CIRCUMNAVIGATION

ZETETIC COSMOGONY:
OR
Conclusive Evidence
THAT THE WORLD IS NOT A
ROTATING—REVOLVING—GLOBE,
BUT
A STATIONARY PLANE CIRCLE.
By Thomas Winship
1899

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(Post 6/47)

CIRCUMNAVIGATION

is said to be be one of the best proofs that the earth is a globe.

It is often asserted—generally by those who have not the remotest idea of the subject—that ships have sailed round the world on one course, East or West, and come back to the place where they started from. It will be a surprise to such to be informed that this wonderful feat of navigation has never yet been accomplished; that it is most unlikely that it will ever become a fact; and that it would take several of the proverbial "small fortunes" to successfully carry it out.

Some people think it is quite an easy matter to start from, say Liverpool, and steer west and come back to the starting point. Suppose we attempt such a journey. After crossing the Atlantic we must leave the ship and traverse the American continent. As there are no roads running due west, we should have to take the sun's bearing almost hourly to keep us on the true course; sometimes having to cross private property, travel through cultivated lands, and in some cases to go through other people's houses to preserve a westerly course. Suppose we arrived at the other side and then took a ship across the Pacific, we should again have to travel across a continent—thousands of miles—to get back to the North Sea, and then across it and England we might arrive at Liverpool. If anyone thinks this possible he ought to try it.

If the reader will scan the surface of a school globe, he will at once see that if such a thing should ever be attempted, no reasonable hope of success could be entertained, unless the attempt were made in the extreme south. Suppose a ship to start from Cape Point, latitude 34 south, and steer east. The first land encountered would be Australia. She would then have to go south to clear the land and so could not return to her starting point on an easterly course, but would have to take many courses to return there.

Let the ship start from Cape Horn, in latitude 56 south, and steer west. She would soon encounter islands and would have to alter her course to north or south to clear them, and so could not get back to Cape Horn on a westerly course. The same would apply on an easterly course.

It is evident, therefore, that the earth can only be circumnavigated on one course in the extreme south. There, the dangers of icebergs, of magnitudes never met with in the north, and darkness during a great part of the year, would render such an expedition costly, dangerous, and of long duration.

Say a vessel starts on an easterly or westerly course in latitude 65 south. She could only sail during the very finest of summer weather, and would have to come north during the winter. Returning to her last point, she could again start on the course round the world, and continue so long as the fine weather lasted, repeating the process of going north during the dark and winter months. That this would occupy a long time, and cost a deal of money, is plain enough to anyone willing to be convinced. For these reasons I am of opinion that no ship will ever sail round the world on one course and come back to her starting point. And yet some will tell you that it has been done scores of times, and proves the world is a globe! One of the greatest feats of navigation and seamanship that man could undertake, and which has never yet been attempted, is spoken of as though it were a matter of almost daily occurrence! And who but the astronomers are responsible for such-like fallacies in school books and astronomical works? Who but those famed for "learned ignorance" are answerable for the foolish arrogance and stupid credulity of the masses on this subject? Can there be any truth in a science which is founded on conjecture and supported by so-called facts as proof of its correctness, which facts have never existed outside the brains of their inventors?     

If it were said that a vessel could sail round the world, allowing for deviations for land, ice, and other obstacles in the way of her making one course; so that by making many and various courses she could at length return to her starting point, I would have no quarrel with the propounders of "circumnavigation." But if the general statements on the point were reduced and brought within the compass of fact, in language such as the above, the supposed proof of the world's rotundity would be annihilated. In Evers' "Navigation" it is stated that a vessel may leave a port, sail round the earth, and come back to her starting point on one course. This, I have no hesitation in stating, is absolutely false. If otherwise, I should be glad to be informed of the name of the port.     

The learned are beginning to see through the fallacy of the circumnavigation proof of the world's rotundity, as the following from "Elementary Physiography," by Professor Richard A, Gregory, F.R.A.S., clearly shows: "The earth has been circumnavigated a great many times, and it is a common occurrence for a ship to leave England, and by steering westward all the voyage to arrive in England again without retracing an inch of her way. Similarly, we can journey round the globe, sometimes travelling on land, and sometimes on the sea, but eventually returning to the starting point without at all turning back on our course. This would appear to be a certain proof that the earth's surface is curved, nevertheless it has been pointed out that circumnavigation would be possible if the earth had a flat surface, with the north magnetic pole at its centre. A compass needle would THEN always point to the centre of the surface, and so a ship might sail due east and west, as indicated by the compass, and eventually return to the same point by describing a circle." D. Wilson-Barker, R.N.R., F.R.S.E., remarks, in his work on "Navigation": "The fact that the earth has been sailed round, is not sufficient proof as to its exact shape." After these "authoritative" statements, we may hope that this so-called proof of the globular shape of the earth will soon be expunged from the text books.    

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In the spinning globe model of earth, Antarctica is an ice continent which covers the bottom of the globe from 78° South latitude to 90° and is therefore not more than 12,000 miles in circumference. Many early explorers including Captain Cook and James Clark Ross, however, in attempting Antarctic circumnavigation took 3 to 4 years and clocked 50-60,000 miles around. The British ship Challenger also made an indirect but complete circumnavigation of Antarctica traversing 69,000 miles.