Chapter 4 – Models of the Solar System – The Copernican System

The next model that we will consider is the Copernican system, developed by Nicholas Copernicus between about 1500 and 1543. This model has come to completely dominate our thinking about the Solar System and the larger Universe beyond. We will not discuss at length all of the reasons why the Copernican system has completely taken over all scientific thinking about space. Much has already been written about that elsewhere, and there is no need to rehash all of that here. Instead, our goal in this book is to come up with a model of the Solar System that conforms to the facts as we know them and the language of the Bible.

The Copernican system is a heliocentric (Sun-centered) model of the Solar System. Note that this is in stark contrast to the Ptolemaic model, which was geocentric (Earth-centered) in nature. Simply put, all of the planets revolve, or orbit, around the Sun, which sits motionless (in an orbital sense) at the very center of the Solar System. The order of the planets in the Solar System under the Copernican model, moving outward from the Sun, is as follows:

Mercury

Venus

Earth

Mars

Vesta

Ceres

Jupiter

Saturn

Uranus

Neptune

Pluto

Eris

Sedna

Note that the Sun is considered to be a star, a self-luminous object quite different from the planets, each one of which merely reflects the Sun’s light. Also, the Earth is considered to be one planet of many, rather than a unique object in its own right. These are major differences from the Ptolemaic model. The Earth spins on its rotational axis in 24 hours, creating the day/night cycle. The Earth orbits the Sun in one year’s time. The planets closest to the Sun orbit more quickly than those farther out. The stars are more distant than any of the planets, since occultations of stars by planets occasionally occur.

In fact, the stars are immensely far away in the Copernican model, much farther away than could ever have been imagined in the Ptolemaic system, which is the explanation given as to why they display no parallax shift with respect to even more distant stars in the cosmic background. Parallax is the subtle alteration in the position of a nearby star as observed against a background of more distant stars which display no parallax. Ultimately, this shift is caused by the Earth’s orbital motion around the Sun (according to the Copernican system). Parallax is essentially the cosmic equivalent of observing a nearby object in a room from two different vantage points. The fact that no parallax shift had been observed for any star from the time of Ptolemy all the way to the 19th Century was a major blow to the Copernican system, which should have been able to see a parallax shift in at least a few stars as observed from opposite sides of the Earth’s orbit around the Sun (if the Earth really is in motion around the Sun). Note that parallax is not a problem in the Ptolemaic system, since it is a geocentric model. In this sense, the Ptolemaic system is superior to the Copernican one, since the former predicted no parallax, and no parallax was observed. The Copernican system, on the other hand, predicted parallax, but didn’t find it. This lack of predicted parallax, then, is the first issue that we have found with the Copernican system. Ordinarily, this one problem would be enough to refute the entire model. We will, however, continue to search for more problems with the Copernican system because of its dominance in MSS and in the thinking and belief systems of the general population.

Today, MSS says that parallax has, in fact, been observed, and that the stars really are so far away that the parallax shift is but a tiny fraction of one second of arc, even in the most optimistic of cases. I treat claims of accurate measurement of such tiny angles with a great deal of skepticism. It seems much more likely to me that parallax has not actually been observed. Instead, I believe that so much pressure has been placed on scientists to “prove” this particular model of the Heavens that they have inevitably found the very thing that they were looking for. Even the possibility of scientific fraud cannot be ruled out.

The extreme impetus for verification of the Copernican system stems from the popularity of what I like to call the limitless space paradigm. In this worldview, nothing is unique and special – not the Earth, not the Sun, not the Solar System, not the Galaxy, not living creatures, not even man himself. Instead, blind and random natural forces have sculpted the world around us over eons of time, and what has happened here has happened in many places throughout the Universe. Why is this view so appealing to so many, and so appalling to people of faith? Because where there is no God, there is no accountability, and one can do whatever one pleases without consequences. Once God enters the picture, one must confront Him, and the reality of one’s own sin. That is why the Copernican system has been “pushed” to such an extent that no other model of the Solar System is seriously considered anymore. That is why we are told to believe in the reality of tiny fractions of a single arc second. Our society is a Godless one, and we don’t want to change our sinful ways. To consider that everything around us has been designed for us is to invite thoughts of God, and we can’t have that! Consequently, even our science is Godless, to minimize the chance that someone, anyone, might grow even a little closer to The One That Created It All, thereby ruining the happy, sinful lives of everyone else through a kind of guilt by disassociation. Therefore, we have now found a second issue with the Copernican system, that being its bias against an Intelligent Designer for the Solar System and the Universe at large. Some may find this a major point in the Copernican system’s favor, but we must keep our overarching goal in mind at all times – that of finding a model for the Solar System/Universe that coexists with both scientific observations and the language of the King James Bible.

Returning now to purely scientific considerations, it must be pointed out that the Copernican system does pass the “Venus test” from the last chapter. At that time, we saw that Venus had to be significantly smaller than Earth, but with a more substantial atmosphere, in order to fulfill all observational requirements. The contrary nature of these requirements (small planet to fit within the available space and provide the observed angular diameters, large planet to retain an extensive atmosphere) ended up refuting the Ptolemaic model. The Copernican system removes these restrictions, largely because the Solar System is immensely larger under the Copernican model. In the Ptolemaic system, every planet orbits the Earth. Consequently, the planet-sized bodies closest to the Earth (the Moon, Mercury, and Venus) have to fit within the available space between the Earth and the Sun and, at the same time, can never pass behind the Sun. In the Copernican system, however, all of that “behind-the-Sun” space becomes available for use. Venus can now orbit in front of and behind the Sun in one vast circular orbit, easing the restrictions on the diameter that the planet must have while still complying with the observed angular widths.

When the disk of Venus has a small angular diameter, it can now be located on the far side of the Sun, at a great distance from Earth, easily explaining its small angular size. And when closest to Earth, on the near side of the Sun, Venus’ disk can balloon to six times its minimum size. To see how all of this works, we will employ the small angle equation again. First, let’s say that Venus is the same size as the Earth (8,000 miles in diameter). Because we live on it, we know that the Earth has a substantial atmosphere. It’s reasonable to assume, therefore, that Venus must be at least as large as the Earth, or else it would not be able to retain the thick atmosphere that it obviously has. The fact that Venus’ clouds never reveal its surface could then be a consequence of its closeness to the Sun. For example, photochemical effects, due to the stronger level of solar illumination operative on Venus, might be effective in causing clouds of the type observed on Venus. The photochemical smog observed in our largest cities provides a reasonable, possible model for what might be happening on Venus. Next, how far away would Venus have to be in order to appear the size that it does at its absolute closest to Earth (60 arc seconds)? The small angle equation provides the answer: just under 27,000,000 miles. This is a perfectly reasonable result. There is no possibility of a collision with Earth with that much distance between the two worlds (at a minimum).

At the other end of the scale, when Venus is at its most distant from Earth, the planet presents a tiny 10 arc second disk to the telescopic observer. Such an angular width would follow if Venus were a whopping 160,000,000 miles from Earth at such times! So, we see that all that we require of Venus can be achieved if the planet is 8,000 miles in diameter, a little less than 27,000,000 miles from Earth at inferior conjunction, and 160,000,000 miles from Earth at superior conjunction. Earth, of course, is 93,000,000 miles from the Sun, leading to a Sun-Venus distance of 67,000,000 miles (160,000,000 – 93,000,000 = 67,000,000). These results are a major triumph for the Copernican system, for they mean that all of the planets can orbit the Sun in nearly circular orbits with plenty of space between each of the planets, and between each planet and the Sun. This is wonderful attribute for a successful Solar System model, as it provides an explanation for the Solar System’s long-term stability and the observed lack of titanic collisions between its major members.

Johannes Kepler, the great German astronomer of the 17^th Century, developed his so-called harmonic law on the foundation of Copernicus’ heliocentric model. The associated equation is extremely simple: orbital period (in years)^2 = distance from Sun (in AU)^3. With this equation, we can now determine planet-Sun distances, if we know the planet’s orbital period. The orbital period can be obtained by simply observing how long it takes a given planet to return to its original position in the sky. The planet Jupiter, for example, takes a little under 12 years to circumnavigate the sky. With Venus, the required time is 225 days. When the Harmonic Law was first introduced, no one knew the exact distance between the Earth and the Sun, except in relative terms. Thanks to our work on demolishing the flat Earth theory, and the refinements of modern astronomy, we now know that the AU is 93,000,000 miles. When the heliocentric model is combined with the AU, the harmonic law, and the small angle equation, we now have all of the tools necessary to determine the distances and sizes of all of the planets, and their moons, in one unified, harmonious system.

We can use what we have learned about the Sun, the Earth, and Venus to check on how well the Copernican heliocentric model coincides with actual observations. It has been observed that Venus visually orbits the Sun in 225 days or 0.616 years, the latter obtained by simply dividing 225 days by the 365 days in a year. Squaring 0.616 gives 0.38. Taking the cube root of 0.38 gives 0.72 AU. This, then, is Venus’ distance from the Sun in AU. Converting to miles (just multiply by 93,000,000) gives a hair under 67,000,000 miles, which is just what we deduced as the distance between Venus and the Sun from other considerations unrelated to the Copernican system, the harmonic law, and the heliocentric model. This is very good evidence that the Copernican model is definitely on the right track. If the Copernican model hadn’t predicted stellar parallax, and wasn’t a proponent of the limitless space paradigm, we would have a perfect model for the structure of the Solar System, and our journey for truth would be nearing its end.

It will be instructive at this point to summarize where we are in our journey for truth about the true structure of the Universe. Let us make a table of our findings to date:

From these results, it is clear that what we are looking for is a “Yes” in Column #2 and a “No” in Column #3, for then we would have a model that coincides with reality, observation, and the KJV Bible. In fact, every possible yes/no combination is represented above except for the one that we want. As our goal has not yet been achieved, our journey for truth will continue in the next chapter.