Talk:Cataclysmic pole shift hypothesis

message: This page seems to me to be biased, making incorrect assumption's, and directly contradictary to another wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_reversal
Seeing as how there is absolutely zero references or citations in this article, I'm adding an  tag at the top. --R.Lange 10:55, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unreferenced 

message: Not a conspiracy theory, just simply the facts.
I wrote that statement after the rest of the information I had placed in this section.  The concept I was trying to put forth is that, if a pole shift may happen at some point, and we can survive it very easily by removing ourselves from the face of the planet, would it not be a good idea to build an excape route for ourselves?.  It is a fact that scientists have reported their information to the governments and the reality is, they (the ones in government control) have the means to survive, they have the ability to get off the planet, if it should happen.     We do not.  That is simply the facts.   
--My Name Is 3 20:25, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  reply to above 

message: It is possible, if we act to build a excape plan for any natural disaster that may fall upon earth at any point, from pole shifts to meteors.  We all know it to be true, but the intersting thing is why we are not doing it.  If it is such a simple task, a simple insurancce plan, for all our technological advances, why dont we have personal space craft?  I discuss this and other subjects in my book which you can read online for free (in its current unedited form - at www.thebookoffact.netfirms.com
: I see crazy people. 213.86.59.92 13:22, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sum0 21:13, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  it is possible

message: I'm not much knowledgeable in the subject, but I think that TPW does not propose that the actual axis of rotation has changed, but rather that the whole group of continents wandered conjointly in a upper layer, independently of the axis of rotation, which remains stable; as if there was a second, nearly perpendicular, axis, with slower rotation speed, and affecting only the external layers of the Earth, so that the magnetic poles (whose "cause" is deeper into the planet, with a much more immense volume) do not wander together with the surface, resulting in climatic changes and in the geologic record of "fake" magnetic pole reversals. An analogy would be to spin an egg or an spheroid object in a table, putting it to spin initially in the "taller" position; it would tend to slowly move itself in order to the equator be the part with the largest diameter, but at the same time it spins in a stable, always nearly vertical, rotation axis.  --Extremophile 17:04, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Confuses true polar wander with pole shift a little bit 

message: WTF?????! Too much Angels and Demons there, buddy. Muuc (talk) 02:10, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Illuminati Connection? 

message: May I firstly say that this article leaves a lot to be desired in terms of referencing and even structure. It could also be written/worded better (in my opinion).
The "...at the time of Jesus..." line is absurd. I'm not here to argue religion, but 1. by saying that you alienate the audience, especially those of other cultures/religions who may not be aware when Jesus was around and 2. there isn't even a definitive date for when Jesus lived, so you simply make that statement useless. On that note, I'm altering that line to 0 C.E. Aristeaus 09:14, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  At the time of Jesus??` 

message: See above --Jack Zhang (talk) 01:31, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Could you expand your request please? It's not clear what you're referring to. --pfctdayelise (talk) 16:43, 2 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Show the equators before and after said scenarios or a animated GIF illustrating the position of the poles relative to the equator during said event. --Jack Zhang (talk) 01:45, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Diagram request

message: Hi. I'm not a registered user on Wikipedia, but I was wondering about something and thought this would be the place to ask. Please forgive me if I'm not supposed to ask about this here. So, I was wondering, if a pole shift occours, would it effect Earth's tectonic plates in any way? Would it cause plates to move around, earthquakes and the like? Or, more specifically, set off a volcano like the Yellowstone Caldera?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.107.57.187 (talk) 01:30, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Basically it would destroy most life on earth. Virtually every volcano on earth would explode, every potential earthquake, etc. The atmosphere would become unbreathable, the seas heat up, etc.  Beetles might survive, some microscopic organisms, etc. The very shape and organisation of the continents would probably change.--Doug Weller (talk) 06:13, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

text: Don't bother as the whole 2012 thing is a load of garbage.  The last world (the third) supposedly ended August 11, 3114 BCE and yet no records of any major disaster is noted for that date nor is there any real reference to it. There are many cities whose continuous_habitation not only goes through this date but there are even a few going back through the previous second world's end of c8240 BCE.--BruceGrubb (talk) 10:30, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Question 

message: This looks like OR and clearly POV pushing a particular website -- a personal website which is clearly not what Wikipedia considers a 'reliable source' - Muuc, see WP:RELIABLE. What you have written here is your own opinion, what is called 'Original Research' and again please read Wikipedia:No original research if you want to add to an article or even create one.
Nor really should you be pushing the website on this talk page. I think this section should be removed entirely, and also note that it is actually not about 'Pole shift theory'.
:I agree.  This section is ridiculous.  Not only is the "reference" for this section a conspiracy theory website, but it is also not properly cited.  I have commented the section out. Snottywong (talk) 19:37, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks.--Doug Weller (talk) 19:41, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: 2012 section

message: 'Pole Shift'
by John White, Editor of Future Science
Doubleday edition published 1980
A.R.E. Press, 7th Printing, December 1988
ISBN: 87604-162-4
provides a comprehensive discussion from many points of view on the subject of pole shift.
submitted by janus51046  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Janus51046 (talk • contribs) 03:11, 10 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  1980 book on Pole Shift 

message: As currently written, this article presents a series of hypotheses (that the text gradually shifts toward the status of a scientific "theory") about pole shift. It presents very little discussion about why such a pole shift is thought unlikely at present. For the purposes of balance and neutrality, I think both sides should be presented. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 15:56, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unbalanced? 

message: I think the following entry is literally correct, but not in the sense implied by this article:
: Research using GPS, conducted by Geoffrey Blewitt of the University of Nevada, has shown that normal seasonal changes in the distribution of ice and water cause minor movements of the poles.Boston Globe News article concerning study of earth's movement.
I can not reach the Boston Globe article to be certain, but I believe it is likely based on the following source:
: 
What the authors are describing is a vertical deformation of poles by a few millimetres that occurs on a seasonal basis. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 22:35, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I was bold and removed the paragraph in question.—RJH (talk) 20:23, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Season changes in the poles 

message: The following statement:
: In 1852, mathematician Joseph Adhémar suggested that the accumulation of thick ice at the poles periodically caused the Earth to flip and the equator to move to where the poles were.
differs from the various sources that discuss his proposal in Revolutions de la Mer, Deluges Periodics. His proposal was that ice ages were caused by precession of the Earth's poles, rather than a 180° flip of the planet. Unless there is a source for the text, I think it should be taken as an incorrect interpretation and removed.—RJH (talk) 20:18, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: As there is no source for the statement, and evidence that it might be a misinterpretation, I am removing it, Awickert (talk) 21:17, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  There's a brief mention of Joseph Adhémar's hypothesis on this National Geographic web site. Apparently he "believed that erosion of the polar ice cap could cause the ice to suddenly collapse into the ocean, shifting the Earth's center of gravity and causing a massive tsunami that would wreak widespread carnage." Not quite the same as the original.—RJH (talk) 16:18, 9 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Statement about Joseph Adhémar 

message: This article puts a lot of weight on the hypothesis of Charles Hapgood, while providing only a single reference. This reference states that, "Hapgood created this theory by documenting three Earth crust displacements in the last 100,000 years." However, it also states that, "Hapgood revised key parts of his thinking because his calculations convinced him that the mass of the ice cap on Antartica could not destabilize the Earth's rotation." I checked through Hapgood's 1970 The Path of the Pole, but that work didn't appear to argue in favor of the ice mass causing a polar shift. It also makes no mention of Adhemar's work, and so I'm dubious about that as well.
It appears that this article is heavily slanted in favor of a particular hypothesis while discarding anything to the contrary.—RJH (talk) 17:41, 8 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I've attempted to remedy this.—RJH (talk) 16:13, 9 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Charles Hapgood 

message: Im just going to ask a question. Based on mathematics, And from that has been found in fossil remains and ELE's from geological time charts . now the question ( would the mag. pole shifts create massive stresses on the con. shelves ? ) And if so . (would it not accure over a long peiord of time) And ending in a grand event?  thank you for your time ,.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.56.146.243 (talk) 23:03, 9 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Well it depends on the rate of pole reversal and what you mean by "massive". I'm sure there would be some net change in the forces acting on the crust, but I don't know if they would be significant. There have been ~60 pole reversals measured in the Atlantic during the last 20 million years, yet we're still here. I'd probably be more concerned about the potential weakening of the Earth's magnetosphere during the reversal, and the consequent increase in cosmic ray exposure.—RJH (talk) 19:27, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  Doubly no. The continental shelves are largely nonmagnetic sediments, and the Earth's magnetic field would need to be a whole ton stronger to actually impose a non-negligible force on a portion of the Earth's crust (the strength of the present-day magnetic field at the equator is two orders of magnitude lower than that of a refrigerator magnet). Awickert (talk) 06:43, 11 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:   What If ??  

message: Regarding  I am (perhaps somewhat surprisingly) of granite07's opinion: these links do in deed belong, though it would be better to work them into the article. All (or at least some of) this nonsense is of a piece, and well worth linking together. I'm going to have a go at doing this William M. Connolley (talk) 17:57, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not at all against adding to the article any relationship to the links, only against a bare addition of them as 'see also' (especially as the reason seems to be that they would act as a reminder for the editor). My first comment above is " if the arguments are used by adherents, fine, use some reliable sources to include them in the article.". It wouldn't just have to be adherents actually, any good source that mentions them in connection the the pole shift hypothesis can be used (the usual caveats about our guidelines, etc still applying and this being a fringe article). Dougweller (talk) 18:11, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, there is something here I'm not familiar with, the link between this and the Black Sea deluge idea - I did a quick search and nothing came up. Shouldn't we have sources for these relationships?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dougweller (talk • contribs) 18:49, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  Yes, I think this is the key issue with those links. Their connection to the current topic is not explained by the content of the articles. It doesn't matter that somebody has supposedly establish a connection in their minds or in a source that is not used here. But that somebody is always free to apply the appropriate edits to those articles to make the connection clear.—RJH (talk) 20:32, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree here, it's not that the proposed links are irrelevant, they're just not clear enough to be separate "see also" links. I've got no problem with those being linked in the article where their context can be clearer. Dayewalker (talk) 18:36, 22 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  I *thought* the idea was that the kind of nutters that believe in the PSH also believe in these other thing William M. Connolley (talk) 18:59, 22 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  Sorry to sound surprised but I thought everyone understood that the Pole shift hypothesis and the entire page is firmly anchored in dogmatic pseudoscience. It is notable as such. The true polar wander page seems to be a more scientific approach with the associated editing constraints likely in effect.  A summary of this page has been made in the recent research section.  I think there needs to be a sub-section for pseudoscience only to capture some of the more tangential topics relying on citations referencing "glossy" magazines and their online derivations. I am a fan of a good pseudoscience theory just like every other sky watcher. As far as the rest of the page goes it should be open to post edits as long as they are within the citable frame given by the leading proponents of this theory, and any new proponents that manage to publish anything substantive in the future. Some of these proponents spent a good portion of their life on this topic while some seem to have written a few articles. The deluge theory does not specifically fit under this pseudoscience category and should be placed in a subsection specific to the deluge in context with the theory as a whole. The same goes for rapid climatic change theories and maybe work-in the hypothesizes time frames of these events.  When do Brown, Hapgood and et al. propose these events occurred. I recall a 5,000 year interval with most imediatly preceding event having failed to occur due to exceptional geostabilization in the current goeconfiguration.  The fine line between OR and embodying the theory on a obvious minimum of literature to work with seems to be within the capabilities of Wikipedia to accommodate without crossing that line. Don't go to the beach and find a sea-shell in a cliff and post it here as evidence of PST, that is OR, linking to a page relating corresponding theories that are more fully embodied is on the line but legitimate in this context. They both have deluge in the title right. Granite07 (talk) 23:22, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

text: Personally I prefer to spend my time editing and not describing || discussing || finding consensus for the edits. In the time I spent writing this post I could have just written the section and posted it and likely would have not given the preceding discussion on see also edits. Granite07 (talk) 23:35, 22 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree. Can this issue be put to bed now? :-)  Thanks.—RJH (talk) 15:22, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  A suggestion re links 

message: * Several sources list Immanuel Velikovsky as an originator of the pole shift hypothesis. Needs a mention.
—RJH (talk) 16:51, 22 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: sounds good. If there are citations is it necessary to find consensus first? Granite07 (talk) 19:09, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  I added in a paragraph about Velikovsky's works. I know he was considered a bit (far) off the wall and was completely off base with his wild hypotheses, but in general the concepts of migrating planets, chaos theory and protoplanetary collisions have become more widely accepted in astronomy these days. So, if anything, it's a teaching opportunity for real science.—RJH (talk) 15:19, 2 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  To do list 

message: The page starts by saying that this is a hypothesis in the change of the locations of the poles. OK.
It then goes on to saying that it is only true polar wander. OK.
It says that this is less accepted than geomagnetic reversal. WRONG.
OK: Pause. So once it becomes the same thing as true polar wander, it stops being a wacko hypothesis and starts being mainstream science. If this is all the article is, it should be merged into the real science of true polar wander and be done away with. But if it is about the crazy speculation, then pole shift is a hypothesis and could be either true polar wander or a change in the rotational axis with respect to the sun. In that case, the article should be changed to reflect this.
So I really can't start to touch the article until I know which of these the article is. I'm going for the latter pseudoscience category myself. 
Your opinions, please? Awickert (talk) 17:54, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: My opinion, it is both and all. Brown proposed the change in the rotational axis with respect to the sun which Hapgood modified to include the physics calculation that the forces do not equal, therefore resulting in the skin slip theory. The more recent Norwegian north sea core drilling study suggests that whichever is the case the maximum change does not exceed 40 degrees and may happen over a longer duration than that envisioned by Brown or Hapgood, therefore implying something incorporating true polar wander. Just a reality check, has everyone read the material, I will be the first to admit it has been a few years. Anyone interested to conduct a literature review and provide a bibliography and cliff notes, not it  Granite07 (talk) 19:05, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a nice discussion and review, including detailed comparison and contrasts of the ideas of Hapgood, Brown, and other advocates of catastrophic pole shifts and the evidence on which they based their interpretations, in "Predictions and Prophecies of the Ultimate Disaster: Pole Shift" by John White. This book is a good starting point before reading through the various books by these people. Paul H. (talk) 07:32, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  The Charles Hapgood work labeled the effect as Cataclysmic Pole Shift, rather than just pole shift. Perhaps this article should focus on the cataclysmic aspect of the topic, with the true polar wander providing the scientific work? I would favor renaming this article to Cataclysmic pole shift hypothesis in order to clarify the focus. In that case it should only have enough science to maintain neutrality. But doing so would still require a WP:SS description of true polar wander.—RJH (talk) 03:05, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  I have not read the material, so if someone could change this article to use what the material says, I will be able to integrate it into the more mainstream science articles. Awickert (talk) 04:46, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  I renamed the page and did some reorganization. Hopefully it is an improvement.—RJH (talk) 20:28, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  The removal of pseudoscience material is not appropriate given it is properly cited and has been discussed to consensus. I did not look at the history to see who removed it but given recent revert 'war' I am going to refrain from anymore reverts. Granite07 (talk) 20:57, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  The material is located under the "Recent conjectures" section. I refrained from using "Pseudoscience" to keep things neutral. But none of the content has been removed; merely reorganized.—RJH (talk) 22:20, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  What is the topic of this article? 

message: ...including psychic readings, often linked to other beliefs such as Tollmann's hypothetical..., often is too strong a word, please change it to possibly. Granite07 (talk) 21:40, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  someone make this correction 

message: I AM A STUDENT OF11 CLASS AND IN THIS SUDJECT I AM NOT SO INELLEGENT BUT I THINK DUE TO HUMAN DISASTER OR NATURAL EVENT HUMAN COMMUNITY $ OTHER ORGANISUM WILL EXTINCT BECAUSE OF THE CHANGES OF POLES  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.168.252.108 (talk) 14:42, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, organisms are constantly going extinct so that isn't really a change. The primary difference now is the rate of extinction, which is comparable to that of an extinction event. I think a mass extinction due to a sudden pole shift has extraordinarily low odds, so I wouldn't worry about that possibility. There wouldn't be much we could do about it in any event.—RJH (talk) 15:36, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  about shifting of poles 

message: The following entry was tagged as unsourced since September:
: A high-velocity asteroid or comet which hits Earth at such an angle that the lithosphere moves independent of the mantle.
I did a search but couldn't find a suitable source. In any event, it seems pretty unlikely to have that effect without having sufficient energy to simultaneously destroy the lithosphere. Cf. giant impact hypothesis.—RJH (talk) 18:37, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You should put it back, that is a near direct quote from Hapgood (or Brown). The theory of an impact was proposed to better reflect the calculations that show gravitational pull is not sufficient in itself to pull the core into a new axis. The second theory is that only the mantle is moved. 128.12.170.154 (talk) 02:59, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  If so, then you should be able to supply a concise reference. See WP:CS. Thanks.—RJH (talk) 17:59, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Entry removed

message: Hello,
I just like to point on the fact, that in the 1956 Book "The Calendar of Tiahuanaco" by H.S. Bellamy and P. Allan (p.30) the theory of earth crust shifting was also part of Hoerbigers theory. Maybe this should be inserted in the text of the article.--87.152.241.131 (talk) 14:44, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Is this part of the Welteislehre theory by Hans Hörbiger?—RJH (talk) 16:22, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  About the history of pole shifting theory 

message: Hi,
Looking at this discussion page, it's clear a lot has been done to clean up this article over time. I have only two minor points to raise.In the "recent conjectures" section, is the following text:
"In 1997, Richard W. Noone published the novel 5/5/2000, ICE: The Ultimate Disaster"
I am currently reading this book, which is how I wound up on this page. While it contains considerable speculative data, it is not a work of fiction in the traditional sense (ie, no characters, plotline,etc.) The Library of Congress has classed it under BF1999 - occult sciences, not fiction or literature. Therefore the descriptor "novel" is inappropriate, and should be removed.
Its original date of  publication is listed as 1986, so this fact is also listed inaccurately.
Otherwise, thanks for the clarifying article.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.83.198.235 (talk) 01:09, 9 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Removed. Also, I'm significantly rewriting the article, so check back and be sure to ask if you think of points that you'd like addressed here. Awickert (talk) 02:53, 9 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you, it's great to have a geologist on the matter at hand. There's too much hypish misinformation about the 2012 meme, and this seems to be one of it's pseudoscientific manifestation. Will the earth flip over or something..:)--Namaste@? 02:37, 10 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You're welcome, but I promised RJHall that I would do this a long, long time ago... so I feel a little guilty about that. Anyway: is there anything that you think should be mentioned? Awickert (talk) 05:31, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

text: I agree, thanks for removing. By "fixed", I meant w.r.t. a celestial reference frame. Awickert (talk) 04:16, 12 May 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  5/5/2000 - novel? Publication Date 

message: The final sentences of the second paragraph are:
"Between approximately 790 and 810 million years ago, when the supercontinent Rodinia existed, two geologically-rapid phases of true polar wander may have occurred. In each of these, the Earth rotated ~55°.[4]"
This claim cites the following paper: http://gsabulletin.gsapubs.org/content/118/9-10/1099 (readable openly at http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~jkirschvink/pdfs/maloof_svaltpw.pdf), which suggests several lines of evidence used to provide the hypothesis that a true polar wandering event was a cause of such observations. There was no direct evidence of this, however a true polar wandering event provides one possible explanation. Language indicating such should be used in presenting that paper's findings in this article. The language used in the current article does not meet that standard, and suggests that this hypothesis is an established fact.
A summary article summarizing this paper, while pointing out this is a "best fit for [the] current evidence, [but] not a certainty", is at: [].  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Klassica (talk • contribs) 07:02, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  True Polar Wander - ~55° rotation - Article is Implying Hypothesis as Fact 

message: Greetings,
I would Like to point out that the author of the article is incorrect at saying this is only a theory, it is a scientific fact that the Earths magnetic poles do completely shift at I believe it is about every 500 thousand years or so. this has been shown from ice cores taken from the Antarctic Region... What is theory is how these shifts occur, do they shift rapidly, immediately, or over an extended period of time...  the complete shift was shown to have occurred approx 750 thousand years ago and the previous one to that 500 thousand years ago... Pole wobble is also a fact and occurs more often...  right now, pole the poles are shifting about 40 miles a year, it is not known if this is just a wobble or a slow shift as the movement is steadily moving away from the current north-south orientation...  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.172.154.78 (talk) 18:14, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pole Shift a theory??? 

message: sorry wanted to update some info... the shifts occure approx 300 - 500 thousand years...
also wanted to site an official source to show scientific fact of this:
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/lookingatearth/29dec_magneticfield.html  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.172.154.78 (talk) 18:32, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pole Shift a theory???  2nd post 

message: In the sentence "Velikovsky supported his work with historical records, although his studies were mainly ridiculed by the scientific community." what is the value of mentioning that his studies were ridiculed by the scientific community? In no way is this a good reason to reject Velikovsky's position because it merely shows that he was a victim of an ad hominem attack perpetrated by some individuals resting on the support of the argument from authority. Given that this article is intended to examine the veracity of the hypothesis at hand and not the struggles of its proponents, the mention of ridicule by the scientific community should be removed. Phiborjam (talk) 23:09, 6 February 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, this article is not 'intended to examine the veracity of the hypothesis at hand'. Please see WP:TRUTH.  Any physical theory mentioned in a wikipedia article requires reporting on its acceptance by the community at large, and in this case, the community of geologists, physicists, etc. Ashmoo (talk) 15:55, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:  Then the edit should state as much and provide reference to where the theory was rejected.  The problem being is that the term 'community' is highly vague, especially in the realm of science where every statement is supposed to be so empirically specific. BTW this is Phiborjam here(I can't remember my password so now I go by Quarky Gluon)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Quarky Gluon (talk • contribs) 07:35, 25 December 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Early proponents 

message: In the 'Recent Conjectures' section, the first sentence states: "The field has attracted pseudoscientific authors offering a variety of evidence, including psychic readings." The term 'pseudoscientific' is an ad hominem label that is epistemologically irrelevant to any arguments or reasoning made by the authors listed in the 'Recent Conjectures' section. The listed authors may or may not have provided any good scientific reasons for believing in their theories, but that can be assessed by anyone that reads their works. Phiborjam (talk) 23:46, 6 February 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The label 'pseudoscientific' has still been assigned due to a conclusion by editors for reasons that require an argument.  There is however no way to support the appropriateness of the label through either direct observation (they don't have a sign flashing on their foreheads nor have they assigned themselves the label of 'pseudoscientific') or through a crisp logic syllogism having exclusively premises that are prima fascia evident facts.  But instead the authors are deserving the label because you would give them a grade of 'F' in undergraduate geology.  I didn't think Wikipedia had become a forum where grades were given to any given authors and labels applied to those authors based on those grades.  I thought Wikipedia was supposed to be an objective resource that was not here to promote any POV agenda such as the skeptic agenda that seems to be behind the insistence that the 'pseudoscientific' label remain in place.Quarky Gluon (talk) 23:37, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually we use the description (a less charged word than 'label') in a number of articles where appropriate. I don't know what you mean by objective, but our policy that is probably most applicable here is WP:NPOV.  If the prevailing opinon amoung the sorts of sources we accept (see WP:RS and WP:VERIFY, particularly academic ones, is that something is pseudoscience, we describe it that way. Dougweller (talk) 12:28, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

text: You call the label a description but without presenting the means to describe.  By that I mean the label pseudoscientific or pseudoscientist is not applied due to some particular empirical datum that can be measured, weighed or counted.  Rather it is a judgement about the ontology of a person and therefore non neutral.  If some professor has described author X as being a Y, then a non objective neutral way of describing that state of affairs is to state that 'professor Z has described author X as being a Y' and provide a citation for that statement.  Instead I've seen in this case Wikipedia as acting being used as a means to actively further the agenda of a dominant paradigm by badmouthing advocates of a competing paradigm.Quarky Gluon (talk) 00:29, 31 December 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  'Pseudoscientific' as an ad hominem label  

message: Why aren't radical and sudden changes to the pole orientation a violation of conservation of angular momentum (except in the case of encountering another large body so that transfer of angular momentum can occur)?
: They are, which is very likely why this conjecture hasn't gained much if any traction in the scientific community. Without some form of external perturbation, you would probably need an internal source to serve as a transfer mechanism of angular momentum. I.e. the core would likely need to be rotating at an obtuse angle or in the opposite direction. True the core does rotate more rapidly, but I believe it has the same spin axis as the crust. Regards, RJH (talk) 20:08, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: In general, the theory is that there is no change in net angular momentum.  The spin axis remains fixed in space (as would be judged by a hypothetical external observer), but the entire Earth shifts relative to that axis.  Changing the orientation of the Earth relative to a fixed spin axis doesn't require any change in the total angular momentum (though it will in general require a change in the total rotational kinetic energy).  As discussed at true polar wander, there are conditions under which the orientation of the whole Earth can spontaneously change (i.e. when the change results in a net reduction in rotational kinetic energy) with only very minor external perturbations.  The most severe of these scenarios, "inertial interchange true polar wander", would give rise to a rapid pole shift, but it requires rather exotic conditions on the surface of the Earth (e.g. placing most of the continental mass near the poles), and it is unclear if such conditions have ever occurred.  Dragons flight (talk) 02:58, 3 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Conservation of angular momentum 

message: This doesn't appear correct to me. Crustal displacement and pole shift obviously does relate to plate tectonics and therefore the principles behind continental drift (also once considered a ludicrous concept). The new discovery of an "ultra-hard layer of rock within Earth’s lower mantle" may provide the mechanism that's currently missing in the pole shift hypothesis. [Nature Geoscience[]: Slab stagnation in the shallow lower mantle linked to an increase in mantle viscosity] Ward Arminius (talk)   — Preceding undated comment added 02:00, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Please read WP:OR and WP:SYN as doubtful that the Nature article says anything about the pole shift stuff (only have access to the abstract). Vsmith (talk) 13:45, 25 March 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I am a geologist, have access to the Nature article, and have read it. The article lacks any reference to either pole shift hypothesis or pole shifts. There is nothing in it that provides an alleged mechanism for any pole shift hypothesis. Paul H. (talk) 14:27, 15 May 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pole shift hypotheses are not connected with plate tectonics...nor with continental drift 

message: > From 1982 to 2005, the pole drifted southeast toward northern Labrador
Is it written about the north geographic pole? But how it can drift anywhere but southward? Where "sotheast from the north pole" is supposed to be? Hellerick (talk) 09:35, 15 May 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Uhm, what? 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: This page seems like it's mostly describing deprecated ideas and modern crankery - surely "pole shift" should redirect to the mainstream notion of geomagnetic reversal?  Twin Bird (talk) 01:57, 19 June 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is this really the best redirect? 

message: I agree that Chan Thomas's writings are nutty, but his work has a little bit of traction out there in conspiracy theory land, largely because it was filed by the CIA. Is it really so off the wall that can't even be mentioned? As it stands, the article has all sorts of ridiculous claims about Atlantis, Mu and worlds in collision. Also - minor point - there are two or three other publications that I could find by Emerson House: a second Chan Thomas effort, and a couple of other "alternative" texts. Ewen (talk) 05:19, 4 October 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: It still appears self-published. Anyway, you're right about some stuff not belonging, if there's no article for author or book, and no discussion in secondary reliable sources, it doesn't belong and I've deleted a couple. Doug Weller talk 15:27, 6 October 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chan Thomas 

message: The following statement appears in the article: "Pole shift hypotheses are not the same as geomagnetic reversal, the periodic reversal of the Earth's magnetic field (effectively switching the north and south magnetic poles)." I suggest that this be further elaborated upon. As of present, neither this article nor the one on geomagnetic reversal makes a significant effort to contrast the two theories. One is a mainstream scientific theory, while the other is a fringe, or pseudoscientific notion. Yet, to a casual observer, they seem very similar. An explanation as to what distinguishes these two from each other would be educationally valuable.Wwkirk (talk) 14:09, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Contrast to Geomagnetic Reversal would have Educational Value 

message: The article says "In the early 1960s, Chan Thomas wrote a book titled The Adam and Eve Story and attempted to have it published by Emerson House in Los Angeles. Soon after publishing the full issue, the CIA classified his book for 50 years.[17] An FOIA lawsuit was filed against the CIA to release the book.[citation needed] In 2013, the CIA released a "cleansed" version of the original book (50 pages out of 240 original pages).[17] The major difference to Hapgood's claims is that, according to Chan Thomas, the crust moved back to its original position within a relatively short time."
I believe this is incorrect, but don't have a good source to justify that belief, so haven't modified the article. In general, only documents authored by members of the government are classified by US intelligence agencies, and it would be unconstitutional and bizarre for the CIA to 'classify' this book and pull it from circulation. 
In particular, the document was neither 'cleansed' by the CIA, nor did they prevent it from being circulated. This library record indicates that it was published and included in library collections in 1961.
https://orbis.library.yale.edu/vwebv/search?searchCode=GKEY%5E*&recCount=50&searchType=1&searchArg=ocm39097180
This Reddit thread has a much more plausible explanation: https://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/b7imlc/the_adam_and_eve_story_the_story_of_cataclysms_by/ejtg2hu/ - in brief, that someone that the CIA had an interest in owned a copy of it, it was kept for some reason, and that copy was released in response to an FOIA request for details about that person.
--Edyoung0 (talk) 05:19, 20 July 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: I've removed that para. The only ref - now dead, but there's an archive (https://web.archive.org/web/20170123195822/https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP79B00752A000300070001-8.pdf) appears to be the book itself. So there's no evidence at all of the "classified for 50 years". I don't see why its notable enough for inclusion, esp with no real refs William M. Connolley (talk) 09:16, 20 July 2021 (UTC)
replies: text:  PDFs of the "CIA" and original versions of this book are available at dedicated web pages in the Internet Archive. Go to Chan Thomas The Adam And Eve Story - CIA copy and Chan Thomas The Adam And Eve Story - original print copy Paul H. (talk) 16:41, 20 July 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Statements about the CIA and classification are probably incorrect 

message: This article needs to better clarify the difference between cataclysmic pole shift and earth crust displacement. Johne White's book, Pole Shift, is a good place to start because he explains the different variations of cataclysmic pole shift and earth crust displacement. Paul H. (talk) 00:41, 27 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cataclysmic pole shift versus earth crust displacement