Flat Earth: The History of the Ball Part II - The Earth is an Apple

This one hinges on quite a fortunate coincidence. In my last post I referred to the earth as an apple. This was just a bit of empty poetry on my part, but it seemed quite timely later on when I started looking into the history of the globe - that's the globe as in three-dimensional models of the globe, not the globe. Anyway, it turns out that the oldest surviving globe is the Erdapfel globe produced by Martin Behaim in 1492.

(Martin Behaim and his Globe)

Interestingly, Erdapfel literally translates as "Earth Apple". According to Wikipedia this may relate to the Globus cruciger  - the holy orb topped with a crucifix that is often held by kings and rulers as a symbol of power. In the German language this orb is called the Reichsapfel - meaning "Empire Apple" or "Imperial Apple".

I've actually seen this link between the royal orb and the globe made on some of the Flat Earth videos I've watched, so I guess it isn't anything new. The general theme being that the globe is used as a concept of control. Setting the boundaries of the political domain and the boundaries of our thinking.

I can't help but think of the apple in the Garden of Eden - assuming it was an apple of course. Was Eve given knowledge of the earth being a globe? Was that the secret the serpent whispered? It would be quite fitting come to think of it. A symbolic journey from the flat, godly garden managed by the almighty to the godless, godforsaken wilderness of the infinite universe.

Flat Earth in many ways is the Garden of Eden. A managed finite space, a wildlife sanctuary for God's pet humans. A beautiful place created especially for us. Leaving that world view means stepping into a world that wasn't created for us. A world where we aren't the focus. Where no-one is looking after us, keeping an eye on things.

The apple is knowledge, the globe is knowledge. Now you have that knowledge you're cast out on your own. A lonely lost species on a loose blue marble. Not even sure if up is up and down is down.

Flat Earth: The History of the Ball

Following my last post I feel inspired to dig down further into the Flat Earth hole. This time I'm wondering; When exactly did people start thinking it was a ball?

The general view is that people started adopting the globe model deep in antiquity. The ancient Greek Eratosthenes's measurement of the circumference of the Earth often being mentioned as a case in point. This was my view as well until very recently, I'm now wondering though if this was ever quite the case.

It's generally reasoned that the world is so self-evidently spherical that anyone who's thought about the problem for more than 5 seconds will unerringly come to the conclusion that it's round. A flat earth world-view being the property of only the unthinking and the religiously inclined. And further more that throughout history, whenever people have really thought about the shape of the world, they've inevitably come to the correct conclusion. After all, how could they not? It's so obviously round. Only an idiot would believe it wasn't. However, I'm not so sure it was ever this cut and dried.

I think maybe we're projecting our certainty on the subject back on to history. Forget NASA for a moment, forget Sputnik and other satellites. Forget high-powered telescopes. Without this direct evidence would the shape of the earth really be so obvious to everyone. My own ignorance has been exposed over the last few weeks. I have no idea how to prove the earth is a ball ..not without resorting to NASA images and the testimony of other people. Sure, I have a vague ladybird book sense of what the solar system looks like, and a vague idea that the phases of the moon are a consequence of the sun's reflected luminosity as it orbits around this earthly apple. But that's about it. Beyond that all I have is belief ..belief that it's round. How many other people out there are in a similar boat?

It's also clear from reading about the history of the Flat Earth movement that right up until the beginning of the Space Age there were still many, many people holding on to the idea that the Earth was flat ..or at the very least sceptical of the idea that we're all spinning around the sun on a giant ball. Were they all idiots? Are we entitled to dismiss them so easily? Forget our modern accumulated evidence and go back to year zero for a moment. What can you see? What do you perceive? What do you see in the sky? Can you really tell it's a ball when you're not standing on the shoulders of giants?

I'm getting back down to ground level for a moment. What do we see? Firstly, the earth seems flat. And as far as the eye can see it looks flat. Even high up on mountains you can't see a curve. Up feels like up and down feels like down. It intuitively seems flat. You'd be stupid to think otherwise.

So what about the sky? Well the stars just look like points of light. No real indication that they're balls of fire. Just lights. And the planets - the wandering stars - look fairly similar. So that just leaves the sun and the moon. They're the biggest clues, but even so the sun looks just like a disc of bright light, and the moon, although it looks more planet-like (not that you'd know what a planet looked like), only shows one of its faces to us. We can't see it turning. So again, like the sun, it looks like a disc.

Essentially the very vision of the universe we have today - in fact, the very concept of outer-space itself - is unavailable to our mind. It's not an option until we create it. Until we think it into existence. Growing up in a world of Star Trek and Science-Fiction we can't not have that image of outer-space in our head. We take it for granted, but it wasn't always the case.

So what next? Maybe we start watching the sky. Noting the movements of the sun, the moon and the stars. We see their circular motion and watch them dip beneath, then reappear above the horizon. But even then would that automatically allow us to leap to a vision of a globular earth? If we see the sun go down below the horizon in one direction, then reappear again the next day back where it started from, would it necessarily be the case that it was going around a round earth. Maybe the sun would be going down into a distant ocean? - after all, the sea looks endless when we look out from the coast. Going down beneath the ocean, then beneath the earth, then reappearing out of a distant ocean on the other side. Or maybe it would be going down somewhere else - into some distant unknown. Either way we just don't know. No need for us to start imagining that we're standing on a ball just yet. No need just yet to throw out the evidence of our senses and consider that we may be hanging upside down on an endless curve.

Now sure, sooner or later, some extra-clever mind may come along and suggest the counter-intuitive idea of a ball. Some ancient smart-arse, some Eratosthenes. But how certain would they be? And how many people would they be able to convince? How many others would believe or comprehend them? No satellite images to back up their case. No telescopes for those sitting on the fence curious enough to have a look. I think at best people would say that maybe it was round.

In this light, belief in a flat earth seems a perfectly reasonable stance for anyone living in any previous era. Not at all the illogical stance that we view it as today with all our modern certainty. The question seems much more open-ended. The debate very much open and unfinished to them. I've mentioned in other posts how I'm slightly sceptical about the accepted view of history. I'm very much in sympathy with Fomenko and other time-line renegades. I think I may use the Flat Earth question as a way to look back at history afresh. Who knows, I may see things in a slightly new light. Alternatively I may only once again discover the extent of my own ignorance. Either way it'll be an education. Long live the ball.

Recently Read: Flat Earth by Christine Garwood

I'm saying read, re-read would be more accurate. I first read this book a few years back. It's one of my all time favourites and what inspired me to read it again was the fact that Flat Earth Theory seems to be having a bit of a revival on-line at the moment. In a way it was always going to happen. Our collective thirst for conspiracy theories was sooner or later going to take us to the big one; the earth is flat. There is none bigger, and maybe none older.

Firstly the book. The book details the history of the flat earth movement over the last few centuries. Introducing us to the various mavericks that have dared to believe in a flat earth in the face of modern science. The most notable being the 19th century zetetic philosopher Samuel Birley Rowbotham, aka Parallax. A larger than life character that literally springs from the pages. A veritable anti-hero that it's hard not to have a genuine admiration for. In fact, most of the flat-earth believers presented in the book have a certain amount of charm. All characters in the truest sense. I really urge you to read it.

Now to the modern revival. I accidentally came across a few videos stating the earth was flat on YouTube. I must admit I'm a bit of a conspiracy buff, so I do watch my fair share of conspiracy vids, but even so I was surprised to see the flat earth pop up. Anyway, it turns out that there's a whole flat-earth community on there, many seemingly genuine believers. Some of the videos having thousands and thousands of views.

I was actually really pleased to discover this. Ever since reading the book I've been fascinated by the idea of a flat earth and I'm glad to see it's still living and breathing out there. Although I'm not a flat-earther myself I am open minded enough to consider the idea. In fact, I think it's essential that we question our assumptions, and that we look for proofs ourselves instead of just accepting the word of other people. The flat earth idea is a great tool for doing that. We all know the earth is a ball, but how many of us can actually prove this for ourselves. After all, it does seem flat. At some point in childhood most of us ditched the evidence of our senses and accepted that we're walking around on a giant spinning ball. How many of us asked for scientific proof of this? xD I guess, in essence we just took someones word for it.

My highlight in all this Flat Earth business was discovering Math Boylan's YouTube channel. Math is a comedian, artist and general polymath it would seem. He's the clown-prince of the YouTube Flat Earth Kingdom. He blurs the line between the real and the unreal. One of those rare people where it's difficult to tell at first if he's being serious or if he isn't. His YouTube channel -  The NASA Channel - is a work of genius. Funny, thought-provoking, blurring all sorts of lines. The modern Parallax.

Tudor Mirror Theory

Ignore this :p I've posted it here because I need to anchor it somewhere so I can link to it somewhere else. Namely this place;

http://www.applied-epistemology.com/messageboard.htm

It concerns the (very much through-the-looking-glass) idea that certain kings and queens never actually existed and were simply duplicates or phantoms of other famous kings and queens. Put simply, the Tudors never existed. Anyone interested in this idea can check it out on the "Did The Dark Ages Exist?" thread on the above mentioned website.

I'm posting this image for similar reasons :p

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JUST SOME MORE PICTURES TO ANCHOR.

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ANCHOR.

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Korean theories;

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Saint Paul's Cathedral in The Allegory of the Tudor Succession (ca 16th century)?

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Hyperboria - Hudson Bay Mercator map detail.

The Tudor Princes xD

Thought I'd mention my music/band on here today. I haven't mentioned it before and felt it was time to give it a little airtime. It's going pretty well, but as ever with new bands and music it's a little bit lost in the internet wilderness, struggling for light. So much so that I'm sharing it on a blog that's also struggling for light xD

It at least gives me a chance to explain the band name though. I haven't explained it to people in 'real-life' yet as it seems a little bit off-piste for them. I generally just say "oh, it's just a word we've made up".

The original name was going to be The Tudor Princes - after 'Prince Tudor theory', a theory that holds that Queen Elizabeth the First actually produced children. I was reading a lot about this at the time. However, I got bored with that so it morphed into The Tudahs. The Tudor Princes also sounded a little bit highbrow for an indie band from Teesside.

Of course, on this blog I've mentioned the word Tudor before, and how it's cognate with words like Dieu, Jew, Judah, Teuton (as in Teutonic), Tiw (the god that gives us the name Tues-day), Theo (meaning godly), and even possibly the words David and Druid. They all vaguely mean God or godly, so I guess we're trying to tap into some sense of godly power or royal greatness. The music's a bit more down to earth though I guess.



432hz.

Capture Shock - Evidence for God?

I've been considering the big questions recently. God, death and the like. Is there a God? Why is there evil in the world? And so on. Anyway, on the question of death people often ask, "If there's a God why does he let people die?" This is a question we all ask in childhood and never really find an answer to. So over time we just brush it off.

Recently the question has crept back up on me, so I've been wondering what would happen if we couldn't die? Immortality sounds great, but it gets dark when you really think about it. Suffering could be infinite. Imagine you're locked in a metal box or a dank dungeon with no way out. Or paralysed with no way to move. Just infinite suffering with no release. Or imagine an even more abstract scenario - you get pulverised to dust by an asteroid, or chopped into a million disparate parts by a thousand tiny knifes - yet still no death.

When we think about death in this sense it becomes our 'get out of jail free' card. It's something of a mercy.

I think of the Bob Dylan line from 'Precious Angel';

When men will beg God to kill them and they won't be able to die

Or the Leonardo da Vinci quote;

As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so life well used brings happy death

Of course, the answer to all this would then be, "Why would God create a world where people can suffer in the first place?" I'll leave that question for another day though :p

But going back to the death-as-mercy idea one thing that I think might illustrate this to be true is capture shock. This is where animals die simply due to the stress of being captured in a cage and trapped. It's not uncommon for monkeys and other animals to die in this way after being trapped, or while kept in cages during transit from one place to another. They don't die due to injury. disease or lack of air and water - their death is brought on by the stress and panic of the experience.

A familiar example of this is when mice die after being caught in humane mouse-traps. The traps don't harm the mice, they only capture them, but the mice often die simply as a consequence of the panic brought on by being trapped. Obviously this must be a harrowing experience for the poor mouse, but the alternative of dying slowly after being trapped for days or even weeks would maybe be much worse.

I wonder if nature/God has built this capture shock system into animals in order to alleviate suffering? Off the top of my head I can't think of any obvious evolutionary reason for it.

In fact, I first read about capture shock in a book which was stating how odd it was that humans don't experience it to anywhere near the same extent as animals do. Do we not need it as much because we have the option of suicide? Can we consciously choose to end our lives, whereas animals need to unconsciously expire?

Maybe death means the happiness of existence outweighs the suffering that comes with it?

Nostradamus: Fraud & Forgery???

I've just finished reading a book about the 16th century French prophet Michel de Nostradamus.

The book was titled Nostradamus: A Life and Myth by John Hogue.

I really enjoyed the book and it contained some fascinating information. As ever though I'm going to leave the reviewing behind and quickly move on to some of the interesting questions the book raised for me.

My first question when reading about the early years of Nostradamus's life was did he actually exist? The evidence for his existence seemingly being a little bit patchy. For example;

Nostradame's father died in early 1547. An examination of a document in the archives of St.-Remy, dated 6 February of that year, lists the heirs of the late notary public. The name of his eldest son, Michel, is inexplicably missing. Were father and son no longer on speaking terms?

Then later this when relating the details of his first marriage;

Finally a marriage was arranged, says Chavigny, to a young Gascon lady "of high estate, very beautiful and very amiable." Strangely enough, neither Nostradamus nor his sympathetic future secretary and biographer make any mention of her name in their writings.

In fact, according to Hogue most the information we have for large parts of Nostradamus's life come from just two sources - the above mentioned Jean-Aymes de Chavigny and Nostradamus's son Cesar de Nostradame. Both published their accounts after his death.

The book is full of incidences like this where factual evidence simply contradicts the narratives of these two biographers. Some muddiness is understandable given that they're writing largely from memory, but the inconsistencies here appear quite considerable.

A large part of Nostradamus's early adult life was apparently spent as a wandering plague-doctor and apothecary. Again the written accounts of this period of his life seem somewhat apocryphal. Take this passage from a work titled Traite des fardemens et confitures about his dealings with plague victims - this was supposedly written by Nostradamus himself;

Among the unforgettable experiences that I actually lived through, one especially stayed in my memory. One day I went to a woman. I called in the window. she covered herself with a death shroud and started sowing it together, starting with the feet. When the undertakers entered the house. they found the woman dead lying in the middle of the house next to her sister. She was just able to sew and cover half of herself in the shroud...

Other passages mention victims going crazy and running amok, dying whilst eating and drinking, and jumping to their death onto cobblestones.

The entire life of Nostradamus seems to be divided into two parts - the early part where he worked as an itinerant doctor, and the later part where he suddenly becomes a visionary soothsayer. The evidence for the first part seems a little sketchy. However, the evidence that there was someone in France publishing under the name Nostradamus during the later part of his life is quite abundant.

My general view is that there was a real Nostradamus that produced almanacs and prophetic quatrains, but that this legend has been added to by countless forgers and writers of fanciful works.

Interestingly, Nostradamus published his quatrains during a turbulent period in French history when Catholics and Protestants were frequently at war with each other. Some people, including England's Sir William Cecil accused him of being a Catholic propagandist. Likewise, some Catholics accused him of being a heretical sorcerer. The possibility that he was being used as an agent to influence the political agenda by one side or another seems a realistic possibility.

Interestingly, Nostradamus referred to Protestants as Jovialists in his writings. This seems interesting as it links Protestantism in with the Pagan revival. Maybe more evidence that the true origins of Protestantism are different to what's generally believed.

Nostradamus was also apparently an acquaintance of Julius Caesar Scaliger, father of Joseph Justus Scaliger.

Also I came across a an example of the name Rome being rendered as Rosne in the book. That seems like something worth bearing in mind in regards my little etymological wanderings.