# An anti-Transubstantiation argument for Geocentrism? (John Edwards)



## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 17, 2020)

I am just after reading this highly intriguing extract from John Edwards wherein he argued against Copernicanism on the basis that it, as with the Romish notion of transubstantiation, was contrary to our senses. What do you make of this argument and how would you argue against it from a Common Sense Realist point of view?
_
Fourthly,_ I would argue thus, Why do we check and gall (and not undeservedly) the _Romanists_ with this, that they deny their Senses in holding of _Transubstantiation?_ And why do we condemn the Doctrine of Transubstantiation for being contradictory to the verdict of our Senses, if we hold that the Earth turns round notwithstanding we have no notice of it in the least by our Senses? Or, can we be wheeled and hurled about every minute as fast as we can imagine, and yet have no Apprehension of it, not only not feeling the Earth move under us, but not perceiving the Air at all moved, nor having any intimation of it by our Sight, or any other Sense at any time of our whole Lives? This is not to be believed, and why therefore do any take the Confidence to assert the Earth's moving under them when they have no _Sense_ of it?

For this is certain that if there be any such thing, it is the proper Object of _Sensation._ But if we admit this which is so much against our Senses, we may as well embrace _Transubstantiation,_ which is a defiance to our Senses. If any Man satisfactorily answers this, I shall be inclined to be a _Copernican,_ and I shall have a great Temptation to believe the Doctrine of _Transubstantiation,_ I mean upon this account of our _Senses,_ though there are other Arguments which are purely Theological that will for ever uphold the contrary belief in me. In short, it is strange to me that such a considerable piece of Natural Philosophy as this, the Object of which is Corporeal and Sensible, should have no proof from any of the Senses. A _Romanist_ with his _Hoc est corpus_ may solve the matter, but I do not see how this can be the Philosophy of one of the _Reformed._

John Edwards, _A demonstration of the existence and providence of God, from the contemplation of the visible structure of the greater and the lesser world in two parts, the first shewing the excellent contrivance of the heavens, earth, sea, &c., the second the wonderful formation of the body of man_ (London: Jonathan Robinson and John Wyat, 1696), 1.2, pp 42-43.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 17, 2020)

While I am not convinced by the exegetical arguments for Geocentrism such as the earth standing still in Joshua, as such passages are open to a different interpretation, this argument seems a bit more weighty on the face of it.


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## RamistThomist (Jan 17, 2020)

I get what he was saying. My only push back is that one of the problems with transub is that it violates definitions. You have accidents without a substance.

The argument that it violates our senses isn't as powerful today as it used to be.

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## Logan (Jan 17, 2020)

From just a basic physics standpoint, his understanding is limited by the extent of knowledge from his time period.

Example: Not feeling the earth moving beneath us. If you are moving at the same speed, then even according to Newton there would be no perceptible frame of reference. If you are on a smooth train which has reached its traveling speed (stopped accelerating), there is no way to "feel" that you are moving except for the bumps or corners. Does that mean the train isn't actually moving and therefore transubstantiation is real? Clearly not. Or try this on a plane at cruising altitude. You might almost feel like you are just floating in a noisy room and yet clearly you are traveling rapidly.

There are many things we can't sense without the use of tools or instruments. That doesn't mean they don't exist. Example: the electromagnetic waves that allow your devices to communicate over wifi or cell towers. We can't sense it (even if some people claim they are allergic to it), yet it clearly exists---we use it all the time.

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## SRoper (Jan 17, 2020)

We don't sense speed. We sense acceleration.

I'm not sure I follow all the ins and outs of the philosophical argument, but it seems like a category error. We might identify a substance by our sense of it, but our sense of motion of a substance is not unambiguous. The sense of being on a train moving at a constant speed and the sense of being on a stationary train is the same. Motion is by definition relative, substances are not.

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> While I am not convinced by the exegetical arguments for Geocentrism such as the earth standing still in Joshua, as such passages are open to a different interpretation, this argument seems a bit more weighty on the face of it.


What would be a different interpretation you have in mind for the passage in Joshua?


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## TylerRay (Jan 17, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> I am just after reading this highly intriguing extract from John Edwards wherein he argued against Copernicanism on the basis that it, as with the Romish notion of transubstantiation, was contrary to our senses. What do you make of this argument and how would you argue against it from a Common Sense Realist point of view?
> _
> Fourthly,_ I would argue thus, Why do we check and gall (and not undeservedly) the _Romanists_ with this, that they deny their Senses in holding of _Transubstantiation?_ And why do we condemn the Doctrine of Transubstantiation for being contradictory to the verdict of our Senses, if we hold that the Earth turns round notwithstanding we have no notice of it in the least by our Senses? Or, can we be wheeled and hurled about every minute as fast as we can imagine, and yet have no Apprehension of it, not only not feeling the Earth move under us, but not perceiving the Air at all moved, nor having any intimation of it by our Sight, or any other Sense at any time of our whole Lives? This is not to be believed, and why therefore do any take the Confidence to assert the Earth's moving under them when they have no _Sense_ of it?
> 
> ...


I asked @Afterthought a very similar question once in regard to common sense realism and special relativity. 

So, our perception is that we are standing still and the sun circles what we are standing on--but (as Ramon pointed out to me), our perception is not absolute--someone in a different position can perceive the same objective reality that we do, but with a different perspective.

We can't get a proper sight of the movements of the spheres so long as we are standing on one of them.

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## TylerRay (Jan 17, 2020)

To put it another way, my son understands himself to be sitting still in his carseat as we're going down the interstate. The unfortunate gentleman with a flat tire in the margin watches my son (along with the rest of our van) go past him at 80 mph. Has common sense failed? Not really--it's just limited by perspective.

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

TylerRay said:


> go past him at 80 mph. Has common sense failed?


Hehe

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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 17, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> What would be a different interpretation you have in mind for the passage in Joshua?



That the text is referring to how we perceive things, rather than making a precise scientific statement about whether or not the sun circles around the earth. There is a technical term for it, but it has slipped my mind.

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> That the text is referring to how we perceive things, rather than making a precise scientific statement about whether or not the sun circles around the earth. There is a technical term for it, but it has slipped my mind.


Accommodation?


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## RamistThomist (Jan 17, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> There is a technical term for it, but it has slipped my mind.



Phenomenalism. Accomodationism is close, but it is how God "lisps" to us. Phenomenalism (or phenomenology) is how things appear.

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## Bill The Baptist (Jan 17, 2020)

Regardless of what our senses may tell us, we can use scientific testing to determine that the earth is indeed moving. On the other hand, laboratory tests would reveal that the bread and wine of the Catholic mass remained bread and wine.

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## Tom Hart (Jan 17, 2020)

Bill The Baptist said:


> Regardless of what our senses may tell us, we can use scientific testing to determine that the earth is indeed moving. On the other hand, laboratory tests would reveal that the bread and wine of the Catholic mass remained bread and wine.


If I am not mistaken, Romanists do not teach that the bread and wine are_ physically _altered. They say that the _substance_ changes, while the _accidents_ remain the same. That is, they remain apparently bread and wine, but they are really, mysteriously, the body and blood of Christ.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 17, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> Accommodation?





BayouHuguenot said:


> Phenomenalism. Accomodationism is close, but it is how God "lisps" to us. Phenomenalism (or phenomenology) is how things appear.



Yes, that term is the correct one.


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## Bill The Baptist (Jan 17, 2020)

Tom Hart said:


> If I am not mistaken, Romanists do not teach that the bread and wine are_ physically _altered. They say that the _substance_ changes, while the _accidents_ remain the same. That is, they remain apparently bread and wine, but they are really, mysteriously, the body and blood of Christ.



But that’s simply now how properties and substances work. They are arguing that it becomes blood and flesh in its substance, but remain bread and wine in its properties. The problem with this view is that, logically, a particular substance is always limited in the number of potential properties it may have. Wine and bread are simply not possible properties of flesh and blood.


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## Taylor (Jan 17, 2020)

Bill The Baptist said:


> But that’s simply now how properties and substances work. They are arguing that it becomes blood and flesh in its substance, but remain bread and wine in its properties. The problem with this view is that, logically, a particular substance is always limited in the number of potential properties it may have. Wine and bread are simply not possible properties of flesh and blood.



I think this is what Jacob was getting at above. Substance and properties are really inseparable. If something has all the properties of a duck, it is a duck. Furthermore, if something is substantially a duck, it will have all the properties of a duck.

To me, transubstantiation thus creates serious issues for our theology proper. If substance and properties can be separated, then God _cannot_ be his attributes, as there is a property "omnipotence" that exists apart from God. Same with the other attributes, threatening the uniqueness of our God.

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## Tom Hart (Jan 17, 2020)

Bill The Baptist said:


> But that’s simply now how properties and substances work. They are arguing that it becomes blood and flesh in its substance, but remain bread and wine in its properties. The problem with this view is that, logically, a particular substance is always limited in the number of potential properties it may have. Wine and bread are simply not possible properties of flesh and blood.


I'm not saying it makes any sense, because it doesn't. But no Roman Catholic says that it becomes the physical body and blood of Christ.

So if you were to lop off an RC's head mid-swallow, you would find that yes, the bread and wine would still be, to all appearances, bread and wine, and the RC wouldn't have a problem with saying so. (He might have a problem with having his head lopped off, however.)


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## lynnie (Jan 17, 2020)

Actually, scientific testing showed the earth at rest. Michaelson- Morley and Sagnac among others. ( from list of quotes link below)

"What happened when the experiment was done in 1887? *There was never, never, in any orientation at any time of year, any shift in the interference pattern; none; no shift; no fringe shift; nothing. What's the implication? Here was an experiment that was done to measure the speed of the earth's motion through the ether. This was an experiment that was ten times more sensitive than it needed to be. It could have detected speeds as low as two miles a second instead of the known 2mps that the earth as in its orbital motion around the sun. It didn't detect it. *What's the conclusion from the Michelson-Morley experiment? The implications is that the earth is not moving..."- Physicist, Richard Wolfson

The reason Time Magazine named Einstein "Man of the Century" is that after a couple decades of scientists puzzling about the scientific results (of course the earth could not be at the center), Einstein explained everything with his theory of relativity.

I would have to say that it is relativity that primarily goes against common sense realism, as well as classical physics. That is where the debate really lies- is relativity correct or is it nonsense. There are PhD astronomers and physicists out there who answer every objection that might arise from the heliocentrists, and it's probably all been posted here before. 

I just tried to find a list of quotes I posted a while back. I did see this that I posted myself.....common sense fails us all I think, the numbers are too hard to grasp. 

"It is interesting to compare the solar system with one atom. Now I know the old Bohr model with electrons as little orbiting points is no longer the model. We now have a nucleus grain of sand in the middle of picturing a big puff of smoke, which can be a sphere or doughnut or dumbbell, and the electron is a probability wave of quantum physics now. 

If our sun and the nucleus of a gold atom were each scaled to one foot long, the outer electron of the gold atom ( or edge of the uncertainty shell) would be past Pluto. (The earth would be 215 feet out.)

https://www.google.com/search?q=per...ei=r7H7V_naOsXme4egpOAN#imgrc=Nc2FckaS9bkClM:

So using a classical Bohr model, every second that electron with an orbit out past Pluto spins 1.7854*10^20 revolutions per second around the sun. Can you imagine Pluto spinning around the sun 1.780,000,000,000,000,000,000 times every single second?

https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090103143328AAI2BrN

Yet people think the universe could not spin every 24 hours. (and see Barry Setterfield on the speed of light decay for why the universe size is far smaller than you've been led to believe).

People accept the structure of an atom without giving it a single thought. Yet the same God who can make an electron spin (or do its uncertainty principle wave motion thing)the equivalent of Pluto spinning around the sun 1.780,000,000,000,000,000,000 times every single second can't make the planets and stars spin every day?" 

Here is a list of quotes from Sungenis' book, fascinating reading:

https://quotesandreferences.blogspot.com/2016/08/quotes-in-favor-of-geocentrism.html

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## Megs (Jan 17, 2020)

Here is a link to my research on the geocentricity question (the older posts are more specifically on point). The scientific evidence for heliocentrism and a moving earth is not as clear cut as many believe:

https://antipaschronicles.blogspot.com/search/label/Science-Cosmology

And my original blog which was probably easier to peruse:

https://upongibeon.wordpress.com/

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

The belief that the earth circles the sun is indeed contrary to our senses, not only of lack of perception of movement but also of sight.

I don’t know how strong an argument it is to compare the claim that the earth is moving, contrary to sense, to transubstantiation. I’d be interested to see what the argument against it would be from a Common Sense Realist point of view (I barely know what that means). Can you give an example of what that argument might sound like, Daniel? (Or anyone?)


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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

Megs said:


> Here is a link to my research on the geocentricity question. The scientific evidence for heliocentrism and a moving earth is not as clear cut as many believe:
> 
> https://antipaschronicles.blogspot.com/search/label/Science-Cosmology


Wow Megs, thanks.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 17, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> The belief that the earth circles the sun is indeed contrary to our senses, not only of lack of perception of movement but also of sight.
> 
> I don’t know how strong an argument it is to compare the claim that the earth is moving, contrary to sense, to transubstantiation. I’d be interested to see what the argument against it would be from a Common Sense Realist point of view (I barely know what that means). Can you give an example of what that argument might sound like, Daniel? (Or anyone?)



John Edwards' quotation above is basically a CSR argument in opposition to heliocentrism. 

For what it is worth, while I do not believe that the Bible overtly teaches Geocentrism, as the texts cited in support of the theory do not necessarily _demand_ that interpretation, I would be open to a scientific/empirical argument for the position if I were scientifically literate, which I am not. 

As I see it, too many who argue for Geocentrism today do so merely on the basis of having read something in John Owen or Francis Turretin without pausing to consider whether or not such conclusions have been superseded by subsequent research.


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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> As I see it, too many who argue for Geocentrism today do so merely on the basis of having read something in John Owen or Francis Turretin without pausing to consider whether or not such conclusions have been superseded by subsequent research.


I don’t think subsequent research could ever prove or disprove heliocentricity or geocentricity (similar to proving or disproving the age of the earth I guess). I’m of the opinion that Joshua under inspiration states that the sun was moving along a course, and that it stopped its course when commanded that day, but I understand people’s believing that it’s an example of phenomenalism.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 17, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> I don’t think subsequent research could ever prove or disprove heliocentricity or geocentricity (similar to proving or disproving the age of the earth I guess).



Subsequent linguistic and theological research, however, could be used to prove that the biblical texts cited in favour of Geocentrism do not necessarily demand that interpretation.


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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> Subsequent linguistic and theological research, however, could be used to prove that the biblical texts cited in favour of Geocentrism do not necessarily demand that interpretation.


If something like that developed, I guess so. (Isn’t it really unlikely that happening for that passage?) But no shame in standing with the passage as translated all these millennia, I think, until and unless that were to happen.


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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 17, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> Subsequent linguistic and theological research, however, could be used to prove that the biblical texts cited in favour of Geocentrism do not necessarily demand that interpretation.


Are you thinking of a possible development from the use of a different underlying manuscript/text family than used now for Joshua?


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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 17, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> Are you thinking of a possible development from the use of a different underlying manuscript/text family than used now for Joshua?



In that particular case, no. As far as I am aware, it is an interpretive question not a matter of textual criticism.

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## py3ak (Jan 17, 2020)

> Grown-up people find it very difficult to believe really wonderful things, unless they have what they call proof. But children will believe almost anything, and grown-ups know this. That is why they tell you that the earth is round like an orange, when you can see perfectly well that it is flat and lumpy; and why they say that the earth goes round the sun, when you can see for yourself any day that the sun gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night like a good sun as it is, and the earth knows its place, and lies as still as a mouse.



Edith Nesbit, _Five Children and It_

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## bookslover (Jan 18, 2020)

I'd like to see a Venn diagram showing the intersection of geocentrists and anti-vaxxers. I'd bet _that_ would be interesting.


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## Ben Zartman (Jan 18, 2020)

Back to Edwards, if the only thing keeping him from transubstatiation was that he couldn't _feel _the elements turning to actual flesh and blood, there was something wrong with his theology.
As for one of his reasons for geocentrism, that obviously the earth is still because air isn't rushing past always--well, even modern flat-earth geocentrists admit that the air gets thinner the higher you go--your senses tell you that--and eventually there is no more air. Surely none of them think that the entire universe all the way up to the dark curtain or whatever that comprises the edge contains breathable air! Back then they didn't understand the idea of a vaccuum, so they thought all empty space was filled with "ether," which, ironically, was impossible to feel.


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## jwright82 (Jan 18, 2020)

lynnie said:


> Actually, scientific testing showed the earth at rest. Michaelson- Morley and Sagnac among others. ( from list of quotes link below)
> 
> "What happened when the experiment was done in 1887? *There was never, never, in any orientation at any time of year, any shift in the interference pattern; none; no shift; no fringe shift; nothing. What's the implication? Here was an experiment that was done to measure the speed of the earth's motion through the ether. This was an experiment that was ten times more sensitive than it needed to be. It could have detected speeds as low as two miles a second instead of the known 2mps that the earth as in its orbital motion around the sun. It didn't detect it. *What's the conclusion from the Michelson-Morley experiment? The implications is that the earth is not moving..."- Physicist, Richard Wolfson
> 
> ...


Amen


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## jwright82 (Jan 18, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> I am just after reading this highly intriguing extract from John Edwards wherein he argued against Copernicanism on the basis that it, as with the Romish notion of transubstantiation, was contrary to our senses. What do you make of this argument and how would you argue against it from a Common Sense Realist point of view?
> _
> Fourthly,_ I would argue thus, Why do we check and gall (and not undeservedly) the _Romanists_ with this, that they deny their Senses in holding of _Transubstantiation?_ And why do we condemn the Doctrine of Transubstantiation for being contradictory to the verdict of our Senses, if we hold that the Earth turns round notwithstanding we have no notice of it in the least by our Senses? Or, can we be wheeled and hurled about every minute as fast as we can imagine, and yet have no Apprehension of it, not only not feeling the Earth move under us, but not perceiving the Air at all moved, nor having any intimation of it by our Sight, or any other Sense at any time of our whole Lives? This is not to be believed, and why therefore do any take the Confidence to assert the Earth's moving under them when they have no _Sense_ of it?
> 
> ...


I would say from common sense, science has a way of expanding our "common sense" to arenas beyond our immediate perception.

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## Logan (Jan 18, 2020)

Regarding Michelson-Morley.

I've tried to correct this many times in the past (nearly every time I see Lynnie bring it up) but you can't use an experiment designed to test how the theoretical ether affects the speed of light to prove the earth is not moving. I'm fairly familiar with their experimental setup (electromagnetics is my area of expertise) and this is misinformed reasoning and misapplication of their experiment and results.

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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 18, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> If something like that developed, I guess so. (Isn’t it really unlikely that happening for that passage?) But no shame in standing with the passage as translated all these millennia, I think, until and unless that were to happen.



I am only noticing this one now, Jeri. Perhaps what I am getting at is that if empirical research proves as an incontrovertible fact that Geocentrism is wrong, then our reading of the book of revelation must concur with our reading of the book of nature. The two cannot contradict one another since God is the author of both. Consequently, if (note that I say if) Geocentrism is demonstrably mistaken, then we must jettison Geocentric interpretations in favour of phenomenalistic interpretations.


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## SeanPatrickCornell (Jan 19, 2020)

lynnie said:


> Actually, scientific testing showed the earth at rest. Michaelson- Morley and Sagnac among others. ( from list of quotes link below)
> 
> "What happened when the experiment was done in 1887? There was never, never, in any orientation at any time of year, any shift in the interference pattern; none; no shift; no fringe shift; nothing. What's the implication? *Here was an experiment that was done to measure the speed of the earth's motion through the ether.* This was an experiment that was ten times more sensitive than it needed to be. It could have detected speeds as low as two miles a second instead of the known 2mps that the earth as in its orbital motion around the sun. It didn't detect it. What's the conclusion from the Michelson-Morley experiment? The implications is that the earth is not moving..."- Physicist, Richard Wolfson



"Through the ether" That's the key. Since there is no such thing as "the ether", this is why the experiment came away with a speed of zero; there's no ether for the earth to move through.

The experiment didn't prove that the earth doesn't move, it proved that there's no "luminiferous aether" pervading all of space.

Also, do you have a source for your Richard Wolfson quote? You end the quotation with an ellipsis ("...") which means there's more to the quote that isn't shown.

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## Charles Johnson (Jan 19, 2020)

The rotation and orbit of the earth is only "contrary to sense" if one is standing on the earth looking up. When men stood on the moon, it looked as if the earth was rising and setting and the moon was still. If this CSR argument may be applied equally well to prove contradictory things, that the earth is still and the moon moves, and that the earth moves and the moon is still, then two possibilities remain: either 1) the argument is invalid in an absolute sense, or 2) the argument is misapplied, and no true contradiction exists. A thorough study of physics reveals that, at least as far as rotation is concerned, it can be proven that certain things are rotating in an absolute sense, and not relative sense, since regardless of one's frame of reference, it can be proven that the rotating thing is rotating. This is necessary to explain certain things that would otherwise be anomalous, such as the coriolis effect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_rotation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foucault_pendulum

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## Ben Zartman (Jan 20, 2020)

^^ As well as the Coriolis effect, we have the gyrocompass, and focault's pendulum, which work along the same principles.

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## Logan (Jan 20, 2020)

Focault's Pendulum is an excellent example to bring up.


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## chuckd (Jan 20, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> That the text is referring to how we perceive things, rather than making a precise scientific statement about whether or not the sun circles around the earth. There is a technical term for it, but it has slipped my mind.


If the sun did not stop in Joshua, what happened?


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## chuckd (Jan 20, 2020)

Logan said:


> From just a basic physics standpoint, his understanding is limited by the extent of knowledge from his time period.
> 
> Example: Not feeling the earth moving beneath us. If you are moving at the same speed, then even according to Newton there would be no perceptible frame of reference. If you are on a smooth train which has reached its traveling speed (stopped accelerating), there is no way to "feel" that you are moving except for the bumps or corners. Does that mean the train isn't actually moving and therefore transubstantiation is real? Clearly not. Or try this on a plane at cruising altitude. You might almost feel like you are just floating in a noisy room and yet clearly you are traveling rapidly.
> 
> There are many things we can't sense without the use of tools or instruments. That doesn't mean they don't exist. Example: the electromagnetic waves that allow your devices to communicate over wifi or cell towers. We can't sense it (even if some people claim they are allergic to it), yet it clearly exists---we use it all the time.


Imagine you wake up in outer space without stars or planets. All you see is a man rotating head over foot. Is he rotating or are you?


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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 20, 2020)

chuckd said:


> If the sun did not stop in Joshua, what happened?


Now you’ve done it.


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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

chuckd said:


> If the sun did not stop in Joshua, what happened?



I would say it’s the same thing that happened when the weatherman this morning said, "The sun rose at 6:32am." We know he wasn't making a literalistic statement about the motion of the sun. Rather, he was simply using a phenomenological descriptor to communicate an event as it seems to us. Yet his statement is no less true. It's just that "sunrise" is easier than saying "the beginning of the 24-hour day cycle initiated in our calendars by the sun appearing over the horizon due to the consistent rotation of the earth on its axis."

This happens all over Scripture. Interpreting something like the sun event in Joshua as phenomenological language is no less respectful of Scripture than interpreting God's having body parts in Scripture as anthropomorphic. And, no matter how one describes it—whether the sun stopped, or the earth stopped—it is no less a miracle that only God by his omnipotence could accomplish.

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## chuckd (Jan 20, 2020)

Taylor Sexton said:


> I would say it’s the same thing that happened when the weatherman this morning said, "The sun rose at 6:32am." We know he wasn't making a literalistic statement about the motion of the sun. Rather, he was simply using a phenomenological descriptor to communicate an event as it seems to us. Yet his statement is no less true. It's just that "sunrise" is easier than saying "the beginning of the 24-hour day cycle initiated in our calendars by the sun appearing over the horizon due to the consistent rotation of the earth on its axis."
> 
> This happens all over Scripture. Interpreting something like the sun event in Joshua as phenomenological language is no less respectful of Scripture than interpreting God's having body parts in Scripture as anthropomorphic. And, no matter how one describes it—whether the sun stopped, or the earth stopped—it is no less a miracle that only God by his omnipotence could accomplish.


Why do you think it was phenomenological language?

And the earth suddenly stopping in Joshua would have had catastrophic affects on anything at rest on the surface.


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## TylerRay (Jan 20, 2020)

chuckd said:


> And the earth suddenly stopping in Joshua would have had catastrophic affects on anything at rest on the surface.


... unless it were a miracle.


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## Charles Johnson (Jan 20, 2020)

chuckd said:


> Imagine you wake up in outer space without stars or planets. All you see is a man rotating head over foot. Is he rotating or are you?


The one who throws up in his space suit is rotating. 
Various aspects of the sensation of rotating, such as the sensation of one's members being "pulled away" from one's center of mass, could be used to determine which is spinning. Like a figure skater, do you spin faster when you pull your arms in? Then you're definitely spinning, since that doesn't happen when you're still.


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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

chuckd said:


> And the earth suddenly stopping in Joshua would have had catastrophic affects on anything at rest on the surface.



So, God has the power to stop a planet, but not enough power to stop the possible drastic effects?

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## SeanPatrickCornell (Jan 20, 2020)

Taylor Sexton said:


> So, God has the power to stop a planet, but not enough power to stop the possible drastic effects?



This reminds me of an IFB who insisted that Jesus could NOT have possibly turned water into ALCOHOLIC wine because it takes grape juice a couple days to start fermenting and the stuff was only in the barrels for a few minutes.

Like, the Son of God could turn water into grape juice, that's cool, no worries, but the further chemical reactions of fermentation? No, THAT the Lord of All Creation needed to allow to happen at a natural pace.


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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 20, 2020)

Rev. Winzer through the years here on PB has showed how the text (and indeed the whole Bible) teaches that the sun moves in relation to earth. There are no markers in the text to allow for it being interpreted phenomenologically. The Scripture itself, therefore God himself, states that at the command of Joshua the sun ceased its movement. (The moon also was commanded.)


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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> There are no markers in the text to allow for it being interpreted phenomenologically.



What markers would these be? Can you give me an example?

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 20, 2020)

Markers identifying the genre of a passage in question. Joshua 6 is straightforwardly a historical narrative. I know that for many (most) the “science is settled” on the movements of the earth and the heavenly bodies. But I think being settled on those matters can be premature.


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## lynnie (Jan 20, 2020)

SeanPatrickCornell said:


> "Through the ether" That's the key. Since there is no such thing as "the ether", this is why the experiment came away with a speed of zero; there's no ether for the earth to move through.
> 
> The experiment didn't prove that the earth doesn't move, it proved that there's no "luminiferous aether" pervading all of space.
> 
> Also, do you have a source for your Richard Wolfson quote? You end the quotation with an ellipsis ("...") which means there's more to the quote that isn't shown.


I'm sorry, I meant to reply sooner and got busy.

The sources are probably in the original list by Sungenis, you could try this for even more comprehensive commentary and quotes on the subject....https://christian-wilderness.forumvi.com/t569-geocentricity-ordered-quotes

I don't think you quite understand that Michaelson-Morley showed the earth at rest, and for that reason Einstein was hailed as a genius when he introduced his relativity theory a while later. Yes they were measuring speed through the ether, which you claim does not exist ( geocentrists say it does), but the point is, there was no change in the light speed moving towards a star in one direction and away six months later. Normally measuring waves, we add and subtract the speed of the object moving, in relation to the speed of the wave. The speed of the allegedly moving earth made no difference in the measured speed of the starlight. 

This was philosophically impossible, and hence relativity became the solution, with its attendant concepts about time itself changing and so forth, which was rejected by many scientists at the time as ridiculous, but is now as canonical as evolution for the most part in science. 

The coriolis effect and focault's pendulum and all sorts of objections work just fine with a rotating universe. You can check it out easily with a search, I am not going to even link more stuff that has been covered at PB before. Even the greatest helios admit it is a philosophical discussion as both models (geo and helio) explain all observed phenomena so long as you include relativity theory with the helio. Take that away and geo wins.


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## SeanPatrickCornell (Jan 20, 2020)

lynnie said:


> ... I don't think you quite understand that Michaelson-Morley showed the earth at rest...



I'm very familiar with Michelson-Morley, why the test was done, the science behind the test, and what it was trying to prove, and I am 100% certain beyond all doubt that what it did _not_ prove was that the Earth was at rest.

In fact, if you too the MIchelson-Morley test and replicated it on a rocket that was flying at a constant speed away from Earth, it would give the exact same result. Would that then prove that the rocket was really at rest?



lynnie said:


> but the point is, there was no change in the light speed moving towards a star in one direction and away six months later.



?????

That's not the Michelson-Morley test...

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## Logan (Jan 20, 2020)

lynnie said:


> I don't think you quite understand that Michaelson-Morley showed the earth at rest, and for that reason Einstein was hailed as a genius when he introduced his relativity theory a while later. Yes they were measuring speed through the ether, which you claim does not exist ( geocentrists say it does), but the point is, there was no change in the light speed moving towards a star in one direction and away six months later. *Normally measuring waves, we add and subtract the speed of the object moving, in relation to the speed of the wave.* The speed of the allegedly moving earth made no difference in the measured speed of the starlight.



Lynnie, I've said it before, but that's just incorrect. That's not how waves normally work, that's not how Doppler shifts work.

And M-M did not even look at the speed of light six months apart. They measured two beams of light, one perpendicular to the other. The idea was that if there was an ether, one beam should be slower than the other. The results showed no difference. That is not even close to being the same as measuring the earth is moving.

And actually, there is a small red/blue shift yearly. So yes, there absolutely is a change detected in moving towards a star and away six months later but that is not the same as speed of the wave, although related.

Also, to those who claim it works both ways: a mathematical model is not the same thing as a physical model. Just because you can do the math in both frames of reference does not account for all the phenomena we observe. A geocentrist can come up with all kinds of models post facto but to my knowledge has never demonstrated (let alone verified) any predictions. The explanations a geocentrist has for Focault's Pendulum are convoluted and lacking, to say the least.

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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> Markers identifying the genre of a passage in question. Joshua 6 is straightforwardly a historical narrative. I know that for many (most) the “science is settled” on the movements of the earth and the heavenly bodies. But I think being settled on those matters can be premature.



Why would we not then conclude, on this reasoning, that historical narrative passages that speak of God’s body parts would have to speak of actual body parts? Acts 13:11 says that the hand of the Lord fell upon Saul to strike him with blindness. Was that a literal hand?

In the end, this interpretation just doesn’t seem plausible to me. It is too difficult a hermeneutical principle to apply universally without serious theological problems. Just because something is within a historical narrative doesn’t make everything described therein literalistic you intended. This is how papists arrive at transubstantiation. After all, Jesus said that the wine _is_ his blood—and this is historical narrative, too, by the way. (Also, lest I be accused, I am not saying that geocentrists affirm transubstantiation.)

Sure, the geocentric theory fits well with the Joshua miracle, but the text simply doesn’t _demand_ it. That’s my issue. I just think this is an area that is too wonderful for us, and something, as you yourself said, about which we should not be settled.

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## Charles Johnson (Jan 20, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> Markers identifying the genre of a passage in question. Joshua 6 is straightforwardly a historical narrative. I know that for many (most) the “science is settled” on the movements of the earth and the heavenly bodies. But I think being settled on those matters can be premature.


This misrepresents the phenomenological claim though. The phenomenological claim is not that the passages in question are always using metaphor in a poetic context, where one might expect the poetic nature of the text to be "marked", but that phenomenological metaphor is common even in otherwise literal, direct speech.
I, in everyday, non-poetic conversation, routinely speak of "sunrises" and "sunsets", despite not believing that the sun is literally rising or falling. If one examined my speech for markers of poeticness, they wouldn't find any. Does that mean that they could validly claim that, based on the genre of my speech, it contains no metaphor whatsoever, and therefore I must believe the Earth is at the center of the solar system? Of course not.

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## Megs (Jan 20, 2020)

For anyone's interest, our own beloved and phenomenologically "dearly departed" Matthew Winzer addressed phenomenology here:

https://www.puritanboard.com/threads/which-is-central-the-sun-or-the-earth.54925/page-2, Comment #56

https://www.puritanboard.com/threads/another-article-against-geocentrism.90800/, Comment #14

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 20, 2020)

“I hope you are not suggesting that the Bible merely accommodated its language to the misconception of the one/s telling or reading the account. This is a liberal view of accommodation.”- MW (in the first thread linked).

Yes, this is the issue. The Bible doesn’t accommodate its language in this way in what it affirms.

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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> “I hope you are not suggesting that the Bible merely accommodated its language to the misconception of the one/s telling or reading the account. This is a liberal view of accommodation.”- MW (in the first thread linked).
> 
> Yes, this is the issue. The Bible doesn’t accommodate its language in this way in what it affirms.



Then the very idea of accommodation is liberal. Accommodation is the speaking figuratively of things we cannot conceive.

Furthermore, by what authority does he say this is the “liberal” view?

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## Megs (Jan 20, 2020)

Taylor Sexton said:


> Then the very idea of accommodation is liberal. Accommodation is the speaking figuratively of things we cannot conceive.
> 
> Furthermore, by what authority does he say this is the “liberal” view?



I think he was getting at the difference between accommodating to truth versus accommodating to error.

Joshua 10:12-13 Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed,....

The text seems to indicate that everyone involved thought that the sun was actually moving and that it actually stood still in response to Joshua's command.

It's one thing to accommodate to people's perceptions in a way that upholds the truth. It's another to mislead people into thinking one thing happened when it didn't really happen at all. (Before Copernicus, would people have read heliocentricity into the text?).

As Rev. Winzer put it in comment #48 of the first thread linked above,

I accept the Calvinian, not the Cartesian, teaching of accommodation. I suggest participants in this thread do some reading on this subject in order to discover the difference. Your advocacy of Cartesian accommodation equally justifies liberal explanations of Bible miracles.​

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## Charles Johnson (Jan 20, 2020)

Megs said:


> I think he was getting at the difference between accommodating to truth versus accommodating to error.
> 
> Joshua 10:12-13 Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed,....
> 
> ...


Liberal explainings-away of Christ's miracles don't rely upon linguistically valid exegesis. I'm not aware of any language, much less Koine Greek, where the expressions used to explain biblical miracles - turning water to wine, casting out demons, raising the dead, etc - are commonly used to express non-miraculous phenomena. Therefore, liberals, in denying miracles, consistently deny the natural, linguistically valid reading of the text. 
However, plenty of societies, whether geocentric or helio-centric in their outlook, speak about the relative movement of the sun in relative terms - the sun rises, the sun sets, etc. In fact, I'm not aware of any language that does _not _speak that way. So this consistutes a fundamental difference between the exegetical approach of the orthodox heliocentrists on the one hand, and liberals on the other. 
Moreover, plenty of orthodox folks have noted that, in the Scriptures, God accommodates human modes of expression. For many topics, this is necessarily the case - for example, when we speak of the nature of God, our statements are true analogically, since God is by nature incomprehensible. This was the teaching of Aquinas and all the reformers. 
Augustine, in his commentary on Genesis 1, speaks often about God's accommodation to human modes of speech.
"[The Manichaeans] look at the shape of our body and ask so infelicitously whether God has a nose and teeth and a beard and also inner organs and the other things we need. However, it is ridiculous, even wicked, to believe that there are such things in God, and so they deny that man was made to the image and likeness of God. _We answer them that the Scriptures generally mention these members in presenting God to an audience of the little ones_, and this is true, not only of the books of the Old Testament, but also of the New Testament.... Let them know, nonetheless, that the spiritual believers in the Catholic teaching do not believe that God is limited by a bodily shape."
Could God be accused of misleading those by his manner of speech who thought that he, like men, had a physical body? After all, the pagans worshipped as gods images of men, and fish, and birds, and other created things. But, of course, that would be a baseless accusation, because the fault would be in the hearers who were blinded to the truth, not in God who had spoken.

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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

Megs said:


> I think he was getting at the difference between accommodating to truth versus accommodating to error.
> 
> Joshua 10:12-13 Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed,....
> 
> ...



Is that the entire argument is based on several assumed and unargued premises:

1) ...that accomodation in this particular instance, given the ancient astrological understanding, is deception;

2) ...that the Spirit's utilization of language that might give credence to one particular astrological perspective is an _actual_ endorsement of said perspective; again, nobody even now does this in day-to-day conversation;

3) ...and that, given any misunderstanding on the ancient audience's part, the Spirit would have taken such a misunderstanding and given a different description of events; this is pure speculation.

If these premises could be proven rather than asserted, then the argument would be more compelling. But until then, the geocentric conclusion is just not a logical _entailment_ of the language used in Joshua, no matter how many times it may be asserted to be so. I'm not saying it doesn't work; I am merely saying the text does not _demand_ it.

And, I just want to point out that the use of the word "liberal" in this discussion is simply poisoning the well. A liberal agenda is the farthest thing from anyone's mind here. I think we can all grant that. Again, whether or not one takes the geo- or heliocentric view, what happened in Joshua still makes perfect sense, and it is still an amazing act of God that only he could have done.

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 20, 2020)

Taylor and others, can you think of any other passage of Scripture where the Bible states something as historical fact, yet most Christians claim it’s phenomenological? I don’t mean passages where God speaks of himself as having arms, or of himself repenting. We know from other Scripture that God is a Spirit, and we know from other Scriptures that he does not change. 

I haven’t been able to come up with one.


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## JennyGeddes (Jan 20, 2020)

What about Isaiah 38:8?
Behold, I will bring again the shadow of the degrees, which is gone down in the sun dial of Ahaz, ten degrees backward. So the sun returned ten degrees, by which degrees it was gone down.
And 2 Kings 20:11
And Isaiah the prophet cried unto the LORD: and he brought the shadow ten degrees.
Sorry if this has already been mentioned or is irrelevant.

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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 20, 2020)

It is important to state the question properly or else everyone will be talking past each other: The issue in relation to Joshua 10 is not one of the historicity of the passage or the fact that a miracle occurred. Both sides agree on these points. The real issue at stake is whether or not the passage is making a precise scientific statement regarding whether or not the sun circles the globe.

Given that the proponents for both views are now largely repeating themselves, it is probably best to move on from the discussion of this text (or else start a new thread in one of the exegetical forums) and return to the subject of the OP, which relates more specifically to geo/heliocentrism in relation to Common Sense Realism.

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 20, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> The real issue at stake is whether or not the passage is making a precise scientific statement regarding whether or not the sun circles the globe.


The passage is certainly making a precise and true statement. But I concede that the thread has strayed from your OP— so I’ll cease and desist.


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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 20, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> The passage is certainly making a precise and true statement.



No one disputes that it is a true statement according to its authorial intent. The question is what is its authorial intent: To describe a miracle in phenomenological terms or to make an exact statement in terms of modern science? (I only add this comment to try and help the disputants not to talk past each other should another thread begin.)

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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> It is important to state the question properly or else everyone will be talking past each other: The issue in relation to Joshua 10 is not one of the historicity of the passage or the fact that a miracle occurred. Both sides agree on these points. The real issue at stake is whether or not the passage is making a precise scientific statement regarding whether or not the sun circles the globe.
> 
> Given that the proponents for both views are now largely repeating themselves, it is probably best to move on from the discussion of this text (or else start a new thread in one of the exegetical forums) and return to the subject of the OP, which relates more specifically to geo/heliocentrism in relation to Common Sense Realism.



Good correction, brother. With that, I will bow out. Besides, the last time I was involved in a conversation around this topic on this board, another member implied that I denied the gospel because I’m not a geocentrist, leading to quite a long hiatus for me from this board. Although thankfully nobody here has stooped so low, the topic does not have a pleasant memory for me. It illustrates the tendency some of us have to major on things that are not even minors, but are really things to wonderful for us to know at this point.

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## Reformed Covenanter (Jan 20, 2020)

Taylor Sexton said:


> It illustrates the tendency some of us have to major on things that are not even minors, but are really things to wonderful for us to know at this point.



Sadly, the tendency on Reformed discussion groups is not to seek mutual understanding and promote reasonable agreement where possible but nearly always to exaggerate disagreements to the point that every lesser matter becomes a major. There are certain subjects that come up for discussion every now and then which I no longer bother to discuss anymore, as I just know what everyone is going to say - to the point that I could almost write their posts for them. 

You have to ask yourself whether the amount of internet ink being spilt over certain topics is really profitable either for yourself or for those reading. That is not to say that lesser matters should never be discussed - we are, after all, to be faithful in what is least as well as to be faithful in much - but the emphasis put on some issues is not healthy.

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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

Reformed Covenanter said:


> Sadly, the tendency on Reformed discussion groups is not to seek mutual understanding and promote reasonable agreement where possible but nearly always to exaggerate disagreements to the point that every lesser matter becomes a major. There are certain subjects that come up for discussion every now and then which I no longer bother to discuss anymore, as I just know what everyone is going to say - to the point that I could almost write their posts for them.
> 
> You have to ask yourself whether the amount of internet ink being spilt over certain topics is really profitable either for yourself or for those reading. That is not to say that lesser matters should never be discussed - we are, after all, to be faithful in what is least as well as to be faithful in much - but the emphasis put on some issues is not healthy.



That’s a healthy perspective. Sorry for contributing to running your thread astray, brother.

To everyone else here, I really do appreciate this discussion. My desire here was not to convince anyone of the heliocentric view, but rather simply to say that those of us who see the language of this Joshua miracle to be phenomenological are not liberals, questioning God’s word, or bowing the knee to scientism.

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## Jeri Tanner (Jan 20, 2020)

Taylor Sexton said:


> ...but rather simply to say that those of us who see the language of this Joshua miracle to be phenomenological are not liberals...


By posting the quote I did not mean to imply that you are. Sorry if it seemed so.

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## Taylor (Jan 20, 2020)

Jeri Tanner said:


> By posting the quote I did not mean to imply that you are. Sorry if it seemed so.



No apology needed! Seriously, I didn’t think you or anyone else was implying that. This conversation has been pleasant. No worries on my part, sister!

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## lynnie (Jan 20, 2020)

*Huh? They measured the light coming from a star at different times of the year. Maybe this was a different experiment from the one you are thinking of? *

*“Always the speed of light was precisely the same…Thus, failure [of Michelson-Morley] to observe different speeds of light at different times of the year suggested that the Earth must be ‘at rest’…It was therefore the ‘preferred’ frame for measuring absolute motion in space. Yet we have known since Galileo that the Earth is not the center of the universe. Why should it be at rest in space?”

- Adolf Baker, Modern Physics & Antiphysics, pp. 53-54 (Addison-Wesley, 1972). 

“The data were almost unbelievable… There was only one other possible conclusion to draw — that the Earth was at rest....“This, of course, was preposterous”

- Bernard Jaffe, Michelson and the Speed of Light, 1960, p. 76

Significant quote here...are you going to argue with Hawking's comments? ( underlines mine)*

"...to the question whether or not the motion of the Earth in space can be made perceptible in terrestrial experiments. We have already remarked... that all attempts of this nature led to a negative result. Before the theory of relativity was put forward, it was difficult to become reconciled to this negative result."

*- 'Relativity — The Special and General Theory', cited in Stephen Hawking's, 'A Stubbornly Persistent Illusion', 2007, p. 169. *
*
"Soon I came to the conclusion that our idea about the motion of the Earth with respect to the ether is incorrect, if we admit Michelson’s null result as a fact. This was the first path which led me to the special theory of relativity....[...]...I have come to believe that the motion of the Earth cannot be detected by any optical experiment, though the Earth is revolving around the Sun.”

- Albert Einstein, in a speech titled: “How I Created the Theory of Relativity,” delivered at Kyoto University, Japan, Dec. 14, 1922, as cited in Physics Today, August, 35 (8), 45, 1982, by Yoshimasa A. Ono.*

*“The Earth is indeed the center of the Universe. The arrangement of quasars on certain spherical shells is only with respect to the Earth. These shells would disappear if viewed from another galaxy or quasar. This means that the cosmological principle will have to go. Also it implies that a coordinate system fixed to the Earth will be a preferred frame of reference in the Universe. Consequently, both the Special and General Theory of Relativity must be abandoned for cosmological purposes.”

- Y. P. Varshni, “The Red Shift Hypothesis for Quasars: Is the Earth the Center of the Universe?” Astrophysics and Space Science 43 (1): 3 (1976).

A few words about the gravitational ether, and the ether concept in general may be in place here. The ether hypothesis was thought to be buried by the Michelson-Morley experiment, but today it is more alive than ever, in the form of the CBR [Cosmic Background Radiation]: experiments capable of finding the ether were not possible in the 1880s, but were possible in the 1960s. In a sense, the electromagnetic ether has always been observed – as the heat of the Sun (since as pointed out, CBR is reprocessed photons)…. All the main cosmological, astrophysical and physical facts: the gravity and Olbers paradoxes, redshift effects and CBR, gravitation and radiation, and the existence of particles can be conceived in the framework of this ether concept."

- “Action-at-a-Distance and Local Action in Gravitation,” in Pushing Gravity, ed., Matthew Edwards, pp. 157-159.

https://christian-wilderness.forumvi.com/t569-geocentricity-ordered-quotes

You really ought to read this list, go look up Megs list posted before, look up anything you can find by Sungenis, maybe Malcolm Bowden. Plenty of physics guys out there...Gerhardus Bouw is one. I don't mind posting quotes because I love love love this subject...but in truth, its been beaten to death before here so I will give it a rest lol. *


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