A major problem is that most people's knowledge is built almost entirely on social consensus and not on personal observation; yet, despite this fragile foundati

A major problem is that most people's knowledge is built almost entirely on social consensus and not on personal observation; yet, despite this fragile foundation, they feel extremely confident about the correctness of their knowledge. IMO most people who call flat-earthers 'stupid' are what I would call 'educated idiots'. Most people who call flat-earthers stupid do so based on a weak foundation of consensus knowledge that they pulled out of a few junior-school-level textbooks and space movies; they never actually read serious scientific research about the subject or did their own experiments. One's inability to distinguish which parts of one's own knowledge is built purely on social consensus from those parts that are built on first-hand observable evidence and critical experimentation is a sign of stupidity.