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Literacy does not imply believing in the round earth. Proving the earth is round to yourself without trusting outside influences is not a trivial pursuit.
by thethirdone 5y ago
Literacy does not imply believing in the round earth. Proving the earth is round to yourself without trusting outside influences is not a trivial pursuit.
- nitwit005 5y agoIt's much harder to prove the Earth is flat. You run into really basic questions like, where is the edge, and why does no one find it? The theory only "holds together", with the assumption that everyone that works in any field even vaguely related to travel or communication is part of a conspiracy to hide the truth.
- mhh__ 5y agoThese days all you need is someone with a phone and a stick in another country to perform Erastosthenes's experiment, right?
- 0x7E3 5y agoDoesn't Erastosthenes's experiment merely allow you to calculate the size of the earth if you already accept that it is spherical? As I understand the experiment it does not (nor was it meant to) prove that the earth is a sphere.
- mhh__ 5y agoCan flat earth explain the phenomenon in a parsimonious way?
- 0x7E3 5y agoIt's probably going to depend on what you mean by 'the phenomenon'. Do you mean that the sun casts shadows at different angles at the same time of day based on your location? Then yes, it absolutely does. In fact some believers in the flat earth theory use the experiment to establish the distance of the sun from the earth. If you mean something else, then I have no idea. I'm not a proponent of the flat earth theory, nor am I a mind reader. The experiment you proposed does not disprove the theory of a flat earth though, parsimoniously or otherwise. It sounds like you may have rejected the notion of a flat earth purely on faith after all?
- mhh__ 5y agoWhat distance do they find? My googling yields nothing. The results must also be consistent with the "circumference" of the earth. And yes, I reject all other evidence but this.
- 0xcde4c3db 5y agoThe thing is that functionally speaking, the flat Earth movement isn't about proving whether the Earth is round or flat. It's about camaraderie in the quest for the hidden knowledge that "they" don't want you to have.
- pintxo 5y agoTake your next vacation at the sea, watch ships approaching the Harbour not just growing in size but also appearing to rise up from the water. Voilà
- marginalia_nu 5y agoIf you drop water onto a flat sheet of glass, surface tension will give its surface a lenticular shape.
- 0x7E3 5y agoIf that's all it takes to prove the earth is round it seems consistent to accept Fata Morgana as proof that gravity can fail once you get far enough away from the coast.
- PeterWhittaker 5y agoFairly trivial: https://www.astro.princeton.edu/~dns/teachersguide/MeasECAct.html https://www.astro.princeton.edu/~dns/teachersguide/MeasECAct...
- thethirdone 5y agoUnfortunately, atmospheric effects make it hard to completely remove doubt. This is definitely evidence that round earth is true, but not conclusive. It also requires you being able to derive those equations which is more than many people would be comfortable with. Especially if you think that "they" are lying to you, this could be a repeatable but cherry-picked piece of evidence that has a requires a more complicated explanation.
- PeterWhittaker 5y agoThe point is that there are many relatively straightforward ways to calculate curvature, from the sunrise/sunset technique to Erastothenes to watching sailing ships dip below the horizon and many more. The math may be beyond some people but the effects at play cannot be explained by a flat Earth. Part of the overall thread was along the lines of we should respect flat earthers, they improve rigour. It seems to me that the only sensible responses to that are the counter illustrations of just easily disproved a notion it is. Far more effort goes into supporting this ridiculousness than did into establishing rough shape and size.