W. Sungenis/Palm on Anfossi-Settele and Bruno, part II of V

Proemium : With Sungenis on Settele-Anfossi Affair · W. Sungenis/Palm on Anfossi-Settele and Bruno : part I of V · part II of V · part III of V · part IV of V · part V of V

I

Me to David Palm, cc Sungenis

11/04/15 à 19h49

Re: Reading but not bed time

@ David: If I misunderstood anything, it was I attributed an entry of the Acta to people "at the Papal Court":

I'm afraid your (and Sungenis's) interpretation of the Acta entry, as reproduced by Mayaud, is impossible. In that entry it is unambiguously Fr. Anfossi, (the Reverendum Dominum Patrem Sacri Palatii Apostolici Magistrum, later just Patre Magistro = Master of the Sacred Palace) who is described as causing “great scandal and disgrace of the Holy See [magno scanalo Santaeque Sedis dedecore]”. He’s described as being a “stiff-necked and deceptive man [hic durae cervicis homo falsissimique]” and “very tenacious in his false judgment [sui judicii in omnibus tenacissimus]”. And he’s said constantly [non cessabat] to resort to “nonsense” [nugiis] in support of his opposition to the Roman Congregations and to “sensible men” [tam Congregationes quam sensatos viros] (see N. Mayaud, La condamnation des livres coperniciens et sa révocation à la lumière de documents inédits des Congrégations de l’Index et de l’Inquisition, p. 240).

Only thing I had forgotten here is that this was from Acta. I thought it was from Papal Court and this would have meant that Olivieri was very far from being alone in "strongarming" a possibly weakened Pope.

I was very well aware that you thought Sungenis had gotten wrong who was described as stiffnecked etc, and I thought I had made it clear I agreed with you. But I had forgotten it was in the Acta.

Does this mean the Pope himself had subscribed these words?

Or was it a decision from some Congregation? Of course, authorised by Pope, but not subscribed?

I do not have access either to the Acta, nor to the book by Mayaud. So, I cannot check myself.

@Robert: I am asking you too, for same reason.

However, I put you in CC because David did not want a "trialogue".

@Both: I hope you are BOTH fine with my plan of adding these mails to this post:

Correspondence of Hans Georg Lundahl : With Sungenis on Settele-Anfossi Affair
http://correspondentia-ioannis-georgii.blogspot.com/2015/04/with-sungenis-on-settele-anfossi-affair.html

If so, title might change to "With Sungenis and Palm on Settele-Anfossi Affair"

Hans Georg Lundahl

PS : I have also not claimed or even seen Sungenis claim in this word choice of "strong arming" that Olivieri outright lied beyond claiming that the elliptic orbits of the modern system made this non-identical to the condemned propositions, which, as said, Napoleon had taken away momentarily. In doing so, he spoke a non-truth. Conspiracy? I did not see Sungenis say that word. Lying? Speaking a non-truth can be considered as lying and Olivieri had no more access than Pius VII had, so he was probably guessing and speaking his guess with more confidence than he should have. Which is a kind of lying.

PPS : David, if you feel this correspondence misrepresents you, feel free to publish whatever correction you like, and I'll link to it. But for my part, I correspond on matters like these in order to publish.

II

Sungenis to me and David Palm

13/04/15 à 21h00

Re: Reading but not bed time

[consistently formulated as dialogue]

Palm:

I'm afraid your (and Sungenis's) interpretation of the Acta entry, as reproduced by Mayaud, is impossible. In that entry it is unambiguously Fr. Anfossi, (the Reverendum Dominum Patrem Sacri Palatii Apostolici Magistrum, later just Patre Magistro = Master of the Sacred Palace) who is described as causing “great scandal and disgrace of the Holy See [magno scanalo Santaeque Sedis dedecore]”. He’s described as being a “stiff-necked and deceptive man [hic durae cervicis homo falsissimique]” and “very tenacious in his false judgment [sui judicii in omnibus tenacissimus]”. And he’s said constantly [non cessabat] to resort to “nonsense” [nugiis] in support of his opposition to the Roman Congregations and to “sensible men” [tam Congregationes quam sensatos viros] (see N. Mayaud, La condamnation des livres coperniciens et sa révocation à la lumière de documents inédits des Congrégations de l’Index et de l’Inquisition, p. 240).

R. Sungenis:

I never made any such claim about Anfossi. As far as I can tell, he was the only one upholding the tradition, and Olivieri and Grandi deceived everyone else to their side. This sentence from Mayaud is clear, and it refers to Anfossi: “Consequently the Supreme Congregation of the Holy Office has given permission to print this booklet and the same was always obstinately refused by the same Master with the great scandal and dishonor of the Holy See.”

Hans:

However, I put you in CC because David did not want a "trialogue".

R. Sungenis:

Well, if you remember the last time we had such a discussion with David, he entered it accusing me of a contradiction regarding Joshua 10 in his citation from GWW Vol. 3 in which I said the universe could be going around a fixed Earth. When David’s ploy was foiled when we mentioned to him that the moon, stars and sun all revolve around the Earth at different speeds, David high-tailed it out of the discussion, but, of course, without an apology to me that he had falsely accused me of a contradiction.

Hans:

PS : I have also not claimed or even seen Sungenis claim in this word choice of "strong arming" that Olivieri outright lied beyond claiming that the elliptic orbits of the modern system made this non-identical to the condemned propositions, which, as said, Napoleon had taken away momentarily. In doing so, he spoke a non-truth. Conspiracy? I did not see Sungenis say that word. Lying? Speaking a non-truth can be considered as lying and Olivieri had no more access than Pius VII had, so he was probably guessing and speaking his guess with more confidence than he should have. Which is a kind of lying.

R. Sungenis:

Call it what you like. The fact is, and it will never change, Olivieri either claimed that the 1616-1633 Church condemned Galileo’s model only because Galileo did not include elliptical orbits and that he had no explanation for the Earth’s atmosphere being sucked away by Earth’s movement; or, Olivieri claimed that it didn’t matter what the 1616-1633 Church decided since they were in the dark concerning elliptical orbits and gravity holding down the atmosphere. This was a total fabrication by Olivieri, and I am not the first one to point this out. McMullin, Fantoli and Finocchiaro all say the same. Hence, the whole maneuver around Anfossi and the swaying of Pius VII was based on a total fabrication from Olivieri, and it was all motivated by his unproven belief that heliocentrism had been proven correct.

Palm:

Sungenis's contention that Fr. Olivieri was "strong arming" the Pope is yet another of his conspiracy theories, but remains an unsupported assertion, made up out of whole cloth and based on nothing more than his imagination and wishful thinking.

R. Sungenis:

This, of course, has become Mr. Palm’s modus operandi, namely, to insult his opponent with exaggerated claims of delusion (e.g., conspiracy theories, whole cloth, imagination, wishful thinking) before he begins to answer the facts. He will take the slightest off-color word of his opponent (“strong arm”) and use it to erect a boogeyman of his own choosing so that he can make an exaggerated claim. He’s disgusting.

The fact remains that, according to Lateran V, the Master of the Sacred Palace had the sole right to issue or decline imprimaturs. So Olivieri, being a devoted heliocentrist, simply went around Anfossi, not to mention Lateran Council V. Mayaud informs us that Olivieri knew Pius VII weak in character and physically sick, and that Pius didn’t want to fight, but Olivieri pursued him anyway (and avoided subsequent popes that he knew he couldn’t maneuver).

When he pursued Pius VII, he made up a story about elliptical orbits being the key to resolve the controversy, yet Kepler’s book about elliptical orbits, the Epitome, had already been put on the Index as early as 1619-1620, and remained on the Index through 1835!

So how in the world was Olivieri able to convince everyone that Galileo’s missing elliptical orbits meant that we could now accept heliocentric models with elliptical orbits??!! No, no “strong-arming” there, right David?

Palm:

He has never offered a shred of evidence in its support and what is gratuitously asserted may be gratuitously denied.

R. Sungenis:

As far as I’m concerned, David Palm is just a modern Maurizio Olivieri. Both are motivated by the same thing – they think they have scientific proof of heliocentrism, and both are willing to distort the historical record to force their beliefs down everyone’s throat. Olivieri distorted it by making up a story about the need for elliptical orbits and gravity-held air, and Palm makes up a story about “strict interpretation” and single-handedly applies it to the 1616-1633 Church, without the slightest official citation to back up such an application; on top of the fact that his whole theory about “strict interpretation” is misapplied to 1616-1633 because he misunderstand what was said in 1616-1633. See below and see my rebuttal to his claims at http://debunkingdavidpalm.blogspot.com/2014/10/ddp-3-canard-of-strict-canonical.html

Palm:

Sungenis constantly insists that it's important that the full records of the Holy Office were held by Napoleon. But he never says just what information the Holy Office would have found in those records that supposedly would have influenced the proceedings.

R. Sungenis:

This just shows how irrational Mr. Palm can become. The very fact that we don’t know what the records contain is the very reason a judge presiding over such an important case could not allow a trial to proceed! There were 7000 documents in those records. Who in their right mind would try to decide a case knowing that 7000 documents were missing? What Pope in his right mind would allow his underling (Olivieri) to make up a story about elliptical orbits and gravity holding air as the basis for the 1616-1633 decision without having the very records from 1616-1633 to verify his claim?

Palm:

Speaking of the opening of the full archives of the Galileo case, Prof. Francesco Beretta states, “This opening, officially celebrated in 1998, . . . failed to bring to light any sensational new knowledge” (“The Documents of Galileo’s Trial,” in Galileo and the Church, p. 193.) They certainly had the 1633 decree itself before them and according to the new geocentrists this by itself should have been sufficient. Thus Sungenis’s insinuation may be set aside as an empty diversion.

R. Sungenis:

We already knew what Olivieri had done, so it wouldn’t be “any sensational new knowledge.” It was old news. Olivieri succeeded in convincing everyone that elliptical orbits and gravity holding air were the clinching arguments to allow the Church to accept heliocentrism as a thesis. But at least we have McMullin, Fantoli and Finocchiaro to thank for pointing out the deception Olivieri perpetrated on the Church. All three were prompted to do so in reaction to the bogus claims that Cardinal Poupard had put in the 1992 papal speech on Galileo.

Palm:

As for his contention that Fr. Olivieri lied to the Pope, let us remember two things. First, it was not only the Pope to whom Olivieri presented the matter but to all the cardinal-prefects of the Holy Office. And the Commissary General had this to say about those discussions with the cardinal-prefects: "the Most Rev. Father Master of the Sacred Palace [Fr. Anfossi] was not present at the two said meetings of the consultants (I do not know for what reasons). As a result, he was not aware of the proposal or of the discussion; and this was certainly unfortunate for him. For he would have heard the difficulties which some advanced at first, the solutions which others gave, and the ideas which everyone presented, until at the second meeting everyone shared an admirable consensus . . . No less uniform were the feelings of the Most Eminent Lord Cardinals; thus the decision had all the signs of having been dictated by the Holy Spirit" (Finnochiaro, Retrying Galileo, 204-5).

R. Sungenis:

What a joke. Here we have Olivieri telling us that, after he convinces everyone of his fabrications about elliptical orbits and the atmosphere, that these are “dictated by the Holy Spirit.” This is nothing but a power-play of sanctimonious words to give the appearance of divine sanction. McMullin, Fantoli and Finocchiaro have already exposed this charade for what it is.

Palm:

So there was no conspiracy, no subterfuge, no wrongdoing as Sungenis claims. Rather, all was done openly and in good order. The Holy Office had theological consultants prepare expert testimony. There was back and forth discussion, with ample opportunity for both sides to present their cases.

R. Sugnenis:

Apparently, David Palm thinks that just because there was an orderly discussion about Olivieri’s fabrications, that makes everything acceptable. How naïve. Everyone prior to this meeting believed the Earth didn’t move because the Fathers and Scripture taught so. But now that everyone can agree that the Fathers, Scripture Bellarmine, Paul V and Urban VIII were mistaken, we can all pat ourselves on the back because we came to agreement. How nice. Where was the Holy Spirit for all those who preceded Olivieri’s consensus?

[On my own view, if I may interrupt Sungenis' answer, Anfossi was the only guy who previous to or after this meeting still believed Geocentrism in the Vatican. Everyone else was seeking an excuse to get away from it, Olivieri provided it and was hero of the day.]

Palm:

The cardinal-prefects of the Holy Office officially sided with those who advocated the narrow interpretation of the 1633 decree and a broad allowance of views not covered by the 1633 decree to be held within the Catholic Church.

R. Sungenis:

No one brought up a “narrow interpretation of the 1633 decree” nor a “broad allowance of views not covered by the 1633 decree.” Both of these are imported presuppositions of David Palm that are misapplied to the 1616 and 1633 decrees. The matter is very simple: The 1616 and 1633 decrees forbid anyone to say that the Earth revolved around the sun. But Olivieri needed to change that, and so he made everyone believe that as long as they put the Earth in an elliptical orbit around the sun, and that a moving Earth would not sweep away the atmosphere, everyone could then either reinterpret the 1616-1633 decrees as allowing a moving Earth or conclude that the 1616-1633 clerics didn’t know what they were doing.

Palm:

And Pope Pius VII was willing at every step to approve. This ended with a general, positive permission bearing the Pope’s signature.

R. Sungenis:

There is no record of the Pope’s signature. And we already saw the background of his “willingness.” It was prompted by a man, Olivieri, who believed that heliocentrism had been proven when it had not. Olivieri tried to make everyone look foolish who didn’t accept his heliocentrism, especially Anfossi.

Palm:

And second, the fact is that the Commissary General, Fr. Olivieri, acted fully in line with the Church’s perennial rules of canonical interpretation, which mandate that the 1633 decree against Galileo must be interpreted strictly, as narrowly as possible and as affecting as few people as possible.

R. Sungenis:

For the sake of argument, let’s just say the 1616-1633 decrees were to be “narrowly interpreted.” The problem here is that Mr. Palm reads into the narrow interpretation what he wants to see. First, the decrees do not leave room for elliptical orbits, which is proven by the fact that Kepler was also put on the Index. Second, when the Church of 1616 said the condemned view believes the sun is in the center and not moving it was referring to the relative motion between the sun and the Earth, not the relative motion between the sun and the rest of the universe that Mr. Palm claims.

How do we know this? Two reasons: 1) the decree does not mention the rest of the universe or anything beyond the two bodies, the sun and the Earth, and 2) when the 1616 qualifiers worded their condemnation the first said: “The sun is the center of the world and completely devoid of local motion.” Notice the words “local motion.” This refers “strictly” to the relative motion between the sun and the Earth, for that is what “local” means. It is not talking about Mr. Palm’s idea that the sun moves with respect to the universe or any other such thing.

Palm:

This may not be convincing to Sungenis, who has a private dogma to uphold, but it convinced the cardinal-prefects of the Holy Office and ultimately Pope Pius VII, which obviously matters a great deal more.

R. Sungenis:

“Private dogma”? The only one with a private dogma is David Palm, since he claims that he has private scientific proof that the Earth moves. Where is it, David? If you have it, let’s debate it in an open, public and moderated debate. If you’re not willing to debate it, then please refrain. My “dogma” comes from the Fathers and medievals, the Tridentine catechism, and not one but two popes who approved the condemnation of heliocentrism and spread their decree all over Europe. Your “dogma” comes from someone who made up a story about elliptical orbits and convinced the Emperor that he was still wearing clothes. Some legacy.

Palm:

So you see, Hans, I do not argue that Pius VII's decree went against the 1633 decree. Rather, he ruled in line with the Church's perennial canonical tradition that a canonical penalty must be interpreted strictly. And the 1633 decree unambiguously references a strict heliocentrism, with an immobile sun at center of the universe and a mobile earth -- a view which nobody will ever hold again.

R. Sungenis:

Yes, we see how Mr. Palm throws in the word “universe” in order to satisfy his desire for “strict heliocentrism,” but this is merely his own scientific imposition. The 1633 decree said nothing about the “universe” but only about the “local” matter between the sun and the earth, since the only issue at hand was whether the sun went around the earth or the earth went around the sun. Anything else is Mr. Palm’s and Mr. Olivieri’s inventions.

Palm:

So at most the 1633 decree is an ecclesiastical dead letter. But whether other cosmological views fell under that decree was an open question. And that question was answered authoritatively and definitively by Pius VII in the negative. It is a decision that his successors have clearly followed.

R. Sungenis:

“Ecclesiastical dead letter”? Another one of Mr. Palm’s specious titles that he dreams up himself. As for imprimaturs, they can be rescinded as quickly as they are given. We already saw that in the case of Galileo who was issued an imprimatur in 1632 and it was taken away in 1633.

III

Me to Sungenis and Palm

14/04/15 à 12h18

Re: Reading but not bed time

I am sorry to have to say Sungenis takes my mail initiative to go on about in the same public speakers' tone as outside this correspondence.

This is about his tone, now for content, after I skimmed through a few things:

The one important fault of Dr Sungenis :

R. Sungenis: "For the sake of argument, let’s just say the 1616-1633 decrees were to be “narrowly interpreted.” The problem here is that Mr. Palm reads into the narrow interpretation what he wants to see. First, the decrees do not leave room for elliptical orbits, which is proven by the fact that Kepler was also put on the Index. Second, when the Church of 1616 said the condemned view believes the sun is in the center and not moving it was referring to the relative motion between the sun and the Earth, not the relative motion between the sun and the rest of the universe that Mr. Palm claims.

"How do we know this? Two reasons: 1) the decree does not mention the rest of the universe or anything beyond the two bodies, the sun and the Earth, and 2) when the 1616 qualifiers worded their condemnation the first said: “The sun is the center of the world and completely devoid of local motion.” Notice the words “local motion.” This refers “strictly” to the relative motion between the sun and the Earth, for that is what “local” means. It is not talking about Mr. Palm’s idea that the sun moves with respect to the universe or any other such thing."

Local motion means motion from one locus to another. Not “motion within a local viewpoint”, though that might be included too.

“center of the world” = centre of the entire universe.

Sungenis is simply wrong on scholastic terminology here.

Less important:

“So how in the world was Olivieri able to convince everyone that Galileo’s missing elliptical orbits meant that we could now accept heliocentric models with elliptical orbits??!! No, no ‘strong-arming’ there, right David?"

One man singlehandedly (or for that matter two of them) strong arming the Pope and everyone else is ludicrous.

There are two possibilities :

• either this is what everyone except Anfossi, including the Pope, wanted to believe, because Paley’s watchmaker analogy about God and creation had made implications of Geocentrism inacceptable to everyone except Anfossi;
  
  
• OR, Pope Pius VII was per se willing to give Anfossi a real chance to condemn the book, but he was weakened and EVERYONE at the Papal court was together strong arming the Pope without realising it. This possibility is the reason why my last email to mainly Sungenis was about whether Pope was sick and weak or not.

Palm is in his turn giving evidence an intrigue may have been going on, with or without involvement of Pope Pius VII, but certainly against Anfossi:

“As for his contention that Fr. Olivieri lied to the Pope, let us remember two things. First, it was not only the Pope to whom Olivieri presented the matter but to all the cardinal-prefects of the Holy Office. And the Commissary General had this to say about those discussions with the cardinal-prefects: "the Most Rev. Father Master of the Sacred Palace [Fr. Anfossi] was not present at the two said meetings of the consultants (I do not know for what reasons). As a result, he was not aware of the proposal or of the discussion; and this was certainly unfortunate for him. For he would have heard the difficulties which some advanced at first, the solutions which others gave, and the ideas which everyone presented, until at the second meeting everyone shared an admirable consensus . . . No less uniform were the feelings of the Most Eminent Lord Cardinals; thus the decision had all the signs of having been dictated by the Holy Spirit" (Finnochiaro, Retrying Galileo, 204-5).”

Fact is, Anfossi can have been very easily kept away from those meetings. Or he can have had a reasonable notion things were going to go exactly one way, and that the wrong one, in same meeting.

The real difficulty was NOT discussed in these meetings, and the real key person was NOT present in them.

Olivieri stating untruthful things and being dishonest does not become less credible because everyone wished to be deceived.

It does NOT become less credible because the position of Anfossi was not defended by Anfossi present in person. It looks very much as if he was kept away or kept himself away from an intrigue, and his position was defended by someone not really believing it and who therefore was not defending it to the uttermost. I e, he was replaced by a strawman version of his case.

Thank you very much Palm for having written this, I suppose Sungenis is not misquoting you.

Hans Georg Lundahl

IV

David Palm to me

14/04/15 à 15h23

Re: Reading but not bed time

Hello Hans,

I hope you will factor another important point into your consideration of this issue. Sungenis insists that Fr. Olivieri lied to Pius VII and made elliptical orbits the sole ground of his case. Sungenis errs and I have pointed this out to him many times, but he continues to repeat the same error.

Please see the discussion at the following locations:

[All on Geocentrism Debunked]

The New Geocentrists Come Unraveled : a linea “the only reason Settele got his imprimatur was because a lie was being circulated by the Commissioner, Olivieri that the Church of the 1600s denied heliocentrism because it didn’t have elliptical orbits.”
http://www.geocentrismdebunked.org/the-new-geocentrists-come-unraveled#Olivieri

Pay No Attention to the Geocentrist Behind the Curtain : a linea Does Bob Really Know the Science? Elliptical Orbits Versus Epicycles
http://www.geocentrismdebunked.org/pay-no-attention-to-the-geocentrist/#Epicycles

Pay No Attention to the Geocentrist Behind the Curtain : a linea Has Bob Accurately Represented Fr. Olivieri, the Commissary General of the Inquisition?
http://www.geocentrismdebunked.org/pay-no-attention-to-the-geocentrist/#Olivieri

As I summarized, "Bob’s contention that Fr. Olivieri makes “elliptical orbits” the “crux of the matter” is unsupported and false. Elliptical orbits was one of many things to which Fr. Olivieri pointed to demonstrate that the views of modern astronomers were not the same as those of Copernicus and hence not the same as what was addressed in the 1633 decree. Based on a false and sloppy analysis, Bob has repeatedly and unjustly accused this Catholic priest of lying and subterfuge."

It remains a fact that, read strictly, the 1616 and 1633 decrees address only a strict heliocentrism with an immobile sun at the center of the universe. Whether other cosmological views fall under those decrees is for the Church, not Sungenis, to decide. The Church has ruled against him.

God bless,

David

V

Sungenis to me and Palm

14/04/15 à 17h30

Re: Reading but not bed time

R. Sungenis: I didn’t say “center of the world” did not refer to the universe. I said that the 1616 decrees’ reference to “local motion” refers to motion between the sun and the earth. THAT was the only issue. It cannot refer to the stars since the stars are not local. The clerics already understood that the universe rotated around the Earth, and that the sun followed the universe in that rotation (except for a 1 degree lag per day). If the sun rotates around the Earth with the universe then obviously it can’t be the “center of the world and completely devoid of local motion.” Anything else read into this decree is simply an imposition from some wished-for universe.