Book Review: The 12th Planet by Zecharia Sitchin

Is he playing pool with planets?

 Sitchin's theory reminds me of an episode of the British comedy "Red Dwarf" where Dave Lister (the main character) causes one planet to hit another to fill in a white hole (using the interface of a pool table shot to do it). Only, Marduk/Nibiru's shot was a glancing shot that shot Earth into orbit, caused the asteroid belt and (to borrow again from Red Dwarf) "shot Marduk off the table and into someone's pint of beer."

I love reading about phenomenology, the occult, the paranormal, ancient astronauts, etc. However Sitchin is just a little bit too far for my tastes. And I think I know why. Born in the early part of the 20th century, Sitchin's "scientific" terminology and knowledge is just too dated for modern readers. Anyone with even a nodding education in physics or astronomy knows that his theories are ludicrous. But its not so much that Sitchin is an idiot but that he is a product of his times. Its like the 19th century physicists or modern occults use of the term "magnetism." It doesn't mean what the modern scientific definition of magnetism is. This is how Sitchin is with terminology like "radiation." I do not think Sitchin means the same thing that we, in the post-atomic age, know as radiation (visible light, gamma radiation, microwaves, the spectrum, etc etc).

Indeed, Sitchin has that quaint early 20th century idea that all radiation is good radiation. Nibiru didn't need the sun in the depths of space because it had its own "radiation" to keep it warm (kind of like a microwave!). I guess Sitchin never heard that, except for a very narrow band, most radiation is very very bad for organic life.

Wrapping your head around Sitchin's cosmology isn't just a stretch, its a rip. But if I was going to try, I'd say the closest anyone else has ever got to Sitchin's idea for Nibiru was Brian Aldiss' "Helliconia" series which postulates a planet with extreme climactic eras because of being in a double sun system. Could Nibiru's radiation keep something warm for 2,000 years of deep space? Oh sure, I can imagine silicon based lifeforms that could be bathed in microwave radiation like we sunbathe... make a good episode of Doctor Who, I bet!