The Earth's Axis Has Shifted by 26°!

 
Friday's Urban Legend: FALSE

Today's dose of non-critical thinking comes from the August 9th issue of New Scientist [Tilting Earth Cover up].

WORRIED by hurricanes, earthquakes and volcanoes? Wondering what to blame? Would you believe that these have all been linked to the Earth's axis shifting by 26 degrees in two stages, one in late 2004 and one in early 2005?

How is it, you may well ask, that you didn't notice? It's because the US government covered it up, as you will learn at http://axischange.wordpress.com. Apparently the Global Positioning System broke down at these times and it was kept secret.

Even bigger laughs can be had at Divulgence.net.

Apparently Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy dealt with this issue some time ago.

Bad Astronomy points out that if the Earth's axis had shifted that much, we would have been in sunlight at midnight, whereas in fact it was quite definitely dark. What's more, even if we didn't look out of the window, we would surely have spotted the satellite TV blinking off as the satellite dishes ceased to point to where the satellites are.

I'd like to link to Phil's posting on this issue—does anyone have a URL? Here's the link to Bad Astronomy [Tilt!]

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