Holocaust Denial and Blatant Anti-Semitism? - The Principle (2014) Discussion

[–] logan-duk-dong 11 years ago

Deeply troubling that anyone over the age of 12 would think geocentrism is where it's at, but it's one thing to be associated with stupid and another to be associated with this guy.

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

In 2014, Sungenis funded the production of a geocentrist film called The Principle, which is narrated by Kate Mulgrew and features an interview with Lawrence Krauss; the latter has since said he was featured in the film without permission and agrees with the scientific community that geocentrism has been thoroughly debunked. Mulgrew's public statement on her Facebook page announces that her beliefs fall in line with Krauss's assertions, and mentions that she was "a voice for hire, and a misinformed one, at that."[14] Of the film, Krauss said that if people ignore it, “Maybe then it will quickly disappear into the dustbin of history, where it belongs.”[15]

Just because someone is holding out a paycheck doesn't mean you have to take it. Maybe next time she'll spend a few minutes looking into perspective employers...

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[–] CommieTT 11 years ago

Lawrence Krauss has written about this nonsensical film in an article on Slate:
I Have No Idea How I Ended Up in That Stupid Geocentrism Documentary
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/04/08/lawrence_krauss_on_ ending_up_in_the_geocentricism_documentary_the_principle.html

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[–] flamesworld 11 years ago

Kate Mulgrew along with several others were duped into doing this. She was a voice for hire, others also had clips taken out of context.

Had she known the true intention of this "documentary", she would have declined. It was a voiceover job to her, nothing more. She was just given her text to read, and what *she* said didn't ring any alarms.

These right-wing freaks simply cannot do anything without trickery.
http://thinkprogress.org/culture/2014/04/08/3424505/kate-mulgrew-duped /

In her own words, from the above link:

I understand there has been some controversy about my participation in a documentary called THE PRINCIPLE. Let me assure everyone that I completely agree with the eminent physicist Lawrence Krauss, who was himself misrepresented in the film, and who has written a succinct rebuttal in SLATE. I am not a geocentrist, nor am I in any way a proponent of geocentrism. More importantly, I do not subscribe to anything Robert Sungenis has written regarding science and history and, had I known of his involvement, would most certainly have avoided this documentary. I was a voice for hire, and a misinformed one, at that. I apologize for any confusion that my voice on this trailer may have caused.

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[–] rocinante-421-313928 11 years ago

Kate Mulgrew was hired to do it, she should complain to her agent.

As far as I know, Krauss wasn't quoted out of context. He was interviewed for more than 5 hours for the movie due to his previous remarks on the geocentric orientation of the CMB poles. Here's what he said in 2006:

That is, we live in one universe, so we're a sample of one. With a sample of one, you have what is called a large sample variance. And maybe this just means we're lucky, that we just happen to live in a universe where the number's smaller than you'd predict. But when you look at CMB map, you also see that the structure that is observed, is in fact, in a weird way, correlated with the plane of the earth around the sun. Is this Copernicus coming back to haunt us? That's crazy. We're looking out at the whole universe. There's no way there should be a correlation of structure with our motion of the earth around the sun — the plane of the earth around the sun — the ecliptic. That would say we are truly the center of the universe.

The new results are either telling us that all of science is wrong and we're the center of the universe, or maybe the data is imply incorrect, or maybe it's telling us there's something weird about the microwave background results and that maybe, maybe there's something wrong with our theories on the larger scales. And of course as a theorist I'm certainly hoping it's the latter, because I want theory to be wrong, not right, because if it's wrong there's still work left for the rest of us.

http://edge.org/conversation/the-energy-of-empty-space-that-isn-39t-zero

I'm pretty sure that's what he was hired to talk about in the movie, and that's perfectly within the context, since with the release of the Planck probe data and confirmation that the issue is not a data blip, there's no other current explanation for the phenomenon other than coincidence. That Krauss claims he has no idea how he ended in a movie about geocentrism after admitting how the CMB orientation could show that the Earth is truly the center of the universe seems dishonest.

I don't know what the other physicists are talking about, but I doubt they are being quoted out of context.

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[–] chizzlewit 10 years ago

Unfortunately, Krauss was corrected in his assertions, since the CMB anomalies - even if they are real - don't magically prove the Earth is at the center of the universe.

Not only were the maps made from the L2 point, and not Earth (meaning that, if you want to play that game, then it's the L2 point that is at the center of the universe, and not Earth), but also the anomaly would exist for every body in the solar system and every stellar system in the universe with an inclination the same as ours.
So, if you want to claim the CMB means the Earth inhabits a "special place", then it also means that every body in the solar system also does, and so does every stellar system in the universe with the same inclination.

Whoops.

And, yes, the other physicists are being quoted out of context. Shortly after getting in touch with Barbour about this, he released a statement explaining that his much-touted by geocentrists paper, "Gravity and Inertia in a Machian Framework" (co-authored with Bertotti, in 1977), actually has the Earth moving around the Sun, making it not a geocentric paper in the first place.

Do any of the physicists involved explain the fact that the universe doesn't act like it has Sungenis' magical center of mass, as they would if anybody explicitly asked them about his conjectures?
If it really was a "fair and balanced film" - and not just a polemic that puts even Michael Moore to shame, as it clearly appears to be - then it would include these points.

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[–] rocinante-421-313928 10 years ago

Unfortunately, Krauss was corrected in his assertions, since the CMB anomalies - even if they are real - don't magically prove the Earth is at the center of the universe.

That's fine. Nobody says the CMB anomalies alone prove the Earth is at the center of the universe, that's just another piece of the puzzle. If Krauss were intellectually honest, the correct attitude would be saying something like:

"Years ago I made an statement that supported some geocentrist claims about the CMB anomalies and they hired me to talk about that in a documentary. That statement was later corrected and I no longer support it, but I needed the money so I did the documentary anyway."

Instead, he opted for being dishonest and claims he has no idea how he ended in the documentary. Not nice, but Krauss is obviously more concerned with his public image as militant atheist icon than with his intellectual honesty.

Not only were the maps made from the L2 point, and not Earth (meaning that, if you want to play that game, then it's the L2 point that is at the center of the universe, and not Earth)

Wait... first you said that the CMB anomalies don't magically prove the Earth is at the center of the universe, but now your argument is that if the satellites were at L2, that would mean the center of universe is at L2? Please, make up your mind. If you're going to use that straw man as an argument, try to at least make it consistent with your other arguments, because it makes you look like a fool.

Obviously that's a straw man. First of all, nobody claims the CMB anomalies prove the Earth is at the center of the universe. They claim some of the modes show some mutual alignment between themselves, the equinoxes and the ecliptic plane, which breaks the assumption of isotropy. That's all, nothing more, nothing less. Second, the fact that the measurement is made from L2 is irrelevant, since the issue is the alignment, not whether there's some magic property in the CMB that says the Earth is at the center. There's your straw man again.

I don't believe you made that mistake in good faith. Please, stop bluffing. If you want to have a serious conversation, read the book and I'm all for it. If you want to scare me with this cheap rhetoric, I really have better things to do with my time. I'm on my day off and I was planning to play Kerbal Space Program today.

but also the anomaly would exist for every body in the solar system and every stellar system in the universe with an inclination the same as ours.

Sure, and wouldn't exist for all the others. Where's your isotropic universe now, huh?

So, if you want to claim the CMB means the Earth inhabits a "special place", then it also means that every body in the solar system also does, and so does every stellar system in the universe with the same inclination.

Nobody is making that claim. That's your straw man again.

And, yes, the other physicists are being quoted out of context.

I don't know. I haven't seen the documentary yet. I know Krauss isn't, and I know the book Galileo Was Wrong has more than enough valid quotations to substantiate that.

Shortly after getting in touch with Barbour about this, he released a statement explaining that his much-touted by geocentrists paper, "Gravity and Inertia in a Machian Framework" (co-authored with Bertotti, in 1977), actually has the Earth moving around the Sun, making it not a geocentric paper in the first place.

I never read that, but it sounds like Barbour himself is confusing ptolemaic and neo-tychonean geocentrism. Maybe he thinks he's being quoted saying the Earth is the center of the solar system, not the center of the universe. The case he uses in his paper, p. 98, clearly fits the neo-tychonean model:

"Let us first consider the case when the massive body is a rigid, uniform shell of mass Mo and radius Ro [e.g., the universe]. The test body [e.g., the Earth] is near the center of the shell (coincident with the center of the cosmological shell and the origin of co-ordinates); thus ri << Ro.

That looks very geocentric to me. If he's saying that's not geocentric, I'm curious to read the statement he released, but I couldn't find that anywhere. Can you share a link?

Do any of the physicists involved explain the fact that the universe doesn't act like it has Sungenis' magical center of mass, as they would if anybody explicitly asked them about his conjectures?

You're repeating the same rant you came up in the other topic. Please, read the answers to Alec MacAndrew, and if that doesn't settle it for you, we can discuss your objections, if you can present them as a civilized adult.

If it really was a "fair and balanced film" - and not just a polemic that puts even Michael Moore to shame, as it clearly appears to be - then it would include these points.

As I said, I haven't seen the film yet. Have you? The book Galileo Was Wrong is pretty fair and balanced, so I see no reason to believe the documentary by the same authors won't be fair and balanced too. From what I heard about it by people who saw it, it was terrific and even some die hard skeptics were moved by it.

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[–] chizzlewit 10 years ago

Nobody says the CMB anomalies alone prove the Earth is at the center of the universe, that's just another piece of the puzzle.

Except it isn't. It's literally, even if confirmed to actually exist, the biggest non-sequitur in the universe. It's an argument as flawed as "I was born in the UK, therefore the UK is the center of the universe".
It's not just that the conclusion doesn't follow on from the premise - it's that the premise has got nothing to do with the conclusion at all.

If Krauss were intellectually honest, the correct attitude would be saying something like:

"Years ago I made an statement that supported some geocentrist claims about the CMB anomalies and they hired me to talk about that in a documentary. That statement was later corrected and I no longer support it, but I needed the money so I did the documentary anyway."

Why would he say this? Are you suggesting he was bribed into saying something for the documentary? Are you suggesting that a world famous physicist would have needed a few measely dollars and so would say anything that supported the documentary paying him?
That's not even painting the documentary makers in a good light.
Besides which, I don't think you get to complain about someone's unsubstantiated and supposed "lack of integrity", when you're talking about a documentary made by a film crew that was so frightened of the people it interviewed actually giving sound arguments against its premise, that it purposefully didn't state its premise to them beforehand.
And yes, we've all seen that release form. Show me the bit where it says "This film aims to examine and promote geocentrism."
Funnily enough, the produces felt they had to leave that bit out, didn't they?

Wait... first you said that the CMB anomalies don't magically prove the Earth is at the center of the universe, but now your argument is that if the satellites were at L2, that would mean the center of universe is at L2? Please, make up your mind. If you're going to use that straw man as an argument, try to at least make it consistent with your other arguments, because it makes you look like a fool.

Wow, so we're going to drop all pretense and just completely straw man me now, are we?
Typical geocentrifraud.
The statement was that EVEN IF YOU WANTED TO PLAY THE GAME WHEREBY THE CMB MAPS SUPPORT THE IDEA THAT THE ORIGIN OF THE MAP IS THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE, then your premise is flawed, since the CMB wasn't mapped from the surface of the Earth.
This statement isn't a straw man - and your pathetic claim that it is, is the most pathetic red herring.
Learn what a straw man is, for god's sake.

Obviously that's a straw man. First of all, nobody claims the CMB anomalies prove the Earth is at the center of the universe. They claim some of the modes show some mutual alignment between themselves, the equinoxes and the ecliptic plane, which breaks the assumption of isotropy. That's all, nothing more, nothing less. Second, the fact that the measurement is made from L2 is irrelevant, since the issue is the alignment, not whether there's some magic property in the CMB that says the Earth is at the center. There's your straw man again.

AGAIN, it's NOT a straw man. The claim is that the CMB supports the idea that the Earth is the center of the universe. But this is a non-sequitur for a variety of reasons - not least because the maps themselves are not centered on the Earth.
How is that so difficult to understand.
Oh wait, it's because you have no response, and have to obfuscate with vacuous and empty claims of people straw manning you.
It's not a straw man - since this claim is made almost daily to me by geocentrifrauds.
You even brought up the CMB as evidence for your claim, but now have nothing to defend the fact that it is nothing but a non-sequitur.
Sheesh, you argue like a petulant child.
~Please explain to me how pointing out the various reasons why using the CMB to support the idea that the Earth is the center of the universe is a non-sequitur is a straw man - when you yourself have just stated above that it's "just another piece of the puzzle."
You are using it as an argument to support your claim, and I'm addressing why it doesn't in any way support your claim.
Not a straw man, you pathetic idiot.

Sure, and wouldn't exist for all the others. Where's your isotropic universe now, huh?

Well, for one thing, it may still be isotropic, since we need to account for all the foreground contamination.
However, it doesn't matter. I don't need an isotropic universe for it to not be geocentric. How does basic logic escape you?
I'm not arguing for an isotropic universe in this thread, and I've never mentioned it.
Oh wow. It looks like the guy who loves to onerously shout "straw man!" every time someone points out a problem in their moronic conjecture, has irnoically just produced a straw man.
The irony is delicious.

"So, if you want to claim the CMB means the Earth inhabits a "special place", then it also means that every body in the solar system also does, and so does every stellar system in the universe with the same inclination."

Nobody is making that claim. That's your straw man again.

Except they are. Even you are suggesting that the non-sequitur of the CMB anomally supports geocentrism.
Now you're admitting that the CMB in no way supports geocentrism? Or are you still just throwing around the "straw man" claim, because you have no response to the fact that it doesn't support geocentrism for the exact same reasons that my being born in 1978 doesn't in any way contribute any support to the claim that Ronald Reagen was involved in the Iran-Contra affair? The premise has nothing to do with the conclusion, even in terms of supporting it in any way.

"Let us first consider the case when the massive body is a rigid, uniform shell of mass Mo and radius Ro [e.g., the universe]. The test body [e.g., the Earth] is near the center of the shell (coincident with the center of the cosmological shell and the origin of co-ordinates); thus ri << Ro.

Erm, they don't say "[eg the Earth]" for their test body. Since your next quote is that this looks very geocentric to you, and THEY NEVER SAY "EG, THE EARTH", I'm wondering why you felt the need to invent words into their paper - and quickly realising that you had to, in order to say that the paper was geocentric.
Hmmmm. Intellectually honest went right out of the window for you, didn't it.
Now, you can say that that test body could be the Earth or any body, and it can, which means, because it could be ANY BODY, it is NOT geocentric.
Look, you've used this quote to prove it's a geocentric paper, and the only words that lend credence to that argument ARE THE WORDS YOU'VE DISHONESTLY SHOVED INTO THE QUOTE.
Since we're going into outright lie mode, I don't see a) why I should take anything you say seriously; and b) how you can ever claim a moral high ground and complain about people insulting you.

That looks very geocentric to me. If he's saying that's not geocentric, I'm curious to read the statement he released, but I couldn't find that anywhere. Can you share a link?

Really? So a model in which the Earth MOVES around the Sun is geocentric in your bizarre universe?
The link: http://www.livescience.com/44839-scientists-misquoted-in-geocentrism-film.html

" British physicist Julian Barbour — cited in a trailer description of the documentary on YouTube – said his involvement in the film seems to have arisen from a gross misunderstanding of a 1977 paper he di-authored with Italian physicist Bruno Bertotti.

The paper, Barbour told Live Science, created a model showing that Newton's First Law — that objects in motion will continue to move in a straight line unless an external force is applied — can be explained by distant stars or masses in the universe. The physicists used a simple modelin which the sun is at the center of the universe, but the model was not supposed to fully represent reality. It also, Barbour pointed out, is not a geocentric model as THE EARTH IS STILL GOING AROUND THE SUN." (my emphasis.)

Perhaps instead of quote mining a sentence from his paper, you could explain exactly how his model has the Earth not moving around the Sun, contrary to the claims he himself has made. Not a quote mine. Show me the mathematics, showing Earth's motion to be zero, from his paper.
And please explain to me how Julian Barbour completely disagrees with you, without relying on the furtive fallacy and an unsubstantiated "conspiracy".

"Do any of the physicists involved explain the fact that the universe doesn't act like it has Sungenis' magical center of mass, as they would if anybody explicitly asked them about his conjectures?"

You're repeating the same rant you came up in the other topic.

So.... no, then.

Please, read the answers to Alec MacAndrew, and if that doesn't settle it for you, we can discuss your objections

Oh, I've read them, alright - and my objections are mostly one-fold:
AT NO POINT DID THEY ANSWER THE POINTS I RAISED.
I know it's a fairly minor objection, but I do expect that when someone spams up a list of vacuous diatribes for me to waste my time on, in response to points that I raise, that they actually at any point, answer the points that I raise.
Do tell me, "Mr physics and philosophy graduate", if you believe that's asking too much from what is meant to be a discussion filled with relevant and pertinent points.
I could go on about how those articles were basically just filled with the most pathetic poisoning of the well - Sungenis' go-to tactic, along with the inevitable false wailing about victimhood - not to mention the fact that he is caught so often cherry picking data, misrepresenting scientific history and dishonestly quote mining scientists.
But all that is just water off a duck's back compared to the more pressing issue of those articles NEVER EVEN ADDRESSING THE POINTS I RAISED AT ANY POINT.
I'm amazed that I have to highlight this problem to a supposed physics and philosophy graduate.

[qoute]we can discuss your objections, if you can present them as a civilized adult. [/quote]

This goes 2 ways. Petulantly and onerously crying "straw man" every time a premise you use to support your conjecture is found to be fallacious, is not acting like a civilized adult. You don't get to use your moral high ground fallacy at the best of times - least of all when you're openly ignoring your own infuriatingly infantile behaviour.
Got it?
I'm frankly not in the business of stroking bruised egos, and I couldn't give a toss about stroking hypocritical ones.

The book Galileo Was Wrong is pretty fair and balanced

OK, you're either a Poe or an outright liar.
That book was selective (to put it mildly) in its data, filled with quote mines taken out of context, and never once even trying to get close to giving the various reasons why modern astrophysics and cosmology rejects geocentrism, and has done for centuries.

so I see no reason to believe the documentary by the same authors won't be fair and balanced too.

Oh, I can think of one - because the book itself wasn't "fair and balanced" either.

From what I heard about it by people who saw it, it was terrific and even some die hard skeptics were moved by it.

WHOOOOOOHOOOOOOO! And we've delved straight into "unnamed" skeptics being moved to substantiate our *beep* without even bothering to substantiate this emotionally charged claim.
Not only are you producing an argument based solely on an emotional plea - you're even incapable of naming the supposed converts (or otherwise) that your fallacious emotional plea rests on!
Have you ever thought of having an argument with substance in your life?

And again, if you want to complain about my tone, just remember your own. As I say, I don't except hypocritical claims about my language from people who petulantly and onerously throw around claims of logical fallacies every time their premises are shown to be flawed.
If you want to complain about how you desire an adult conversation - then you have to prove yourself capable of having an adult conversation.

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[–] AureliusBady 10 years ago

I saw you admitted you actually haven't read the book.
Yet you somehow exactly know what it contains, by hearsay (or is it omniscience?).

In light of that, I don't know how you could possibly be entitled to criticising it at all.
What kind of person would do such a thing?

The more you speak the more you sound like that dreadful feller CHL's teen fans who fancy themselves "scientists".

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[–] abjectis 11 years ago

So is she not recommending this film?

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[–] parolina 11 years ago

It's very hard to believe that Mulgrew, especially after signing a release form and reading the film's entire script, still had no idea what it's about.

The same goes for Dr. Krauss:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/04/09/i-can-tell-you-how-lawrence- krauss-ended-up-in-our-film-he-signed-a-release-form-and-cashed-a-chec k/

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[–] parolina 11 years ago

Sources, please. I have never heard of Robert Sungenis denying Hitler's genocide.

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[–] Satan2016 11 years ago

I've never heard of Robert Sungenis. Are you sure it's not Subgenius?

§ "Jewish people conspired with Satan to rule the world"
Delusions of Control by "the Jews" is a sure sign of mental illness.

Three More Years! Climate Apocalypse! $17½ trillion!

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[–] parolina 11 years ago

See this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvR7pMqAEso , which discusses whether they are anti-Semitic or not.

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[–] Jorge_2005 10 years ago

Their anti-Semitism has been duly documented. See
geocentrismdebunked.org

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[–] AureliusBady 10 years ago

Oh my!
The filthy dog should be burned at the stake for blasphemy against the Shoah and Science!

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[–] freeloverecords 10 years ago

Hi TigerTanaka,

I was just wondering what all of that had to do with this film? Hmm? Anything?

This film, this production, deals with the scientific understanding of the nature of the earth and our 'place' in the cosmos. I'm pretty sure the holocaust and 'jewish people' are not the topic. I'm deeply troubled that you would choose to limit your comment to completely unrelated and irrelevant (and slanderous but that's beside the point) topics.

Sometimes it's easier to attack the messenger than the message? Sometimes it's easier to wrap an ignorant cowardly wrongful attack on a theory you've been brainwashed into believing is ludicrous up in a fanboy trekkie defense of an actress you have no business being "deeply" pleased or "troubled" about period? Are you her father or something?

Honestly, you want to make fun of others and other theories to make yourself and your theories seem more solid, right? Don't lie.

I owe my solitude to other people.

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