Neville J Well we seem to have some common ground now. Are you reading this Allen? Polaris, when considering the rotation about the ecliptic axis, is just another star. The path to Polaris will define a cone of 47 degrees centred on the ecliptic axis. Now to the celestial coordinate system -- yes it works well but of course it is only an artifact. It is just an agreed set of markers which make it possible for one man to be understood by another man when he describes where to look to see a comet etc. It may well be the best system possible for man discussing day to day events but even in this time frame, there are many other ways this could have been achieved. As a child, I pondered latitude and longitude, and wondered why longitude was not similar to latitude in consisting of a succession of rings on parallel planes. It would have worked, but later I realised that there were advantages to having longitude composed of circles which intersected on a common line -- the axis of rotation. Bottom line here is that systems devised by man for man revolve around the time frame or some other consideration in which they will have the greatest utility. If the time frame of greatest utility were to have an annual frequency rather than daily, then a system based on the ecliptic pole could well be more efficient. Horses for courses! And of course there is no reason why both should not exist simultaneously, the system used for a given task being the one in which calculations are more easily carried out. Inter planetary navigation I feel sure would be much more likely to use a system based on the ecliptic as this allows the location of the home world to be defined with only two parameters rather than the three and the location of other planets vary only slightly from the earth referenced ecliptic plan. I noticed in a post from Philip M -- isn't he a terrier in the research arena? -- a reference to an ecliptic which was based on the momentum of all the planets in the solar system. I can see where this would have utility. And of course that would be entirely an artifact, but still potentially just as useful as any other reference system, and complete with its very own set of ecliptic poles! Paul D ----- Original Message ---- From: Neville Jones <njones@xxxxxxxxx> To: geocentrism@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Wednesday, 31 October, 2007 5:46:49 PM Subject: [geocentrism] Re: Is geocentrism supported by facts? (Supplementary) Paul, I know that your response was to Allen, but I just want to pick up on something (in red) below: -----Original Message----- From: paul_deema@xxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Wed, 31 Oct 2007 14:36:56 +0000 (GMT) No it doesn't. Relative rotation on the axis between the camera and the object in question with the object in question at centre frame is what causes star trails. The axis must be the axis of rotation -- either Earth geographical polar axis or Earth orbit axis (Ecliptic) being the two axes under discussion at this juncture. The diameter of each circle (one per star) is determined by the radial displacement of the star making the circle from the axis of rotation. Agreed. And as JA has stated so well, Polaris would need to describe a sizeable circle about the second axis, since it is about 23.5 degrees off the second axis. I also agreed with you that the star field does not rotate about Rigel, Betelgeuse, Sirius or Capella. Now there is only one point that you are sticking on: the NEP has a right ascension and a declination, just like Rigel, Betelgeuse, Sirius or Capella. So if the stars do not rotate en masse about Sirius, which is off the celestial polar axis, then they cannot rotate about the NEP, which is also off the celestial polar axis, for, if they did, the whole coordinate system of right ascension and declination would not work. But it does work. It works beautifully. Neville. National Bingo Night. Play along for the chance to win $10,000 every week. Download your gamecard now at Yahoo!7 TV. http://au.blogs.yahoo.com/national-bingo-night/