Will, can you explain your astronomy point in light of the fact that the gemara itself (Pesachim 94 or nearby) says that the non-Jewish astronomers were correct and Chazal were wrong on the orbit of the Sun. Also the Rambam says in Hilchos Deyos that the Sun goes around the Earth, and is embedded in a sphere, and each of the planets is embedded in a hard sphere, as well, and there is no space in between the spheres. Also the dimensions of the Sun and Moon are about an order of magnitude off from currently accepted values.
This doesn’t bother me at all since the Rambam says in Kiddush Hachodesh 17,24 that anything proven mathematically or scientifically, even by a non-Jew carries the same weight as Divrei Neviim in halacha. So the Rambam in Deyos was going with the best science of his times, but would have been the first to say we should follow the best science of our day, not his day.
(Incidentally, you don’t mean to say that our astronomers don’t know orbits, do you, as if so, kindly explain how they got the 24 GPS satellites into correct orbit transmitting accurate positional information to your car.)