Velikovsky nut butter (Introduction)

by dhw, Thursday, October 25, 2012, 17:58 (4389 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: A new book has put a nut to rest. "The Pseudo-science Wars" by Michael D. Gordon does just that. Goodbye Velikovsky. What weird ideas he had, and folks swallowed them whole. -http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444709004577651741918258080.html?KEYWORDS...-I have forwarded this article to the Secretary of the Society for Interdisciplinary Studies, as she will be far better placed than I am to respond. The SIS is not a Velikovsky mouthpiece ... there is vehement opposition to many of his ideas and conclusions ... but it was his work that led to the formation of the society back in 1974. For more information see www.sis-group.org.uk-I will, however, comment on David's post. David, you frequently point us in the direction of articles on Creationist sites, warning us not to reject the science just because of the provenance. In Section 5 of the "Brief Guide", I have referred to Velikovsky's attempt to collate ancient myths and legends and link them with the Earth's history and with geological and cosmic catastrophes. He was a champion of catastrophism (anticipating punctuated equilibrium) at a time (the 1950s) when uniformitarianism was the order of the day, and whatever may have been his shortcomings, his interdisciplinary approach was not only a prodigious undertaking in itself, but has also initiated lines of inquiry that are a very long way from being exhausted. He may not have been a Copernicus, but I would hesitate to call his then ridiculed opposition to Darwinian gradualism the work of a "nut". Here is an extract from Chapter 5 of a book called Darwin's Enigma by Luther Sunderland (© 1988):-"Another book by Velikovsky, Earth in Upheaval, gave an even more convincing case for worldwide Catastrophism. While the earlier book [Worlds in Collision] included extensive documentation from literature and folklore showing that every civilization had witnessed cosmic disturbances, this book contained a massive amount of geological and paleontological evidence showing that catastrophes were the primary mechanism for fossil deposition and formation. It also gave evidence that conflicted with Darwinism. -At first the scientific community was solidly opposed to Velikovsky, and it gave him very shoddy treatment, calling him a heretic. But after over 50 of his predictions were shown to be correct through space program research, some scientists began to reconsider his ideas.
 
Although today few conventional astronomers agree with some of his hypotheses about the recent interaction among Mars, Venus and Earth, close encounters of Earth and comets or stars are now openly discussed. In fact, most of the recent geological conferences have been dominated by discussions of worldwide catastrophes which caused mass extinctions of almost all life -- perhaps 96 percent of the species."-The article you refer to is right to point out the difficulty of "demarcation" between science and pseudoscience. It is also difficult to draw borderlines between science and philosophy, as we know from the diametrically opposite conclusions scientists often draw from the same evidence. I don't know that Velikovsky's theory about Venus is any nuttier than that of different versions of you and me battling it out in multiple or parallel universes but, as the above extract suggests, it is clear that at least some of his ideas were not as weird as the scientific establishment wanted us to believe. But when the scientific establishment makes its pronouncements, some folk swallow them whole!