A French Flat earther friend of ours, who has earned a doctorate from a University in Paris, has responded to Dr. Sungenis' book called "Flat Earth, Flat Wrong".
We are witholding their full identity for the moment to protect them in case of a backlash.
Here is the text of their response:
Dear Dr. SUNGENIS,
I am a French post-graduate who bought your e-book, understanding very well your position about geocentrism and contradicting flat earth cosmogony. I thank you for it although I would like to make an objection to just one argument, if you please.
I myself used to be a fond geocentrist, studying among others Fernand CROMBETTE. As a matter of fact, after having lost my faith, been in a yeshiva in Jerusalem, and living in the French Diplomatic Corps in the Caribbean, I was converted by reading NATO original texts, the relevancy being an incredible hatred against Judeo-Christians, and surprisingly, against Catholicism, which didn't seem to me to represent a danger. To me, it appeared such a dishonest fight that it could only be against the Truth. Thus, I surrendered on the 25th of March, which was the Feast of the Annunciation.
At first surprised by the deep dissensions within the Church, originating from modernists against traditionalists, I studied the errors of the last Council, which seemed to me to stem from the same enemy inside the fortress, like in the Trojan war, aka the Adversary. However, I was more concerned about analyzing the key, deep root of actual Atheism, especially through Science. I thought to have found it in Evolutionism, that forces one to accept the idea of a cruel or at least powerless Creator, although I suspected the front to have also infiltrated Philosophy, especially with Phenomenology - denying the human rational abilities - thus destroying at its base any possible logic or reasoning.
My struggle was to point out the irrelevance and inconsistency of these lies who, without rigor and objectivity, led millions of people astray from Truth, Dignity, Hope and Salvation for eternity. As I was working on Teilhard de Chardin to find the decisive factual and logical arguments as a means to open good-willed eyes, I once heard from a respectable friend about flat earth (FE). I was shocked. It was so ridiculous with my Columbus image of ships falling into the nothingness. I couldn't understand how normal people, having a good sense of rationality, could fall into such a trap! How could it happen nowadays? I felt really sorry for him especially with that esteem I had. But I didn't dare say anything assuming he may just not have enough scientific background, being rather a historian.
I shall say Geocentrism didn't seem to me essential in my journey because anybody could answer: "It just depends on your reference point, everything is relative, everybody is right from his point of view and it is not worth fighting for details which won't change much the implications about faith." However, I remembered how strongly the Zionists and atheists I met had forced me to admit the church had been VERY wrong with the "Galileo affair," so I had to suspect it could be a key point for enemies of Christianity, but I still didn't understand why it would be so essential. After a while, I discovered not only my friend had fallen on his head in the FE lunacy but apparently millions (more than 12 million!) of obscurant extreme conspiracy theorists, mostly Americans! Why? It seemed really odd. Even Obama as President talked at least twice on the subject in order to try to ridicule it. Pope Francis must also have found the subject serious enough to accept it as a working topic for the Vatican Scientific Commission. He himself went to Antarctica although I doubt the penguins needed his visit. His "colleague" the orthodox Russian Patriarch went the day after. At that time, I didn't see the connection with FE. Francis made an interview with ISS astronauts, pointing out the philosophical implications of the status of earth for man as a sand grain within the universe. The authority of the astronaut’s position allowed him to conclude how earth is insignificant, without any universal direction up and down as a clue for the relativity of any "truth" which should always be considered as an epiphenomenal point of view. He once also declared he would baptize aliens if they would ask him for it! Leonardo di Caprio had offered him a book about FE but still, I found all this very strange.
I thus decided to check this unexpected topic by myself in order to understand at least how so many people could be fooled and to be able to see what exact point they need to understand to come back to reason. I also thought it was time to convince my friend and I needed evidence. So began my personal adventure on FE. I can say it was as strong an experience as my 2001 conversion. What I discovered was very different from what I had imagined. Their model was much more consistent than I could have thought by myself. I realized I had been stuck on the idea of a magical alternative to the globe, a model as superstitious and irrelevant as the Egyptian goddess Nut I had seen in tombs. I realized that I was intellectually kept away from questioning ball-earth physics. But this FE model could indeed scientifically work. Of course I found some unscientific ideas, some inconsistent globe-critics like: *rivers needing to flow upwards, whereas flat-earthers just didn't understand correctly the sea level corresponding to the radius from earth’s center to the surface or *the case of people who should fall in Australia which is not a problem at all in the globe model with gravity, or *the perspective explanation.
I realized I needed to study more, especially all these arguments which needed to have an explanation. I also checked many flat-earth detractors, so-called scientists, but their arguments were either not pertinent, nonspecific, inconsistent, based on controversial testimonies like the mainstream NASA data, or just injurious and arrogant (which is a recognition of lack of serious proof!). I was shocked to realise there had in all human history never been any strong and undeniable demonstration of the shape of earth, except from bias, reasoning from false premises, Computer Generated Images or controversial testimonies. And no earth movement (at a rate of 1260 km/h or 1000 mph with rotational acceleration) even in the geocentric model should be detected nor visualized in the fluids of the atmosphere and water masses.
I was terribly shaken. All my scientific convictions could be sitting on shifting sand? So I decided to take my time, several months indeed, and I wouldn't accept validating anything until I had found a strong, logical or rigorously verifiable experimental proof for it. At first I must agree I was ashamed, humiliated and angry. Understanding most of the liars had been as deceived as myself, and that the perpetrators were, in their treason, already self-punished, I began to feel a great liberation. It was a freedom I couldn't have thought of before, a deep happiness and an overwhelming gratefulness about God's mind-blowing mightiness, proximity and goodness which I had never imagined or felt before. As a matter of fact, I had, until then accepted the Bible "FE verses" as poetry, symbolic, metaphors. But when I looked at them with a new eye, it just made sense and seemed clear as if it was written for any kind of people, children as well as eminent scientists or theologians, of any civilization or epoch.
I won’t be controversial about Biblical interpretation, although I know a little Hebrew. My point is rather to discuss a scientifically, rational, factual investigation method. That is why I am writing to you. After reading your objections against flat earth, I concede I was very deceived. First because I have a deep respect for your intelligence and concern about God's matters and apologetics, about your courage and investment (I have myself also a big family), but also because I suppose your book has actually been written too rapidly. I must confess I even thought at first you were intellectually dishonest. But when I heard your conversation with Rob SKIBA, I was so glad to realize you could be as sincere as Saul before he became Saint Paul. Therefore, I would like to expose to you just one simple argument. If you can prove to me I am mistaken, I would be so glad to recognize it, as it would be easier for me to recover my first paradigm, just to fit in wisely into the societal scene. But prior to that, I would like to share some reflections and personal understandings about the FE model, because I know for myself as a scientist, it can be an obstacle if you cannot grasp exactly how a model could physically work.
First, the sunsets.
I personally found them in FE only relevant when I could: *reproduce the experience of a ball on a glass slipping along a long table with a magnifying glass 'which represents the refraction of a humid atmosphere’) on the frontal plane; *see a sunset in a dry desert with a sun becoming very small along the horizon.
Secondly, gravity. I think it's the biggest Kabbalah hoax. It is not a coherent concept. It is completely superstitious and cannot be asserted as a physical theory because: *It gives no explanation about its origin and has never been observed between 2 non-magnetic objects, even in a vacuum chamber in a zero-G plane when falling. *It does not account for volumes nor density: W = Mg . A water level consisting of a tube with disproportional extremities should show a lower level where the volume, hence the mass, of water are the biggest, which is not the case. *Its formula is conducting to an unstable system in disequilibrium for satellites orbiting for the slightest deviation from an ideal perfectly circular trajectory leads the object to deviate on a square rate: F= g M M' / d2 *It is also inconsistent that the repartition of the 2 masses (M and M') could affect the force intensity. *In the case of the solar system, every elliptical or epicyclical trajectory becomes irrelevant and mathematically impossible. As soon as there are 3 or more moving objects, no equilibrium is ever conceivable. *It cannot possibly impact PV=nRT on the higher atmosphere along vacuum as it cannot even do it on the earth surface where the gravity is supposed to be much stronger. *It doesn't give any rational explanation for phenomena like a rotating gyroscope staying in equilibrium outside the edge of a table and falling when at rest.
Thirdly, functioning mode. The origin of the sun, moon and stars motions on FE. It could be electromagnetism using an ether vortex (which would rather explain MICHELSON-MORLEY and SAGNAC experiments or density, buoyancy and weight) induced by the movement of a crystalline, maybe poly-layered dome, itself moved by perpetual cycle of waters. Fourthly, credibility. Einstein's theories are non-scientifically rigorous: train movement doesn't have the same impact as lane “movements," inconsistent: light velocity considered as constant whereas he himself speaks of deviation around masses meaning necessarily acceleration, irrelevant: photons cannot gain energy to travel suddenly faster in the air after passing through water, particle theory being just there to deny ether in vacuum and explain MICHELSON's failure to defend Copernicanism, foolish: the so-called fourth dimension is oriented without return possibility and has nothing to do with the 3 first ones which are necessarily connected to each other, unreal: like the unreal numbers needed to calculate it. Official data cannot be taken as any undeniable proof since there has been found at least some false photography, films or documents.
That is why I wish to submit you a first-hand verification everyone admits and can observe and verify by himself without needing necessarily to be a Ph.D., but as one, you may perhaps detect an eventual error in the reasoning, namely concerning the sunrise and sunset directions along the seasons. This peculiar topic affects heliocentrism as well as geocentrism, as both accept a spherical geometry. On the other hand, nobody could allegedly say one morphological option is equivalent to the other or would be a question of relative perception nor that it could not be once and for all rigorously selected and strictly calculated unless we accept such nonsense as virtual reality, hologram-like environment or whatever unreal approach. Indeed, on this particular subject, nobody will deny, under our northern latitudes in Europe or in the USA, how the sun is rising: approximately South-East in Winter, East in Spring and Autumn, North-East in Summer in order to rise a larger course. Whereas it sets: South-West in Winter, West in Spring and Autumn, and North-West in Summer. It can also easily be checked on www.timeanddate.com or other similar sites. So where is the problem? Well, if you dare to follow strange ideas like checking yourself if experience agrees with either the Copernican or the Geocentric model, I bet you get headaches very quickly. Why? It should not be a huge geometrical problem, at least with a little earth globe in hand, slightly inclined in order to simulate the 23.4,° i.e. 66.6,° with a vertical axis with a table representing the ecliptic. You have to check for each position of the sun regarding each equinox and solstice, what is its direction from a particular point on the globe at sunrise, midday and sunset. But it is worth the time spent because the results do not match with reality: *during Spring and Autumn, you will find an asymmetry between rise and set and *in the Summer, the sun’s direction is towards the South, as if the sun’s course was short and not the longest of the year in the sky at that time of year. How can one explain that? Your answer would make me indebted to you.
Whereas these experiments work on a FE model (with the sun circling lower above a small Tropic of Cancer and higher in the sky above the larger Tropic of Capricorn with the equator being in-between but not equidistant from both).
This is just one subject, but there are many other implications of the earth shape we can logically verify and practically test and I would be very glad to discuss this subject further with you if you like. Whereas only one cosmogony can be true, what I certainly do agree with you is this:
John 8:32 And ye shall know the truth: and the truth shall make you free.
Timothy 6:20 O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding the profane novelties of words and oppositions of knowledge falsely so called.
and Gamaliel's advice to the other doctors of the Law:
Acts 5:38-39: And now, therefore, I say to you: Refrain from these men and let them alone. For if this council or this work be of men, it will come to nought: 39 But if it be of God, you cannot overthrow it, lest perhaps you be found even to fight against God. And they consented to him.
I am at your disposal for any request of further details or information I could share, and I send you my respectful and best regards.
God bless you
Dr. R.B.