what do people think of this...?

[James R. Coplin]

My biggest point of contention is that even if we entertain that passing
through the gravitational plane is a potentially cataclysmic event, they
fact that they can't say when we passed through it last means that there is
no reason they can say anything about when we pass through it next.  They
vaguely imply that somehow these catastrophic events in the past were from
the last time we passed through the plane but there is no evidence other
than the events themselves.  There are many explanations besides
gravitational planes to explain disasters.  Also, the Mayan calendar
originates from around 5BCE.  In the case of China, we have much more extant
records from much farther back than that and they don't have any recordings
of these kinds of events.  Which brings up a related issue with the film.
They kept flashing all these ancient texts about making the implication that
these were somehow documents of past occurrences.  The Chinese document look
to be a famous piece of Tang poetry.  It probably talks about someone
longing for the moon, hometown, or wine.  The medieval documents were early
astrological works, probably Ptolemy copies which have nothing to do with
cataclysmic events.  It's this kind of historical "sets" that film makers
use that drive historians nuts.  It's the main reason why I loathe Ken Burns
historical films.

James R. Coplin


-----Original Message-----
From: music-bar-bounces at lists.music-bar.org
[mailto:music-bar-bounces at lists.music-bar.org] On Behalf Of Jay Vaughan
Sent: Saturday, November 15, 2008 7:37 AM
To: Music-bar
Subject: Re: what do people think of this...?


I mean, I am willing to entertain the perspective of this movie, but  
only really for about as long as the movie is something I'm bothering  
to watch.  It is entertaining to imagine that our puny lives are  
nothing compared to the rest of the known universe, and I don't see  
any reason, therefore, to not at least acknowledge the fact that its  
all extremely, very, violently, delicate.  Scientifically,  
religiously, humanly, whatever we have to say and do about it, there  
is little we can actually really do, for ourselves, so far, than to  
just enjoy every second of it.

Hey, I'm down with protong, personally.  go-ligaginamipopo!  i will  
swim every flood!  hail tepis!


j.

On Nov 15, 2008, at 1:11 PM, Gert van Santen wrote:

> Peter Korsten schreef:
>> Gert van Santen schreef:
>>
>>> This video isn't about black holes.
>>
>> Well, I didn't watch the lot of it, because it started with a lot of
>> pseudo-scientific rambling. But weren't they claiming that there's  
>> some
>> sort of 'gravitational plane' (cool, directional gravity) because  
>> of a
>> black hole 'over a trillion miles in diameter' at the centre of the  
>> galaxy?
>
> Yes. But that is not the point.
>
> The story - in short - is about how the movement of the earth is
> changing as a result of the gravitational pull of that black hole
> (whatever its size), and how this may lead (and may have led) to
> cyclic geographical pole shifts - when the arth is passing
> through the galactical plain - during which the earth is sort of
> given a huge shaking and whole continents sink into the sea
> within a matter of weeks/months.
> This might explain the fact that so many great civilisations have
> suddenly and literally disappeared from the face of the earth and
> new eras start (the "Ages" of which the Mayan Calendar speaks)
> where the memory of "modern" times quickly fades away as being
> just a legend...
>
> -- 
>
> :-)
>
> G e r t   v a n   S a n t e n
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> www.gertvansanten.nl
>
> _______________________________________________
> music-bar mailing list
> music-bar at lists.music-bar.org
> http://lists.music-bar.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/music-bar

;
--
Jay Vaughan




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