# Did medieval scholars argue over how many angels could dance on the head of a pin? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports\ **Created:** [January 18, 2015, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-medieval-scholars-argue-over-how-many-angels-could-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin/710179 "2015-01-18T16:44:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![pfk2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f04885/32.png) [@pfk2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pfk2)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-medieval-scholars-argue-over-how-many-angels-could-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin/710179/1 "2015-01-18T16:44:07Z")
[Did medieval scholars argue over how many angels could dance on the head of a pin?](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1008/did-medieval-scholars-argue-over-how-many-angels-could-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin) How could Cecil, writing in 1988, have known that Martinus Scriblerus would be available gratis on Google Books, when [Sergey Brin wouldn’t meet Larry Page until 1995](http://www.notablebiographies.com/news/Ow-Sh/Page-Larry-and-Brin-Sergey.html) and [Google Print wouldn’t arrive until 2004](http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2004/12/all-booked-up.html)? Stranger still, how did he quote [Koetsier and Bergman](http://books.google.com/books?id=AMOQZfrZq-EC&pg=PA251&lpg=PA251&dq=Mathematics+and+the+Divine+angels+know+things+more+clearly+in+a+morning&source=web&ots=q4ywufSsSi&sig=7OuXkvL3AM3mwi5Dw34tmr-gQ1U&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result) sixteen years before it was published? Is Cecil an angel? Can he travel through time? Does he pass through all the intermediate moments when he time-travels, or does he hop between the endpoints? Can he distinguish “before” and “after”, and did he write in 1988 of what he read in 2004 because he can know things more clearly in the past? If he _can_ time-travel, why didn’t he simply travel to 18th century London and ask D’Israeli himself for his sources? If his readers mutely allowed him to cite an unwritten book they surely would have accepted a two century old personal communication. Or is he only an angel from time to time, and not from place to place? I personally believe that Cecil _is_ an angel. His search of a 2005 volume on Google Books did not return “No preview available for this page.” What else could account for that? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-medieval-scholars-argue-over-how-many-angels-could-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin/710179/2 "2015-01-18T17:08:06Z")
It looks like Cecil occasionally updates his old online columns when he gets the chance. ---
**Author:** ![John\_W.Kennedy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_w.kennedy/32/1031_2.png) [@John\_W.Kennedy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_W.Kennedy)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2015, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-medieval-scholars-argue-over-how-many-angels-could-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin/710179/3 "2015-01-18T22:43:51Z")
It’s more complicated than that, and involves the intermediate era when Cecil was on AOL, rather than the Web, but yes. And sometimes the record of the updates is lost, although the updates aren’t, resulting in the “time travel” effect. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2015, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-medieval-scholars-argue-over-how-many-angels-could-dance-on-the-head-of-a-pin/710179/4 "2015-01-19T02:33:44Z")
So, a bit of the “wibbley-wobbley, timey-wimey?” I bet Ed hates that phrase. 😉