Does the Universe Revolve around Me? A Critical Review of the Geocentrism Documentary The Principle In 2014, a group that believes Earth does not orbit the Sun released a documentary called The Principle. What’s their science like? MATTHEW P. WIESNER n the January/February 2015 SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, I presented an article about the modern geocentrism Imovement (“Modern Geocentrism: A Case Study of Pseudoscience in Astronomy”). I mentioned that geo- centrists had produced a movie titled The Principle. This movie brought more attention to the geocentrists than they had previously experienced, with media outlets from Popular Science (Lecher 2014) to Slate (Krauss 2014) to NPR (Neuman 2014) reporting on the movie. The news media were interested because the producers of the movie had managed to include interviews with noted scientists such as Lawrence Krauss and George Ellis, but these sci- entists (as well as narrator Kate Mulgrew) later indicated they had been deceived into participating. This movie was released in October 2014 and had a to direct and produce the movie. as a feature film questioning current very limited theatrical run. It was re- Robert Sungenis holds a master’s cosmology, especially the eponymous leased on DVD on December 8, 2015. degree in theology and is the founder Copernican Principle. The Coperni- In this article, I give a brief overview of of an organization called Catholic can Principle says that Earth is not in the backstory behind the development Apologetics International. Sungenis a privileged location in the universe. of The Principle, summarize the movie’s did not invent the idea that Copernicus Another principle—the Cosmological main points, and critically analyze the was wrong and the universe is in fact Principle—is a related but more gen- science presented. centered on the Earth (Keating 2015), eral statement about cosmology. The but he did reinvigorate the movement Cosmological Principle says that the The Backstory with the publication of his 1,200–page universe is homogeneous (the same book Galileo Was Wrong, the Church Was in every location) and isotropic (the The makers of The Principle are geo- Right (Sungenis and Bennett 2007). same in all directions) when viewed centrists—people who claim that the Rick DeLano is an associate of Robert on large scales. These two principles idea that Earth orbits the Sun is wrong Sungenis. He does not list any notable are important to the primary theory of and that Earth is in fact motionless at educational credentials, but he indicates cosmology, called the Standard Model the center of the universe. The major he has extensive experience in film and or ΛCDM, where the CDM stands for movers behind The Principle are Robert music production. “cold dark matter” and the lambda de- Sungenis and Rick DeLano, although The Principle was marketed not as scribes dark energy. a number of other people were enlisted a documentary about geocentrism but The Principle was marketed as a doc- 50 Volume 40 Issue 4 | Skeptical Inquirer umentary questioning the Copernican shining out into space. .” Who can (Hatch 1992), attempting to refute Principle and mainstream science. But argue with smiling babies? relativity. Finally, of course, Robert it contains repeated suggestions that We next meet the experts. They are Sungenis appears; he bills himself here Earth is at rest in the center of the uni- Michio Kaku, Lawrence Krauss, Julian as “Catholic Theologian and author of verse, and it was immediately followed Barbour, John Hartnett, Bernard Carr, Galileo Was Wrong.” by a straight-to-DVD movie version Max Tegmark, John Byl, Martin Sel- The movie continues with a sum- of Galileo Was Wrong, the Church Was brede, George Ellis, Robert Bennett, mary of the history of cosmology. It Right. In The Principle, the producers Ron Hatch, and Robert Sungenis. Mi- presents Ptolemy and his geocentric mostly avoided using the word geo- chio Kaku and Lawrence Krauss are model of the universe and then jumps centrism in order to avoid alienating a among the better-known physicists, to Copernicus and how he tried to re- general audience. These two movies and in the movie they are presented as vise the long-held Ptolemaic model. were meant as a two-pronged attack on the “bad scientists”—a la good cop/bad Michio Kaku is quoted at this point as Λ CDM, with The Principle introduc- cop—the ones who strongly advocate saying, “The Copernican Principle is ing doubt about the standard model of for ΛCDM. Julian Barbour frequently theological dynamite.” Robert Sunge- cosmology and the much lower budget appears in documentaries and is also nis states, “The Copernican Principle Galileo Was Wrong movie providing a formal introduction to both the scien- tific and the religious dimensions of geocentrism. The fact that the geocen- trists are motivated by religious fun- damentalism means that they will not be dissuaded from their goal by incon- veniences such as scientific evidence. They are, like Elwood Blues, “on a mission from God.” Or so they think. Summary of the Movie The Principle is an impressively pro- duced documentary, and to the average person it might seem like just another educational show about astronomy. Like many other scientific documen- taries, it uses animations, astronomi- cal imagery, and a collection of talking heads to express ideas. However, cre- ationist scientists and full-fledged geo- a renowned physicist. John Hartnett leads to ultimately the idea that there is centrists are interspersed among the and John Byl are both trained physi- no God,” unintentionally demonstrat- talking heads. In addition, the overall cists who are active creationists. Ber- ing for us the meaning of the slippery message is similar to that presented in nard Carr is a British physicist who slope fallacy. geocentrist propaganda pieces such as holds a professorship at Queen Mary The movie continues with its his- Geocentrism 101 (Sungenis 2014), just University of London. Max Tegmark tory lesson, discussing Tycho Brahe’s in a much more attractive and profes- is a well-known cosmologist at MIT. model of the universe, then introduc- sional way. Martin Selbrede is a trained physi- ing Kepler and Galileo (who Sungenis The Principle starts out with Holo- cist and is president of the Chalcedon claims repented of his scandalous he- gram Girl, who appears periodically Foundation, an organization that pro- liocentric ideas). The video then tells throughout the movie to define terms. motes development of a Christian the- us the story of heretic Giordano Bruno, Next, there is a set of snippets from the ocracy. George Ellis is a physicist from animating his fiery demise. Next, the talking heads, presenting the idea that South Africa who is considered one of movie explores Newton and the Prin- there is a crisis in modern cosmology the world’s foremost experts on theo- cipia Mathematica, a point where Sun- and suggesting that Earth is in a special retical cosmology. Robert Bennett is a genis points out the importance of the place. Narrator Kate Mulgrew begins physicist and a geocentrist; he is listed concept of center of mass (he likes to speaking about the Copernican Prin- as coauthor of the seminal geocentrist argue that Earth is the center of mass ciple, discussing how scientists think work Galileo Was Wrong, the Church of the universe). Earth is not in a special place. She Was Right. Ron Hatch is the founder Ernst Mach is the next scientist presents as a counterexample, “A baby’s of NavCom Technology, a company brought to our attention, where it is smile, the finale of a great symphony, that developed GPS systems. He is au- claimed that his ideas show that you the lights of all the cities of our Earth thor of the book Escape from Einstein could get the same effect from a rotat- Skeptical Inquirer | July/August 2016 51 ing Earth as from a stationary Earth tion curves, the idea that objects in the CMB at the largest scales. The movie with a rotating universe. Next, we en- outer regions of spiral galaxies are mov- claims that the temperature differences counter the Michelson-Morley experi- ing faster than expected. In this section are shown to align with the orbit of ment, done in 1887 as scientists sought there is a discussion of dark matter, Earth. evidence for the ether wind. This ex- dark energy, and energy of the vac- Next, the movie argues that astron- periment is used as a segue to Einstein uum. If you, like Lewis Carroll, were omers should be more open-minded. and his development of the theory of hunting for the snark, this is where Bernard Carr is quoted as saying, relativity. The producers make no you’d find it. In one place, responding “Cosmologists should be open-minded, bones about their contempt for relativ- to Lawrence Krauss’s discussion of the and not suppress, if you like, the explo- ity, having the narrator say of relativity, properties of “nothing,” the Hologram ration of non-mainstream ideas.” An “In order to maintain the Copernican Girl defines “nothing” for us, trying to analogy is made to Giordano Bruno, Principle, the length, time, and mass of show how mind-bogglingly stupid all claiming that mainstream scientists will moving objects were altered.” these scientists are. Lawrence Krauss “burn at the stake” anyone who dares to The Principle continues with a re- exclaims at one point, “We don’t un- question the status quo. Sungenis then view of Edwin Hubble and his obser- derstand anything, or rather we don’t goes off on a tangent, claiming, “As vations of how the more distant spiral understand nothing.” The next image a matter of fact you can go on some websites of NASA and see that they’ve started to take down stuff that might hint to a geocentric universe.” The idea The producers make no bones about their of the Axis of Evil is hit really hard, as we go back to meet with Max Tegmark contempt for relativity, having the narrator to discuss the status of this phenome- say of relativity, “In order to maintain the non after the Planck satellite released its results.