[who_would_fardels_bear]

Immanuel Velikovsky.

All of the planets hung out together.

Egyptians used to be able to go up to Saturn because it was so close that the gravity of Earth and Saturn cancelled each other out and you could fly there.

The crescent moon looms large in Arabic cultures because it is actually Saturn, not our measly moon with its tiny crescent.

The dinosaurs can only be explained by lower gravity due to the proximity of other large planets tending to lower our overall gravity. Else they would have been crushed under their own weight

Venus or some other planet got into some collision that caused all of the planets to scatter into their current orbits.

etc.

[ml/nj]

I don't know where you got all that stuff, but you didn't get it from anything Velikovsky wrote.

ML/NJ

[UCANSEE2]

“Venus or some other planet got into some collision that caused all of the planets to scatter into their current orbits.”

Mars has a big gash across it’s face.

[Partisan Gunslinger]

All of the planets hung out together.

Some of the records of ancient cultures have them saying (paraphrasing, of course): "The sky used to touch the earth".

[Gondring]

Dr. Velikovsky's fans tried to make much of his friendship with Albert Einstein, but here's what Dr. Einstein wrote to him about his work:

I have read the whole book about the planet Venus. There is much of interest in the book which proves that in fact catastrophes have taken place which must be attributed to extraterrestrial causes. However it is evident to every sensible physicist that these catast- rophes can have nothing to do with the planet Venus and that also the direction of the inclination of the terrestrial axis towards the ecliptic could not have under- gone a considerable change without the total destruction of the earth's entire crust. [...]

If an African Bushman wrote 3,000 years ago that the moon was made of green cheese, Velikovsky's approach would be that the moon is made of green cheese, regardless of the rocks brought back by the Apollo astronauts--as long as the green cheese story fit his hypothesis. He cherry-picked his data a lot, and rejected things that didn't fit his preconceived story.

"He is an interesting writer. It's fun to read his books. I have read every book he has published and hope to read any he writes in the future. Although he doesn't lure me into accepting his views, I can well see where those less knowledgeable in the fields Velikovsky deals with would succumb." --Isaac Asimov, on Velikovsky

I believe Dr. Asimov was too kind. Dr. Velikovsky's antics set back public science knowledge a GREAT deal, IMHO, and because he refused to study the basics of science that made his ideas impossible, scientists became reticent, unable to rely on people becoming informed rather than misapplying what they said.

I bet Dennis Kucinich is a big fan.