while you are at it.

[–] rocinante-421-313928 10 years ago

Relative kinematics can't prove anything about whether the Earth is moving or static. Your example of space ships reflects your complete ignorance on the subject, since all space launches use a coordinate system with a fixed Earth.

[–] rocinante-421-313928 10 years ago

The whole premise of this movie is logically flawed and fundamentally dishonest.

Let's see...

Sungenis and his followers are cherry picking from Einstein and the physics derived from his work.

No, but let's see what you mean by that.

On the one hand they claim that Einstein's theory of relativity is an utterly wrong-headed attempt to explain away the Michelson-Morley experiment, which in their view demonstrates that the Earth is absolutely immobile.

No, they don't claim that. Einstein's theory of relativity is a mathematically valid way to explain the results of the MM experiment. What they claim is that Einstein's theory is given preference on ideological, not scientific grounds.

But then they argue that their geocentrism is consistent with relativity. But if relativity is utterly wrong, how can they use this to support their premise?

No. They argue that geocentrism is consistent with newtonian, machian and einsteinian systems, which would be required to postulate the equivalence above, and therefore the choice made on ideological grounds. They are saying relativity isn't needed once you get the math to work in a purely newtonian universe, not that it's utterly wrong.

[–] sooperklew 8 years ago

Yes you are right.

They are completely dishonest. They don't care because this is lying in the name of god which they consider a virtue.

This all part of the flat earth which is the new face of creationism. We all know how dishonest creationists are.

I came here from youtube when i found out they had one of their stupid videos on IMDB (and i could vote it 1/10). Sadly i can't vote it lower than 1/10.