Do they really think the earth is flat?

[glenc]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7540427.stm
"In the 21st Century, the term "flat-earther" is used to describe someone who is spectacularly - and seemingly wilfully - ignorant. But there is a group of people who claim they believe the planet really is flat. Are they really out there or is it all an elaborate prank?"

[mojo]

It's a puzzle, eh. I've always just assumed it was a group of people who believe in 'alternate' scientific views and not necessarily that the earth is actually flat... but then, they do discuss such things with a straight face over there (http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/forum/).... :rolleyes:

[acropolite]

You have to laugh at this one. It's worth having a look at other posts buy user Tom Bishop, he's obviously the knowledgable one. This is one seriously whacky society. :rofl:

[Kal]

One word that seems to pop up alot on their FAQ is 'conspiracy'. It's all a conspiracy by the governments, by NASA, by everyone.

It makes legitamite conspiracy theorists look bad :rofl::lol:







:ship2:

[xelasnave]

No we really need an IIS team to go to Chile to a nice dark high site and take photos of all the constelations come back and compare with ones we take in Australia...

I remember in the days of the Sydney domain there was a chap there who believed the world was flat... he could prove it.. he just needed on of the air line companies to fly him on a certain course (37 degrees...I dont know if that was to the horizontal a bearing North or what) and he sited as proof he was right the fact the air line company would not fly him on that course because their part in the conspiracy to hide the flat world from everyone...would be exposed....:screwy:

They are wrong these flat world folk a push universe demands matter is ordered in the shape of a sphere:lol::lol::lol::screwy:

There is a book Flatlander I think..it has been pointed out to me as if to alert me to the possibility there may be something I dont know;)

alex:):):)

[xelasnave]

Anyways my point and in reply to Glens question..are they really out there... I say yes I personally met and argued with one... I was young in the apprenticship of an uncle who took me to the Domain to learn how to arge with anybody... and he selected this chap to let me argue against his point as he had and was training me to do... That episode taught me that folk can believe in things and nothing will sway them and it is possible to lose an arguement even if you are right.

This chap was more entrenched than any of the religious "speakers" and more dogmatic than the "political" speakers.

alex

alex

[Dog Star]

Yep. I've heard this one.
The Earth is a disc that is carried on the backs of 4 huge elephants who ride on the back of Atúan, the giant Cosmic Turtle, as he swims lazily through space. The Sun is indeed about 400 miles away and one of the elephants has to lift his hind leg to allow the Sun to pass by as it orbits the Discworld.
Always did think Terry Pratchett was a clever fella. Little did I suspect that he was actually the vanguard of a revolution in scientific thought.
Anyone unfamiliar with this mode of thought should check out the Discworld series of books by the aforementioned Mr Pratchett. You won't be disappointed, I assure you.
Wikipedia has a good introduction to Discworld which will give you the gist of
this wonderfully wild and crazy world.
Enjoy.

[erick]

It cannot be flat, I keep tripping over things!

[nightstalker]

I've stumbled across that site before :) and find a lot of the content very funny.. obviously theres a lot who visit there just to take the ****.And some who take it very seriously.. some posts start as a conspiricy only to skew to challenge the conspiricy as being another conspiricy.
:rofl:

[Jen]

:lol::lol::lol::lol: me too Erick :rofl:



there are some crazy people out there :screwy:

[wraithe]

I got informed yesterday that the media tell the truth...
I was that gobsmacked that I didnt know what to say...
A lady that is in her late 60's informed me that she would believe the media before she would believe anyone who said the media was wrong...
I have been discussing this issue with a friend, our talk involved how the education system has gone from giving people the basics of how to question and learn to a point of conditioning them to do as there told and not question. My son gets into a lot of trouble at school by asking hard questions and wanting to know, if you told him the world is round, he asks how can you show me that, if you tell him that a computer application is the best available, he wants to see the competition...
The teachers cant accept that, they want him to be a puppet...
I think things have started to go backwards from the day when most of us where in school and teachers asked us questions and then discussed the answers and delved into the possibilities...

Sad, Sad earth...

[xelasnave]

Now its not so bad Wraithe your Son has not fallen under their spell and how good is that.

alex

[wraithe]

Yeh he is going well, maybe too well in some ways...
Hopefully the world doesnt fall to bits and the thinkers get back to making others think...

Either that or I shall enjoy hiding in the middle of nowhere..

Whats the saying, "got me horse, got me swag, got me kids, got me gun, got meself lost out nowhere"...
Sounds like a nice life plan...

[wraithe]

Adding to this thread...

When you discuss things with people, you tend to find yourself migrate to those that think like yourselves...
Now in this group that think like you do, you will come across people that have a very limited understanding of things and others that can adopt to any discussion, albiet talking about farming, then how to design a boat to the concepts of space and then off to discussing the climate...
When a group of friends change the subject matter around, you will notice some that think outside of the box and others that sit on the fence convinced that what they read in the paper is fact.
If you ever go to a party or bbq, just twist the conversation around a few times and watch people get into and drop out of the conversation...
If you can adapt to any subject, you can get people talking easy...
I do it with friends, talk about farming and livestock, then bring up about mechanics(only have to say anything about my ute and they start asking questions), then move it onto say climate change or the universe, and I am amazed how many drop out of the conversation and become spectators...
My best friend and I usually get left alone, we talk about things like ET's, psycology, the universe, nature, history etc etc, but others think we are potty, and thats mainly because they have a limited concept of how big things are...

My favourite question, "How big is the universe?"

I love telling people that humans are trained in a box, live in a box, and cant think outside of the box...
And another thing that stuffs them up is when I say "To put a limit on the universe is human, we as humans cant grasp the idea of space being infinite"
Have been informed that a couple of my friends have gone home with headaches trying to grasp the idea of the universe not having a limit...rofl

[jungle11]

It sounds like mysticism to me, lots of people think like that even these days, i know a couple myself.
But the earth being flat! - a round earth conspiracy would have costed trillions already, and what could possibly be the point of that?
The hundreds of thousands of pictures from orbit, the thousands of hours of video, countries space programmes and budgets, gps, satellite phones, satellite tv, satellite internet, the fact that you can see the satellites themselves cruising overhead at night, all the international airliners in on it too, the moon is obviously round, so are the planets also with phases and moons (oh yeah, you'd have to fake another 50 000 pictures at least from all the probes we've sent around the solar system.

Yeah 'nuff said;)

jungle

[xelasnave]

Wraithe sounds like you have a wonderful and free mind. That is great. However we will always find others who for whatever reason find it hard to hold up their end of the conversation.... well no problem... they are usually good listeners... so run the latest ideas past them...that is your duty.

So how big is the Universe... I like to think it is infinite and that is so big you can take any amount away from it and it is still infinite... this may not fit current cosmology but unlike the flat world thing the answer to such a question is in little fear of chalenge in so far as proving the contrary is just as difficult as proving the opposite.

Alex

[leinad]

I suppose they think then that satellites just hover above a continent. Otherwise they'd have to move in a racetrack fashion above the continents. Perhaps then they can think about how that would be possible? Anti-gravity? endless amounts of fuel? Or objects up there just stay on a cushion of air and dont fall ? LOL

[xelasnave]

If most of us are ashamed of shabby clothes and shoddy furniture,
let us be more ashamed of shabby ideas and shoddy philosophies.

--Albert Einstein

alex

[g__day]

Now to throw same rain on the parade - there is a very serious branch of theoretical physics that accepts the Earh as flat - in fact it insists on it!

But it doesn't stop there - in fact it says everything in the entire universe is two dimensional and its our minds that infer a third dimension. I must say you can have alot of fun with the maths here - so long as it is internally consistent - you can hypothesis anything you want - even if it is completely counter-intuitive. The point becomes unless you can dis-prove it - the simplist thing to intuit will probably be all you need in everyday life.

[jungle11]

Yeah i guess so, but grrr. You and i know that matter itself couldn't exist in a two dimensional universe, but as long as the math works someone will always believe it.

It just pains me that these people are missing out on the awesome knowledge that mankind is accomplishing amazing things these days (how often does a species evolve that can make rockets, and wonder about the nature of reality itself?
Who needs unfounded fancifull ideas, when science has proven so many amazing things?

These people aren't hurting anyone so that's cool with me - but they are missing out on a whole lot.

On the flat Earther's web sight, they state that the speed the earth would need to travel at to rotate around the sun in a year is too fast - we would fly off into space! Yet they state that the sun revolves around us, the stars too. If that was so, those stars would be travelling millions or billions X light?!?

[xelasnave]

every idea has its problems
alex

[BerrieK]

In relation to the Terry Pratchett Discworld novels that Dogstar mentions, there is a fantastic book on the science of the discworld. A great read for anyone whe has read any of the novels...or for anyone al all really!

He has also recently released a novel called 'Nation' whist not one of the hilarious discworld series it it a great read with an astronimical twist towards the end.

[peter brown]

think that these flat earthers are either delusional ie mental illness sufferers, or the strange personality disorders that seek attention...the same attention that we are all now giving in this discussion.:screwy:

[ngcles]

Hi All,

If you thought the "Flat Earth Theory" was interesting, then try this one:

http://www.cabotia.com/stationary-earth.html

Hmmm ...

Best,

Les D

[wraithe]

Leinad, they do have satellites that dont move...lol...(geostationary)...
I thought damm thats a point then went, "hang on, TV, Internet etc, dish dont move"...
But shhh, dont let the flat earthers hear that one...

Jungle11, that thought about speed being limited, as light is not possible to be exceeded...I agree with current technology...
But the possibility to exceed light speed may be possible one day..Probably not in my lifetime but who knows. The sound barrier was supposed to be impossible to break and if you did there where hundreds of stories saying it would never happen...

As most know here, the limit is no longer the sky, but more our present ability. If we could keep looking outside of the box and not get restricted by those that cant, then we are but one step on the journey of a 1,000 kilometre walk.

xelasnave,
Discussing education, I have a friend who over 50 years has become one of the wealthiest members of our local community, now thats a good achievement for any body, but the best bit of the whole thing with him, is he has no education, is very much illiterate(I know that for fact, I do all the paperwork as a friend) and the most laughable bit, he loves physics and science, absolutely amazing to talk to and the grasp of these subjects is phenominal.
He will discuss the planets, and a lot of the theories that are thrown about, he will either support with a good knowledge of them, or dispute them with the same ability..
he also agrees that education today is making our kids into puppets as he has noticed the lack of ability to question things...

Anyway, I must go and be a Redneck, I have to help cut more hay tomorrow...:shrug:

[xelasnave]

Thank you for sharing that.
Unfortunately folk think education comes from and stops with the school/university system... but education is a never ending process and anytime we think we know everything is the time to chalenge all you have learnt as an education that leads one to this point is too shallow in my view.
Folk look to folk like Mr Hawking for the answers as if he has a monopoly upon ideas..this is unfortunate... everyone has the right to think...enjoy that aspect of our society there is no gaurantee such freedom will continue.

alex

[jungle11]

Hi Wraith, i agree that we shouldn't accept what may or may not be possible based purely on our current theoretical and technological base.
I may be risking some derision here, but i've read a lot on the ufo phenomenon. Im not saying it's for real (i've definetly never seen one!) but the more you study this subject, mass sightings, military and civil aviation sightings, released government files (Look up Bill Chalker) the more you wonder. If these craft are real, they defy physics as we know them, inertia being one of the fundamentals and the ability to slip through an atmosphere as though it wasn't there.
If it is real, then we have a lot to learn indeed;)

Also, im only 26 and i've got alot of young friends. I was talking to a girl awhile back who thought the moon was the nearest star! I showed my cousin's husband a picture of M101 to awe him, and he asked if it was a solar system. Maybe space may seem irrelevant to alot of people but shouldn't schools teach childeren something about it?

[erick]

"The earth is NOT TILTED 23.45°degrees....It is UPRIGHT as God created man to walk UPRIGHT. The tilted earth probably came from Galileo as he looked through the telescope and saw that some of the planets were tilted in their orbits around the sun. A tilted EARTH could be an explanation for the seasons, he reasoned, as people were still apt to ask difficult questions about the reason for the seasons!!"


Oh dear! :sadeyes:

[sjastro]

To the average person in the street Hawking may as well be talking in a foreign language, in which case the acceptance of what Hawking says is a matter of faith.

On the other hand Hawking has been shot down more than once by his academic peers which illustrates the advantages of having an education.....

Steven

[andrewk_82]

I wonder how they explain the rotation of the stars each night. By my calculation if the stars were rotating around the earth, at 4.2 light years away, Alpha Centauri would be travelling at roughly 9600 times the speed of light to make that trip in one day. Imagine how fast the Andromeda Galaxy or anything further out would be travelling :confuse3:. There must be some pretty fast things out there. ;)

Maybe they didn't consider this :shrug::screwy:.

[leinad]

:whistle::P

[wraithe]

Sorry leinad, ;):lol:




Actually if that is the case then physics needs to catch up, they got it all wrong again...:rofl:

Oh the possibilities of physics if the earth is totally stationary in space...

I wonder if they all try and lean in the direction of rotation to see if the pressures from rotation force them upright?
I know the world spins, after a bottle of butterscotch schnapps I can actually experience the spin first hand, it even has a tendancy to wobble too...hmmm... must give that another try and find the exact direction of wobble and spin...last time i was sure it was the south pole that i was experiencing...:P:rofl:

[wraithe]

Now i must point out that relatives of mine live in this country here and they are from farming backgrounds, some even still live in the homes built a 90 years ago from the local trees...
So we can relate to this mathematics problem in the video below...
Its just amazing that someone has made a video of such simple maths, whats so funny that the people laugh at it...

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=Bfq5kju627c

[leinad]

They'd still need to explain how a geostationary sat' stays in a fixed position in the sky an doesn't move.
:)



Classic. :lol:

[xelasnave]

The world is flat:eyepop: ....not in topography but certainly it is when it comes to thinking;)..there are few that stand out as being prepared to point out our stupidity...leaving aside those wonderful folk, my friends, who can point out mine:lol::lol::lol:.

alex:):):), my friends