Paul S. Mills a professor at Utah Valley University, will discuss "The Mystery of the Sundial Enigma" during an International Year of Astronomy lecture Tuesday, Oct. 6, at 7:30 p.m. in the Harold B. Lee Library Auditorium at Brigham Young University.
A question-and-answer session will follow from 8:30 to 9 p.m. Admission is free.
"Hipparchus, the most famous and conscientious astronomer of Helenistic Greece, handed us a paradox of astronomical proportions, according to Mills.
"His collection of ancient sundial measurements taken over a period of several hundred years, thousands of miles apart, and by half a dozen different and well-qualified experimenters reveals an earth with an equator tipped eight degrees from its present orientation," he said.
No one with Hipparchus' skill and disposition would tolerate such an error, and yet no credible geologist in modern times would tolerate such a recent shift of the Earth's equator. Indeed, the data seem to prove something that is physically impossible.
Mills address will investigate this strange paradox.
For more information, contact Denise Stephens at (801) 422-2167.
