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Is this book lame or laudable? Read my review and get the inside dope

Does the Earth Rotate? NO!

Author(s)
William Westfield [pseudonym of William Edgell?]
Publisher
The Author
Edition / Year
1919
In the section labelled

Does the Earth Rotate? NO!

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.


Viewing tube experiment

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:


The sun over London and New Zealand

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?

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Comments

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on 05 Oct 2010 - 14:11 Permalink

I am also in favor of flat earth. But, the only thing which disturbs my thinking is the rotation of geosynchronous satellites. Can anybody prove that why these satellites do rotate (as they say to sync up with earth's so called rotation!), if our earth is flat? I really would like to hear the answer for this as this is the only thing which prevents me from setting my mind to flat earth concept. Plz can anybody give me answer. Plz, only flat earth supporters do reply to this, I don't want this question to be ignored in flow of other comments or topics, as this is much important for my understanding. Sorry if I am being selfish or rude. Plz do answer...
Submitted by Lord Kefka (not verified) on 18 Oct 2010 - 22:45 Permalink

First of all you need to scrap your idea of gravity. Flat earth theories and Newtonian gravity don't mix because gravity would wad the flat earth into a ball. Also you don't need Satellites. Instead all you need to do to broadcast signals over the earth is to build a network of towers on mountains, the only thing which will stop them sending signals to any point on earth is other mountains. See the picture at the top of the article.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on 04 Oct 2010 - 16:06 Permalink

To be honest this is probably one of the most interesting blogs ive ever seen, even if its not a blog or discussion or argument or whatever. Point is if you have been though highschool and earth science you would understand that the earth revolves around the sun becuase the sun has a much larger mass and gravitational pull on the earth giving it an eliptical orbit. This applies to all the planets caught in the sun's gravitational pull. Regardless i don't have time to get into all of it.
Submitted by Lord Kefka (not verified) on 27 Sep 2010 - 02:27 Permalink

I once beloved that the earth was round but, like all the rest of you, I soon discovered that it is all a strange conspiracy. Why would anyone want to lie to us about it? All you have to do to prove that it is flat is go to a very high place, in my case Mount Olympus in Washington, and take an expensive telescope and look at the horizon. If it is a fantastically clear day you can see Japan, China, and all the little boats in between. 1 proof that the earth is truly flat: the moon. It never seems to rotate, because its flat too. In other words we only ever see ONE side of the moon. EXPLAIN THAT! And the shadow that makes it wax and wane? That is simply mold. Another way to check to see if the earth is flat is just getting into an airplane and traveling to the edge of the world. I work for a fishing/salvage/waste disposal company and we go out there and cast nets to get some of the fish flopping over the edge. Its an incredibly profitable business but you need to have the right permits and clearance to do it. What is gravity? Gravity is simply the pull of sin, toward hell. Have you ever noticed that newborn babies, who don't have sin to begin with besides original sin (and sometimes spicy nacho sin), float slightly off the ground? its true. Babies also have less friction. That is how Jesus could walk on water and why hell is subterranean.
Submitted by Uncle Samurai (not verified) on 26 Sep 2010 - 12:23 Permalink

Oh good, I'm in the right thread. Question: do ALL solar systems (that we know of in sight) rotate on parallel axis'? Is there a universal compass?
Submitted by Alfred Armstrong on 26 Sep 2010 - 13:05 Permalink

No, you aren't on the right thread. Mostly, this page is about ignorance of astronomy, not knowledge of it.

My guess at an answer would be no, because if it were true it would be an astonishing observation and there'd have been a big fuss about it. But as I don't have the facts to back it up, I can't be sure. Go ask an astronomer, not random idiots on the internet.

Submitted by jeff daniels (not verified) on 22 Sep 2010 - 18:46 Permalink

Satellites launched from our earth orbit our earth do they not? All satellites must orbit the earth (else they fall into it or arc out into space) If the earth was not rotating then geostationary satellites could not exist. And yet ... Geostationary satellites, launched from our planet exist do they not? Therefore - the earth rotates. L8rs
Submitted by Elder TruthTeller (not verified) on 22 Sep 2010 - 10:46 Permalink

These ROUND EARTHERS, i tell ya. The poor lot of them. Still thinking the Earth is Round. Or worse, that it ROTATES. Good lawd! lol! I wonder if any of them realize that if the Earth was, indeed, Round and Rotating, you wouldnt have GRAVITY. You would have CENTRIFUGAL FORCE. Yet, you are told its Gravity that is in effect! Oh the Horror! Haaaa! Any simple Experiment will PROVE this. Or better yet, just go to the MOON! lol! Its (allegedly) ROUND and ROTATES--and yet, has (little) or NO Gravity. Yet, the EARTH which is allegedly doing the same thing is supposed to have Gravity? Hmmmm? I smell BAD science (as usual). Indeed. The EARTH does NOT Rotate. If it does, STOP it so i can get off...lol!
Submitted by New Guy (not verified) on 20 Sep 2010 - 15:47 Permalink

If everybody can just look at all these boats we have every day that are travelling around the Earth in a circle and getting back from just where they started, you can easily see that the Earth is round. Or you have to have an IQ under 50 to think otherwise
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on 15 Sep 2010 - 15:54 Permalink

I just want to add one thing about the comment somebody had on Tue, 09/07/2010 - 11:06. The comment was:- "if the earth is flat//... when you are standing at a pier you should see a boat going ahead getting smaller, and as it gets farther it is still visible to our eyes.. but that did not happen when we watch boats go ahead it gets smaller as it gets farther but it looks like being swallowed by the sea... it didn't remain visible to our eyes// it means that the earth is round......." The answer to this question is:- Our eye sight has a limit because of which we can see things up to a limited distance. If an object goes beyond that distance, either we can see converting it into a "very small point" or we cannot see that object at all. For example, 1) If you fly a kite, initially we can its size as a square or quadrilateral. But, as it goes far and far in sky, we can only see a small "point", no shape. 2) A plane, when flying above your head in sky, you can see its shape clearly. But, as it goes far and far, you can only see converting it into a "small point" though the sky is clear and clouds are there. Even after some time, you cannot see the plane at all. The same thing, happens in case of boat. Initially you can see the boat, as it goes long you can see a small point and then nothing. But, that doesn't prove that earth is round, because THE SAME BOAT/PLANE/KITE CAN BE SEEN BY A "BINOCULAR" OR ANY OTHER SUCH INSTRUMENT CLEARLY AND IN ITS ORIGINAL SHAPE. IT DEPENDS ON POWER OF BINOCULAR HOW FAR YOU CAN SEE THAT BOAT. If the earth is round, and if the boat cannot be seen because it has gone behind the "curve" of the round earth, then IT MUST NOT BE SEEN WITH BINOCULAR AS WELL. Because, like our vision, the binocular's direction will also be went "Tangent" to that curve and will not see the boat.
Submitted by Kris (not verified) on 13 Sep 2010 - 08:25 Permalink

Alfred, it was good fun..I'm sure that you know what shape the earth is and all about its rotation and other physics..You are just have a little fun at others expense ;-) bad boy..Just make sure you moderate any racist/religious remarks..All those great men turning in their graves..have fun..