In the compiling of this little book as a contradiction of the theory of the present Astronomers I have made a special point of being as concise and plain as possible in putting forward my proofs, and to do so I have used simple language not indulging in astronomical terms. My intention is to place all my facts in a plain and simple method so that all may conceive what I wish to prove, as the use of unnecessary terms and huge wording would only tend to puzzle and fog one in reading, hence I hope that those who peruse this book will be able to follow any argument and agree with my conviction that the earth is a fixture and the sun does certainly move.
Thus begins this uncommon little tract, by which William Westfield hoped in vain to persuade the “Educational Authorities” to abandon the idea that the earth rotates, or indeed moves at all, in space. The crux of his argument is based on a simple experiment performed in his garden, in which he placed a tube pointed at the Pole Star.
He says of it:
I have this tube fixed in my garden, size 3 feet 6 in. by 3/4 in., directed to the fixed pole star, and I can view the star continually. Why? Because the star is fixed in the heavens and because the earth is a fixture also.
His tube would have covered only just over one degree of arc of the sky, so actually he should have observed a little movement of Polaris, but presumably he was not really looking for it. His disbelief in the earth's rotation did not wholly rest on this single experiment, in any case:
Here is another positive proof that the earth cannot rotate. In the Desert of Sahara, the length from east to west is 3,000 miles, its average breadth 900 miles, and its area 2,000,000 square miles. Rain falls on this desert at intervals only of five to ten or twenty years. If the earth rotates over 10,000,000 miles daily [corrected in errata to a mere 1,555,200 miles a day - still too large by a factor of about 60!], and in addition makes another movement round the orbit and sun yearly how can this large desert escape the rain from the heavens for years at a stretch, while other places receive the rain regularly? Why? It is because this desert is a fixture, and is not favoured by rain from the heavens, like other places, owing to geographical conditions.
As recent as June, 1917, it rained for about one hour on my garden, and only two and a half miles from here, north, south, east and west, there was no rain at all.
His garden should be located and marked with a blue plaque to record its important role in the history of thought.
I would not want to address each of the many fallacies expounded in Westfield's book, though it may be of interest that he thought that the rotation of the earth that he was arguing against was like the rolling of a ball, with the north and south poles exchanging places twice daily, but I do think his attempt to justify a belief in a flat earth is worthy of some attention:
As I contend that our earth is practically flat except for the hills, mountains and valleys, that no such thing as a globe exists, readers may wonder why the sun is not on view all over the world at one time. My answer is as illustrated. No 1 is the position of the sun at mid-day, in June, in England. At the same time it is midnight in New Zealand, and the mountain, hill or horizon as shown at C would easily prevent a person in New Zealand at D from viewing the sun when over England.
No 2 is the sun at New Zealand in mid-winter and a person in England at A is prevented from viewing the sun at New Zealand after it has travelled from viewing across the heavens to that country. This is due to the mountains, hills, towns, villages or horizon at B obstructing the view. All readers are aware that mountains and hills and horizon are common in all countries, and therefore it is these that easily hide the sun from our view, although the sun is even at a high altitude at that place.
(Yes, those horizons get everywhere, don't they?) On this basis Westfield calculates the sun to be only 2,500 miles above the earth. Curiously, he omits to say exactly how it must move in relation to the flat earth below it, in order to give the relative timing and orientation of sunrises and sunsets that are actually observed throughout the world. But to do so would presumably be a simple exercise, given his confident conclusion to this volume:
There are [...] large sums of money spent annually at our Observatories throughout England on astronomy based upon Astronomers' opinion and enormous distances given by them, such as the distance of the earth to the pole star and sun of millions of miles, whereas ordinary mathematics as taught at schools daily, absolutely prove the distance in both cases to be less than 10,000 miles.
With all due respect to astronomers' prophesies of future happenings as to comets, readers will see their judgment as to distances and earth rotation cannot be relied upon. May I ask, is it worth while keeping a large staff at our Observatories, or anyone working at a false and unreasonable theory, especially when our Government has now definitely decided on economy at their establishments?
A considerable sum of money can now be saved by greatly reducing the staff at observatories in this country, and undoubtedly the Government will be convinced that the proofs given in this small book is [sic] overwhelming against the enormous distances given by astronomers, and that the earth rotation theory is absolutely disproved.
I wonder if the current British Government, given its documented willingness to accept dodgy evidence is yet ready to listen?
Comments
wow thats a good book
I'm Muslim and many times Muslims disagreed the world and the scientists in some theories , and after few years (or more) they find that Muslims were right.
Example : for the new babies ,scientists said that meat forms before bones , where Islam disagreed that because the holey Q'uran says that bones forms before meat.
So,in Islam we the Muslims first refer to the Q'uran ,then we study it by science.
But in this case , we the Muslims are different with our opinions about this thing.
Thanks for reading my comment.
First of all, dumberst arguments ever. I could literally sit here for days giving REAL evidence why these theories are horrible.
Second, to the "Muslim" contributor. First off, being in the medical field I can tell you for a fact that Muslims weren't the only ones who have those thories. In fact, about half of the world's MD's believed that. As for the Q'uran and science. I noticed how you didn't mention the many, many, many other things the Q'uran has been 100% wrong about when dealing with science?
Summary: Both of you are wasting everyone's time. By all means, keep believing in what you believe in, that is your right (at least in America, not so much in many Muslim taught countries), but quit bothering the rest of us with your conspiraacy theories that are universally rejected by anyone with a 4th grade education.
Thank you for wasting my time. 17+3=?
see you in heaven
So Newton was a jerk.. gravity doesn't exist right? Or maybe it does, but the Earth is much bigger than the sun? or Maybe our friend was broken and needed some money for his garden, so he wrote this book.. maybe
Why get annoyed about someone who thinks the world is flat, if his arguments are so bad you have to like him?
I agree with you man, the earth is fixed and a clear evidence that will support your article, is that why in any branch of science they always assume that the rotation is zero to solve any problem? does not the rotation effect the credibility of the equation so why to set it zero and yet that means the earth does not rotate. isn't this convincing. see you yesterday
If the earth rotated how does a blimp photograph a ball game when it(the blimp) is stationary. How can the earth move at about 1000mph and we cannot feel the movement. How can airplanes fly west and get to their destinations. Wouldn't their destinations be rotating out of their way?. Do not believe everything you hear, read or learn.
Sometimes the comments here are considerably odder than the books.
You're not wrong there. For years this site did not have a commenting facility. What wonders did we miss?
REFUTATION THAT THE EARTH ROTATES By AHMED RAZA KHAN a muslim scholar (1856-1921)
The earth moves constantly about its own axis and also round the sun, which is stationary. This theory espoused by Nicolaus Copernicus, Johannes Kepler and Galileo Galilei, gained popularity all over the world. The theory says that the speed of rotation of earth is 1036 miles per hour, i.e., 17.26 miles per minute i.e., 30,389 yards per minute, i.e., 506.4 yards per second. Against this theory, nobody could speak. It was A‘lahazrat who challenged it and declared:-
"The Islamic principle is that the sky and earth are stationary and the planets rotate. It is sun that moves round the earth; it is not earth that moves round the sun."
In order to substantiate it, A‘lahazrat put forward two-tier arguments. First, he quoted a number of verses from Holy Qur’an and Hadith, the translation of some of which is given below:
1. The movement of Sun and Moon is according to a course.
2. The sun and the moon are sailing within a circle.
3. The moon and the sun were besieged for you which are constantly moving.
[For detailed study, please see "Nuzool-i-Ayat-i-Furqan Besukoon-i-Zameen-o-Aasman" of A‘lahazrat written in 1339 A.H, published from Riza Academy, Bombay.]
In 1920, he presented his book "Fauz-i-Mubin Dar Radd-i-Harkat-i-Zamin", Published from Idara Sunni Dunia, Saudagran, Bareilly. This book contains 105 arguments, dozens of diagrams and lots of calculations in refuting the said theory. Out of 105, I am giving below gist of only five logical and axiomatic arguments which are quite easy and which can be understood by a man of average intelligence.
1. If a heavy stone is thrown up straight, it would fall on the same place from where it was thrown, whereas according to the theory of movement of earth, it must not happen. According to it, if the earth were moving towards east, the stone would fall in west because during the time it went up and came down, that place of earth from where the stone was thrown up, due to movement of earth, would slip away towards east. Suppose, the process of stone going up and coming down took a time of 5 seconds, then according to the said speed of movement of earth, that is, 506.4 yards per second, the earth would slip away towards east by 2532 yards i.e. about one and a half miles In other words, the stone must fall in the west of that place (place of throwing up the stone) at a distance of about one and a half miles but actually it would fall on the same place from where it was thrown up. It shows that the said theory of movement of Earth is wrong.
2. If two stones are thrown away at the same time and with the same power — one towards east and the other towards west, then what should happen according to the said theory of movement of earth, is that the stone going towards west must appear to be going very fast and that the stone going towards east very lazy. Suppose the power of throwing the stone is 19 yards within three seconds, then the respective stones would fall in the east and west at a distance of 19 yards only but according to the said theory, by the time the westward stone would cover a distance of 19 yards in three seconds, the place from where the stones were thrown, would slip away towards east by 1519 yards (506.4 x 3) In this way, it must fall at a distance of 1519+19 i.e. 1538 yards, whereas it would actually fall only at a distance of 19 yards. Similarly, the other stone going towards east must fall in the west at a distance of 1519-19 i.e. 1500 yards, whereas actually it would fall in the very east at a distance of 19 yards only. It shows that the said theory of Movement of Earth is wrong.
3. Suppose, from a tree, two birds fly with equal speed and for equal period, one of them goes towards east and the other towards west. Now if their flying speed is equal to the speed of movement of earth, that is, if they fly at a speed of 1036 miles per hour, then according to the said theory, bird going towards west must fly at a speed of 1036+1036 i.e. 2072 miles per hour (being its own speed added by the speed of movement of earth), while the bird going towards east would not be able to move even an inch as its speed after adjusting the speed of movement of earth (both being equal) would become zero. On the contrary, what would actually happen is that the bird going eastward would go in the east to a distance of 1036 miles during an hour and the bird going westward would go in the west at a distance of 1036 miles. It shows that the said theory of movement of Earth is wrong.
For a bird, the abnormal speed of flight of 1036 miles per hour has been assumed only to bring it parallel to the speed of movement of earth and simply to prove that according to the said theory, the bird flying towards east would not be able to cover any distance even if it comes abreast of a plane in the matter of speed and flies at a rate of 1036 miles per hour.
4. If it is intended to kill a bird appearing at a distance of 10 yards in the air from a particular place and suppose it takes two seconds in stringing the bow and shooting the arrow, then by the time the arrow is shot, that particular place would slip away within these two seconds at a distance of 1013 yards at a speed of 506.4 yards per second being the speed of movement of earth and thus the arrow can never reach the target, whereas it may be taken for granted that the arrow would hit the target. It shows that the theory of movement of Earth is wrong.
5. If a bird is sitting on a pillar near its nest just at a distance of one yard, even then it can never reach the nest, because in order to reach the nest, the bird shall have to fly — may it be for a second or part thereof. The fact is that, the bird can never surpass the speed of 1036 miles per hour, which is said to be the speed of movement of earth. It shows that the theory of Movement of the Earth is wrong.
Need you go yet for further arguments? Go on thinking over plane, gun, cannon, missile squad and so forth.
Thus, it's easy to come to the conclusion that a person who challenged the great scientists like Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Newton etc, must have been a great scientist himself. What is required to disprove the theories of these scientists, A‘lahazrat has done ahead of it but sooner or later its credit will be bagged by someone else who will win the fight in the name of a scientist for, Ahmed Rida Khan is better known as a Muslim theologian rather than a scientist.
The above mentioned cases have no standing in the science of physics. It is very obvious that the author and Mr. Ahmad Rida had no knowledge in the field of physics, and if they did, it was not adequate.
This is Great Stuff. I think many of us would love to hear you go into depth to reasons why the earth is portrayed as spinning. Is it a giant conspiracy?
Also: does the sun spin around the earth? how do night and day work? and the seasons? The apparent movement of stars? Does the entire universe spin around the earth? How does The Foucault Pendulum work?
If the truth ever becomes manifestly obvious to the world what major outcomes do you predict? Mass conversion to Islam? the end of the pork industry?
If you know the truth it is your duty to pursue it!
These comments are by far the oddest and funniest that I have ever come across!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE!
That was fun.
to all the uneducated people that believe they are right, that the earth does not rotate do you not see that anything is relative to your frame of reference. what that means is that if you are at the ball game looking at the blimp hovering above you, to you from your frame of reference the blimp is stationary. to an observer in space the blimp would be moving at the speed the earth is turning. two people looking at the same object from a different frame of reference see two different things. if the blimp were to fly in the same direction as the earth rotates at a relative 10 mph, the observer on earth sees the blimp move at 10mph. the observer in space observes the blimp move at the speed the earth is rotating plus 10mph. the blimp moves at 10mph relative to the earth and its atmosphere, this is why blimps can fly east and west.
if you do not understand this please refrain from commenting and please do not pass on your wisdom about the earth being flat or not rotating to anyone.
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