Are "flat-earthers" an actual thing?

Legit question wrote:

What proof do you have? You been indoctrinated since birth with globes from: elementary school, TV, movies, Sesame Street, Disney and NASA. You can test just about anything for yourself, fire burns, water is wet, drop something it falls to the floor, etc. This can be observed and tested by yourself.

However, when it comes to the shape of the Earth, it is based on what you were told. Nobody tests this on their own. If you ask anyone on the street, how do they they know that they they live a ball, eventually they will lean on NASA or some other space agency in their country, "I've seen the pictures, I've seen the satellite shots, or a streaming video from the ISS, etc"

NASA was started in 1958

The first picture of the Earth from space in full sunlight was taken in 1972 by Apollo 17

The second picture of Earth wasn't taken until 2015 That was 43 yrs later!

My point is this, if the first picture was taken in 1972, how did you know before, that we lived on a globe? And the answer will inevitably be "Science. Science told us!" Science is not infallible, it is an institution like anything else. If they (science) figured out it was NOT a globe after preaching it for 500 years, would they tell you? If you're naive enough, to believe it, of course they would disclose it to us..." Yeah right.

By the way, the whole globe concept began about 500 years ago, not 2000 years ago.

Legit question wrote:

The Sun cannot be 93 million miles away.  For example, under certain conditions you can even see the Sun appear to start at a near point and grow many times bigger as it passes over the camera and then reduces in size as the Sun moves away toward the vanishing point.  This would be impossible if the Sun was 93 million miles away.  One of the most common objections to the flat Earth is the claim that a sunset is impossible on a flat Earth, i.e., the Sun should appear to move further away not get sliced from the bottom up.

There are three different kinds of sunsets:

* Land Horizon (most common)

* Atmospheric Blocking (best at measuring the change of sun size)

* Cloud Horizon

Most people see the “Land Horizon” sunset on a daily basis and so have a mistaken conception of how the Sun works because the Sun is disappearing behind a mountain or land, not the curvature of the Earth. 

With "Atmospheric Blocking” the sunset shows a clear change in the size of the Sun as the Sun moves away across the flat plane and shrinks to a near point.  Several videos prove the same.  If the Earth was a globe, there would NEVER be a change in the size of the Sun. 

Also, keep in mind that the “Cloud Horizon” occurs very often (even over land) because perspective causes the clouds to “bunch up” at the horizon (more clouds over a given area) which causes the typical sunset like the “Land Horizon.”

Sunsets on flat Earth:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8Uj0FgDP38

Sun rays prove flat Earth:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_ppPXChyTo

Ground Control to Major Sun wrote:

The problem with debating flat-earth "youtube" scientists is that they pretend to play science, by selecting and describing selected observations, but tend to downplay, ignore, or reject measurable, observable, repeatedly testable scientific findings, while simultaneously, yet unknowingly, demonstrating a profound lack of understanding of the model they are trying to debunk. This makes the kind of argument you seek very frustrating, as the flat-earther is not aware that he does not know what he does not know, and is not capable of seeing why the flat-earth arguments fail.

Flat-earth arguments often depend on declaring some fabricated rule or law or axiom, taken for granted not based on science, to demonstrate some contradiction, .e.g "the horizon always rises to eye-level -- this is not possible on a globe earth". While the first part seems to be observably true, we will see to a large extent, this is also expected, using the globe earth model. Other fabrications include a Law of Density to replace Gravity (rather than confirming it), and a Law of Perspective to explain sunsets (which do not satisfactorily explain them).

Let's attack three flat-earth topics:

1) Conspiracy by NASA: The globe earth model is over 2000 years old, dating back to the ancient Greeks, before the birth of Jesus. The circumference of the sphere has been accurately estimated by at least two independent methods -- 1) measuring shadows of two sticks in two largely separated locations, 2) measuring the angle of the horizon as viewed from a high mountain top with a known height. Practically all civilizations have transitioned from a flat-earth model to the Greek spherical model, based on physical observations and accurate measurements. Since then the spherical model has only been refined slightly, due to more accurate observations and measurements, and never in the "flat" direction.

NASA was only formed in 1958. NASA's contribution to the "globe earth" model is virtually non-existent. NASA uses the globe earth model to make rocket flight possible. With the inclusion and proliferation of other governments, and private industry, NASA is a relatively minor organization with minor influence in the space industry. NASA's budget peaked in 1966, at 4.4% of the federal budget, and has been steadily declining ever-since, until 2012. In 2012 it was 0.5%.

While NASA agrees, and indeed relies on, the "globe earth" model, it has played virtually no role in the formation of the globe earth model.

2) Line of sight experiments

Atmospheric refraction is a known, observable, and measurable phenomenon. Anyone who has ever seen heat-haze off of hot asphalt on a summer day should be aware of the ability of heat to distort light -- even laser light. Measuring "flatness" over calm cool water on a clear hot summer day produces ideal conditions for bending light, making remote distant objects visible, when they would otherwise be too far to see.

To gain more credibility flat-earth scientists should repeat their experiments on clear winter days, without such thermal differences in the layers of the air. Or repeat them on land, in the hot desert to observe how much the visible distance will actually shrink.

3) The horizon always rises to eye-level -- this is (allegedly) impossible in a globe earth model

This one will be longer, as I will list the results of 10th grade mathematics to describe where the globe earth model predicts the horizon should be, compared to eye-level.

First, it should be noted that for relatively small surface areas, the differences between the flat earth and the globe earth are not significant. If the horizon rises when the eye level goes from 8 inches to 6 feet, we should observe a similar "rise in the horizon" with both models. The challenge is to understand how small is "relatively small", and how high we need to go to start seeing some curvature effect.

Now let's imagine we have a hula-hoop placed at eye-level with our eyes at the center of the hoop. Although we know the hoop is round, we cannot see any roundness from our vantage point. As we place it lower, to gain a vantage point from above, we can begin to see the roundness of the hoop.

To scale it to the real world, imagine a much larger hula-hoop, 1 mile in radius, and we descend this loop by 8 inches. How much curve would you expect to see?

Similarly, a 3 mile radius hula-hoop, descending it by 6 feet, how much curvature would you expect to see?

It's hard to say, without doing these experiments, and without real numbers. But it should be easy to understand, that the curvature becomes more visible, as the hoop descends with respect to eye-level. In trigonometric terms, this is connected to the "sin" of the viewing angle of the eyes, with respect a perfectly "horizontal" eye-level.

Let's try to put some numbers on this. Luckily, using basic trigonometry, we can estimate what the globe earth model predicts, for both the distance of the horizon, as well as the viewing angle below eye-level -- how far we need to tilt our head down to see the horizon, as the eye level gets higher.

The globe earth model says the radius of the earth is 3959 miles.

If eye-level is 8 inches, the visible horizon 1 mile away, and the viewing angle to the horizon is visible 0.0144 degrees downward, from eye-level.

If eye-level is 6 feet, the horizon is 3 miles away, and the viewing angle drops 0.043 degrees from eye-level.

If we are on a mountain at 10000 ft, the horizon is 122 miles away, and the viewing angle is 1.77 degrees below eye-level.

Some curvature should be detectable, but it will be very minor as the sin(1.77) is 0.03. Any curvature measurement must accurately tuned to detect this expected small change.

If we are on a plane at 30000 ft, the horizon is 212 miles away, and the viewing angle is 3.07 degrees below eye-level.

If we launch an amateur balloon with a Go-Pro camera to 100000 ft, the horizon is 388 miles away, and the viewing angle is 5.6 degrees.

From the space station, at a height of 250 miles, the horizon is 1429 miles away, and the viewing angle is now 19.8 degrees below horizontal.

Note, although the horizon is 1429 miles from the eye, the radius of the horizon ring on the surface of the earth is only 1344 miles.

From a MEO orbit at 1243 miles, the horizon is 3374 miles in radius, and the viewing angle now drops to a significant 40.4 degrees.

Note even at this great height of 1243 miles above the surface of the globe earth, we can only see a 2568 mile radius circle of the rounded surface of the earth, while the half of the earth facing us has a 6219 mile radius -- we can only see about 1/6 of the surface that is facing in our direction.

From GPS satellites at a height of 12540 miles, the horizon is 16017 miles away, and the viewing angle is now 76 degrees.

From GEO satellites, at a height of 22236 miles, the horizon is 25894 miles away, and the viewing angle is 81.3 degrees.

All of these figures are what the globe earth model predicts -- as high up as 100000 ft, our eye-level is still fairly horizontal -- even at 100000 ft., we only have to tilt our head down from horizontal by 5.6 degrees.

The point here is not to declare the globe model as correct, but to show that the globe model predicts the horizon to also rise, almost one for one, with the eye-level, until we get to heights much farther up than an amateur balloon has flown.

"This is not possible with the globe model" is demonstrably false, and represents a lack of understanding of the globe model.

Some experiments flat earthers can do. Go to a high mountain or to the top of a large building on a clear day. The horizon, and viewing angle, on a global model will be easily calculated. The flat earther can measure the actual visibility and viewing angle. On a flat model, with sufficient visibility, we should be able to see much farther than the global model predicts.

4) I'm still waiting for an explanation of how the sun can illuminate Australia, Africa, and South America at the same time. Someone sent Rob Skiba of a 24 hour day in Antarctica. He (wrongly) suggested this contradicts a claim that South America doesn't experience any 24 hour days (it wouldn't at only 46 degrees south latitude) and suggested that their might be a fake sun because of a NASA "star" patent. It's all much more simply explained by the mathematics of a spinning globe tilted on its axis as it goes around the sun each year.

Also note in one of your videos, Rob Skiba agreed with global earthers, that the flat earth map is accurate in direction and distance from the north pole, but distorted in the longitude direction. He didn't think he could produce an accurate flat map. Despite rating himself only an 8 on the scale of 1-10 of being a flat earther, at least he is honest enough to admit there are parts that trouble him, that he hasn't quite figured out yet.

Legit question wrote:

What is your argument? You have nothing.

MEL Rnr wrote:

Legit question wrote:

As mentioned several times, water always seeks its flatness. It is part of the natural physics of water. This fundamental physical property of fluids finding and remaining level is consistent with experience and common sense.

If, however, the Earth is a giant wobbly spinning ball, tilted on its vertical axis flying through the Milky Way then it follows that truly flat, consistently level water cannot happen. It would show that the oceans must maintain a certain convexity- which is not observed and never ever happens and more importantly be in direct violation to the physics of water.

Water does not flow uphill, that is impossible and violates physics. As for your "toward the horizon is not downhill'- we agree. The horizon is not curved, it is flat. You must be a closet flat earther, ha!

The oceans actually bulge and are not flat. The oceans bulge for a number of reasons, the other easiest to see is the tides. Lunar tides occur because of the Moon's gravitational pull as it orbits the Earth.

I don't know why I'm bothering to respond to you. I don't think you actually believe what you are saying. It's such absolute nonsense, that it has to be trolling.