Father John Matthew Fewel posed a few questions

John Matthew Fewel

If the earth is stationary at the center of the universe, how do the heavens move about the earth? At what calculated speed is the distant star moving, so that it can circle the globe in a year. If gravity isn't the force, what is it, that keeps the Sun, as well as the distant heavenly bodies, captive and orbiting the earth?

Alex Naszados

I think that the answer to the origin of the spin of the heavens ultimately lies in Genesis, in the account of the first days of creation. (If you read Robert Sungenis' short book ("The First Four Days of Creation") day & night occurred on the second & third days, before the creation of the sun & moon, by way of a spinning).

But I think the idea of that the universe could have been "born spinning" is supported by science. If you read the work of Dr. Longo on galaxy handedness, you discover not only another violation of the Copernican Principle in the universe, but support for this idea that the whole thing is spinning. See:

"The universe may have been born spinning, according to new findings on the symmetry of the cosmos"

Michigan News : The universe may have been born spinning, according to new findings on the symmetry of the cosmos
Jul 07, 2011 Contact Nicole Casal Moore
http://ns.umich.edu/new/releases/8467-the-universe-may-have-been-born-spinning-according-to-new-findings-on-the-symmetry-of-the-cosmos

Also, the following quotation form a Discovery News article appears in GWW:

<< If the whole universe is rotating, then an excess number of galaxies on the opposite part of the sky, below the galactic plane, should be whirling in a clockwise direction. And indeed they are according to a separate 1991 survey of 8287 spiral galaxies in the southern galactic hemisphere.

Galaxies spin, stars spin, and planets spin. So, why not the whole universe? The consequences of a spinning universe would be profound. The cornerstone of modern cosmology is that the universe is homogeneous and isotropic — it has no preferred orientation and looks the same in all directions.

This isn’t the first time astronomers claimed to have observed a carousel universe. The cosmic microwave background from the big bang had suspected anomalies that were once suggested as evidence of rotation, but were later dismissed as instrumental effects.

This result might just be a statistical fluke. Or is it somehow biased because we are only looking at the local universe?

What is very curious to me is that the Milky Way’s own spin axis roughly aligns to the universe’s purported spin axis within just a few degrees, as deduced from the two galaxy surveys. That seems very anti-Copernican too. It has also been used to bolster biblical creationist arguments that we are at the “center” of the universe. >>

Discovery : Is the Universe Spinning?
Jul 8, 2011 07:22 PM ET // by Ray Villard
http://news.discovery.com/space/do-we-live-in-a-spinning-universe-110708.htm

Regarding the calculating the speed of distant stars:

"Relative to the stationary roundabout [the Earth], the distant stars would have a velocity rw [radius x angular velocity] and for sufficiently large values of r, the stars would be moving relative to O' [the observer] with linear velocities exceeding 3 x 10^8 m/sec, the terrestrial value of the velocity of light. At first sight this appears to be a contradiction…that the velocities of all material bodies must be less than c [the speed of light]. However, the restriction u [less than] c = 3 x 10^8 m/sec is restricted to the theory of Special Relativity. According to the General theory, it is possible to choose local reference frames in which, over a limited volume of space, there is no gravitational field, and relative to such a reference frame the velocity of light is equal to c . However, this is not true when gravitational fields are present. In addition to the lengths of rods and the rates of clocks the velocity of light is affected by a gravitational field. If gravitational fields are present the velocities of either material bodies or of light can assume any numerical value depending on the strength of the gravitational field. If one considers the rotating roundabout as being at rest, the centrifugal gravitational field assumes enormous values at large distances, and it is consistent with the theory of General Relativity for the velocities of distant bodies to exceed 3 x 10^8 m/sec under these conditions."

(An Introduction to the Theory of Relativity, W. G. V. Rosser, London, Butterworths, 1964, p. 460)

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"If the earth is stationary at the center of the universe, how do the heavens move about the earth?"

Two options. St Thomas Aquinas : God is moving all of Heaven around Earth (sphere touching sphere, but that can be accomodated to some cohesion within aether).

Riccioli: heavens are actually empty space, each heavenly body alone is moving westward each day, moved by an angel.

NB, St Thomas Aquinas also believes each body is moved by angels, however, the difference is that for Riccioli, angel of Sun is concretely moving the Sun westward throuugh empty space, but a little slower than the angels of the fixed stars are moving these westward each day. But for St Thomas, the angel of the Sun is moving the Sun eastward, through a sphere that is moved Westward each day by God. This gives the angel only 1/365 as much speed as the Riccioli scenario.

"At what calculated speed is the distant star moving, so that it can circle the globe in a year."

Only star which takes a year in any kind of sense "around earth" (I would rather say : around the zodiac, moving with it around Earth) is the Sun. All heavenly bodies are moving or moved with aether westward each day. If α Centauri and so on also have a yearly movement, it is not "around earth", but about its locus in relation to the other stars.

"If gravity isn't the force, what is it, that keeps the Sun, as well as the distant heavenly bodies, captive and orbiting the earth?"

Captive is only applicable in a scenario of claustrophobia or potential such. Visible Sun is presumably not alive, its angel is presumably not feeling calustrophobic about it, since he would count as captor rather than captive.

NB, I have it from Latin Mass Magazine about a decade ago, from the successor of Mgr Lefèbvre at Dakar, (Mgr Thiandoum, isn't it?) that angels are so strong that demons would easily, each one of them, make earth or any heavenly body explode, and hate us so much they would easily go on and do it, unless God's greater strength were stopping them. But demons have no more force than angels loyal to God and God is not stopping the kind of movements He ordered angels to perform when creating such bodies for them to move on day four.

As I have a pet theory that stars are one light day away from us, that means that each day they are moving a distance of 2pi light days (just a bit more than "six light days", but mostly resting "the seventh").

That, since I forgot to answer about "what speed".

John Matthew Fewel

Thank you.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

You are welcome!

John Matthew Fewel

Isn't it possible that the earth rotates on its axis at the center of the universe?

Mass and gravitational pull have a huge roll to play in the stellar traverse of manned and unmanned space vehicles and the behavior of other objects moving in relation to each other.

If the Sun with its huge mass isn't holding nine planets, etc., captive in its orbit, and is rather circling the earth from 93 million miles away at nearly the speed of light (is that right?) what keeps that massive Sun captive in earth orbit?

Rick DeLano

John Matthew Fewel:
Earth cannot rotate on its axis and not orbit the sun ( unless we want to go with angels of course).

If we want to account for the motions of the heavenly bodies by known physical forces, then gravity works in the case of a rotating and orbiting earth or a rotating and precessing cosmos.

But if Earth is rotating on its axis but not orbiting the sun we cannot account for the seasons without adopting angels and abandoning classical physics.

John Matthew Fewel

In classical physics doesn't the more massive Star hold the much smaller bodies in its orbit? What is the motion of the Sun in geocentric motion? My gap in understanding is the force which keeps massive stars precessing around earth - if I have understood geocentrism.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"Isn't it possible that the earth rotates on its axis at the center of the universe?"

Possible, yes. In abstract physics. But we are not just human philosophers, we are also Christians and Joshua X:12 would seem to preclude that.

"In classical physics doesn't the more massive Star hold the much smaller bodies in its orbit?"

In Newtonian physics this is indeed so, but Newton was successor therein to Kepler, whose theory about magnetic force keeping planets around Sun was rejected by Riccioli as less pious than assuming God gave the nobility of spirit, if not to the Sun and Moon as visible bodies, at least to the principle moving them (because heaven is higher and nobler than earth).

Rick DeLano

John Matthew Fewel:
Newton plus Mach's principle provides a complete gravitational solution to a stationary earth and a rotating cosmos.

A paper deriving these solutions was published in 2013 in the European Journal of Physics.

The author is Luka Popov, and the title is Newton- Machian Analysis of Planetary Motions in the Neo-Tychonic system.

The answer to your question is that the rotating masses of the distant stars and other objects generate a real gravitational force which is treated as the fictitious (centrifugal) force by Newton.

This gravitational force generated by the rotating cosmos is what accounts for all observed motions.

John Matthew Fewel

Thank you. Now, what about earth's gravity? You describe the gravity of the spinning cosmos, but what about on earth, where, "what goes up must come down?"

Rick DeLano

Each object of course generates its own gravitational field, exactly as per Newton.

If you get a chance to look over the referenced paper you will see exactly how the gravitational interactions work mathematically.

John Matthew Fewel

I shall do that. Thank you.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

May I with all due respect for questioner, John Matthew Fewel, ask Rick DeLano whence this preference of naturalistic (a k a "physical" by now, though even angels have a "physis", and God has two of them) causation over divine and angelic ones?

Rick DeLano

Hans-Georg Lundahl: It is an excellent question.

It is perfectly acceptable so far as I am concerned to say that the planets and stars are moved n their courses by angels.

All that physics can tell us are the principles by which the angels are commanded by God to move them (apart from miraculous intervention), to a less and less imperfect degree of precision.

It is customary in this civilization at this time to prefer a term like "forces", or a term like "fields".

To really try and pin down what the physicist means by these terms is to understand that he means something that is very much like a messenger from the God he is not permitted to behave as if he believed in if he wishes to remain employed.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"All that physics can tell us are the principles by which the angels are commanded by God to move them (apart from miraculous intervention), to a less and less imperfect degree of precision."

Er, no.

If I drop a pen, physics will tell you exactly where on the floor it will drop - if I let it fall all the way.

BUT, physics cannot tell if I will catch it before it touches the floor.

Physics in the sense we talk about deal with how material bodies influence material bodies and how "physical forces" influence material bodies.

They say nothing on how spirits influence material movements.

So, if we want to know the laws by which bodies move, these are:

• 1) Everything in Creation (or in all creations, in the case of a multiverse) obeys the direct acts of will of God. Whether a material body or a soul or a pure spirit.
• 2) Under that, angels move whatever they want (but can only be present on one locality at a time), whereas human souls move their own bodies (under the limitation of its strength).
• 3) Under THAT we get the laws of movement studied by Newton and stated or misstated by Newton (I suspect it is a bad misstatement to equate uniform movement with absolute rest - it makes the Prima Via of St Thomas Aquinas moot, which the other aspects of same law do not).

Obviously souls moving their bodies have limitations from third level laws, because these determine bodily strength. Angels moving bodies are not similarily limited by 3rd level laws.

Therefore, these laws do NOT show is the principles by which angels are commanded by God to move stars artistically.

They would show us the principles by which angels normally conform when acting down on earth so as not to make their presence nearly directly visible through undeniable effects. They decide which way a windgust will blow, but it blows because of physical effects ultimately derived from the daily motion which God gives the aether from Ocean currents up to fix stars.

"It is customary in this civilization at this time to prefer a term like "forces", or a term like "fields"."

These things are, probably, distinct from angelic action.

If not, any time we used electricity, we would be meddling in the spiritual world, and thus probably sinning. I hope this is not the case.

[Its seems he was giving instead an angelistic version of Occasionalism, which properly speaking makes the habitual acts of God only appear as causation between created things, as in Geulincqx and Malebranche, one of whom was condemned for saying same thing about free will.]

"To really try and pin down what the physicist means by these terms is to understand that he means something that is very much like a messenger from the God he is not permitted to behave as if he believed in if he wishes to remain employed."

The physicists' problems of employment are one problem, should they admit angelic and divine action beside and above the physical one.

But normally, by "forces", I am not expecting even a physicist employed under the terms of Sorbonne AD 1377 (different from modern conditions) to mean "angelic and divine action".

The only thing I generally have to say about football/socker is, that if the ball were left to obey the law of gravitation, the mutual between the ball and Earth (if Newton's analysis is correct on this one, which I am not positive on), it would just be lying on the football field, and there would be no match, no interest in watching.

However, I can grant, "forces" in the physical sense is no more visible in itself or themselves, than God or angels. They are mysteries, not empirically obvious evidence, but proven by evidence more visible than they.

Rick DeLano

Hans-Georg Lundahl.

It is one thing to say that what physics attributes to forces or fields can equally be attributable to an observed lawfulness in the actions of angels.

it is quite another to propose that physics is an incorrect, or uncatholic, or inadmissible knowledge domain, or that its empirically demonstrable results must be rejected unless they are attributed to the free-will and hence unpredictable actions of angelic beings.

Since you explicitly reject the former, may I say that I explicitly reject the latter.

One cannot use the laws of physics to predict the outcome of a soccer match.

One can use the laws of physics to predict the outcome of a given application of force to a given soccer ball.

If one were to conclude from this that the laws of physics were false, and motion could only be attributed to the free will actions of soccer players, one would have made a truly monumental error.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"It is one thing to say that what physics attributes to forces or fields can equally be attributable to an observed lawfulness in the actions of angels."

If we speak of all forces and fields in general, we are including magnetism and electricity.

If these are only done by angelic beings, then we might fear they are done by demons. Note very well, this is not a question of physical knowledge being inadmissible, but of a certain use, interpreted to be not ordinarily physical, should be considered as spiritual and occult.

While using electricity, I feel morally safer to consider these fields and forces as not angelic bot corporeal states or activities.

[The question of Occasionalism in classical sense, as direct actions of God, being irrelevant for the question of "meddling with spiritual world.]

"it is quite another to propose that physics is an incorrect, or uncatholic, or inadmissible knowledge domain,"

You are mixing apples and oranges. You are lumping "electricity", "astrophysics" and ordinary "mechanics" together as "physics" with a take all or leave all label. All correct or all incorrect. All licit or all occult. I can agree electricity is not necessarily occult, but this on condition it is more or less basically what physicists say it is.

Astrophysics is not empirical knowledge. You cannot stop the "solar system", pick out one body for a while and check how this affects the gravitational interplay of other bodies.

"or that its empirically demonstrable results must be rejected unless they are attributed to the free-will and hence unpredictable actions of angelic beings."

As said, astrophysics is not empirical.

In heliocentrism, attributing the empirical results of planar or even three dimensional observations to gravitation and inertia may have some a priori merit (unless you watch an empirical parallel, which the stone on string experiment is not), but with Tychonian orbits of Geocentric astronomy, I think we have a fair demonstration of free wills engaged in art is a better option.

"free-will and hence unpredictable" is a confusion of categories. Free-willed actions are sometimes predictable. If you have watched a dance (not rock, more like square dance or European folk dances) you CAN fairly predict the next moves. This does not make dancers automata.

"One cannot use the laws of physics to predict the outcome of a soccer match."

One cannot even use the laws of physics to explain why socker is played or the rules of a socker match.

"One can use the laws of physics to predict the outcome of a given application of force to a given soccer ball."

But one cannot predict exactly which application will be given.

However, one can predict that if it is given by a socker player, it is mostly free-willed.

Astrophysics is like physicists watching a socker game, then ignoring the players (which is easier with invisible angels) and then try to determine the changing masses or gravitational constants of Earth and ball in order to "predict" the movements of a game (grosso modo) as if predicting how the ball lies still on the ground.

And that a socker game is unpredictable while stellar movements are very predictable, really changes very little to the meaning of this parable. Hence the other one about dancers moving predictably, though free-willed.

The question if this belief in astrophysics of yours is just erroneous or heretical is beyond "my pay grade".

It is thoughtless. I am arguing against it as a philosopher on natural grounds, not as expressing devotion or claiming either prophecy or megisterium.

Btw, here IS an empirical experiment, clearly parallel to basic assumptions of celestial mechanics:

[ISS] Don Petit, Science Off The Sphere - Water Droplets Orbiting Charged Knitting Needle
SpaceVids.tv
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyRv8bNDvq4

Orbits cease [in this video and for each droplet, there being many successive ones] after between 10 and 20. That is the physically PREDICTABLE result [both for droplets and celestial mechanics], even with heliocentrism [for celestial mechanics], if gravitation, inertia and masses of different magnitude or intensity were all to it.

I predicted sth like it (even less like modern astrophysics) on Thomistic grounds : a balance between two opposing forces is not stable, if that is all there is to it (in stone on string experiment, or bikers on perpendicular walls of a tub, that is NOT all there is, since string and tub are solids, not per se forces).

Rick DeLano

Because the movements of the stars and planets are exquisitely predictable, it is false to say that the empirical evidence of that predictable motion is not part of the science of astrophysics.

It is a very strong argument for the correctness of the scientific method that it has managed to derive an excellent physical theory to account for all such observed motions until we reach the scales above a stellar cluster, at which point our present physical theories of gravity fail completely.

So our physics is incomplete, even wrong perhaps.

But it is by far the most empirically supported and useful- in its predictive power- theory ever advanced.

It is simply incorrect to suggest as you do above that the modern Tycho model is somehow less compatible with our present theory of gravity than a heliocentric model.

Both models are identically accounted for under present theories of gravity.

Since my points here are neither erroneous nor heretical, there is no.pay grade too low to dismiss your risible mischaracterization of them.

Lastly, the fascinating video provides not the slightest empirical evidence against present theories of either gravitation or electromagnetism.

// Orbits cease after between 10 and 20. That is the physically PREDICTABLE result, even with heliocentrism, if gravitation, inertia and masses of different magnitude or intensity were all to it.//

Since orbits manifestly do not cease between 10 and 20, your prediction is falsified, and the equations upon which it was based (if any) will be found to involve error.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

« Because the movements of the stars and planets are exquisitely predictable, it is false to say that the empirical evidence of that predictable motion is not part of the science of astrophysics. »

How about sticking to what I said in what you want to refute ? Or was that an introductory remark ?

I have NOT said that « empirical evidence of predictable motion » is not there or is not part of the celestial mechanics or astrophysics stuff, I have mentioned it is NOT enough of a part of it to be guaranteeing it. In other words, there are other premisses which are not empirical.

« It is a very strong argument for the correctness of the scientific method that it has managed to derive an excellent physical theory to account for all such observed motions until we reach the scales above a stellar cluster, at which point our present physical theories of gravity fail completely. »

There is always that failure which is a strong argument against.

« So our physics is incomplete, even wrong perhaps. But it is by far the most empirically supported and useful- in its predictive power- theory ever advanced. »

Predictive power was also overrated by Apollo worshippers after Apollo predicted Perseus killing his maternal gramp and Oedipus killing his father and marrying his mother.

In the clearly demonic case, the devil knew (and still knows) how to fool people into selffulfilling prophecies, and in the scientific or astronomic case, planar astronomy is enough to make predictions about regularity. ONE exception was finding Neptune by calculations about gravity. But other calculations are enough to account for most predictions of regularity.

Furthermore, supposing gravity is what it is said to be, the video certainly provides an example of how a parallel (electricity) behaves in NOT providing lasting orbits, you have only thrown that evidence off, you have provided no calculation as to why gravity would work on astronomic levels for thousands of orbits of several orbits within orbits, while electricity fails to go beyond twenty turns of an orbit at two droplets orbitting at a time.

In other words, I do not need to be denying gravity is there, I only need to propose that a balance of gravity inertia is an unstable one per se, unless something is added, and that therefore the balancing out of the forces needs a kind of « biker » to stay in motion and upright. You know how a bike may roll forward and forward and forward, with very little pedalling, but there needs to be a biker on the bike, if there is no biker to control it, somehow the good theoretical balance doesn’t keep it either upright or rolling very long.

« Since orbits manifestly do not cease between 10 and 20, your prediction is falsified, »

The orbits in the video do so.

My prediction is not about orbits as they are, but about them as they WOULD be if only two opposing forces (gravity and inertia) were involved.

It is NOT manifest now and has not been so before, but even more so not since this video, that the orbits of celestial objects as they are depend as uniquely on two opposing physical forces as the water droplet orbits in the video.

« and the equations upon which it was based (if any) will be found to involve error. »

I based the prediction on no equation but on parallel.

Precisely as physics teachers base their predictions also not on giving exact intricate equations, but on the false parallel of a stone on a string experiment.