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THE CENSORSHIP OF VELIKOVSKY'S

INTERDISCIPLINARY SYNTHESIS

by Lynn Rose

What may we expect of an empirical theory before we judge it successful?  
The criteria are three: I) the overall logical simplicity or economy of
the theory in comparison with other theories; 2) the extent to which
statements deducible from the theory turn out to be true, and 3) the
absence of any statements, deducible from the theory, which turn out
definitely to be false.

Velikovsky,s theory (1950) of global catastrophes, the more recent of
which occurred within historical times, is by now a near-classic case of a
successful empirical hypothesis, viz.: it was accompanied by an extensive
collection of evidence that seemed to lend it considerable plausibility;
it provided a simple, yet comprehensive set of premises around which to
organize and to understand a vast range of previously disconnected
phenomena; the theory was eminently open to testing, since it entailed a
number of important consequences not yet verified, and many of these were
incompat- ible with rival theories; and finally, succeeding years
witnessed the verification of a great many of those consequences and the
disconfirmation of none.  By all the usual canons of sound methodology the
theory should now be accepted as a successful one, that is, one that may
be regarded as very probably true.

Nearly all bold theories that were on the right track have encountered
initial opposition irrelevant to the canons of acceptance listed above.  
Scientists often reveal elaborate and sometimes inflexible views about the
traits a theory must have merely in order to be proposed for examination;
usually these traits have nothing to do with the traits that theories are
expected to have in order to be judged successful.  The theory proposed by
Velikovsky in 1950 led to the expression of a number of such views about
prior requirements.  On May 20, 1950, in a letter of protest and threat
written to the Macmillan Company, Dean B. McLaughlin, Professor of
Astronomy at the University of Michi- gan, wrote:

"The claim of universal efficacy or universal knowledge is the
unmistakable mark of the quack. No man can today be an expert even in
the
whole of geology or the whole of astronomy.  There is specialization
within specialties.  I do not mean that we are ignorant of all fields
but
our own; I do mean that we are not equipped to do highly technical
original research in more than several distinct specialties for each
scientist.  But no man today can hope to correct the mistakes in any
more
than a small subfield of science.  And yet Velikovsky claims to be
able
to dispute the basic principles of several sciences!  These are
indeed
delusions of grandeur!..."

This same injunction against the crossing of disciplinary boundaries seems
to underlie also the criticism directed at Larrabee and Oursler four
paragraphs later:

"No, I have not read the book. I have read the ballyhoo that preceded
it,
written by such "authorities" as Eric Larrabee and Fulton Oursler,
whose
ignorance is exceeded only by their colossal conceit..."

One notes in passing that this self-confessed ignorance of the contents of
Worlds in Collision does not prevent McLaughlin from protesting the
Macmillan Company's...

"promulgation of such lies, -yes, lies, as are contained in wholesale
lots in Worlds in Collision. "

But McLaughlin,s principal objection seems to be directed both at the
interdisciplinary character of Velikovsky's investigations and at the
boldness of his conclusions.  It is interesting that what McLaughlin sees
as grounds for objection are in other quarters seen as grounds for
admiration.  Thus Professor Horace M. Kallen then Dean of the Graduate
Faculty of the New School for Social Research, wrote to Velikovsky on May
21 , 1946:

"The vigor of the scientific imagination that you show, the boldness
of
your construction and the range of your inquiry and information fill
me
with admiration..."

Range and boldness, then, are the points at issue, and it is true that
Velikovsky,s investigations have led him into many different fields of
learning.  It is also true that the conclusions to which his theory leads
are in conflict with some of the more popular theories in those fields.  
But his theory is not in conflict with any clear-cut facts unearthed by
other disciplines, and claims to the contrary have never been
substantiated. Whether it is true that "no man can today be an expert..."
in several fields at once depends upon what is meant by "expert".  If it
means "able to hold his own in debate with specialists from many fields
for more than a quarter of a century" then it appears that Velikovsky
himself is an exception to McLaughlin's rule.  And on the chance that
there are occasional exceptions to that rule, we would do well not to
censor in advance any suggestion that happens to cut across disciplinary
boundaries.

Unlike universities, the world around us is not neatly divided into
departments and specialties.  If each specialty restricts itself to its
own selected subject matter, with no serious regard for the relevance of
other specialties and with no real effort toward synthesis, what chance is
there that the mere summation of isolated special theories will be
anything more than a disconnected jumble of progress reports that cries
out for synthesis into a unified, coherent theory that has some real
chance of truly representing the unity and integration of the operations
of nature? Indeed, many students of scientific methodology have concluded
that only an interdisciplinary approach, seeking one coherent theory to
describe our one universe, has much prospect of turning out to be true.

An important consequence of the present disciplinary isolation has been
the continuing preference for theories that are uniformitarian.  
Uniformitarianism is the thesis that only the processes that we see
operating today could have operated in earlier periods of history; this
rules out any of the sudden, global catastrophes of the sort described by
Velikovsky.  What seems to have happened is that each discipline has
borrowed unchallenged the uniformitarian conclusions of each of the other
disciplines, and has assumed that those other disciplines have encountered
no serious indications of catastrophism.  Each discipline is left with the
impression that only in that discipline are there any data that might
suggest a catastrophic model rather than a uniformitarian model. These
unwanted data are then either ignored, or else forced into a
uniformitarian framework they do not really fit. The strain is tolerated
so as not to conflict with the uniformitarianism of the other disciplines.

Thus each isolated discipline tends to borrow only the uniformitarian
conclusions of the other disciplines, and to remain unaware of the
catastrophic data that are hidden away as skeletons in the closets of all
the disciplines.  Velikovsky has removed those skeletons from the various
closets and has been rattlirig them loudly for all to hear.  His
suggestion is that when one looks at all of the evidence, without
restricting oneself to the limited number of "facts" usually considered by
one group of specialists, it be- comes possible to make a strong case for
catastrophism. This interdisciplinary foundation of his arguments is one
of the principal reasons for both their novelty and cogency.

Giordano Bruno long ago pointed out that what the "facts" are will be
determined in large part by the observer,s intenzioni, the whole "set"
that he brings to his work.  Sometimes these disciplinary "sets" are so
influential in our methodology that we decide in advance what
ramifications will ensue even from "facts" whose nature is not yet known!  
And so NASA was able to announce prior to any moon landing that the
findings of such expeditions would shed further light on the creation of
the solar system some billions of years ago when as everyone (except
Velikovsky) knows the moon's features were being formed.  Here it would
seem that each investigator works on his own specialized assignment and
has no responsibility for the overall theory since it has not been
included as part of his assignment; and yet the overall theory that
general uniformitarian picture, serves as an unquestioned backdrop for his
activity and is so influential that it even predetermines the character of
a new unexplored world.

We have seen that the viewpoint expressed by McLaughlin rejects in advance
any interdisciplinary reforms that would transgress the boundaries of the
separate specialties; and that it rejects Velikovsky's theory in
particular both because of the degree of boldness in Velikovsky's
constructions' and because of the number of areas in which that boldness
is expressed. Anyone who is led to challenge the basic conclusions of
several different disciplines is said to be suffering from delusions of
grandeur; any kind of universality in such enterprises is seen as "the
unmistakable mark of the quack".  But is it not possible that there are
some people whose range and capacities exceed the disciplinary boundaries?  
Is it not possible that some of the basic conclusions of a number of
disciplines do need to be challenged?  Has there ever been a time in
history when all of the basic conclusions of all of the various
disciplines were beyond any need of reexamination?  Discoveries in the
years since 1950 have forced extensive revision of astronomy texts in
order to correct the misin- formation they contained about the
temperatures of the planets, the role of electricity and magnetism in
astronomical phenomena, the wanderings of the Earth's axis, etc.  On the
other hand, no major claim made by Velikovsky in Worlds in Collision in
1950 has had to be retracted, though a great many of the claims that he
did make and that were at the time considered by others to be false are
known to be true.

Velikovsky's own theory illustrated the danger of rejecting a theory in
advance because it is interdisciplinary and daring. This policy' if
successfully applied' would have led us to discard just about the only
theory of the solar system and of ancient history that has not had to be
drastically revlsed during the iast two decades.

Despite the success of Velikovsky's theory, one continues to hear
objections of the same sort that were advanced when the theory was first
proposed.  Perhaps the most frequently expressed objection is that
Velikovsky,s theory violates the laws of "celestial mechanics" that it
overthrows Newton,s theory of gravitation, that it is dynamically
impossible.  Usually this attitude is traceable to a merely hearsay grasp
of what Velikovsky has written. One of the earliest statements of this
objection was made in a letter to Horace Kallen, on May 27, 1946, by
Harlow Shapley, then Director of the Harvard College Observatory:

"Dr. Velikovsky,s claim that there have been changes in the structure of
the solar system during historical times has implications which apparently
he has not thought through; or perhaps was unable to convey to me in our
brief conversation.  If in historical times there have been these changes
in the structure of the solar system, in spite of the fact that our
celestial mechanics has been for scores of years able to specify without
question the positions and motions of the members of the planetary system
for many millennia fore and aft, then the laws of Newton are false. The
laws of mechanics which have worked to keep airplanes afloat, to operate
the tides, to handle the myriads of problems of every day life, are
fallacious.  But they have been tested competently and thoroughly.  In
other words, if Dr.  Velikovsky is right, the rest of us are crazy "

(All that Shapley knew of Velikovsky,s work at the time of this letter was
the latter's claim that the present order of the solar system was
stabilized only in historical times- not billions of years ago.  Later
(1950) it transpired that Velikovsky claimed the participation, not only
of gravitation and inertia, but also of electromagnetic fields and forces
in celestial mechanics, even if only as minor factors; in catastrophic
conditions and at close distances these ignored forces could become
dominant.)

The general motions of the bodies in the solar system at present conform
very closely to Newton,s gravitational formulas.  But there are numerous
phenomena that are not explained, such as the origin and movements of
solar spots, the paths followed by solar prominences, certain librations
of the moon, the variations in the planets, periods of rotations, some of
the orbital perturbations of the exterior planets, the capture of
particles by the Van Allen belts, etc.  And it has certainly not been
established that even the large scale motions of the planets have always
been primarily in accord with celestial mechanics built on gravitation and
inertia alone.

The history of the solar system is but one branch of natural history, and
if historical data conflict with astronomical theories, it is strange that
history should have to be rewritten to conform to these theories!  
Indeed, it is the historical material itself, together with corroborating
evidence from other fields, that led Velikovsky to conclude that space is
not empty, but is swept by particles and permeated with electromagnetic
fields, and that when planets are in close approach they are greatly
affected by electromagnetic interrelations, so that their subsequent paths
are not determined solely by gravitational fields.  As a matter of fact,
in Worlds in Collision, Velikovsky has not only not denied that gravity
plays a role in determining the motions of astronomical objects, but also
showed in the epilogue how the historical events could have happened in
the frame of the celestial mechanics in which gravitation and inertia are
the only forces in action. Yet he admitted that in "searching for the
causes of the great upheavals of the past and in considering their effects
[he] became skeptical of the...celestial mechanics based on the theory of
gravitation" in which "electricity and magnetism play no role"  In his
admiration of Newton, Velikovsky likes to stress that on the last page of
Principia Newton prophetically wrote of electricity-very little explored
in his time- as a force that will need to be reckoned with in future
studies.  Shapley assumes that to deny gravity the sole role in astronomy
is to deny gravity any role in astronomy.  But in all sorts of familiar
situations on earth we see gravitational attraction outweighed by other
factors.  The laws of gravitation are not then wrong; they are simply seen
for what they are: descriptions of one of the factors that determine the
actual motions of objects. The Newtonian laws need not on this account be
revised;  what does need to be revised is the unjustified belief that
gravitational laws are the sole factor determining astronomical events.  
Shapley begs the question by assuming that the planetary motions have been
successfully calculated "for many mil- lennia fore and aft..."  The only
way to check these calculations is to wait several millennia and see, or
to check them against the testimony of history, a procedure that Shapley
has ruled out of court in advance.

Shapley continued to insist that if Velikovsky is right, then everything
we have learned about the operation of gravity is wrong.  When Worlds in
Collision was finally about to be published, Shapley wrote a threatening
letter to Macmillan (on January 25, 1950) and reiterated "that if the
earth could be stopped in such a short space of time it would overthrow
all that Isaac Newton had done".  The history of science will inevitably
record, even if Velikovsky should somehow turn out to be mistaken, that
Shapley and his colleagues made a snap decision about Velikovsky. That
decision will be seen as based far less on evidence and argument than on
various untenable prejudices.