Prove or Disprove Flat Earth Theology

[Subduction Zone]

Which was silly of him, since Eratosthenes had estimated the circumference of the Earth pretty accurately in 300BC and his estimate would have been known to scholars of his time - if they believed it, of course.

It was well known. Columbus "knew" better: This article goes over some of his errors on page 16:


http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/...JRAS..16..152F&defaultprint=YES&filetype=.pdf

 

[exchemist]

It was well known. Columbus "knew" better: This article goes over some of his errors on page 16:


http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/...JRAS..16..152F&defaultprint=YES&filetype=.pdf

This is rather amusing. Columbus needed sponsors and, according to this, the rationale for sponsorship was the idea that it would be faster to get to India by sailing West than the overland route East. (Reminds me of that line in The Right Stuff: "Know what makes this bird go up? Funding makes this bird go up.").

So he basically chose to take Posidonius's wrong estimate and fiddle it further, to make the overland route seem to take up more degrees of longitude than it did which, by subtraction, left less for his new proposed sea route. Et voila! or rather Ecco! he got his sponsorship, and the rest is history!

 

[Subduction Zone]

This is rather amusing. Columbus needed sponsors and, according to this, the rationale for sponsorship was the idea that it would be faster to get to India by sailing West than the overland route East. (Reminds me of that line in The Right Stuff: "Know what makes this bird go up? Funding makes this bird go up.").

So he basically chose to take Posidonius's wrong estimate and fiddle it further, to make the overland route seem to take up more degrees of longitude than it did which, by subtraction, left less for his new proposed sea route. Et voila! or rather Ecco! he got his sponsorship, and the rest is history!

Here in the U.S. we used to get taught how Columbus discovered America because "he knew the Earth was round and others scoffed at him". It was a bit surprising to learn that it was the other way around. He was initially denied funding because he was wrong. But if one repeats a false claim often enough and others want to believe you, one can eventually convince others.

 

[exchemist]

This initially unpromising thread is getting rather informative!

 

[Jose Fly]

The psychology of this intrigues me. Why do people - who are not residents of secure psychiatric institutions - apparently feel the need to disbelieve something so ordinary and for which there is so much obvious evidence in the modern world?

I thought that was answered pretty clearly in this post: Prove or Disprove Flat Earth Theology

The spherical earth is a plot to undermine the Bible....isn't it obvious?

 

[exchemist]

Btw, you cannot by definition troll your own thread. And a strawman is something that one makes a position that is easy to defeat. Such as calling someone a troll and telling them they are making a strawman argument. These were simply abbreviated arguments through pictures.



And my grandpa worked for NASA designing suits. It's not like they don't give people stuff to do. But they deceive their own workers, because their agenda is the following.

I do not deny that outer space exists, necessarily. I do deny however that a rounded unenclosed plane can hold water.

But since we're talking NASA pictures, three things:
1. Stop motion filming and/or green screen
2. Timestamp manipulation
3. Voice overs.

All of these not only possible but easy to do. Hell, Hollywood in the 1920s could make people ride in cars and mess with backgrounds. So forgive me if I raise eyebrows on this "livestream" from space. How difficult would it be to re-record a tweaked live video? So I asked the internet.

How can I create a fake live video?
YouTube is overrun with fake livestreams

Yeah, uhhhh. Forgive me if I'm still not convinced.

I am not 220 lb nor a truck driver, sorry.

I found this today.


Military projectile equations assume a flat earth. Tell me, why would you assume a flat earth if you're on a spinning ball?

And NASA themselves put out at least one of these. Assuming you're using equations to get into space, why go to the trouble of... oh wait, I already told you. Are there possibly other planets which do not in fact have a flat Earth? Maybe so, but they would be significantly more inclined to crash space shuttles than a non-rotating flat Earth, where you just need the right angle of entry.

Actually military projectile equations do correct for something called the Coriolis effect. Here is an example: Do battleship gunners have to take the coriolis effect into account when firing? : askscience

You might want to look the Coriolis effect up and tell me how it arises on a flat Earth.

And wait a moment, what is this about you asking if there are "other planets which do not have a flat Earth"? What shape do you think these other planets have. Jupiter for example?

 

[exchemist]

I thought that was answered pretty clearly in this post: Prove or Disprove Flat Earth Theology

The spherical earth is a plot to undermine the Bible....isn't it obvious?

In the case of "Samantha", yes it looks like it. But it wasn't obvious that the jerks in Subduction Zone's video clip were bible nutters.

 

[Jose Fly]

In the case of "Samantha", yes it looks like it. But it wasn't obvious that the jerks in Subduction Zone's video clip were bible nutters.

Yeah, I wasn't sure about that either. But I will say, that film was awesome. My teenage kids loved it and cracked up at the end scene...."Well that's interesting". They still talk and joke about it. But it was a good illustration of how seemingly normal people can fall victim to some of the traps that lead to unreasonable thinking.

 

[Ouroboros]

And my grandpa worked for NASA designing suits. It's not like they don't give people stuff to do. But they deceive their own workers, because their agenda is the following.

Newton and many other scientists in the past were religious and Christian, and they all knew Earth was a sphere. It has nothing to do with atheism.

I do not deny that outer space exists, necessarily. I do deny however that a rounded unenclosed plane can hold water.

Gravity. 9 m/s^2.

But since we're talking NASA pictures, three things:
1. Stop motion filming and/or green screen
2. Timestamp manipulation
3. Voice overs.

You forget European space agency, Blue Origin, Space-X, and other space agencies and companies who are not part of the NASA conspiracy.

All of these not only possible but easy to do. Hell, Hollywood in the 1920s could make people ride in cars and mess with backgrounds. So forgive me if I raise eyebrows on this "livestream" from space. How difficult would it be to re-record a tweaked live video? So I asked the internet.

How can I create a fake live video?
YouTube is overrun with fake livestreams

Bunches of BS.

Military projectile equations assume a flat earth. Tell me, why would you assume a flat earth if you're on a spinning ball?

I told you one of my sons work at JPL. My second oldest son actually work in missile defense industry. You want me to ask him? It wouldn't make any difference though, would it? Nothing would convince you unless you were dragged out into space and put in EVA.

And NASA themselves put out at least one of these. Assuming you're using equations to get into space, why go to the trouble of... oh wait, I already told you. Are there possibly other planets which do not in fact have a flat Earth? Maybe so, but they would be significantly more inclined to crash space shuttles than a non-rotating flat Earth, where you just need the right angle of entry.

What about sling-shots around Earth? How did they do those? Also fake? Everything fake?

What is the purpose of all these fake science then? All these human beings included in this conspiracy of lies. What's the goal here?

 

[Polymath257]

Which was silly of him, since Eratosthenes had estimated the circumference of the Earth pretty accurately in 300BC and his estimate would have been known to scholars of his time - if they believed it, of course.

While it is true that Eratosthenes' value is very close to the real one, there was a LOT of debate about the size of the Earth during the middle ages. Not whether the Earth is spherical or not, just the size.

it turns out that some mathematicians in Baghdad set up some expeditions to determine the size of the Earth. They attempted to go to a very high mountain and measure the 'dip' from level to the horizon. The problem is that this angle is small, and so small errors lead to big errors in the size of the Earth.

Well, the value for the size of the Earth that they got was MUCH smaller than the one that Eratosthenes got. Columbus, from what I have seen, used the Islamic value and not the value given by Eratosthenes. With a smaller Earth, the distance to China would be much smaller.

 

[exchemist]

While it is true that Eratosthenes' value is very close to the real one, there was a LOT of debate about the size of the Earth during the middle ages. Not whether the Earth is spherical or not, just the size.

it turns out that some mathematicians in Baghdad set up some expeditions to determine the size of the Earth. They attempted to go to a very high mountain and measure the 'dip' from level to the horizon. The problem is that this angle is small, and so small errors lead to big errors in the size of the Earth.

Well, the value for the size of the Earth that they got was MUCH smaller than the one that Eratosthenes got. Columbus, from what I have seen, used the Islamic value and not the value given by Eratosthenes. With a smaller Earth, the distance to China would be much smaller.

Yes that's more or less I was saying later, in my commentary on Subduction Zone's link, except that the linked article seemed to suggest Columbus used the smaller figure attributed to Posidonius, as a result of confusion among later scholars about the units of length etc., rather than an erroneous Baghdad estimate.

 

[paarsurrey]

So ummm, I took a trip to China in like 2005. I noticed that rather than going from LA to China directly east to west, we instead flew directly north through the Arctic Circle. The official reasoning behind this is that planes need to be near land in case of emergency, but c'mon, this is 2019 and seaplanes were invented during the Midway campaigns of WWII. Pretty sure a water landing is safer than a crash landing in the ice.

However, when you look at one of those overhead maps of the Earth, it suddenly makes sense, as you're flying overland in a mostly straight line.

Is it because of one's religion that one believes that Earth is flat?

Regards

 

[Polymath257]

Yes that's more or less I was saying later, in my commentary on Subduction Zone's link, except that the linked article seemed to suggest Columbus used the smaller figure attributed to Posidonius, as a result of confusion among later scholars about the units of length etc., rather than an erroneous Baghdad estimate.

At the very least, the story that Columbus was 'trying to prove the world is round' is complete mythology.

He was working for an estimate that the Earth is smaller than others thought. Both sides had some reasonable evidence on their side. Columbus turned out to be wrong about the size and his opponents turned out to be correct.

 

[Samantha Rinne]

There's a difference between velocity and acceleration. You can feel changes in velocity and acceleration/deceleration, but you don't feel inertia. With that said, Earth's velocity does change through space, but compared to the strength of gravity, it's too small to notice for human balance sense.

Fair enough. But traveling at a constant (velocity) versus moving faster or slower (acceleration), still exerts a "pull" on the body.

Let's take a trip to the amusement park. Mine has a chair where you pull yourself up, and then you drop. During the ride up, there is virtually no acceleration, and yet your body can definitely feel yourself getting hoisted up. Then you drop and there is velocity and acceleration (until finally you get scared and try to slow the thing down). There's the roller coasters that are likewise pulled along a track, but on the slower end, some of them have a bicycle type ride where you have to push the ride along slowly (this would be horizontal rather than vertical velocity, and believe me there is not much acceleration going on). And finally, you have spinning rides. Okay, so here's where it gets interesting. You see, the tiny spinning cups you can stay in, no problem. But then there is a spinning room, where it feels like the floor drops out, but actually your seat has been forced upwards.

Hmmmm, I wonder what would happen if you weren't fastened in, or the ceiling came off? You see, faster spinning doesn't tend to hold things in place. Quite the opposite, really. And you notice people stop drifting upward when it STOPS spinning? Cuz I did. And you would DEFINITELY notice clouds turning around us at, what did I say, close to 1000 mph?

But since it's still not sinking in, let's also discuss the problems of liquid within a surface.

The top part is supposed to be water poured in. As you can see here, these are convex ("rounded") surfaces, and concave ("flat"), one of these, no matter how fast it turns, should not be able to hold water. What can hold water...

http://www.poolpro.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/tiled-explainer.jpg

Here's another thing, I live in California and most of my family live in Sweden. 9 hours difference. When we have morning here, they have evening there. When we have evening here, they have morning there. I can call any time to confirm this, and even Skype them and tell there's a difference in time. This wouldn't happen if Earth was flat. Either they're paid by NASA to lie (my 90 year old mom who doesn't speak English?) or perhaps me and my wife and kids here are all lying to them about what time we have here and using software to mimic day and night? Either alternative is ludicrous. Besides, I've flown between the countries at 33,000 feet altitude over Alaska and the North Pole to take the shortest path between the continents, also only possible if there's a curvature.

Ummm, dude, time zones have little or nothing to do with the Earth's rotation. They have to do with two things. (1) Arbitrary assignment, as in, you can start the morning at 6am or 7am or 8am. In fact, do we not have Daylight Savings Time in the US to do exactly that? To dictate that 6am is now 7am, or vice versa? (2) The relative position of the sun with regards to your location, with regards to the day. Time zones, by the way were set up in response to railroads. Originally, every major town had a slight displacement (usually only a few minutes, every few miles apart, but it added up) but then governments standardized things. Of course, the problem now is that aside from the movement of the sun, you have no way of knowing the actual time anymore.

Why Do We Have Time Zones?

Btw, I have a friend in Germany. This is not proof or disproof. It's a side note.

You're also acting like I'm saying people are "in on it" possibly as an attempt to strawman this. Sure, okay, let's look at this. The average teacher in school would have to also be "in on it" but they don't appear to all be CIA or other government agents. Rather, they seem to just be people who got a four year degree mainly for working hard and not questioning what they are told. Math teachers are also taught to use order of operations. Have any of them bothered to work such equations out?

PE
MD
AS

Easy, right? Well ummm. If you've at all seen Facebook, you've probably noticed that they leave these challenge math questions, that people get three or four different ways. This is because problems like

86+85+84/3

get run through the order of operations. But this is obviously an average! A graphing calculator will get this wrong, dividing first or 86+85+(84/3) but one of those old dumb solar calculators will correctly crunch together numbers as an average (86+85+84)/3. But teachers don't really teach most students this. They hammer into their heads the order of operations, then the students are later surprised when things don't add up properly. It was because your teacher, who you idolize, never taught you to think about why we know what we know! Your teachers failed you.

 

[Polymath257]

Fair enough. But traveling at a constant (velocity) versus moving faster or slower (acceleration), still exerts a "pull" on the body.

No, it does not. One of Newton's laws is F=ma. Forces produce acceleration, not velocity.

Let's take a trip to the amusement park. Mine has a chair where you pull yourself up, and then you drop. During the ride up, there is virtually no acceleration, and yet your body can definitely feel yourself getting hoisted up.

There *is* an acceleration. The chair itself is exerting a force on you, countering the force of gravity. You feel that force.

Then you drop and there is velocity and acceleration (until finally you get scared and try to slow the thing down). There's the roller coasters that are likewise pulled along a track, but on the slower end, some of them have a bicycle type ride where you have to push the ride along slowly (this would be horizontal rather than vertical velocity, and believe me there is not much acceleration going on). And finally, you have spinning rides. Okay, so here's where it gets interesting. You see, the tiny spinning cups you can stay in, no problem. But then there is a spinning room, where it feels like the floor drops out, but actually your seat has been forced upwards.

Acceleration is a change in velocity, which is a vector. In other words, if you change direction, you are also accelerating. This happens in such rides.

Gravity is *one* force on an object. For things on the Earth, the acceleration due to gravity is about 32 ft/s^2. But there are also other forces, like friction, buoyancy, electrical forces, etc. All those forces (the vectors) add together to give the total force on an object, which then will give the acceleration.

Easy, right? Well ummm. If you've at all seen Facebook, you've probably noticed that they leave these challenge math questions, that people get three or four different ways. This is because problems like

86+85+84/3

get run through the order of operations. But this is obviously an average! A graphing calculator will get this wrong, dividing first or 86+85+(84/3) but one of those old dumb solar calculators will correctly crunch together numbers as an average (86+85+84)/3. But teachers don't really teach most students this. They hammer into their heads the order of operations, then the students are later surprised when things don't add up properly. It was because your teacher, who you idolize, never taught you to think about why we know what we know! Your teachers failed you.

Well, someone failed, that's for sure. The order of operations is specifically because there are times when it *isn't* obvious which order to do things. In your example, it is, in fact, a mistake to put in the numbers without a parenthesis around them before dividing. The old calculator is NOT doing the 'correct' calculation. There *are* times when you want the 86+85+(84/3) as your answer.

The trick is to know when. I always tell my students not to use a calculator as an idiot box: a box with an idiot pressing the buttons. You have to know how your calculator works and you have to know what it is you want to calculate and why.

 

[Samantha Rinne]

Actually military projectile equations do correct for something called the Coriolis effect. Here is an example: Do battleship gunners have to take the coriolis effect into account when firing? : askscience

You might want to look the Coriolis effect up and tell me how it arises on a flat Earth.

And wait a moment, what is this about you asking if there are "other planets which do not have a flat Earth"? What shape do you think these other planets have. Jupiter for example?

The driving question in all of this is, "How can we know what we know?" I have never, even on a night when I supposedly could see Mars, actually clearly been able to see the thing. And the fact that everything was flipped eventually made me give up in frustration . I think we sold or gave away our telescope.

If you're like most people, the only Mars you have even seen is by a picture. The problem with this, is that we live in a digital age where not only photographs but entire videos can be fake. No? You don't believe me? Then explain the movie Interstellar where they literally made like three planets out of whole cloth. Awhile ago (you can search my posts on this thread), I have a video where multiple military documents are like "assuming a nonmoving and flat land (why are they assuming that)" so I asked myself that exact quest and, I came up with this answer: They are not necessarily asserting that the Earth is flat, these are calculations for takeoff and landing given those equations. This tells me that the idea that neither you nor NASA mentioned aloud is that this universal idea that all planets must be a single shape is not so. There are tidally locked planets, one that is completely dark but for red spot, some are made of ice or gas, but nah planets can't have different shapes or rotations. This is assuming of course...

IF there are other planets. All we have is pictures, and I just saw an old B/W show about a police fraud division, whipere this guy convinced these investors that he had other successful oil drilling stations else by showing them stock pictures. So, before any of you sleep tonight... You will need to look up quantum theory, specifically the notion of holographic universe. Got it? Now tell me, does a fish in a bowl necessarily know there is something out it? Btw, someone will also need to answer how we got pictures of the Milky Way (we're inside of it, and as far as I know, none of these could have made it this far as of yet, given light years refers to distance it takes something going at light speed years to get to). For that matter, is it even relevant to talk about such things, as some are supposedly so many light years away that they are already gone by the time we see them or whatever so yeah, major moot point.

Now back to what I was saying these calculations assume a flat nonmoving land. So why do they work? Either the moon or the Earth is what they mean in this estimation, or they are one day planning to land on such terrain. But the thing is, not only do they mention calculations in NASA launches, but they mention it for helicopter trajectory. While it could make sense to know this for takeoff on an unfamiliar planet, we would assume rounded Earth calculations. So what do you think would happen if you curved your helicopter downward to adjust for the curve so you wouldn't "fly out into space" (I mean c'mon that's the straw man that is always used that you somehow fall off the edge of a flat Earth) what would you expect to happen? And why don't you ever see helicopters do this? They fly straight.

Okay, why don't You "fall off the edge"? Well, because while I definitely don't accept the concept of a round Earth (anymore), the Earth is disc-shaped not square.

Gleason's new standard map of the world - Norman B. Leventhal Map & Education Center

This means that north is toward the center, south is away, and east and west are actually curved.

Now, why do I reject a sphere as a model? Alright, let's try something. Hang upside down and see how long it takes for your eyes to bulge. Our bodies are not designed this way and so if you were at the part of the Earth that was upside-down, you would have to be in steady proximity to the group or blood would rush to you brain. This means in order to be able to stand at all places the same way without head rush, the magnetic/gravity field is towards Earth's center rather than towards Earth's north, which would mean all compasses everywhere are screwed up. Also simple horizontal rotation wouldn't work on all directions, the Earth would have to be spinning in a pattern more like an atom than a straight line. And this doesn't even account for the fact that flying in a hang glider, you'd probably get this sensation if that were true, but again, not a shred of even anecdotal evidence that northern or souther hemisphere makes any difference. Flying upside-down? Yes, you get head rush.

(Btw Coriolis effect, works in a horizontal space only, there is no vertical equivalent, which is consistent with direction away from pole but not given that some things are vertical flips of each other, as would be the case in a perfect sphere)

Curved disc? Sure! Round sphere? Prove it!

This, as well as the fact that all of Earth's water would essentially leave (since despite surface tension or cohesion, water doesn't cling permanently to surfaces even on flat ground), dripping down the bottom without something containing it... Btw, if other planets exist, we can safely assume Mars is in fact round, and this is what happened to it seeing as it used to have water, now most of it is gone.

 

[Darkstorn]

This, as well as the fact that all of Earth's water would essentially leave (since despite surface tension or cohesion, water doesn't cling permanently to surfaces even on flat ground), dripping down the bottom without something containing it... Btw, if other planets exist, we can safely assume Mars is in fact round, and this is what happened to it seeing as it used to have water, now most of it is gone.

If you don't think other planets are verified to exist, then you can't even safely assume Mars exists, let alone assume a bunch of variables and features attached to it, and then use these variables as reasoning for Earth being flat. You're getting ahead of yourself there.

This has got to be the stupidest thing i've ever read. Anywhere.

 

[Polymath257]

The driving question in all of this is, "How can we know what we know?" I have never, even on a night when I supposedly could see Mars, actually clearly been able to see the thing. And the fact that everything was flipped eventually made me give up in frustration . I think we sold or gave away our telescope.

Unfortunately, Mars is *very* difficult to observe in an amateur telescope. Jupiter and Saturn are considerably easier.

The problem is that planets are a *long* distance away and fairly small. Mars, in particular, is small and the patterns are very dim. Even in a *good* amateur scope, it is considered a very tough object to see unless the (Earth's) atmosphere is *very* still.

And, another thing. The telescopes you get at department stores tend to be crap. The have poor quality optics, poor mounts, and really, really bad lenses.

Given that, I am not surprised at your experience. It is, unfortunately, the experience of many. If you were expecting to see what the large, professional scopes are able to see with time exposed pictures, disappointment is inevitable.

That said, Jupiter is pretty easy to observe, even in the crappy department store telescopes. The four largest moon are easy to spot and follow from night to night as they orbit the planet. Saturn is smaller and farther away that Jupiter, but it is easy to see the rings and follow at least one moon (Titan) as it orbits.

One of my best experiences was looking through my 12.4" reflector and seeing the swirls in the cloud bands on Jupiter. The sky was very still that morning.

But I have certainly seen Mars as a disk (very tough), as well as phases of Venus (which are rather difficult to explain for either a geocentric or a flat-Earth model). I've also seen other galaxies. While I did NOT see the detail that you get from the nice professional instruments, I did see enough to verify that those instruments are showing something that is really there.

 

[Samantha Rinne]

If you don't think other planets are verified to exist, then you can't even safely assume Mars exists, let alone assume a bunch of variables and features attached to it, and then use these variables as reasoning for Earth being flat. You're getting ahead of yourself there.

This has got to be the stupidest thing i've ever read. Anywhere.

Alright then. I have a gold mine for you. Act now before others swallow it up. Remember, I'll only share this payout if you help me with the start up costs. But look, here's a a series of pictures I took of it. What's that you say? They look grainy almost like a picture of a painting? Why, that's just because the lighting was poor!

You think that sounds silly? Trusting only someone's words and a pretty picture? Well uhh that's what you've done. Sent your (or someone else's) hard earned tax money to NASA. Forgive if I say "Unless I see the marks on his hand and his side..." Show me the thing. Oh but no, civilians aren't allowed into space, at least not until we perfect augmented reality simulations . I mean uhhh the rockets.

Could Mars exist, sure maybe. Does Mars look like its description? Maybe not.

 

[Polymath257]

Alright then. I have a gold mine for you. Act now before others swallow it up. Remember, I'll only share this payout if you help me with the start up costs. But look, here's a a series of pictures I took of it. What's that you say? They look grainy almost like a picture of a painting? Why, that's just because the lighting was poor!

You think that sounds silly? Trusting only someone's words and a pretty picture? Well uhh that's what you've done. Sent your (or someone else's) hard earned tax money to NASA. Forgive if I say "Unless I see the marks on his hand and his side..." Show me the thing. Oh but no, civilians aren't allowed into space, at least not until we perfect augmented reality simulations . I mean uhhh the rockets.

Could Mars exist, sure maybe. Does Mars look like its description? Maybe not.

You can see Mars without a telescope. It is fairly bright and deep red. You won't be able to see a disk without a good telescope, though.