ant wrote:By the way, Leonardo is not on record as having any philosophical commitments. Quite the contrary, he wrote nearly nothing about his personal reflections about any ideas of the time,
Particularly anything related to astronomy. - NOTHING Can you provide evidence for that claim, Robert? You are becoming a fraudulent scientist. Its going to be fun slapping the doodoo out of this crazy fantasy of yours. every bully needs this type of beatdown.

Again, ant makes incredibly stupid and ignorant assertions here, flinging mad bullying insults because I have questioned his hostility to the science of evolution. ant's questions are solely aimed to defend his traditional supernatural religious commitments, and have a creationist flavour to them. Ant’s assertions of fraud and error on my part are entirely false, and his aggressive errors about astronomy and philosophy are easy to refute.

I earlier mentioned Leonardo's comment that "The earth is not in the centre of the Sun's orbit nor at the centre of the universe.” (858) He also says "The sun does not move". (886) This was written in his Notebooks several decades before Copernicus and illustrates his support for heliocentric astronomy. I have mentioned this in this thread which it appears ant has ignored.

As I have detailed in this thread, Leonardo’s Notebooks provide extensive support for his philosophical commitment to Hermetic method, the idea of “as above so below”. This is the principle later used by Sir Isaac Newton as the basis of modern astronomy and physics. Leonardo wrote “Hermes the Philosopher”.

In response to a question earlier from Geo at http://www.booktalk.org/post84371.html#p84371 I wrote that “Gnostic tradition saw the divine in nature. Suppression of such ideas as heresy meant they could not be spoken openly in Leonardo’s day. Yet, if Leonardo was sympathetic to such thinking of Hermes the philosopher, what better way to express it than in a painting that seems to validate Christian dogma while actually pointing to a higher truth?”

At http://www.booktalk.org/post91743.html#p91743 I wrote that Leonardo “anticipated a fractal philosophy through his observation of reflection between microcosm and macrocosm. For example, he found that the anatomy of veins and arteries follows the same geometry as the roots and branches of a tree. There is a deep sense of causal logic here, using observation to articulate a natural necessity… Jessica Teisch and Tracy Barr [write]

“Leonardo saw patterns in nature and revered all forms of life. His insatiable curiosity led him to constantly observe, experiment, theorise and invent. His anatomical studies show an advanced understanding of the systems in the body. His ideas about the stars and heavens prefigured later great thinkers like Copernicus and Galileo. All Leonardo's endeavours were connected by his never-ending quest to discover and understand the underlying principle, or design, of the universe. He observed an integrated universal design in unrelated objects and natural phenomena. He saw the world as interconnected, with things at the micro level mirroring designs at the macro level, for example human arms and legs functioning sort of like tree branches do. Human perception and experience, rather than religious teaching, mysticism, superstition, alchemy, or even Aristotelian logic, provided the real core of understanding of the universe. This quest for truth freed him from medieval scientific convention. For most of his life, Leonardo developed theories about the micro and macrocosmos. He compared the circulation of the Earth, for example, to the circulation of the human body: both living systems seemed to operate according to similar rules. His desire for perfection - to render each detail, from a petal to a finger, strikingly realistic - hindered his productivity. Painting The Last Supper, he'd stare at the wall for a few hours, perhaps fix one tiny thing or make one small brush stroke, and then return home to work on other pressing projects. In some ways, he adhered to tradition, but in other areas he was a true explorer, a pioneer whose fertile imagination grasped and prophecied unheard of possibilities. Most of Leonardo's dreams had to wait a few centuries to be realized. The Leonardo's of the world - those visionary audacious thinkers - are the ones who break with an antiquated past and move the world forward one step at a time.”

I can see that ant simply and blithely dismisses this entire scholarly understanding of Leonardo’s modern position and work because it clashes with ant's pre-modern supernatural faith. But the point of this thread is entirely about scientific analysis, a broad topic to which ant continues to display a deep and irrational opposition.

The two authors you cite as a source of evidence have zero expertise in either renaissance history of are Leonardo scholars. Nor are they saying anything that backs up your craziness.


His studies on anatomy as depicted in his drawings have nothing to do with a christian motif of any kind. There is simply no connection there in the record.

could not be spoken openly in Leonardo’s day. Yet, if Leonardo was sympathetic to such thinking of Hermes the philosopher, what better way to express it than in a painting that seems to validate Christian dogma while actually pointing to a higher truth?”

That is wild " what if" speculation that be used as an argument for nearly anything the arguer wants.
It's baseless and there is zero evidence in Leonardo's writings or works for it - nothing.

Your speculative analysis is simply a kind of virtual vandalism of the painting itself.

It has been said of Leonardo "there is genius. And then there is genius. And then there is Leonardo"
The man was very nomadic in his career as a courtier and an artist. His range of interests were highly diverse but he left very very little of his personal reflections/beliefs on anything. They simply arent there in the record.
There is also not much of his work that actually survived. It is very much a piecing together project when any scholar attempts to know the man himself. There have been several biographical constructions of him by various scholars over the years, all inventing the man they wished to invent.
read "Inventing Leonardo" by renaissance scholar A. Richard Turner. Unfortunately for you, there is no da Vinci code craziness discussed.

What is well understood is his humanistic style of portraiture which I clearly articulated and reflects the renaissance movement in art.

What you are engaging in here is vacuous circumlocution.

Whats evident here is your emotional attachment to your 3rd grade thesis. It is your little wacky brain child you are emotionally invested in and will protect at any cost. Even if it makes you look silly.

You take much pride in being a scientist. Hence your very identity is at risk here.
You have zero credentials that would cause anyone to take you seriously. I seriously doubt youve even read one book on the man.
Because science is a prestigious field you seem to think you embody that same prestige and are an authority in anything you stick your hands into.

This entire thesis of yours is surely a joke. It is about as credible as The Da Vincu code.
Try selling it to Hollywood. Some desperate starving director might take it off your hands for 2 dollars.
Thats what its worth.

Ill help you out here because of your inability to find credible sources;

"For the Florentine of Leonardo's time, drawing - disegno - was the foundation of all the visual arts. Leonardo's education in draftmanship would have been in the context of preparation for finished works of art and probably learned in the sequence that he himself recommended to students much later: coping of drawings of accomplished masters, followed by drawings of three dimensional model, culminating in drawing from an appropriate life model. In short, the emphasis was upon repeated imitation not upon the imagination as the point of departure. The success of this training, supervised by the master, was a reciprocal process of making and judging" - A. Richard Turner

This method of copying the works of previous masters was exactly how Leonardo was trained as a painter.
The Last Supper narrative portraitures were a common theme in Leonardo's time. And as ive said before, the positioning of the characters at the table was common. What Leonardo introduced was a refreshing humanistic element to the character's facial and bodily expressions. Each character's intellectual presence became alive to the viewer "reading" the narrative.

Its that simple and that obvious.
Such genius has no need for superfluous covert nonsense.
Perhaps an artist would understand that better than you.

Leaving aside ant's manifest errors and worsening rudeness (which should get him suspended), the simple point at issue here is that I have made an important new discovery with world historical significance, and ant's blind inability to see it is a perfect illustration of how a person with emotional commitment to an old paradigm is unable to see simple evidence.

The use by Leonardo of the stars as his template is as obvious as the moons of Jupiter, but to see the moons of Jupiter you have to be willing to look through a telescope.

There is no commitment to any philosophical doctrine in Leonardo's notes.
His examination of the natural world purely by the talent of the observer's eye is clear and something Leonardo wrote about - vision is superior to verbal expression.

Leonardo considered himself a man " not of letters"
So perhaps his articulations that site is the superior method of examination of nature is related to his admittance that he did not have an extensive education.

Robert Tulip wrote:Leaving aside ant's manifest errors and worsening rudeness (which should get him suspended), the simple point at issue here is that I have made an important new discovery with world historical significance, and ant's blind inability to see it is a perfect illustration of how a person with emotional commitment to an old paradigm is unable to see simple evidence.

The use by Leonardo of the stars as his template is as obvious as the moons of Jupiter, but to see the moons of Jupiter you have to be willing to look through a telescope.

You are losing ground here
It is obvious you have not even attempted to do any serious research here.
The man's life and his historical context is the only way you should be approaching this.

You do not wish to engage in a serious discussion about Da Vinci. You'd rather play "what if" games to advance your fairy-tale thesis in order to virtually vandalize the most famous religiously themed work of art in the history of mankind.
And all because youre an atheist.

How absolutely pathetic.

Unfortunately everything that ant says is completely wrong. He is crazy. His arguments in this thread are of flat earth creationist quality, flatly refusing to examine the compelling evidence I have provided that Leonardo did in fact use the zodiac as his template for the Last Supper. Ant simply skirts around this central issue, like a flat earther arguing that the horizon looks flat. But ant does not read or understand what I say, so don't expect any sensible reply from him.

Max May, who I have never met, saw that the evidence of my argument is compelling and obvious in purely empirical terms. Max prepared the youtube video matching each figure in the fresco to its corresponding stars. This simply would not be possible if the science were not simple and correct. This is a no-brainer as to the correctness of my claim. But the inability of fundamentalists like ant to engage with it exhibits some fascinating problems in cultural psychology, with abuse replacing dialogue.

So ant's insults have a mildly deranged quality to them, indicating that he needs pity and help. Ant wonders why I call him a troll. It is because he exactly typifies the internet phenomenon of someone with nothing positive to say who gets emotional pleasure from baiting people by making outrageous false statements.

Unfortunately everything that ant says is completely wrong. He is crazy. His arguments in this thread are of flat earth creationist quality

Huh??

What are Mr. May's credentials?

You seem desperate now.

This is about evidence, not credentials. I neither know nor care what Max's credentials are. What I care about is that his depiction matches the natural evidence I have collected, which it does, except for some small technical points. I also care that the long string of groundless abuse that ant has directed towards me in this and other threads is a sign of his mental instability. I understand that ant goes into 'brain fry' mode at the mere mention of the zodiac, and find that a fascinating problem helping to illustrate why my findings remain invisible.

Robert Tulip wrote:This is about evidence, not credentials. I neither know nor care what Max's credentials are. What I care about is that his depiction matches the natural evidence I have collected, which it does, except for some small technical points. I also care that the long string of groundless abuse that ant has directed towards me in this and other threads is a sign of his mental instability. I understand that ant goes into 'brain fry' mode at the mere mention of the zodiac, and find that a fascinating problem helping to illustrate why my findings remain invisible.

Of course you dont care about credentials here.
What you care about is if someone agrees with you.


You wont get any sympathy from me.

This type of atheist hooliganism toward art is deplorable.
I'm shocked that you've spent so much energy making this stuff up.