Worlds in Collision paperback book cover. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Worlds in Collision is a book written by Immanuel Velikovsky and first published April 3, 1950. The book postulated that around the 15th century BCE, Venus was ejected from Jupiter as a comet or comet-like object, and passed near Earth (an actual collision is not mentioned). The object changed Earth's orbit and axis, causing innumerable catastrophes that were mentioned in early mythologies and religions around the world. Many of the book's claims are completely rejected by the established scientific community as they are not supported by currently available evidence.
Contents
Publication
The book was first published on April 3, 1950, by Macmillan Publishers.[1] Macmillan's interest in publishing it was encouraged by the knowledge that Velikovsky had obtained a promise from Gordon Atwater, Director of the Hayden Planetarium, for a sky show based on the book when it was published.[2] The book, Velikovsky's most criticized and controversial, was an instant New York Times bestseller, topping the charts for eleven weeks while being in the top ten for twenty-seven straight weeks.[3] Despite this popularity, overwhelming rejection of its thesis by the scientific community forced Macmillan to stop publishing it and to transfer the book to Doubleday within two months (Friedlander 1995:14).
Core ideas
In the book's preface, Velikovsky summarized his arguments:
- Worlds in Collision is a book of wars in the celestial sphere that took place in historical times. In these wars the planet Earth participated too. […] The historical-cosmological story of this book is based in the evidence of historical texts of many people around the globe, on classical literature, on epics of the northern races, on sacred books of the peoples of the Orient and Occident, on traditions and folklore of primitive peoples, on old astronomical inscriptions and charts, on archaeological finds, and also on geological and paleontological material.
The book proposed that around the 15th century BCE, Venus was ejected from Jupiter as a comet or comet-like object, passed near Earth (an actual collision is not mentioned). The object changed Earth's orbit and axial inclination, causing innumerable catastrophes which were mentioned in early mythologies and religions around the world. Fifty-two years later, it passed close by again, stopping the Earth's rotation for a while and causing more catastrophes. Then, in the 8th and 7th centuries BCE, Mars (itself displaced by Venus) made close approaches to the Earth; this incident caused a new round of disturbances and disasters. After that, the current "celestial order" was established. The courses of the planets stabilized over the centuries and Venus gradually became a "normal" planet.
These events lead to several key statements:
- Venus must be still very hot as young planets radiate heat.[4]
- Venus must be rich in petroleum gases, and hydrocarbons.[5]
- Venus has an abnormal orbit in consequence of the unusual disasters that happened.
Velikovsky suggested some additional ideas that he said derived from these claims, including:
- Jupiter emits radio noises.[6]
- The magnetosphere of the Earth reaches at least up to the moon.
- The sun has an electric potential of approximately 1019 volts.
- The rotation of the Earth can be affected by electromagnetic fields.
Velikovsky arrived at these proposals using a methodology which would today be called comparative mythology – he looked for concordances in myths and written history of unconnected cultures across the world, following a literal reading of their accounts of the exploits of planetary deities. In this book, he argues on the basis of ancient cosmological myths from places as disparate as India and China, Greece and Rome, Assyria and Sumer. For example, ancient Greek mythology asserts that the goddess Athena sprang from the head of Zeus. Velikovsky identifies Zeus (whose Roman counterpart was the god Jupiter) with the planet Jupiter. Velikovsky identifies Athena (the Roman Minerva) with the planet Venus. This myth, along with others from ancient Egypt, Israel, Mexico, etc. are used to support the claim that "Venus was expelled as a comet and then changed to a planet after contact with a number of members of our solar system" (Velikovsky 1972:182). –
