This Just In! Earth Doesn't Rotate!

By Mimikatz

You can't make this stuff up.  From Josh Marshall:  A Republican State Legislator,  one Ben Bridges of Georgia, had a letter distributed by a campaign aide, over his signature, which not only denounces evolution as "Pharisee" science, but links to a site that disputes the Earth's rotation on its axis as well as its passage around the sun.

“Indisputable evidence — long hidden but now available to everyone — demonstrates conclusively that so-called ‘secular evolution science’ is the Big-Bang 15-billion-year alternate ‘creation scenario’ of the Pharisee Religion,” reads the letter that went out under Bridges' name. “This scenario is derived concept-for-concept from Rabbinic writings in the mystic ‘holy book’ Kabbala dating back at least two millennia.”

Barnes' memo pointed fellow state legislators to the information at fixedearth.com which rails against the “a mystic, anti-Christ ‘holy book’ of the Pharisee Sect of Judaism” and claims that “the earth is not rotating … nor is it going around the sun.” They've even caught on to the "centuries-old conspiracy" on the part of Jewish physicists to destroy Christianity.

The letter was then disseminated to other state legislators in other states until the Anti-Defamation League finally got wind of it and people started backing away.  But Bridges still believes:

Asked if he agreed with the Kaballah evolution conspiracy theory and the earth's lack of motion, he told the Atlanta Journal Constitution, “I agree with it more than I would the Big Bang Theory or the Darwin Theory. I am convinced that rather than risk teaching a lie why teach anything?”

Why teach anything, indeed.  No wonder Ben Bernanke, Fed head, said in testimony to Congress yesterday that good jobs were being created in the US, but too many Americans lacked the education to fill them.   Eratosthenes must be rotating in his grave.

And meanwhile the Antarctic ice aseems to be melting in new and unexpected ways as two huge new lakes are discovered under the ice.

What's on your mind today?

Comments

[Joseph Cannon]

Of course, whoever wrote that www.fixedearth.com site understands the Qabala (my preferred spelling) as little as he understands science. What I found particularly interesting was the page which scores the "Christian Zionist" movement and opposes Israel. A passage there damns Communism as "Jewish."

This anti-Semitic strain is not the dominant tendency in Fundeamentalist Christianity, but it IS there. And it may one day become the dominant view within Fundamentalism.

[P J Evans]

One of the comments on this stuff at dKos pointed to 'timecube' as another nutcase theory-of-everything site. I'm afraid to see what they're pushing: the quotes in the comment were bad enough.

[emptypockets]

Is Erastosthenes spinning in his grave -- or does the grave spin around Erastosthenes?

Meanwhile NASA says that data from its Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, soon to set a record for most data received from any Mars spacecraft, shows mineral deposits that suggest materials were dissolved in some liquid or gas and then, when that liquid or gas passed over a surface, the materials crystallized out. No reason yet to say there was life in them thar hills, but evidence mounts that Mars wasn't always a dry dirtball.

The discovery of life of any form on another planet would be the single most stunning finding of whatever century in which it is made. How did life happen here -- was it a single rare event, or were there multiple competing ways of putting together a greedy system and the greediest won out? Better check my Bible for the answers -- or perhaps my Sefer Yetzirah.

[James Kuo]

The legislator's beliefs and statements are ridiculous, but your ending comment is rather ironic in that context. If you actually read the scientfic report, you'd understand that these lakes (at over 1/2 mile below the surface ice), while possibly important in the context of anthropogenic climate change, are not likely a result of it. Lack of respect for science cuts both ways, I'm afraid.

[William Ockham]

I think every single Republican candidate ought to be asked the following question:

Do you agree with your fellow Republicans in Georgia and Texas, who say that the Earth doesn't revolve around the Sun and that there is a Jewish conspiracy to push the idea of evolution?

[emptypockets]

The report is available only via ScienceExpress, for which (in many cases) even the research institutes that subscribe to Science magazine don't bother to pay the extra fee. It will be available on the regular Science site shortly.

As these lakes were only just discovered, it is not known why or how they are filling and emptying, as is noted by the pop news piece to which Mimikatz links. That piece implicitly ties them to global warming -- more than Mimikatz has done here, with her absolutely (if unintentionally) correct summary.

I probably shouldn't, but I guess I feel like I have to add that it seems unlikely that public opinion has turned against science in recent years because science advocates were insufficiently sneering or condescending in our tone when talking to non-scientists interested in using it for better-informed policy.

[P J Evans]

The story on CNN.com about the lakes indicates they've been there for quite a while, and says they're not a result of global warming. (I'm looking forward to the story in _Science News_.)

There are other lakes under the ice in Antartica (google 'Lake Vostok'); it's just that these two were previously unknown.

[Mimikatz]

The SF Chronicle story on the lakes to which I linked suggested that the passage of fresh water through the lake system might accelerate the melting of the Ross Ice Shelf.

Fricker and her colleagues have calculated that one large lake about 18 miles long has dumped nearly 530 billion gallons of fresh water through another, lower lake and into the ocean during the past three years alone -- eventually flowing under the Ross Ice Shelf, a large body of ice where planes loaded with supplies for the American research base at McMurdo Sound land.

The speed at which the lakes alternately rise and fall are a puzzle, Bindschadler said, "But this is fast-moving water, and it's lubricating all the ice; it's the grease," he said. "So now, we can figure out how this plumbing system beneath the ice really works -- we can measure where the water is going and how fast it's going. It's a brand new tool for understanding how the ice above is moving and how it's affected by the changing climate.

It is my (non-scientist's) understanding that the issue with the lakes is how they might facilitate slippage into the sea of large amounts of ice that are melting due to global warming, not that the lakes themsleves are melting because of global warming. The article seems to bear that out. Emptypockets has a point about attitudes toward non-scientists, although why he thinks my summary was unintentional is unclear to me.

[emptypockets]

...because I gave you too little credit of course. I thought you thought this was another report of Antarctic ice melting due to global warming, which is what I thought after reading the link -- but from clearer summary in your comment I appreciate that whatever scientific training you may lack is obviously compensated for by much better reading comprehension than I usually manage...

[freepatriot]

that's some pretty nice science you got there Mr. Ben Bridges

lets put your theories to the test

lets build a rocket according to the laws of your scientific theories, put you in it, and see how well it flies

science is a "Survival of the fittest" exercise in my world

put your sorry ass where your mouth is

if you are NOT willing to risk your life to PROVE your theories, why should I give a shit about what you think ???

btw, my theories of evolution and solar motion are proved each time NASA launches a missile, and I am willing to risk my sorry ass riding a NASA missile to prove it

so how about it Mr Ben Bridges, willing to test your beliefs ???

I didn't think so

[pluripotentate]

what's on my mind? genes methylated (turned off) in stem cells. some americans are still qualified for great science jobs, but we did have to have science teachers who weren't afraid to teach us science. i really hope that hasn't been lost since i was in high school and college only ten to fifteen years ago.

[Steve]

You should try living down here! Bridges is the rep from about 30 miles over....he's nuts.

[John Casper]

Great post MimkKatz, thanks for catching this. It sounds like Ben is a dues paying member of the FLAT EARTH SOCIETY.

[Neo]

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