• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

The Geocentrism Challenge

Timothy said:
Quotes from James Randi's commentary (emphases mine)

"Well, friends, my offer last week to pay the JREF million to anyone who could prove that the Sun rotates about the Earth, got the expected storm of responses. All but a few properly pointed out that it's a matter of relativity — not Albert's variety, though similar — and that's of course right."

"It's very true that one can look upon the Earth as the reference position, in which case the Sun would be traveling around the Earth."

"When you walk across the beach, you will probably perceive that as your body moving across the surface of the Earth, which — relative to you — is standing still. But if you wished, you could also choose to decide that your legs are turning the planet Earth beneath your body — and that's just as correct as the more sober view. It's relative, you see."

Yes, I do see. So, who was the first and who gets the million?
Click to expand...
Except Randi is wrong. Those two views are not equivalent. Standing still, than walking across the beach entails acceleration. Acceleration is not relative. It is trivial to prove that it is you that are moving, and not the earth rotating under your feet.
 
James Randi writes:

"JREF will write a check for $1,000,000 to the first person who can prove that the Sun revolves around the Earth."

"You can submit your "proofs" to our e-mail address jref@randi.org. We will then offer a response. Both your "proof" and our response will be posted on the JREF website."

"JREF will never be the judge of whether you have successfully proven your case and JREF will not depend on "its reputation of honesty and truthfulness" in acting as a judge of whether or not you have successfully proven your case; tests, as always, will be independently designed and conducted by neutral agencies. If you do indeed prove your case, you will be rewarded the money."

I feel that the flippant oneupmanship of the offer, proclaimed with authoritative bravado, was a poor move. One can in fact prove the stated challenge that "the Earth revolves around the Sun" because the challenge was presented with no constraints on assumptions and reference frames. It *precisely* comes down to judging whether you have proved your case, contradicting the above statement. James Randi has conceded as much in his latest commentary ... that it's a matter of semantics, not of orbital mechanics.

And now Mr. Randi's latest commentary has him brushing off and explaining away his hastily conceived challenge. I assume that Mr. Randi's intent was to sarcastically rebuff in public forum with authoritative certainty the one or two feeble-minded who dared to take this challenge ... instead he is deluged with intelligent commentary that he is in fact wrong. (I for one would like to see the proofs and rebuttals, but I fear we never will.) Which is a shame, since it supplies ammunition to those who claim the Paranormal Challenge will always be treated similarly. The value that the Paranormal Challenge has is in its absolutely rigorous integrity. This side-challenge cheapened that.

I'm saddened to see that in an effort to target a loonie (who rightfully deserved it) Mr. Randi has shot himself in the foot.
 
I just read the commentary and saw "Dr." Sanguines's response. He's one of the worst sort of debaters, a guerilla (aka Socratic) debater.
 
roger said:
Except Randi is wrong. Those two views are not equivalent. Standing still, than walking across the beach entails acceleration. Acceleration is not relative. It is trivial to prove that it is you that are moving, and not the earth rotating under your feet.
Click to expand...

Randi's argument is based on kinematics, and from that standpoint he is perfectly correct. Kinematics equations describe the motion of an object with respect to a particular reference point; they do not describe the forces acting on the object. One can construct kinematic equations which accurately describe the motions of the planets with respect to any reference point, be it the sun, the earth, or any arbitrary point in space. Randi also asserts that with multiple reference points to choose from, the "parsimonious view" (i.e. Occam's razor) defines the correct reference point.

One of the foundations of Dr. Sungenis' arguments (the small portion I've seen, at least) seems to be this flexibility in choosing the reference point, coupled with a refusal to accept the "parsimonious view." This is not a totally unreasonable viewpoint; the simplest explanation is not always the correct one. (However, when choosing among equally correct explanations, the simplest one is preferred.)

The nature of the debate changes a bit when it shifts to the realm of dynamics, which relates the motion of an object to the forces acting on it and to the properties of the object. For instance, the earth weighs about 5.97x10^24 kg, while the sun weighs about 2.0x10^30 kg, or roughly 300,000 times the earth. Since the sun and the earth exert equal and opposite gravitational forces on each other, the earth's acceleration will be about 300,000 times the sun's.

Sadly, this argument is unlikely to sway Dr. Sungenis. He will counter with a universe constructed so that the forces of other stars on the sun cause the sun to move in such a way that the earth is stationary. If one goes through the tedium of refuting that, no doubt he will proffer some even more complex (and harder to disprove) argument. In this respect, he reminds me of my brother, another exceptionally tenacious debater. There are only two possible outcomes to the debate: He wins, or you give up (which is the same thing to him). I would not waste my time on such a fruitless endeavor.
 
wdsmith,

Thanks for your insight into Sungenis' modus operandi.
I read his responses to one particular challenger and didn't see that.

BJ.
 
wdsmith said:
Randi's argument is based on kinematics, and from that standpoint he is perfectly correct. Kinematics equations describe the motion of an object with respect to a particular reference point; they do not describe the forces acting on the object. One can construct kinematic equations which accurately describe the motions of the planets with respect to any reference point, be it the sun, the earth, or any arbitrary point in space. Randi also asserts that with multiple reference points to choose from, the "parsimonious view" (i.e. Occam's razor) defines the correct reference point.
Snip.....
For instance, the earth weighs about 5.97x10^24 kg, while the sun weighs about 2.0x10^30 kg, or roughly 300,000 times the earth. Since the sun and the earth exert equal and opposite gravitational forces on each other, the earth's acceleration will be about 300,000 times the sun's. <<<<snip>>>>
Click to expand...
I agree with you, except for one little quibble (Which relates to the whole argument...)
The Earth (or any planet(oid) has no weight It/they are in a free-falling orbit about a point. centrigugal acceleration is exactly equal to gravitational acceleration. thus, m*x'' (cent)=m*x''(grav), and the sum of forces acting on the body are zero
by definition, no force=no weight.
Mass, now--that's a different story...
 
CAI's DNA challenge

With thanks to Synchronicity:

CAI will write a check for $1,000 to the first person who can prove that all we see in the universe is a result of natural transformism (or even intermittent supernatural transformism). If you lose, then we ask that you make a donation to the apostolate of CAI.

The specific question on the table in regard to the $1,000 Challenge is this: It is a fact of science that species of animals contain the genetic information in their DNA which is specific to that species. Fish have fish DNA; birds have bird DNA; and animals have animal DNA. It is also a fact that in order to produce a fish, a bird, or an animal from an upward progression of biological material, the fish or bird or animal must somehow acquire the genetic material needed for its species. That being the case, can any Evolutionist tell us how, when, and from where does any particular species acquire this new and specific genetic material if, as is commonly understood, the genetic material did not exist before that specific species existed? If anyone can prove this process to us by the known facts of science, consider yourself the winner of $1,000 from CAI!
Click to expand...

So presumably they never heard about the experiment where DNA from an arctic fish was transplanted into a tomato plant to stop it freezing in the winter.

Admitedly the experiment didn't work but the genes were present. Of course, to the CAI, this is going to be because you can't put fish DNA in plants.

Mind you it also makes you wonder how come we can use pig insulin to treat diabetes sufferers. Surely since insulin is manufactured in the pig's body (and therefore manufactured according to the pig's DNA) it should be incompatible with our human DNA, right?

Plus isn't it cute how fish and birds aren't animals to these scientrific (not a typo) thinkers! I've also got to love that "upward progression of biological material". I mean we're obviously higher up the biological ladder than fish, despite lacking all those nifty abilities such as the ability to detect electrical impulses from anothers muscle contractions, or being able to control chromophores for camouflage! And birds, well they've got to be further down the scale than us right? Despite the fact that most of them can fly, just like angels can!

Kaydens.
 
rwguinn said:
I agree with you, except for one little quibble (Which relates to the whole argument...)
The Earth (or any planet(oid) has no weight It/they are in a free-falling orbit about a point. centrigugal acceleration is exactly equal to gravitational acceleration. thus, m*x'' (cent)=m*x''(grav), and the sum of forces acting on the body are zero
by definition, no force=no weight.
Mass, now--that's a different story...
Click to expand...

I respectfully disagree for the following reason: If the net force on a moving object is zero, that object will move in a straight line. Obviously, the planets are not moving in straight lines. They have a net force applied to them which keeps them moving around the sun instead of shooting off into space.

"Centrifugal force" is not a real force. If you are on a merry-go-round (a fast one :D ), what you interpret as centrifugal force is merely your body's reaction to the centripetal force of the merry-go-round. The merry-go-round exerts a force on your body towards the center of the merry-go-round. Your body also exerts an equal and opposite force on the merry-go-round. The sensation of these forces feels like something is trying to pull you off of the merry-go-round, when in fact the merry-go-round is trying to keep you moving in a circle instead of a straight line.

This is another example of how our senses can fool us.

And also, looking back on my first post, I was a bit sloppy when I stated the weights of the earth and sun. Those numbers are masses. Oopsie.
 
The CAI evolution challenge sounds a [Rule 8] of a lot like the initial challenge to Darwin's theory about where genetic diversity came from. Gregor Mendel solved that through his pea plant experiments. The next question would be where the dominant/recessive genes came from.* As I remember from Biology 101, they were always present in DNA, it's merely a question of what and how well the RNA reads it. I'd love to go 10 rounds with Sungenis and shut his woo face up, but with the bar exam three weeks from now, I do not have the time to make such a commitment. Add on the fact that it is quite apparent that Sungenis is being dishonest and it looks like a waste of processing power.


*A note for the real Biology buffs here: YES, I know this is a gross oversimplification but there really is no other way describe it right now.
 
wdsmith

wdsmith said:
If you are on a merry-go-round.....what you interpret as centrifugal force is merely your body's reaction to the centripetal force of the merry-go-round. The merry-go-round exerts a force on your body towards the center of the merry-go-round. Your body also exerts an equal and opposite force on the merry-go-round. The sensation of these forces feels like something is trying to pull you off of the merry-go-round....
Click to expand...
I don't think this quite accounts for the sensation of being pulled off the merry-go-round. If you are in orbit around the Earth, you won't get the sensation of being pulled off into space. Why not?

It seems to me the reason is that gravity acts on your body as a whole. Or, in other words, gravity acts on every part of your body. The merry-go-round, on the other hand, acts on only a part of your body.

On the merry-go-round, imagine that you are standing close to a bar fixed to the merry-go-round. The merry-go-round suddenly starts spinning very fast. You grab hold of the bar and your hands stay where they are fixed onto the bar. The rest of your body flings outwards. Your feet feel as if they are pulled out from under you and and end up about 7 ft away from the bar.
So I think it is the fact that the force of the merry-go-round is exerted directly on only one part of your body, whilst the rest of your body flings outwards, that you feel as if there is a force being applied to you trying to pull you off the merry-go-round. And you hold firmly onto the bar in a desperate attempt to stop this force from pulling you off.

Otherwise why wouldn't you feel the same sensation whilst in orbit around the Earth (for simplicity, imagine it is just you in orbit around the Earth).

BillyJoe
 
BillyJoe, I admit I'm no physicist and I haven't even explored the math for this let alone solved the equations but; couldn't you make the argument that the difference in sensations that you refer to could be the vast difference in terms of the forces?

I mean when we're talking about the merry-go-round then the forces exterted due to acceleration and angular movement far outweigh the force of the gravitational pull that it exerts. Whereas with the earth you'd be talking about a much higher contribution from gravity than you would from the angular motion.

Don't orbital paths have escape velocities? As I said, I've not got any solid grounding in this subject so please point out my mistakes. Orbital dynamics isn't something I'm overly familiar with.

Kaydens.
 
BillyJoe said:
wdsmith

I don't think this quite accounts for the sensation of being pulled off the merry-go-round. If you are in orbit around the Earth, you won't get the sensation of being pulled off into space. Why not?

It seems to me the reason is that gravity acts on your body as a whole. Or, in other words, gravity acts on every part of your body. The merry-go-round, on the other hand, acts on only a part of your body.

On the merry-go-round, imagine that you are standing close to a bar fixed to the merry-go-round. The merry-go-round suddenly starts spinning very fast. You grab hold of the bar and your hands stay where they are fixed onto the bar. The rest of your body flings outwards. Your feet feel as if they are pulled out from under you and and end up about 7 ft away from the bar.
So I think it is the fact that the force of the merry-go-round is exerted directly on only one part of your body, whilst the rest of your body flings outwards, that you feel as if there is a force being applied to you trying to pull you off the merry-go-round. And you hold firmly onto the bar in a desperate attempt to stop this force from pulling you off.

Otherwise why wouldn't you feel the same sensation whilst in orbit around the Earth (for simplicity, imagine it is just you in orbit around the Earth).

BillyJoe
Click to expand...

Not quite, Billyjoe:
The acceleration is acting on your whole body. Your arms are exerting the force that keeps you aboard. Do a free-body diagram...
The difference in forces is a direct result of the distance from center. Your legs are say, 2 meters further from the center of rotation than your hands. In a 150km orbit, that is a small effect. On a 3 meter merry-go-round, it is significant.

And wdsmith:
Yes, there are forces acting on the body--but they are in equilibrium.

Nobody said a thing about centrifugal force--it is acceleration being discussed. (you can quibble over that all you want)
Centrepital acceleration is a result of the circular motion of a body. The mathematical value is r*w^2, where r is the radius of the circle, and w is the circular frequency (Radians/second)
Since centrepital acceleration forces the body to change direction (This is the gravitational acceleration acting on the body), the body's velocity is constantly changing (Velocity is a vector). The time rate of change of velocity is acceleration. This is the centrifugal acceleration, and it acts outward (away from the center of rotation
this circular velocity is always tangential to the circle. it is the straight line velocity should the centrifugal acceleration fail, and it acts opposite the centrepital acceleration. When r*w^2=g (where g is the local gravitational acceleration), then the sum of forces F=0.00
Should one of the two fail (ie, w-->0, or g-->0) then the object will travel in a straight line, either toward the center of mass (where w-->0), or tangentially off into space (where g-->0)
since the two accelerations are absolutely related to each other (assume g=constant,or reasonably so for some particular mass), if we increase the orbital velocity (w), then r must get bigger unless another force acts on things to maintain equilibrium.
http://teacher.pas.rochester.edu/phy121/LectureNotes/Chapter14/Chapter14.html
also:
http://solarsails.jpl.nasa.gov/introduction/how-sails-work.html
has a pretty good diagram...

Now there are a number of folks who will take violent exception to my terminology, and my engineering poit-of-view on the world. Have at it. The princple remains...
 
ignore most of the above...I am not an astrophysicist, but an engineer.
What I posted does apply to centrifuges, not necessarily to orbits, although some of it does (if g or w go away...) but it is a really (rule 8) bad description of why free-falling objects have no weight...
Jump out of an airplane carrying a scale. the scale will register no weight because you are falling with exactly the same acceleration as gravity causes you to fall. An orbiting object has the exact same problem-it is falling toward the center of mass of the larger object (assuming large mass differences between the two objects), but because it has a tangential velocity (w), the center of mass has moved (relative to the falling object), and the direction of fall must continually change. the fall continues.

The merry-go-round and stuff in the previous post does, however, partially explain wha a person weighs less at the earths equator than he/she does at the pole. see Hal Clemmet's Mission of Gravity for a cute story based on that fact..
 
BillyJoe said:
I don't think this quite accounts for the sensation of being pulled off the merry-go-round. If you are in orbit around the Earth, you won't get the sensation of being pulled off into space. Why not?

It seems to me the reason is that gravity acts on your body as a whole. Or, in other words, gravity acts on every part of your body. The merry-go-round, on the other hand, acts on only a part of your body.
Click to expand...
Exactly correct! Although I can't help but tinker with your phrasing a bit: The merry-go-round does act on your entire body, but it has to act through the parts which are in direct contact with the merry-go-round.

It's the same when you are standing on the ground. Gravity is pulling your entire body (bones, muscles, organs), but all of your support (the upward force from the ground) has to come through your feet. You "feel" your weight because you feel your muscles and organs hanging from your skeleton.

rwguinn said:
ignore most of the above...I am not an astrophysicist, but an engineer.
What I posted does apply to centrifuges, not necessarily to orbits, although some of it does (if g or w go away...) but it is a really (rule 8) bad description of why free-falling objects have no weight...
Click to expand...
Even the NASA page about solar sails has a mistake. In one paragraph, they mention "the outward centrifugal force, mv^2/r, of the spacecraft's motion." The quantity mv^2/r is actually the centripetal acceleration required to cause an object of mass m to move at speed v in a circular path of radius r. The spacecraft's motion does not cause a force, centrifugal or otherwise. It is the force of gravity which causes the circular motion.

And I'm an engineer, too -- mechanical, to be precise. Dynamics was one of my favorite classes. :biggrin:
 
wdsmith said:
Exactly correct! Although I can't help but tinker with your phrasing a bit: The merry-go-round does act on your entire body, but it has to act through the parts which are in direct contact with the merry-go-round.

It's the same when you are standing on the ground. Gravity is pulling your entire body (bones, muscles, organs), but all of your support (the upward force from the ground) has to come through your feet. You "feel" your weight because you feel your muscles and organs hanging from your skeleton.


Even the NASA page about solar sails has a mistake. In one paragraph, they mention "the outward centrifugal force, mv^2/r, of the spacecraft's motion." The quantity mv^2/r is actually the centripetal acceleration required to cause an object of mass m to move at speed v in a circular path of radius r. The spacecraft's motion does not cause a force, centrifugal or otherwise. It is the force of gravity which causes the circular motion.

And I'm an engineer, too -- mechanical, to be precise. Dynamics was one of my favorite classes. :biggrin:
Click to expand...
Yeah--well, I have been doing it a while, now. It's like explaining Algebra II to my son. Been doing it so long, its like breathing, and you forget the basics. I Just have to remember reference frames. That r*W^2 acceleration is absolutely true, if you want to simulate a constant acceleration, such as in a centrifuge. It works there-- it is not necessarily the proper description for a falling body in orbit.
 
wdsmith,

wdsmith said:
Exactly correct! Although I can't help but tinker with your phrasing a bit: The merry-go-round does act on your entire body, but it has to act through the parts which are in direct contact with the merry-go-round.
Click to expand...
Yes, I did qulaify this later on: "...the force of the merry-go-round is exerted directly on only one part of your body..."

wdsmith said:
It's the same when you are standing on the ground. Gravity is pulling your entire body (bones, muscles, organs), but all of your support (the upward force from the ground) has to come through your feet. You "feel" your weight because you feel your muscles and organs hanging from your skeleton.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I guess if there was a wall around the periphery of the merry-go-round and you stood on this wall and the merry-go-round was moving very fast, it would feel like the effect of gravity.

BJ
 
BillyJoe said:
wdsmith,

Yes, I did qulaify this later on: "...the force of the merry-go-round is exerted directly on only one part of your body..."

Yeah, I guess if there was a wall around the periphery of the merry-go-round and you stood on this wall and the merry-go-round was moving very fast, it would feel like the effect of gravity.

BJ
Click to expand...
There is a carnival ride that is exactly that- Actually, more than one. They are essentially centrifuges.
One of them has you stand against the wall, the thing starts spinning, and they drop the floor out from under you. The wall is rubber/sticky, so the gravity part of the force vector doesn't slide you down the wall.
The other ride starts spinning (you stand against a metal mesh wall and are not strapped in!), and then it tilts to the vertical...
 
Well, I had to ask my son - he informed me that it is called a "Graviton"......

pinned4_med.jpg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom