Re: [asa] geocentricity

My prior post does not do a nice job of answering your question, I fear.

The Yates Proof looks valid in demonstrating relative motion.

If one drives through a stationary rain cloud with the rain falling straight
downward, the motion of the car will cause the rain to appear to fall at a
given angle. If the driver turns around and drives back through the
rainstorm and at the same speed, the same angle will be found for the rain.

However, if the driver is in a parked car and the rain cloud passes over at
the same rate, and the cloud returns and passes over again, then the same
result would be found as that of the driver above who was traveling.

Because of the adjacent terrain, the driver will recognize which one of
these two scenarios are true relative to the terrain. For stellar
aberration of light, there is no other reference frame to compare to. It
could be argued that the Earth is fixed and the universe is orbiting the
Earth.

Copernicus used primarily subjective arguements. For instance, he reasoned
that it makes far more sense for the contained to be in motion rather than
the entire container. The early results of Galileo's tiny telescope of the
moons of Jupiter greatly supported this reasoning.

Helio George

----- Original Message -----
From: "William Yates" <billyates@billyates.com>
Cc: <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, July 25, 2007 9:36 PM
Subject: Re: [asa] geocentricity

> Regarding geocentricity, I have thought of a possible physical proof that
> disproves geocentricity. I would like your thoughts on it.
>
> Consider the phenomenon of the aberration of starlight. One definition...
>
> "The difference between the observed position of a star and its true
> direction; this is a combined result of the observer’s motion across the
> path of the incoming starlight and the finite speed of light.
>
> There are three components of the aberration of starlight: annual
> aberration (up to 20.47") caused by Earth’s revolution around the Sun,
> diurnal aberration (up to 0.3") caused by Earth’s axial rotation, and the
> very small secular aberration caused by the motion of the solar system
> through space."
> Source:
> http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/A/aberration_starlight.html
>
> Note the three components to the aberration: annual, diurnal, and secular.
> The solution is to note that these definitions all assume a point observer
> on a point Earth. But on the Earth we can have numerous observers
> distributed in latitude. Being at different latitudes, they each have
> unique diurnal aberrations as their velocities about the Earth's axis are
> latitude-dependent, being maximum at the equator and zero at the poles.
>
> Have two observers at different latitudes note the aberration of a star at
> the same time. They will measure different aberrations due to their
> different latitudes. The differences will be small, but there nontheless.
>
> Now a geocentrist can state that a reference coordinate system can be
> Sun-centered, that the Earth is fixed and all the apparent movements
> observed are due to the motions of those observed bodies about a fixed
> Earth.
>
> But, considering our two observers, each measuring different aberrations
> requires that the observed object undergo two motions simultaneously to
> produce the two observed aberrations. This, even for a geocentrist, is
> impossible.
>
> Therefore geocentricity is false.
>
> I modestly call this the Yates Proof. If it is not true, then I won't call
> it anything. :)
>
> I have the feeling I may be overlooking something so please tell me if I
> am.
>
> Thanks,
>
> --Bill Yates
>
> --
> --Bill Yates
> --mailto:billyates@billyates.com
> --http://www.billyates.com
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Received on Thu Jul 26 12:54:25 2007