Some Desiderata Not to be Overlooked
From the foregoing it will have become clear that the reigning relativity can indeed not pillory an Earth-centered cosmology. Accepting the second elucidation – the pencil at rest – of the data observable “inside” the Universe, I can stick to my geocentric guns. If Einstein is right the Tychonian quest amounts simply to forcing an open door. But therefore not yet to a much ado about nothing! Its knights-errant may then rightfully insist on a theoretical Equal Rights Amendment. What is more -allow me to repeat it! – there is the undeniable circumstance that their consistent all-out creationist position, based as it is on faith void of proof, can only be attacked by a conviction based likewise on an act of faith forever void of proof. That a post-Christian society should in consequence take Tycho seriously is therefore, I am afraid, a pipe dream. Superstitions are out of fashion in the Age of a Science Revered as Religion, except the basic faith assumption of Copernicus and Galileo. Only a demonstration that Einstein missed the mark may accomplish something. That is: something of indisputable value in the defense of at best a teleological world view. For that, in the present age, without God-given faith and without accepting the self-authentication of the Bible, mortal man can by reasoning progress beyond a “self-evident” Deism or non-specific theism I deem to be impossible. Only, to quote Pascal’s well-known epigram, a heart having reasons that reason knows nothing of – and not suppressing those! – may yet long for a God, Who is Love. Seeking Him behind the relentless and unloving blind causality, which secular science must attribute to the present phenomenal world. And then find that God, because – again Pascal! – it would not seek Him if it had not found Him.(65)
And there, I readily admit, the matter will rest if Einstein is right…, but he is not! At least not yet! A plain experimental demonstration, as simple as Dingle’s question for the Special Theory, may well put, I venture, the General Theory, as presently mathematized, outside the pale of responsible science. But before coming to that, first of all something that cannot be stressed enough: the whole Einsteinian enterprise rests on a logical fallacy. Consider: an Indian in the Amazonian jungle will never see snow and therefore declare that the white man’s nonsense about such a cold stuff is just that: nonsense. And only a trip to the Antarctic will effectively undeceive him. Draw the obvious parallel: on our supposedly through space corkscrewing planet light reaches us from all directions at the standard speed c. But this does not prove that measurements on the Moon, or on any satellite in motion with respect to us here on Earth will also always give us that c. To extract from a localized phenomenon a universal application is unwarranted. Before we shall be constrained to assert that we move but cannot prove this, at least one control experiment is necessary aboard a platform rapidly moving with regard to Earth-bound laboratories.
In the summer of 1982 three of us performed an experiment, later published in the “American Journal of Physics”, that I have been asking for since 1968 (See Addendum 1). Our heavy apparatus, a modified version of the Rayleigh refractometer, equaled in simplicity of construction the set-up employed by Hoek in 1868, but had the advantage of applying a single unilateral laser beam instead of the from opposite directions returning two light rays, with which that Dutchman operated. Our instrument was able to detect changes in the velocity of light, measured relative to itself, down to about 14.4 m/sec, and further refinements would have resulted in a still greater sensitivity.
Needless to say: rotating this refractometer employed as an interferometer we drew a blank. Not the slightest fringe shift could be observed. The apparatus “stood still”. (66)
A portable form of the heavy device was subsequently constructed by our technician, Mr. M. Sanderse. And the proposal we now put forward will be clear: with this light-weight instrument the isotropy postulate should be tested on a fast-moving object, such as an airplane, a satellite, or a space shuttle.
The data obtained by such a control experiment, even a child can realize this, will either at last put Poincare’s and Einstein’s principle of relativity on a firm footing, or otherwise utterly disavow it. Now true science, it is always loudly proclaimed, will not leave a stone unturned for a chance to disprove even its dearest theoretical deductions. And if there is one thing which amazes me then it is this that Einsteinians have not hurried to arrange such a trial as soon as it became feasible, but that – to name just a few – a Theocharis, a Zappfe, and my co-workers and myself remain voices clamouring in a wilderness of complacency and lack of even elementary logical insight. Yet on the other hand I understand this unwillingness all too well. The fall of the ruling paradigm will have such “unthinkable” consequences that for its adherents it is simply out of the question to envisage such a calamity. They cannot but beforehand declare it impossible that any test will ever topple their theorems, and therefore conclude that any effort aimed at disowning those would be a waste of time and money. However this prejudiced a priori “therefore” does not hold in the light of cold reason. Objectively appraised it represents an instance of ostrich policy, an act of willfully turning away from a contingency not wanted. For considering that contingency evokes the daunting spectre of the geostatic Universe evidenced by all solid and practical experiments ever performed. Scuttling their relativistic dogma will confine the reigning savants again, they realize, to the cul-de-sac out of which they by the grace of Einstein were delivered and compel them to re-think the “unthinkable”.
Staggering indeed, I do not deny it, are the features of the model that emerges for an astronomy no longer able to apply the Lorentz Transformations. I even hesitate to catalogue those “unthinkable” integrants facing him, who bids Copernicus et al farewell – ten to one he will reject them out of hand. Yet I shall take the risk of enumerating the consequences following the fall of relativity. After all: on patient paper to peruse these will harm nobody. It only may serve to show that Tychonians have reasons for their way of reasoning.