This is tough- Minnesota Riots and here are the links of what’s going on.

Friends, we have to prepare by 8:00pm

Last night, right-wing extremists escalated their campaign to create chaos in Mpls & Saint Paul.

They used arson as a primary tactic. It was an escalation from their work to encourage looting on Wednesday night.
https://twitter.com/rljourno/status/1266751050452795392?s=21

They are using the widespread (and justifiable) demonstrations of grief about #GeorgeFloyd as a vehicle to advance their political objectives.

They have launched an organized effort to manipulate public perception, deconstruct public infrastructure, and create mistrust and fear.

They will likely return tonight.

What’s going on?

Certain right-wing extremists have a revolutionary orientation. They want to advance their objectives by sparking civil conflict. Their theory is that, if properly polarized (often by race), others will rise up to join them. They see themselves as leading a vanguard effort.

There’s a strain of this kind of thinking that runs through touchstone reactionary documents, like The Turner Diaries, and touchstone terrorist efforts, like the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in 1995.

The latest update is an internet-irony-infused version (of course) that identifies as the Boogaloo movement. You can read more about them here.
https://www.adl.org/blog/the-boogaloo-extremists-new-slang-term-for-a-coming-civil-war

And here:
https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2020/05/27/the-boogaloo-movement-is-not-what-you-think/

You can read about their work to manipulate demonstrations about #GeorgeFloyd here.
https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/pkyb9b/far-right-extremists-are-hoping-to-turn-the-george-floyd-protests-into-a-new-civil-war

Suffice to say, there is growing evidence that some kind of organized effort is afoot in MSP. It appears to have at least three operational forms.

First, they blend into protests, encourage lawlessness, relocate, and repeat. Again and again, those transgressing certain social taboos, like smashing windows, have been white men, masked and sometimes conspicuously geared up.

Remember this one from way back on Wednesday. This guy was acting as an agent provocateur.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/minneapolis-protest-riot-umbrella-man-george-floyd-a9539741.html

It’s a tactic designed to manipulate public perception. By encouraging lawlessness, they can shift the public narrative about the demonstration and produce polarizing (and memorable visuals) like looting.

Second, they attack public infrastructure, both physical and social. Friday night saw the burning of a post office, a first. Previous nights included attacks on banks, pharmacies, grocery stores, etc. It can be easy to miss this if you just see it all as looting.

The story isn’t ‘people want stuff’. The story is: someone is trying to deconstruct the systems that support communities in Minneapolis & Saint Paul.

This attack on infrastructure plays out in a second way, and vividly so on Friday night. They were using geographically widespread acts of arson to force the Minneapolis Fire Department to play Whack-A-Mole.

Friday night’s arsons, particularly those on the Northside, were taking place miles away from demonstrations on the Southside, sometimes focused on beloved institutions.
https://twitter.com/michaelleewrite/status/1266584741274423298?s=21

This tactic is designed to create chaos, weaken the community bonds, and discredit political leaders.

Third, there are active disinformation efforts happening online. If you dig through your recent followers or the replies in journalist’s tweets you can pretty easily find bogus accounts. (i.e. those with 1000s of tweets but fewer than 100 followers, accounts created in May 2020 with no personally identifiable information).

These accounts are posting polarizing content, sometimes right-leaning, sometimes left-leaning, often fear-inducing. This tactic is designed to create mistrust and fear.

Look, this stuff is alarming. I guess I am sounding an alarm here; but let me put this in some context. There may not be many of these folks. This post from late last night was a crew of just five in a car.
https://twitter.com/wedgelive/status/1266666617573789697?s=21

There are likely more than five, but they are not an insurmountable number. Why are they not insurmountable?

Because they only win if we overreact.
They only win if we overreact.
They only win if we overreact.
They win by making us afraid and by getting us to do their dirty work.

There are at least five things we can do to counter the right-wing extremists who’ve been using the #GeorgeFloyd demonstrations.

1) Go talk to your neighbors today. Build a contact list. Offer to stay up tonight or offer to split up shifts. You do not need to violate curfew. Sitting on your stoop or your deck in the back will be fine. Just prepare together to keep an eye on things tonight.

2) Get in relationship with your implicit bias. The protestors aren’t scary or violent. Black & brown youth aren’t the problem here. You should keep an eye out for white dudes with backpacks. You are preparing for the white nationalists, not the protestors.

3) Obey the curfew tonight. If you’ve been going to the protests, take a night off. The white nationalists are camouflaging themselves inside the protests. They will be more exposed, more obvious, if the crowds are smaller. The Fire Department will be more nimble if the police, national guard, and our elected officials are less strained. Staying home tonight is a legitimate contribution to the cause. We’re not done overhauling the MPD, but we’ve got to expose the right-wingers first.

4) Prepare to document and de-escalate. If you go to a demonstration today, go with friends and go with a mission. Keep your phone charged and your voice loud. Film people who are doing sketchy stuff. Call them out. Add light, not heat, to the situation. The white nationalists are mostly working at night because they don’t want to get caught. Exposure is what scares them off.

5) Share the things you love about our city. Share them online and with your neighbors. Help clean up today. Donate supplies to families who need them. Shop at a local business. Post all that online. Our own fear and reactivity is our enemy. It’s how they win. They only win if we overreact.

We can do this. With each other, for each other, with an abiding love for this badass city we’ve made and remade a dozen times.

Ivo on Ascension and the Liberation of Planet Earth – Sharon Stewart – Google Books

Again, Sharon and Ivo have joined forces to help you with your role of Lightworker here on earth. “Ivo on Ascension and the Liberation of Planet Earth,” is a thought-provoking book which opens your eyes to what's happening within you and the world around you as we undergo enormous personal and global rebirthing.What's happening to your body and why? Why is your reality changing? As you begin to experience a greater multidimensional reality and heightened states of consciousness, Ivo answers questions you have as to why, how and where is this taking you, from his advanced galactic perspective. This essential information will make you rethink your future path in life and will open you up to new experiences as you go through this evolutionary process.As our world begins to change from a meaningless, money-driven, warring world to one of benevolence, peace and love, Ivo divulges information not intended for those who aren't ready to hear.Written with love for you from Ivo and Sharon.
— Read on books.google.com/books

News flash! MOTHER TERESA CHILD TRAFFICKING


MOTHER TERESA WAS A CHILD TRAFFICKER, FUNNELING MILLIONS OF DOLLARS TO THE VATICAN

WELCOME TO THE FALL OF THE FALSE IDOLS: We all know the name Mother Teresa. She won a Nobel Peace Prize for her so-called humanitarian work and founded the Missionaries of Charity. When She was on her world tour she gathered millions (rumored to be billions) of dollars from the rich, because they foolishly believed that she would be able to help the poor and suffering in India. Many people would believe that India was and currently is eternally grateful to her. How wrong they are! But what did she really do with all that money? It surely wasn’t used to improve the conditions of the suffering. Mother Teresa was not a living saint and in fact was somewhat morally corrupt — with a lot of evidence. Mother Teresa’s money was mostly spent on funding Pedophilia and child rape, and not on the poor. She built a hundred facilities all over the world with her name and organization ‘Missionaries of Charity’ on each one. Most of them were nunneries and Papist-run children’s homes. where millions of children were abused, beaten and sodomised on a daily basis. Many of these children were brainwashed and conditioned into cult-like-thinking, to make them act like her, thus sprang her “cult of suffering.” Ever wondered why the Catholic Church rushed to canonize Mother Teresa after her death? Turns out she was a child trafficker, selling babies & funneling between $50-100 million/year to the Vatican. Mother Teresa’s connections include Baby Doc Duvalier, the Haitian dictator, Saving’s and Loan criminal Charles Keating, and Robert Maxwell, the father of Jeffrey Epstein’s child sex trafficking partner, Ghislaine Maxwell. And here’s the kicker! Mother Teresa opened the D.C. based Home for Infant Children with none other than Hillary Clinton. This orphanage of sorts was quietly closed in 2012.

Stargaze- Dare to truth

THE EVENT-2020 MAJOR CELESTIAL ALIGNMENT

THE EVENT-2020 MAJOR CELESTIAL ALIGNMENT

by MICHAEL LOVE – ANDARA ENTERPRISES, LLC | Oct 29, 2019 | Ascension | 4 comments

PLEIADIAN LIGHT FORCES TRANSMISSION 10282019

CHANNELED BY MICHAEL LOVE

* FOR IMMEDIATE PLANETARY BROADCAST TO THE STARSEEDS OF EARTH *

PRELUDE:
2 EARTH MONTHS AGO, THE EARTH ALLIANCE RECEIVED A CRITICAL AKASHIC DOWNLOAD FROM LIGHT FORCES WHICH CONTAINED DETAILS ABOUT A MAJOR UPCOMING CELESTIAL ALIGNMENT WHICH WILL SIGNAL THE LONG AWAITED TIME OF THE COMPLETE LIBERATION OF PLANET EARTH AND THE GRAND EVOLUTIONARY ASCENSION OF HUMANITY!
CERTAIN MEMBERS OF THE EARTH ALLIANCE HAVE BEEN PROCESSING THE DATA MARKERS IN THIS LATEST TRANSMISSION FOR SOME TIME NOW AND ON THIS DAY WE PRESENT TO YOU A GRAND MESSAGE OF HOPE, FREEDOM, AND ENCOURAGEMENT WHICH COMES DIRECTLY FROM THE PLEIADIANS!

WHAT WE CAN TELL YOU FOR SURE IS “THE GREAT TIME OF HUMANITY HAS COME!”

NOTICE ABOUT THIS ASTROLOGICAL EVENT:
MOST MAINSTREAM ASTROLOGERS WILL NOT BE FULLY AWARE OF THE HISTORICAL DETAILS OR IMPLICATIONS OF THIS PLANETARY ALIGNMENT! 
CERTAIN HIGH-LEVEL ASTROLOGERS WHO ARE KEY MEMBERS OF THE EARTH ALLIANCE HAVE A PRIMARY INTEREST IN THIS CELESTIAL EVENT AND HAVE BEEN WATCHING IT FOR SOME TIME AND HAVE PROVIDED 
SUPPORTING INTEL FOR THIS LIGHT FORCES TRANSMISSION!

BEGIN TRANSMISSION…

GREAT ONES,
IN 4 EARTH MONTHS, A VERY SIGNIFICANT AND RARE CELESTIAL ALIGNMENT BEGINS WHERE PLUTO AND JUPITER BECOME CONJUNCT WITH EACH OTHER!
THE POWERFUL EFFECTS OF THIS COSMIC ALIGNMENT WILL BE EXPERIENCED BY THE STARSEEDS OF EARTH FROM FEBRUARY 20 UNTIL DECEMBER 17TH, 2020!

THE FULL ENERGETIC IMPACT OF THIS ALIGNMENT WILL HIT THE EARTH AT 11:11AM UTCON 11/11/2020!

PLEIADIAN INTEL ABOUT THIS CELESTIAL EVENT:

THE CENTRAL SUN (SGR-A), LOCATED IN THE GALACTIC CORE, AT THE CENTER OF THE MILKY WAY GALAXY, IN THE SAGITTARIUS CONSTELLATION HAS RECENTLY SHOWN HEIGHTENED ACTIVITY DUE TO CYCLICAL MASS EJECTIONS IN THE BLACK HOLE AT THE GALACTIC CORE!

THESE CENTRAL SUN EJECTIONS ARE BLASTING THIS SOLAR SYSTEM WITH EXOTIC PARTICLES OF HIGH FREQUENCY, GAMMA PHOTON PLASMA LIGHT THAT HAS BEEN MEASURED BY EARTH’S SCHUMANN RESONANCE IN THE 40-100 HERTZ RANGE!
THE GAMMA STATE OF CONSCIOUSNESS (BLISS AND SUPERHUMAN ABILITY) RESONATES BETWEEN 40-100 HERTZ!
THE LOWER BOUNDARY OF THE 5TH DIMENSION (HEAVEN) BEGINS AT EXACTLY 40 HERTZ AND THE UPPER BOUNDARY ENDS AT EXACTLY 100 HERTZ!
A DIMENSION IS NOT A PLACE, BUT A STATE OF BEING OR CONSCIOUSNESS THAT CAN AND WILL MANIFEST ITSELF AS A PERCEIVED REALITY!

THE GREAT CENTRAL SUN AT 12-D IS WHAT IS CALLED ‘ INTELLIGENT SOURCE ENERGY’ AND EMANATES ITSELF OUTWARDLY IN AN INFINITE MANNER, MANIFESTING ITSELF AS ALL THAT EXISTS!

THE GREAT CENTRAL SUN TRANSMITS ALL OF ITS INFORMATION (ON COSMIC RAYS) DOWN TO THE CENTRAL SUN, IN THE 5TH DIMENSION, FOR STORAGE AND USE IN THIS LOCAL COSMOS!
THE CENTRAL SUN IS AN INTERGALACTIC REPOSITORY THAT HOLDS ALL THE LIGHT-INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS UNIVERSE!
ALL THE INFORMATION THAT EXISTS IS THE SAME AS ALL THE KNOWLEDGE OF

GOD/THE UNIVERSE AND THE AKASHIC RECORDS!
IT IS THE DATA-INFORMATION THAT MAKES UP ALL THINGS!
ALL THINGS ARE THIS AND NO THING IS NOT MADE OF THIS 100%!
IT IS THE UNDERLYING, INTELLIGENT ENERGY OF THE UNIVERSE!
THIS REPOSITORY OF DIVINE, 5D LIGHT HAS BEEN BLOCKED BY NEFARIOUS BEINGS FROM ENTERING THE EARTH’S ENERGETIC FIELD FOR THE LAST 350,000 YEARS, HOWEVER BENEVOLENT LIGHT FORCES HAVE ALMOST COMPLETELY REMOVED ALL ARTIFICIAL CENTRAL SUN-BLOCKS NOW AND HAVE BEEN ASSISTING HUMANITY BY DEFLECTING CENTRAL SUNLIGHT TO EARTH FOR SOME TIME NOW USING ADVANCED CRYSTAL AND LIGHTSHIP TECHNOLOGY!

THE PLEIADIANS KNOW THAT AT SPECIFIC POINTS ON THE ASTROLOGICAL CALENDAR, THE HEAVENLY BODIES OF THIS SOLAR SYSTEM ALIGN IN A SPECIAL WAY , CREATING HUGE STARGATES THAT ALLOW MUCH MORE OF THIS 5D CENTRAL SUNLIGHT TO REACH THE EARTH!
THEY ALSO KNOW THIS IS THE PRE-ORDAINED AND OPPORTUNE TIME TO ACT ON BEHALF OF ALL OF HUMANITY!

IN THE FINAL STAGE OF OPERATION MASTERPIECE (THE COMPLETION OF 5D NEW EARTH)
THE PLEIADIANS WILL USE THE 2020 JUPITER/PLUTO STARGATE TO CHANNEL MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF 5D GAMMA, CENTRAL SUNLIGHT, NOW FULLY PRESENT ON THE SURFACE OF THE SUN, ON DOWN TOWARDS EARTH WHERE IT WILL BE RECEIVED, DECODED AND INTEGRATED INTO THE HUMAN BODY VESSEL DNA OF THE 4.5 BILLION STARSEEDS OF EARTH, FOR THE PURPOSE OF FULLY MANIFESTING THE NEW 5D EARTH REALITY HERE!
THIS POINT ON THE HUMAN-HISTORY TIMELINE IS THE FULL ENERGETIC CLIMAX OF THE EVENT AND WILL CLOSE THE GREAT COSMIC CYCLE OF THIS SOLAR SYSTEM AND OF HUMANITY!

CERTAIN MEMBERS OF THE EARTH ALLIANCE KNOW ABOUT THE CERTAINTY OF THIS SOLAR EVENT AND CONFIRM THAT OUR SOLAR SYSTEM IS PASSING THROUGH AN EXTREMELY, ENERGETICALLY DENSE AREA OF THE GALAXY AT THIS VERY HOUR!
THE EXOTIC PARTICLES CONTAINED IN THIS COSMIC PLASMA FIELD ARE CHARGING UP THE SUN LIKE A GIANT SUPER CAPACITOR, WHICH WILL SOON DISCHARGE AS AN EPIC AND COSMIC LIGHT EVENT THAT WILL BE WITNESSED BY ALL ON THE SURFACE OF THE EARTH!

THE MASSIVE INBOUND WAVE OF WHITE, MAGNETIC, 5D, CENTRAL SUNLIGHT THAT WILL COME INTO EARTH BEGINNING IN THE SPRING OF 2020, BUILDS TO AN APEX ALL YEAR LONG AS THE 2020 STARGATE FULLY OPENS AND WILL CULMINATE AS A GRAND SOLAR FLASH NEAR THE END OF, 2020!

THE ENERGY THAT IS CURRENTLY BUILDING UP IN THE MAGNETIC FIELD AROUND EARTH IS ELEVATING THE VIBRATION OF THE EARTH AND THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF ALL LIVING BEINGS HERE!
EARTH CIVILIZATION IS ABOUT TO TRANSITION INTO A HYPERDIMENSIONAL SOCIETY!
IT WILL NOW BE POSSIBLE TO TRAVEL MULTIDIMENSIONALLY THROUGH SPACE AND TIME WITH THE PROCUREMENT OF ZERO POINT, FREE ENERGY TECHNOLOGIES WHICH ALLOW FOR ANTI-GRAVITIC FLIGHT.
SUPER-HUMAN ABILITIES WILL BE ATTAINED BY THE 4.5 BILLION STARSEEDS ON EARTH WHO ARE READY FOR THIS TRANSFORMATION!

DEAR ONE,
THIS PLANETARY ALIGNMENT WILL BE THE MOST POWERFUL AND SPECIAL ONE IN HUMAN HISTORY!
ALL, GALACTIC INTEL, CHANNELED DATA, EVERY ORACLE AND EVERY SIGN IN THE COSMOS IS POINTING TO THAT FACT THAT AN IMMINENT EVOLUTIONARY EVENT IS ABOUT TO OCCUR ON PLANET EARTH!

PREHISTORIC, ARCHAEOLOGICAL DATA DERIVED FROM CARBON-14, CHRONOMETRIC DATING, IN CONJUNCTION WITH VARIOUS OTHER TYPES OF RELATIVE TIMELINE DATING METHODS SHOW: 
THE FOLLOWING PRE-HISTORICAL EVENTS IN EARTH’S ANCIENT TIMELINE OCCURRED WHEN THE PLUTO/JUPITER STARGATE WAS OPEN :

TIAMAT DESTRUCTION
THE BEGINNING AND END OF THE ICE AGE
PREHISTORIC SPECIES EXTINCTION
THE COMING OF THE ANNUNAKI
THE GREAT DELUGE
THE FIRST CREATED, MODERN HUMAN
THE BEGINNING AND END OF THE LEMURIAN AND THE ATLANTEAN CIVILIZATIONS
THE BEGINNING AND END OF THE BUILDER RACES
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE MAYAN CULTURE
THE PLEIADIAN DEPARTURE FROM EARTH

IN MORE MODERN TIMES, FOR THE LAST TWO CENTURIES, ASTROLOGISTS HAVE TRACKED AND KEPT WRITTEN RECORDS ABOUT THIS SPECIFIC HEAVENLY ALIGNMENT!
JUST AS IN ANCIENT TIMES, EVERY TIME THIS GALACTIC PORTAL HAS OPENED, THE MOST SIGNIFICANT EPOCHS, ERAS, EVENTS AND SHIFTS HAVE OCCURRED ON PLANET EARTH!

BEGINNING IN THE SPRING OF 2020, THIS ALIGNMENT WILL BRING THE ENERGY OF ASCENSION, LIBERATION AND NEW BEGINNINGS FOR THE CITIZENS OF EARTH, BUT AS WITH ANY MAJOR SHIFT OR CHANGE, THERE WILL BE A SUBSTANTIAL AMOUNT OF PLANETARY CHAOS AS THE OLD COLLECTIVE 3D MATRIX FULLY GIVES WAY TO THE NEW 5D MATRIX OF LIGHT!

THIS SPECIAL PLANETARY ALIGNMENT, IS THE HEAVENLY SIGN THAT THE NEW GOLDEN ERA OF LIGHT HAS FINALLY COME TO PLANET EARTH!

DEAR ONE,
AS WE MOVE CLOSER TO THE GRAND YEAR OF 2020, WE MUST ALL BE THE BEST VERSIONS OF OURSELVES THAT WE CAN BE!
THE INCOMING LIGHT IS VERY STRONG NOW AND IT WILL ONLY INCREASE IN POWER OVER THE NEXT FEW MONTHS!
IT TAKES A STRONG AND HEALTHY LIGHT BEING TO BE ABLE TO INTEGRATE THESE HIGHER LEVELS OF PHOTONIC LIGHT SO NOW IS THE TIME TO TAKE THE BEST CARE OF YOUR BODY, YOUR MIND, YOUR EMOTIONS AND YOUR SPIRIT!
EAT ONLY NATURAL, PLANT-BASED ENERGY FOODS AND DRINK LOTS OF PURE WATER!
YOU MAY HAVE TO REST/SLEEP MORE THAN NORMAL TO INTEGRATE THESE HIGHER LEVELS OF LIGHT!
REMOVE YOURSELF FROM ALL THE NEGATIVE PEOPLE AND THINGS IN YOUR LIFE AND SPEND SOME TIME ALONE. YOU ARE CHANGING AND HEALING SO YOU NEED TO BE LEFT ALONE FOR A TIME!
DO YOUR INNER TRAUMA HEALING TO CLEAR TRAPPED NEGATIVE AND TOXIC EMOTIONAL ENERGY FROM THE BODY!
SEEK KNOWLEDGE OUTSIDE OF THE MATRIX SYSTEM SO YOU CAN FULLY UNDERSTAND WHAT IS HAPPENING!
GROUND YOURSELF IN NATURE!
MEDITATE AT LEAST ONE HOUR PER DAY!
A SEA SALT BATH EACH DAY WILL DO WONDERS!
ASK FOR HELP IN STARSEED SOCIAL MEDIA GROUPS!
CRYSTALS HELP CHANNEL HIGH-VIBRATIONAL ENERGY THROUGH THE LAYERED BODIES.

LOVE ON YOURSELF MORE THAN EVER, RE-CREATE YOUR LIFE TO BE ONLY WHAT YOU WANT, AND LEARN TO IGNORE THE OPINION OF OTHERS!
YOU HAVE TO COME FIRST NOW AND THAT IS JUST THE WAY IT IS!

STANDBY FOR A MAJOR CELESTIAL LIGHT SHOW IN THE HEAVENS IN 2020 AS LIGHT FORCES CONTINUE TO ASSIST HUMANITY IN ITS GRAND SPIRITUAL EVOLUTION!

THANK YOU FOR YOUR GREAT SERVICE TO ALL OF HUMANITY!

GOD-SPEED,
MICHAEL AND THE PLEIADIANS
https://5dearthproject.com/

SPECIAL CREDIT AND ACKNOWLEDGMENT TO THE EARTH ALLIANCE, THE GREAT WHITE BROTHERHOOD, THE WHITE DRAGON SOCIETY, PLEIADIAN CODENAME: COBRA, THE GUARDIANS OF EARTH AND THE SPHERE BEING ALLIANCE.
DAVID WILCOCK COREY GOODE ECETI RANCH

Black whole sun

Nothing is new under the sun

Reminds me of the song- “Black hole sun, where have you gone- to wash away the pain.

In “Black Sun: Aryans Cults, Esoteric Nazism, and the Politics of Identity,” Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke talks about the links between conspiracy theory, Nazism, and patriotism, referring to the work of German conspiracy theorist and Nazi Jan van Helsing:

“Helsing’s Illuminati-Jewish world conspiracy is extensively borrowed from the American patriot movement, but is applied to German nationalist concerns. He argues that this cosmic plot can be foiled only by a restoration of the German Reich…This ‘Third Power’ may prove mankind’s only defense against Illuminati enslavement.”

Helsing’s books are popular in New Age circles. This is why I’m concerned about increasing calls for “revival” throughout America, and for Christians to stand and defend against the tyranny of the New World Order. I sense a sinister spirit behind it, one that has already done much the same work in the past.

“What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun.” – Ecc. 1:9

This came from a source listed

Eratosthenes:

Between the cosmological foundation set by the Presocratics and the world of Ideas introduced by Plato was a set of fundamental calculations on the size of the Earth, Moon, Sun and the distances between the nearby planets performed by Eratosthenes and Aristarchus (c. 250 BC). Using some simple geometry, these two natural philosophers were able to, for the first time, place some estimate of the size of the cosmos in Earth terms.

For a long time it was realized that the earth’s surface was curved by people familiar with the behavior of incoming and outgoing ships. For it was obvious that as a ship passed over the horizon, the hull disappeared first, then the topmost sailing masts (although one could argue this is an effect of refraction in the atmosphere). Ancient astronomers could see with their eyes that the Sun and the Moon were round. And the shadow of the Earth, cast on the lunar surface during a lunar eclipse, is curved. A sphere is the simplest shape to explain the Earth’s shadow (a disk would sometimes display a shadow shaped like a line or oval).Eratosthenes used a spherical Earth model, and some simple geometry, to calculate its circumference. Eratosthenes knows that on a special day (the summer solstice) at noon in the Egyptian city of Syene, a stick placed in the ground will cast no shadow (i.e., it is parallel to the Sun’s rays). A stick in the ground at Alexandria, to the north, will cast a shadow at an angle of 7 degrees. Eratosthenes realizes that the ratio of a complete circle (360 degrees) to 7 degrees is the same as the ratio of the circumference of the Earth to the distance from Alexandria to Swenet. Centuries of surveying by Egyptian pharaohs scribes gave him the distance between the two cities of 4900 stadia, approximately 784 kilometers. This resulting in a circumference of 40,320 kilometers, which is amazingly close to the modern value of 40,030 kilometers. With this calculation, Eratosthenes becomes the father of geography eventually drawing up the first maps of the known world and determining the size of the most fundamental object in the Universe, our own planet.

Geometric Cosmology:

There were only seven objects visible to the ancients, the Sun and the Moon, plus the five planets, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. It was obvious that the planets were not on the celestial sphere since the Moon clearly passes in front of the Sun and planets, plus Mercury and Venus can be seen to transit the Sun. Plato first proposed that the planets followed perfect circular orbits around the Earth. Later, Heraclides (330 B.C.) developed the first Solar System model, placing the planets in order from the Earth it was is now called the geocentric solar system model.Note that orbits are perfect circles (for philosophical reasons = all things in the Heavens are “perfect”). Heraclides model became our first cosmology of things outside the Earth’s atmosphere.

Slightly later, Aristarchus (270 B.C.) proposed an alternative model of the Solar System placing the Sun at the center with the Earth and the planets in circular orbit around it. The Moon orbits around the Earth. This model became known as the heliocentric theory Aristarchus was the first to propose a Sun centered cosmology and one of the primary objections to the heliocentric model is that the stars display no parallax (the apparent shift of nearby stars on the sky due to the Earth’s motion around the Sun). However, Aristarchus believed that the stars were very distant and, thus, display parallax’s that are too small to be seen with the eye (in fact, the first parallax will not by measured until 1838 by Friedrich Bessel). The Sun is like the fixed stars, states Aristarchus, unmoving on a sphere with the Sun at its center. For Aristarchus it was absurd that the “Hearth” of the sky, the Sun, should move and eclipses are easy to explain by the motion of the Moon around the Earth.

Problems for Heliocentric Theory: 

While today we know that the Sun is at the center of the solar system, this was not obvious for the technology of the times per-1500’s. In particular, Aristarchus’ model was ruled out by the philosophers at the time for three reasons:

  1. Earth in orbit around Sun means that the Earth is in motion. Before the discovery of Newton’s law of motion, it was impossible to imagine motion without being able to `feel’ it. Clearly, no motion is detected (although trade winds are due to the Earth’s rotation). 
  2. If the Earth undergoes a circular orbit, then nearby stars would have a parallax. A parallax is an apparent shift in the position of nearby stars relative to distant stars.Of course, if all the stars are implanted on the crystal celestial sphere, then there is no parallax.
  3. Lastly, geocentric ideas seem more `natural’ to a philosopher. Earth at the center of the Universe is a very ego-centric idea, and has an aesthetic appeal.

Ptolemy:

Ptolemy (200 A.D.) was an ancient astronomer, geographer, and mathematician who took the geocentric theory of the solar system and gave it a mathematical foundation (called the “Ptolemaic system”). He did this in order to simultaneously produce a cosmological theory based on Aristotle’s physics (circular motion, no voids, geocentric) and one that would provide a technically accurate description of planetary astronomy. Ptolemy’s system is one of the first examples of scientists attempting to “save the phenomena”, to develop a combination of perfect circles to match the irregular motion of the planets, i.e., using concepts asserted by pure reason that match the observed phenomenon. 

Ptolemy wrote a great treatise on the celestial sphere and the motion of the planets call the Almagest. The Almagest is divided into 13 books, each of which deals with certain astronomical concepts pertaining to stars and to objects in the solar system. It was, no doubt, the encyclopedic nature of the work that made the Almagest so useful to later astronomers and that gave the views contained in it so profound an influence. In essence, it is a synthesis of the results obtained by Greek astronomy; it is also the major source of knowledge about the work of Hipparchus.

The Christian Aristotelian cosmos, engraving from Peter Apian’s Cosmographia, 1524

In the first book of the Almagest, Ptolemy describes his geocentric system and gives various arguments to prove that, in its position at the center of the universe, the Earth must be immovable. Not least, he showed that if the Earth moved, as some earlier philosophers had suggested, then certain phenomena should in consequence be observed. In particular, Ptolemy argued that since all bodies fall to the center of the universe, the Earth must be fixed there at the center, otherwise falling objects would not be seen to drop toward the center of the Earth. Again, if the Earth rotated once every 24 hours, a body thrown vertically upward should not fall back to the same place, as it was seen to do. Ptolemy was able to demonstrate, however, that no contrary observations had ever been obtained.

Ptolemy accepted the following order for celestial objects in the solar system: Earth (center), Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. However, when the detailed observations of the planets in the skies is examined, the planets undergo motion which is impossible to explain in the geocentric model, a backward track for the outer planets. This behavior is called retrograde motion.
Retrograde motion for Mars, notice how Mars increases in brightness in the middle of the cycle (due to Earth’s closest approach)

He realized, as had Hipparchus, that the inequalities in the motions of these heavenly bodies necessitated either a system of deferents and epicycles or one of movable eccentrics (both systems devised by Apollonius of Perga, the Greek geometer of the 3rd century BC) in order to account for their movements in terms of uniform circular motion.In the Ptolemaic system, deferents were large circles centered on the Earth, and epicycles were small circles whose centers moved around the circumferences of the deferents. The Sun, Moon, and planets moved around the circumference of their own epicycles. In the movable eccentric, there was one circle; this was centered on a point displaced from the Earth, with the planet moving around the circumference. These were mathematically equivalent schemes.Even with these, all observed planetary phenomena still could not be fully taken into account. Ptolemy therefore exhibited brilliant ingenuity by introducing still another concept. He supposed that the Earth was located a short distance from the center of the deferent for each planet and that the center of the planet’s deferent and the epicycle described uniform circular motion around what he called the equant, which was an imaginary point that he placed on the diameter of the deferent but at a position opposite to that of the Earth from the center of the deferent (i.e., the center of the deferent was between the Earth and the equant). He further supposed that the distance from the Earth to the center of the deferent was equal to the distance from the center of the deferent to the equant. With this hypothesis, Ptolemy could better account for many observed planetary phenomena.Although Ptolemy realized that the planets were much closer to the Earth than the “fixed” stars, he seems to have believed in the physical existence of crystalline spheres, to which the heavenly bodies were said to be attached. Outside the sphere of the fixed stars, Ptolemy proposed other spheres, ending with the primum mobile (“prime mover”), which provided the motive power for the remaining spheres that constituted his conception of the universe. His resulting solar system model looked like the following, although the planets had as many as 28 epicycles to account for all the details of their motion.This model, while complicated, was a complete description of the Solar System that explained, and predicted, the apparent motions of all the planets. The Ptolemic system began the 1st mathematical paradigm or framework for our understanding of Nature.

Mathematics and Cosmology

At the end of the Greek era, there is no doubt that we completed our transition from mythical, supernatural explanations of cosmology to a natural, science based description. And, it is clear, that the mathematical description of the cosmos given by Ptolemy is, in the words of the mathematical Wigner, “unreasonably effective”, meaning that is mathematics is a surprisingly successful to understand the natural world, beyond our expectations given the chaos that reigns in everyday phenomenon. This is the ultimate verification of the Greek philosophical tradition which asserts that nature is understandable rather than under the control of capricious deities which are to be appeased rather than understood, is one of the roots of science. Thus, the greatest gift from the Greek was the philosophy of rationalism, that the Universe is open to inspection and, ultimately, understandable.The Greeks were also the first to recognize the deep connection between science and mathematics. Mathematics is a natural language for rational arguments and relationships expressed mathematically are capable of being placed in logically correction chains of progression as an efficient way determining their validity. As later stated by Galileo:

Philosophy is written in this grand book, the Universe which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the letters in which it is composed. It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles and other geometric figures without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it; without these, one wanders about in a dark labyrinth.

It is of continuing amazement, to both scientists and philosophers alike, that the laws of Nature can be expressed in mathematical form, and that humans are capable of processing that kind of math. However, while no one doubts the importance of mathematics to science, there is a continuing debate on the origin of math’s effectiveness. On one hand, we see Plato’s belief that mathematical ideas exist independent of our world, or human thought (the realist or Platonism view). In fact, for Plato, the real world is this mathematical world, not the shadow, physical world we live in. Aristotle, on the other hand, believes that math is a human invention, and that the mind is where math is created (the instrumentalist or formalist view). Humans created mathematics by idealising or abstracting elements of the physical world. In fact, mankind’s extraordinary math abilities may simply be the product of millions of years of evolution providing us with powerful intellectual tools as a survival asset.

A modern view of mathematics and science is provided by Bertrand Russell who states “Mathematics is the chief source of the belief in eternal and exact truth, as well as a sensible intelligible world”. This is a guiding principle for most scientists and mathematics. Scientists do create methods to quantify phenomenon in physics, chemistry and biology, and these inventions are effective. However, it should be remembered is that these mathematical methods are, in many cases, incredible accurate. So as phenomenon is studied and recorded, and as patterns emerge (via the scientific method), humans will take mathematical concepts from abstracting elements and apply them to problems. But the discovery is in the connections to science, not the mathematical objects themselves.

The bottom line about the relationship of mathematics to science is basically that math works. Mathematics is very much a part of the Universe and very necessary for understanding cosmology. For we will see, in later chapters, that there are properties to the Universe can only be understood through mathematics. For example, our senses and mental models are fixed in a three dimensional world (3D), and the macroscopic Universe is the four dimensional (4D) construct called spacetime. To explore spacetime requires an extension to our senses that only mathematics provides.

The mathematics of the Greeks was geometry and arithmetic, but as we advance forward in the history of cosmology we will encounter more sophisticated mathematics. Newton will introduce calculus, the math of infinitesimals. Einstein will introduce non-Euclidean geometry. Quantum physics uses differential equations and matrix algebra. These math methods are the windows in which we see, and understand, reality. By the 21st century, we will see a heavy usage of computers and artificial simulations to probe the vast amount of information provided by new technologies. And our sense of how we do science will change as encounter new concepts which are not testable in the traditional sense of direct observation or experimentation.

However, common to all cosmological investigations from the Greeks to modern times was an appreciation of the regularity of Nature. That Nature has, within itself, mathematical patterns that could be expressed as laws of Nature (the law of gravity, the law of conversation of energy, the Ideal Gas law, etc.). The idea that physical entities obey laws is a strictly Western invention for Eastern cultures would find it absurd for inanimate objects “understanding” laws.

Middle Ages

The period between the fall of the Roman Empire and the start of Renaissance in the 14th century is known as the Dark or Middle Ages. While the Middle Ages were considered a time of scientific stagnation due to the recurring political and social upheavals of the time, their was a continued steady progress in intellectual thought in Europe and surrounding kingdoms in the Mideast and India. While the Catholic Church dominates most knowledge enterprises during this era, their influence was not as suppressive as popularly portrayed and various Church institutions were mostly responsible for the preservation of cosmological ideas from the Greeks.

The distinction between what makes up matter (the primary elements) and its form became a medieval Christian preoccupation, with the sinfulness of the material world opposed to the holiness of the heavenly realm (which is interesting since modern cosmology is heavily consumed with the issue of dark matter). The medieval Christian cosmology placed the heavens in a realm of perfection, derived from Plato’s Theory of FormsWhile adopting most of Aristotle’s worldview into Christian thought, his finite Universe was at odds with the Church’s idea of God of infinite power. If God is without limit then he can not be bounded in one place. Thus, the Church proposed an unlimited Universe rather than an infinite Universe, a subtle difference. A heliocentric Universe was impossible for the Church to adopt. In the end, medieval cosmology centers on the balance of angelic sphere and the earthy realm. One such cosmology is found in Dante’s `The Divine Comedy’.Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’ is an epic poem dealing with an allegorical vision of the afterlife and Catholic world-view. Based on the Aristotelian model, the Earth in the ‘Divine Comedy’ is at the center of the Universe, surrounded by whirling spheres made of transparent solid matter. Added to the Aristotelian eight spheres is a ninth sphere, the primum mobile or “first moved”, the source of the movement of all the inner planetary spheres. Beyond the primum mobile lies the spiritual Universe, the mind of God or Empyrean heaven, thus this sphere marks the boundary between the natural and supernatural worlds.

Dante’s cosmology is divided into three sections, based on theological doctrine, Inferno (Hell), Purgatory and Paradise. The physical layout is such that Lucifer defines the very center of the Universe and God is found in the outer region. Inside the Earth is found Hell, divided into nine circles for increasing levels of sin. Between the surface of the Earth and sphere of the Moon lies Purgatory (a mountain divided into seven terraces, displaced from the Earth when Lucifer fall created Hell).

Above Purgatory lies the spheres of Heaven, each describing a deficiency in one of the cardinal virtues. The Moon, containing the inconstant, whose vows to God waned as the moon and thus lack fortitude; Mercury, containing the ambitious, who were virtuous for glory and thus lacked justice; and Venus, containing the lovers, whose love was directed towards another than God and thus lacked Temperance. The final four incidentally are positive examples of the cardinal virtues, all led on by the Sun, containing the prudent, whose wisdom lighted the way for the other virtues, to which the others are bound (constituting a category on its own). Mars contains the men of fortitude who died in the cause of Christianity; Jupiter contains the kings of Justice; and Saturn contains the temperant, the monks who abided to the contemplative lifestyle.

Despite the main focus on religious concepts in the ‘Divine Comedy’, a great deal of physical cosmology is outlined that merges religious doctrine of the time into the Ptolemaic system with scientific additions that parallel the discoveries from the time of Aristotle. For example, there are numerous references to a spherical Earth and changing constellations with latitude and varying timezones. The connection between the supernatural and the physical in Dante’s cosmology mimics the Platonic viewpoint of the physical world being a copy of the world of Forms. Here the planetary spheres copy the angelic hierarchies that rotate around God (and the circles of Hell are a parody that rotates around Satan). Even the geocentric Universe is simply an imperfect copy of the spiritual form of Paradise, a theocentric Universe where the angels that power the motion of the planets are actually revolving around God, who illuminates all things from the center. With perfect symmetry in both physical and theological space, Dante’s cosmology represents the peak in medieval cosmology blending the Ptolemaic system with Christian doctrine.