Velikoysky At Fifty

Skeptic, Spring, 2001 by David Morrison

CULTURES IN COLLISION ON THE FRINGES OF SCIENCE

IN 1950, DR. IMMANUEL VELIKOVSKY published Worlds in Collision (WIC), [1] a remarkable book that boldly challenged the fundamental tenets of a wide number of academic fields. Velikovsky, a psychoanalyst living in New York, sought to replace the current paradigms of physics, astronomy, geology, and geophysics. He also challenged prevailing notions of ancient history, anthropology, and archeology. Generally, persons with such ideas are dismissed as cranks and their work is ignored, but Velikovsky's book was published by the prestigious Macmillan house and accompanied by laudatory endorsements. He was described as "an international scholar" comparable to Newton, Darwin and Einstein, and his book was "a magnificent piece of historical scholarly research." [2] While scientists denounced it, WIC rose to the bestseller lists. Thus began the "Velikovsky affair," one of the most prominent 20th century examples of the collision between the cultures of science and letters. Even after it became abundantly clear that Veli kovsky was wrong, many persons condemned the scientific community for its hostile reaction toward him and his work.

The Velikovsky affair raises many issues that are pertinent today-it illuminates the profound differences in assumptions and methodology that set scientists and their work apart from the rest of society, and it illustrates barriers to communication. Fortunately, since Velikovsky dealt with ancient history, the debates that surrounded him had little practical significance. But next time we may not be so lucky.

The Fundamentals of Worlds in Collision

Velikovsky's primary thesis was that ancient myths and legends described real cataclysms the Earth experienced in the millennia that preceded the rise of classical Greece. He concluded that cross-cultural concordances among these legends demonstrated that these traumatic events were global in scale. He then identified their specific astronomical causes, which involved the ejection of Venus from Jupiter and repeated near-collisions among Venus, Mars and Earth-events that changed the Earth's rotation and orbit and precipitated global floods, volcanic eruptions, meteoric bombardment, and other catastrophes. Finally, in an effort to explain this aberrant planetary behavior, Velikovsky proposed that electromagnetic forces are (or were) of critical importance in determining planetary motions. [3]

All this is presented in a 401-page book, amply stocked with scholarly-looking footnotes and a long index. While it was written for the general public, the style had a curious old-world ring to it. Many of the references, for example in quoting translations from ancient Middle Eastern languages, are from 19th-century sources that had long since been superceded. WIC appears to have sprung fully developed from the brow of its creator. It is not an extension or a summary of previous work, because Velikovsky did not publish any articles in professional journals. He had no collaborators, and he gives little credlt to predecessors such as Ignatius Donnelly, whose 1883 book Ragnarok has many similarities to WIG. Further obscuring his purpose, Velikovsky asks the reader to "consider for himself whether he is reading a book of fiction or non-fiction, whether what he is reading is invention or historical fact."

Many critics described the book as exceedingly well written, and certainly it had enthusiastic readers. Yet to a scientist it seems vague, illogical, and obtuse. Velikovsky is inconsistent, for example, with the terms he uses to describe the chemistry of the atmosphere of Venus and Mars, alternating between "hydrocarbon," "carbohydrate," "petroleum gases," and "of the nature of carbon" (whatever that means). His many references to electromagnetic phenomena, always presented qualitatively (without numbers or equations) are incomprehensible, as in the following: "The cessation of the diurnal rotation could also be caused-and most efficiently-by the earth's passing through a strong magnetic field; eddy currents would be generated in the surface of the earth, which...would slow down the earth or bring it to a rotational stasis,...if the interaction with the magnetic field caused the earth to renew its spinning..." etc.

One of the most mystifying passages is found in the final pages of WIC, where Velikovsky suddenly introduces the idea that the solar system is like an atom, and hypothesizes that if the forces between sun and planets were primarily electrical, the planets might be able to jump from one orbit to another like the quantum changes in the electrons of an atom. This stunning nonsequitur seems to be a serious suggestion, not just a reversal of the common pedagogical analogy that compares electron orbits to miniature planetary systems.

Henry Bauer, whose book Beyond Velikovsky is the definitive history and analysis of the subject, summarizes WIC thus: "Velikovsky displays a lack of understanding of chemistry, physics, and astronomy...[He] is not only ignorant of the facts...his whole approach is not that of the scientist...he does not weigh his evidence...he does not adduce independent tests of validity...[his] ideas about natural science are not worth taking seriously." Yet "he discusses these subjects in a manner that would convey, to a layman, an apparent familiarity with these fields." It is this difference in response--the easy dismissal by scientists, while non-scientists found him to be plausible and even compelling--that makes Velikovsky relevant today to our understanding of the relationship between scientists and the public.