Are "flat-earthers" an actual thing?

Legit question wrote:

Ship captains when navigating great distance at sea never factor in the supposed curvature of the earth into their calculations. Both plane sailing and great circle sailing use plane trigonometry, not spherical. All mathematical

calculations are on the assumption that the Earth is perfectly flat. If the Earth were in fact a sphere, such an errant assumption would lead to constant glaring inaccuracies. Plane Sailing has worked perfectly fine in both theory and practice for thousands of years, however, and plane trigonometry has time and again proven more accurate than spherical trigonometry in determining distances across the oceans.

They are Ship Captains, not Mathematicians. That is why people have to wait for their ship to come in. Bad Math.

Legit question wrote:

Ship captains when navigating great distance at sea never factor in the supposed curvature of the earth into their calculations. Both plane sailing and great circle sailing use plane trigonometry, not spherical. All mathematical

calculations are on the assumption that the Earth is perfectly flat. If the Earth were in fact a sphere, such an errant assumption would lead to constant glaring inaccuracies. Plane Sailing has worked perfectly fine in both theory and practice for thousands of years, however, and plane trigonometry has time and again proven more accurate than spherical trigonometry in determining distances across the oceans.

Ummm, what were you saying dumbf*ck?

coach deez nuts wrote:

Legit question wrote:

Ship captains when navigating great distance at sea never factor in the supposed curvature of the earth into their calculations. Both plane sailing and great circle sailing use plane trigonometry, not spherical. All mathematical

calculations are on the assumption that the Earth is perfectly flat. If the Earth were in fact a sphere, such an errant assumption would lead to constant glaring inaccuracies. Plane Sailing has worked perfectly fine in both theory and practice for thousands of years, however, and plane trigonometry has time and again proven more accurate than spherical trigonometry in determining distances across the oceans.

http://www.sailingissues.com/navcourse5.html

Ummm, what were you saying dumbf*ck?

"Correction for water height can be left out". I stand by my previous statement. Try again.

hear ya go wrote:

Another interesting discussion. Long railway tunnels. Tunnels of continuous rise, whether level or slight incline/decline, result in curved structures that follow the curvature of the Earth.

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1061231

Engineer W. Winckler (Published in Earth Review) regarding the Earth’s supposed curvature, stating, “As an engineer of many years standing, I saw that this absurd allowance is only permitted in school books. No engineer would dream of allowing anything of the kind. I have projected many miles of railways and many more of canals and the allowance has not even been thought of, much less allowed for.

This allowance for curvature means this - that it is 8” for the first mile of a canal, and increasing at the ratio by the square of the distance in miles; thus a small navigable canal for boats, say 30 miles long, will have, by the above rule an allowance for curvature of 600 feet. Think of that and then please credit engineers as not being quite such fools. Nothing of the sort is allowed. We no more think of allowing 600 feet for a line of 30 miles of railway or canal, than of wasting our time trying to square the circle"

Do things change on the moon where the curvature is more pronounced?

Would railroad tracks be designed differently?

Legit question wrote:

hear ya go wrote:

Another interesting discussion. Long railway tunnels. Tunnels of continuous rise, whether level or slight incline/decline, result in curved structures that follow the curvature of the Earth.

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1061231

Engineer W. Winckler (Published in Earth Review) regarding the Earth’s supposed curvature, stating, “As an engineer of many years standing, I saw that this absurd allowance is only permitted in school books. No engineer would dream of allowing anything of the kind. I have projected many miles of railways and many more of canals and the allowance has not even been thought of, much less allowed for."

Except for tunnels.

Flat earth proponents are winning this argument thus far. Did not see that coming. I thought this thread would have ended with page 1. I noticed that some of the globe supporters just resort to jokes.

Legit question wrote:

Ship captains when navigating great distance at sea never factor in the supposed curvature of the earth into their calculations. Both plane sailing and great circle sailing use plane trigonometry, not spherical. All mathematical

calculations are on the assumption that the Earth is perfectly flat. If the Earth were in fact a sphere, such an errant assumption would lead to constant glaring inaccuracies. Plane Sailing has worked perfectly fine in both theory and practice for thousands of years, however, and plane trigonometry has time and again proven more accurate than spherical trigonometry in determining distances across the oceans.

You are both right and wrong, but you are right for the wrong reasons and draw the wrong conclusions as a result.

As a side note, one of the early problems in long distance navigation was determining an accurate longitude. One way to do this is to compare local noontime with GMT noontime, but that required very accurate clocks. There were (complex) mathematical techniques that were used as well. Determining the latitude was easy (height of the sun at noon). These calculations would be very different on a flat Earth. Different enough to notice.

Anyway, ships today will almost certainly use GPS, so that's that. Ships of the past could navigate on a constant compass setting, which wasn't the most direct route between two points, but was usually pretty good. This was the origin of the Mercator projection (the one that makes Greenland look huge and Africa look tiny) - it made this calculation trivial (essentially, draw a line from where you are to where you want to be. Measure the angle relative to the equator. Follow that compass heading. As long as you aren't going *too* far north or south it works well). The practice was messier.

For short trips the Earth is flat enough to ignore curvature. After all, if you end up 10 miles off at your destination it's not the end of the world. Similarly, when you want to go from the Earth to the moon you tend to ignore the gravitational effects of the sun, but you have to take them into account when going to Mars.

But I know that you are trolling.

Just goes to show that LRC is still the most entertaining part of my work day.

call me troll? Fine, but most of rhese globe support replies either been defeated or called a draw. There are other Flat Earth supporters on this thread who have chimed in. I think I proved that this was not the easy argument that many of you Globalists thought it was. Otherwise, this thread would be done.

Do you realize the implications this holds for the global climate change theorists? If our oceans are bordered on all sides by Antarctica, then if those ice packs melt, our oceans will drain off the edges to somewhere in the universe. Maybe our water will transfer to venus who will then be able to support life, or at lease get a good cleansing.

Yet, more proof that Science and Al Gore are wrong. Global climate change will result in a massive decease in the levels of the ocean, not in a rise. You can tell the low lying areas not to worry any more. But the fish and sharks should be concerned. I am looking forward to this, because it will be easy to find sunken treasure and the remains of MH370.

Legit question wrote:

call me troll? Fine, but most of rhese globe support replies either been defeated or called a draw. There are other Flat Earth supporters on this thread who have chimed in. I think I proved that this was not the easy argument that many of you Globalists thought it was. Otherwise, this thread would be done.

Actually, your willingness to post nonsense can keep the thread going for as long as you wish to post nonsense. It says nothing whatsoever about how "easy" the argument may be and everything about your willingness to post nonsense.

The fact that you apparently believe this last post of yours and that other folks (or at least poster(s) under other handles) think that this shows something about the difficulty of the argument says a great deal about your lack of ability to think clearly - nothing more and nothing less.

Legit question wrote:

call me troll? Fine, but most of rhese globe support replies either been defeated or called a draw. There are other Flat Earth supporters on this thread who have chimed in. I think I proved that this was not the easy argument that many of you Globalists thought it was. Otherwise, this thread would be done.

If you believe that your argument that all pictures purporting to show a curved earth surface have simply been doctored is a draw, then yes, you should be convinced the earth is flat. Rock on....now where did you get your medication.

So, I can't dig a hole to China in my sandbox? How deep is the earth? Can I dig a hole though to the other side? What's on the other side? Will I fall through the hole or could I stand upright on the other side.

This is so cool.

I'm very curious about a few things. Why do you think it's nighttime in Japan when it's daytime in the US? Why do you think the sun never sets in the Arctic during the summer months but never rises during the winter months?

You're assuming there's one sun and that it is very big and very far away.

There are actually multiple suns that are relatively small and close and go around the earth in different patterns and directions.

That's why it changes throughout the year and some places are dark and while some have day time.

Fantasy Land wrote:

Legit question wrote:

call me troll? Fine, but most of rhese globe support replies either been defeated or called a draw. There are other Flat Earth supporters on this thread who have chimed in. I think I proved that this was not the easy argument that many of you Globalists thought it was. Otherwise, this thread would be done.

If you believe that your argument that all pictures purporting to show a curved earth surface have simply been doctored is a draw, then yes, you should be convinced the earth is flat. Rock on....now where did you get your medication.

And that all pilots and airlines are lying to you about what direction you're traveling.

Sorry, it would be incorrect to call it "Global Warming" or "Global Climate Change" since a globe is round. Need a new name. Like "Planar Warming" or "Saucer Warming."

If the earth were flat, a photo from space would show all continents and land masses. Space photos do not produce this.

Just because someone throws out a bunch of pseudo science doesn't mean they are right and "winning". Every fact posters have put out there, numbnuts just says wrong and doesn't disprove it. How's that winning? He still hasn't produced a picture of the edges of the flat earth. Seems like that would be a freaking great vacation destination and there'd be a crap-ton of photos on facebook or instagram.