M&D - Chapter 10, (a few annotations)

[Mark Kohut]

"With the advent of the Scientific Revolution, use of the term
"planet" changed from something that moved across the sky (in relation
to the star field); to a body that orbited Earth (or that were
believed to do so at the time); and by the 18th century to something
that directly orbited the Sun when the heliocentric model of
Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler gained sway.

Thus, Earth became included in the list of planets,[33] whereas the
Sun and Moon were excluded. At first, when the first satellites of
Jupiter and Saturn were discovered in the 17th century, the terms
"planet" and "satellite" were used interchangeably - although the
latter would gradually become more prevalent in the following
century.[34] Until the mid-19th century, the number of "planets" rose
rapidly because any newly discovered object directly orbiting the Sun
was listed as a planet by the scientific community."

                 --wikipedia stuff.

What new planet did the German Engineer add "free of charge" to the
Philadelphia Orrery? I suggest, see previous post, it was the
Earth......Pynchon bringing the scientific revolution down to earth,
so to speak, a witty jab at the loss of 'the heavenly city of the
philosophers"....

On Mon, Feb 16, 2015 at 7:17 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
> The German Engineer, the one who travers'd the sea came to set up a
> new Planet in Philadelphis...
>
> Also an allusion to the brave new land that will be HQered in Phildalphia?
>
> See what is said after "By the time he got to Philadelphia.....
> a World with a history even longer than our own, etc.....'lands that had
> to be fought over, other Species to be conquered".....
>
> 'Revealed to him one orrery at a time"...the harmonious cosmic ideas get
> modified by.......reality".........
>
> Sounds a little like coming to America, yes?
>
> On Sun, Feb 15, 2015 at 11:11 AM, Becky Lindroos <bekker2 at icloud.com> wrote:
>> Continuing in the chapter -  (chapters are approximate because I'm reading on a Kindle app)
>>
>> Following the sermon the text gives us Cherrycoke reporting on the activities of the family as they retell and play out the story of the 1761 Transit of Venus.
>>
>> p. 94:
>> "Orrery"
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orrery
>>
>> Jules Verne's:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlgyXY3vPd4
>>
>> At Christies's for only $37,098 an 18th century orrery/tellurian:
>> http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/lot/a-boxed-american-orrery-and-tellurian-set-5480154-details.aspx
>>
>> "Tenebrae" - in Latin means shadow or darkness) - reminds Ethelmer of his darkness in the innocent light of her youth.  (Not sure what the illuminated nostril suggests.)
>>
>> ** Are these two kissing cousins?  Or was there some kind of abuse involved at some past point?
>>
>> ********
>>  p. 95 -
>> "...having travers'd the Sea"
>> Traverse is the family name in ATD and Vineland. Metaphor, fer sure. For more, see ch. 3, p. 14
>>
>>  "Nessel" - is fictional but the discovery of a new planet is real - Uranus - 1781.
>> "Georgian"  -   Herschel first reported the discovery of Uranus ("Georgian")  on April 26, 1781, initially believing it a comet.[12]
>>
>> **  and from Otto's page at http://www.ottosell.de/pynchon/md/md10.htm
>> "This reminds me of another "new planet" in another novel by Pynchon, "(...) The new planet Pluto (...)." (GR 415)
>>
>> Nessel (fictional?) provided Uranus for the Orreries to make sure they were updated.  And for extra realism he pasted map pieces on it - Mappemondes - (a two -hemisphere map),  but that won't really work because flat maps don't conform to their three-dimensional realities.
>> http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/mappemonde#mediaviewer/File:Delisle_-_Mappe-Monde.png
>>
>>
>> Solar Parallax:
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallax
>>
>> Any parallax is a triangle - which by definition has 3 sides - a Jesuit, a Corsican and a Chinaman - fwiw and whatever that's about - etc.
>>
>> Bek-
>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l