1969: PATRICK MOORE - In Defence of INDEPENDENT THINKERS | Classic BBC Documentary | BBC Archive

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"Whether they're right or whether they're wrong is neither here nor there."

For more than a decade, Patrick Moore has been putting forward the conventional views of modern astronomy in books and on The Sky at Night on television. Next week, he will be back in the BBC space studio reporting on the Apollo 12 moon landing. In this documentary, he steps off that platform to question whether orthodox views should be as readily accepted as they are.

Is the sun really a hot flaming body dashing about the sky? Have astronauts really proved that the earth and the moon are round? Might not the universe be enclosed by a giant magnet? Is not the ultimate man already living on Saturn in the form of an incandescent egg, 40-feet tall.

These ideas and more are put forward in a cheerful, convincing, and fearless way by a number of 'independent thinkers' - from flat-earthers to astrologers to people who believe the can communicate with other worlds. Patrick Moore feels that - despite not agreeing with any of their ideas - the stuffy conventionalists, like himself, would do well to listen to these independent thinkers once in a while, and emulate their outlook on life.


Clip taken from One Pair of Eyes: Can You Speak Venusian?, originally broadcast on BBC Two, 10 May, 1969.

00:00 Introduction
01:57 Rev. P.H.Francis - the Sun is cold
03:46 Is independent thought being stifled?
07:52 Samuel Shenton - Flat Earth Society
10:40 Hollow earth theory
11:27 Julia Parker - British Astrological Society
13:35 Independent thinkers in history
15:01 John Bradbury's unorthodox theories
21:49 Arthur Shuttlewood - UFO spotter
28:29 Mr Robertson - Aetherius Society
33:20 Bernard Byrant - Venusian speaker
36:58 Closing thoughts





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