Stumble it!Oh… well if science says so…
posted in Politics by themaiden |I’ve spent a tremendous amount of energy picking Christians, mostly creationists, for their mutilation of science. Now it is time to spread the love. Here is wee interview with Dr. Abd Al-Baset Sayyid of the Egyptian National Research Center.
I have to say up front that I do not speak Arabic so I am basing this post on the included translation. I would appreciate some verification by someone who does speak the language.
Apparently, (00:11) “The centrality of Mecca has been proven scientifically”.
Interesting. Scientists took pictures from space (00:16) and saw that the Earth is a dark hanging sphere (00:19)– I’m betting that ‘dark hanging sphere’ bit is straight out of the Qu’ran. This was all very surprising to the astronauts taking to photos and so of course they asked who hung the sphere (00:28). Well, obviously it was Allah.
Sadly, this is all nonsense. Not thirty seconds in and all we’ve got is nonsense.
1) The Earth is hanging? Nonsense. To say the Earth is ‘hanging’ is silly. ‘Hanging’ means something like ’suspended from something by some kind of rope or cable’. Now, to be fair, the speaker could means ‘hanging’ in the sense used when someone says something like ‘The UFO was hanging there in the sky above Brooklyn’. If so, the statement is less silly but still misleading. It implies that the scientists saw something other than gravity at work.
2) Somehow this ‘hanging’ of the Earth is supposed to demonstrated by pictures taken from space. I’ve seen a lot of pictures that were taken from space and I have yet to see one that suggests the Earth is ‘hanging’. I’d really very much like to know which picture(s) the speaker means. Certainly I’ve seen nothing suggesting that the Earth is suspended by some kind of cable or, as we shall see, magic light. And if ‘hanging’ is meant in the second sense I suggested, I wonder if it is even possible to demonstrate that by a picture.
3) Armstrong asked who hung it (00:28) ? Now, I’m not convinced that Armstrong actually said any such thing, but if he did I do question the speaker’s inference from ‘who hung it’ to ‘Allah did it’ (00:34). That is bloody absurd, and kinda dishonest, but lets return to the story.
The Earth emits radiation (00:42). This information was published online (00:47) but only for 21 days (00:49) then the deceivers made it go away.
4) Radiation? Maybe. I guess this depends on what you mean, exactly. The Earth certainly does radiate.
5) Information? Published online? Made to vanish by the evil science conspiracy (01:00)? Come on guys? You can do better than that. How about some… oh… I don’t know… proof?
Of course the information had to be suppressed because it revealed that the Ka’aba emits radiation into space (01:09). Short wave radiation (01:13). This radiation is infinite (01:27).
6) Infinite radiation means infinite power. If this were true Mecca would be infinitely times hotter than the Big Bang. Utterly cracked.
Then the reached Mars and began to take pictures (01:29).
7) Hang on a second. Let’s hope the strangeness of that comment is due to editing. The speaker appears to be talking about the astronauts but has them visiting Mars.
“They said that the wavelength know to us… or rather the shortness of the wavelength known to us… this radiation had a special characteristic: It is infinite and I believe that the reason is that this radiation connects the (earthly) ka’ba with the celestial ka’ba. “(01:34 — 01:51)
Ummm… where… is… the… science?
But he can explain… see at the equator compass needles don’t move… (1:52 — 02:06) and the magnetic force has no effect… (02:06). At Mecca, Earth’s mgnetic field has no effect either (02:25) as least while circling the Ka’ba. Oh… wait… that doesn’t explain the infinite radiation it explains why someone who lives in Mecca, or just visits– magic is a funny thing–, lives a longer healthier life than the rest of us (02:08 — 02:12). But even more neato is that gravity is weaker at Mecca too (02:15).
9) Compass needles do move at the equator. Really, the ways in which he’s got magnetism wrong boggle the mind. For one, the Earth’s magnetic field loops from pole to pole. It doesn’t tug at the middle the way he seems to imagine.
10) You live longer in Mecca? Oh, I don’t know. Looks to me like he’s wrong.
11) Gravity? Is that one really worth addressing?
All of this explains that ‘charge’ you get when circling the Ka’ba (02:19).
On to a new topic.
The black rocks of the Ka’ba are the oldest rocks on Earth (02:32 — 02:35).
11) False.
I’m not sure about his claim that the British Museum houses pieces of the Ka’ba stone, but I doubt it. It the British had pieces of the stone there would not be so much debate about what it is actually made of.
The Black Stone has been described variously as basalt lava, an agate, a piece of natural glass or — most popularly — a stony meteorite. It is evidently a hard rock, having survived so much handling. A significant clue to its nature is provided by an account of the stone’s recovery in 951 AD after it had been stolen 21 years earlier; according to a chronicler, the stone was identified by its ability to float in water. If this account is accurate, it would rule out the stone being an agate, basalt lava or stony meteorite, though it would be compatible with it being glass or pumice.[12]
It has been suggested that the Black Stone may be a glass fragment from the impact of a fragmented meteorite some 6,000 years ago at Wabar, a site in the Rub’ al Khali desert some 1,100 km east of Mecca. The craters at Wabar are notable for the presence of blocks of silica glass, fused by the heat of the impact and impregnated by beads of nickel-iron alloy from the meteorite (most of which was destroyed in the impact). Some of the glass blocks are made of shiny black glass with a white or yellow interior and gas-filled hollows, which allow them to float on water. Although scientists did not become aware of the Wabar craters until 1932, they were located near a caravan route from Oman and were very likely known to the inhabitants of the desert. The wider area was certainly well-known; in ancient Arabic poetry, Wabar or Ubar (also known as “Iram of the Pillars”) was the site of a fabulous city that was destroyed by fire from the heavens because of the wickedness of its king. If the estimated age of the crater is accurate, it would have been well within the period of human habitation in Arabia and the impact itself may have been witnessed
As for the rock not coming from the Solar System, maybe. Speculation is that it might be a meteor, but that in itself does not mean it is extra-solar-system and I wonder if this loon even has the wit to recognize the distinction. But, then again, no one really knows what the stone is, so how can the speaker or anyone else describe its origins?
A related piece: Bad Astronomy has a post about another one of the Egyptian doctor’s rants.
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