Old Wizard
2nd Lieutenant
The Flat Earth society
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vikingBerserker
Lieutenant General
6 down, 2 billion to go.
Robert Porter
Senior Master Sergeant
That is a very conservative estimate. I remember reading an interview with Robert Heinlein, he made mention of the fact that stupidity and ignorance while used interchangeably were not at all the same. His characters quote summed it up something like this:
"Stupidity cannot be cured. Stupidity is the only universal capital crime; the sentence is death. There is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity."
His contention is that when human mercy and protection laws interfere with the natural laws we lose as a race. Keeps bad genes active in the gene pool too long.
"Stupidity cannot be cured. Stupidity is the only universal capital crime; the sentence is death. There is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity."
His contention is that when human mercy and protection laws interfere with the natural laws we lose as a race. Keeps bad genes active in the gene pool too long.
mikewint
Captain
"Delusions are often functional. A mother's opinions about her children's beauty, intelligence, goodness, et cetera ad nauseam, keep her from drowning them at birth."
Robert Porter
Senior Master Sergeant
Very true, and in that context can even be considered valid and with purpose which make them worthwhile. Not words one usually associates with "delusions" but very true!
To people on the outside others actions may appear stupid, movies like The charge of The Light Brigade are made about such events. At least one of those people "attacked" by a big cat was caused by a failure of safety barriers. I use parenthesis for "attacked" because a big cat does what they do, eat meat. I have seen young children trying to get into a pen to stroke a pig, it was a full grown male Saddleback male, quite capable of killing an adult. It is for adults to educate their children of dangers and today the internet does the opposite, tigers and lions are used in advertising and are usually cute and cuddly. It is quite common in China for people to try to enter the Panda enclosures because Pandas are such lovable cuddly dahhlings. A full grown Panda can rip any human to pieces any time they want, they dont realise what cute means.
mikewint
Captain
"Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it."
Robert Porter
Senior Master Sergeant
Exactly, and therein lies the difference between stupidity and ignorance. We are all born ignorant, a mostly correctible condition. Stupidity, and by this I am NOT referring to mental illness, cannot be cured. I know some folks with severe learning and social disabilities that fit neither definition.
I have two simple (I think that they are simple) questions for the flat earthers.
1. As a ship sails over the horizon it doesn't disappear at once as it would if it fell off the earth, it disappears slowly, first the bottom, then gradually the rest of it. This happens no matter in which direction the hypothetical ship sails. If the surface of the earth is not curved how do you explain that? If you accept a curve then you must acknowledge that a spherical object has a curved surface making the spherical (near enough) earth a plausible explanation.
2. Ancient humans noticed that in certain circumstances the earth casts its shadow on the moon. That shadow is always circular, or in the case of a partial eclipse a portion of a circle. The only object that will always cast a circular shadow, no matter from what angle the light comes is a sphere. How do you explain that?
Any idea where I should ask these questions?
Cheers
Steve
1. As a ship sails over the horizon it doesn't disappear at once as it would if it fell off the earth, it disappears slowly, first the bottom, then gradually the rest of it. This happens no matter in which direction the hypothetical ship sails. If the surface of the earth is not curved how do you explain that? If you accept a curve then you must acknowledge that a spherical object has a curved surface making the spherical (near enough) earth a plausible explanation.
2. Ancient humans noticed that in certain circumstances the earth casts its shadow on the moon. That shadow is always circular, or in the case of a partial eclipse a portion of a circle. The only object that will always cast a circular shadow, no matter from what angle the light comes is a sphere. How do you explain that?
Any idea where I should ask these questions?
Cheers
Steve
The flat-earth thing recently appearing was largely a US psy-op from what I was told. It sounds ridiculous, but I guess the idea was to either discredit people, or see how stupid some people are.
Personally, I think it's quite telling when a member of the flat earth society said "the flat earth society has members all around the globe".
Personally, I think it's quite telling when a member of the flat earth society said "the flat earth society has members all around the globe".
mikewint
Captain
On the sinking ship, Rowbotham describes a mechanism by which the hull is hidden by the angular limits of perception - the ship will appear to intersect with the vanishing point and become lost to human perception as the hull's increasingly shallow path creates a tangent on which the hull is so close to the surface of the ocean that the two are indistinguishable. The ship's hull gets so close to the surface of the water as it recedes that they appear to merge together. Where bodies get so close together that they appear to merge is called the Vanishing Point. The Vanishing Point is created when the perspective lines are angled less than one minute of a degree. Hence, this effectively places the vanishing point a finite distance away from the observer.
Usually it is taught in art schools that the vanishing point is an infinite distance away from the observer, as so:
However, since man cannot perceive infinity due to human limitations, the perspective lines are modified and placed a finite distance away from the observer as so:
This finite distance to the vanishing point is what allows ships to shrink into horizon and disappear as their hulls intersect with the vanishing point from the bottom up. As the boat recedes into the distance its hull is gradually and perceptively appearing closer and closer to the surface of the sea. At a far off point the hull of the ship is so close to the sea's surface that it is impossible for the observer to tell ocean from hull.
While the sails of the ship may still be visible while the hull is perceptively merged, it's only a matter of time before it too shrinks into the vanishing point which rests on the surface of the sea and becomes indiscernible from the surface.
Usually it is taught in art schools that the vanishing point is an infinite distance away from the observer, as so:
However, since man cannot perceive infinity due to human limitations, the perspective lines are modified and placed a finite distance away from the observer as so:
This finite distance to the vanishing point is what allows ships to shrink into horizon and disappear as their hulls intersect with the vanishing point from the bottom up. As the boat recedes into the distance its hull is gradually and perceptively appearing closer and closer to the surface of the sea. At a far off point the hull of the ship is so close to the sea's surface that it is impossible for the observer to tell ocean from hull.
While the sails of the ship may still be visible while the hull is perceptively merged, it's only a matter of time before it too shrinks into the vanishing point which rests on the surface of the sea and becomes indiscernible from the surface.
Shortround6
Lieutenant General
No, it's true, you just aren't using the right telescope or camera in order to get around the vanishing point problem.
Now what kind of telescope do I need to see The tip of the Brest peninsula from Lands End?
Or Ireland?
mikewint
Captain
The above is a perfectly reasonable explanation of the phenomenon and is logically consistent with the observations.
It was decided long ago that when there were two (or more) competing explanations explaining the same phenomenon the simplist one has the best chance of being correct. The principle of Occam's Razor.
Occam's (or Ockham's) razor is a principle attributed to the 14th century logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. The principle states that "Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily." William used the principle to justify many conclusions, including the statement that "God's existence cannot be deduced by reason alone." That one didn't make him very popular with the Pope.
Many scientists have adopted or reinvented Occam's Razor, as in Leibniz's "identity of observables" and Isaac Newton stated the rule: "We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances."
The most useful statement of the principle for scientists is:
"when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."
*N.B.* Simplicity is subjective and the universe does not always have the same ideas about simplicity as we do.
In physics we use the razor to shave away metaphysical concepts. The canonical example is Einstein's theory of special relativity compared with Lorentz's theory that ruler's contract and clocks slow down when in motion through the ether. Einstein's equations for transforming spacetime are the same as Lorentz's equations for transforming rulers and clocks, but Einstein and Poincaré
recognized that the ether could not be detected according to the equations of Lorentz and Maxwell. By Occam's razor it had to be eliminated.
The principle has also been used to justify uncertainty in quantum mechanics. Heisenberg deduced his uncertainty principle from the quantum nature of light and the effect of measurement.
Stephen Hawking writes in A Brief History of Time:
"We could still imagine that there is a set of laws that determines events completely for some supernatural being, who could observe the present state of the universe without disturbing it. However, such models of the universe are not of much interest to us mortals. It seems better to employ the principle known as Occam's razor and cut out all the features of the theory that cannot be observed."
This principle goes back at least as far as Aristotle, who wrote "Nature operates in the shortest way possible." The principle of simplicity works as a heuristic rule of thumb, but some people quote it as if it were an axiom of physics, which it is not. It can work well in philosophy or particle physics, but less often so in cosmology or psychology, where things usually turn out to be more complicated than you ever expected. Perhaps a quote from Shakespeare would be more appropriate than Occam's razor: "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.".
So in simplest terms you can't win a Flat Earth argument. Find a hole in their logic and they plug it with a new assumption.
It's like the flat horizon. The Earth's curvature, 8" for the first mile is so small as to be undetectable by human senses. Add to that the F.E. don't understand the difference between PLANE trigonometry and Geodetic trig. At a height of 1000ft the horizon is only down by 0.56 degrees. Even at aircraft height of 40,000ft the declination is only 3.5 degrees. Don't know about you but my head can't measure that small of an angle very well
It was decided long ago that when there were two (or more) competing explanations explaining the same phenomenon the simplist one has the best chance of being correct. The principle of Occam's Razor.
Occam's (or Ockham's) razor is a principle attributed to the 14th century logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. The principle states that "Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily." William used the principle to justify many conclusions, including the statement that "God's existence cannot be deduced by reason alone." That one didn't make him very popular with the Pope.
Many scientists have adopted or reinvented Occam's Razor, as in Leibniz's "identity of observables" and Isaac Newton stated the rule: "We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances."
The most useful statement of the principle for scientists is:
"when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."
*N.B.* Simplicity is subjective and the universe does not always have the same ideas about simplicity as we do.
In physics we use the razor to shave away metaphysical concepts. The canonical example is Einstein's theory of special relativity compared with Lorentz's theory that ruler's contract and clocks slow down when in motion through the ether. Einstein's equations for transforming spacetime are the same as Lorentz's equations for transforming rulers and clocks, but Einstein and Poincaré
recognized that the ether could not be detected according to the equations of Lorentz and Maxwell. By Occam's razor it had to be eliminated.
The principle has also been used to justify uncertainty in quantum mechanics. Heisenberg deduced his uncertainty principle from the quantum nature of light and the effect of measurement.
Stephen Hawking writes in A Brief History of Time:
"We could still imagine that there is a set of laws that determines events completely for some supernatural being, who could observe the present state of the universe without disturbing it. However, such models of the universe are not of much interest to us mortals. It seems better to employ the principle known as Occam's razor and cut out all the features of the theory that cannot be observed."
This principle goes back at least as far as Aristotle, who wrote "Nature operates in the shortest way possible." The principle of simplicity works as a heuristic rule of thumb, but some people quote it as if it were an axiom of physics, which it is not. It can work well in philosophy or particle physics, but less often so in cosmology or psychology, where things usually turn out to be more complicated than you ever expected. Perhaps a quote from Shakespeare would be more appropriate than Occam's razor: "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.".
So in simplest terms you can't win a Flat Earth argument. Find a hole in their logic and they plug it with a new assumption.
It's like the flat horizon. The Earth's curvature, 8" for the first mile is so small as to be undetectable by human senses. Add to that the F.E. don't understand the difference between PLANE trigonometry and Geodetic trig. At a height of 1000ft the horizon is only down by 0.56 degrees. Even at aircraft height of 40,000ft the declination is only 3.5 degrees. Don't know about you but my head can't measure that small of an angle very well
Adolphe Quetelet's "homme moyen", reasonable man, or the British 'man on the Clapham omnibus' all spring to mind. Faced with the evidence, for example that the vast majority of the observable universe (the biblical heavens and earth) is more than 6,000 light years away, how could a reasonable man conclude that the universe was created in six days about 6,000 years ago? The last estimate I saw for the diametre of the observable universe was 93 billion light years!
I'm sure the creationists will have some other idiotic explanation, but which would the reasonable man accept?
Cheers
Steve
I'm sure the creationists will have some other idiotic explanation, but which would the reasonable man accept?
Cheers
Steve
This explanation only works for the naked eye. When you use a good telescope and a smooth sea it is obvious that the hull disappears over the horizon. Galileo mde money from spotting the trading fleets first.
Robert Porter
Senior Master Sergeant
There is no "discussing" with those types. But it may get you burned as a heretic...
mikewint
Captain
Pbehn, actually not, depending...bear with me it gonna take a bit...
First a bit of history: FEers (Flat-Earthers) often refer to the Rowbotham experiments or the Bedford Level Experiments -
The Old Bedford River had a six-mile drainage canal marked at each end by a bridge. The canal was so long and straight that, if the world were round, a boat at one end would not be visible to a boat on the other end. They would each be hidden from each other by the curve of the Earth.
*NOTE* The curvature of the Earth on average is 8in for the first mile; 32in for two miles; 72in for three miles; etc. Thus at 6 miles the curvature would produce a drop of 288in or 24 feet.
Parallax — whose real name was Samuel Rowbotham, in the summer of 1838, waded into the river and used a telescope held eight inches (20 cm) above the water to watch a boat, with a flag on its mast three feet (0.91 m) above the water, row slowly away from him. He reported that the vessel remained constantly in his view for the full six miles (9.7 km) to Welney bridge, whereas, had the water surface been curved with the accepted circumference of a spherical earth, the top of the mast should have been some 11 feet (3.4 m) below his line of sight. He published this observation using the pseudonym Parallax in 1849 and subsequently expanded it into a book, Earth Not a Globe, published in 1865. Rowbotham often took people out on the water and showed them the boats at the other end of the canal convincing many that the world, therefore, was flat.
On 11 May 1904 Lady Elizabeth Anne Blount, who would go on to be influential in the formation of the Flat Earth Society, hired a commercial photographer to use a telephoto lens camera to take a picture from Welney of a large white sheet she had placed, touching the surface of the river, at Rowbotham's original position six miles (9.7 km) away. The photographer, Edgar Clifton from Dallmeyer's studio, mounted his camera two feet above the water at Welney and was surprised to be able to obtain a picture of the target, which should have been invisible to him given the low mounting point of the camera. Lady Blount published the pictures far and wide.
The above is True and Correct as attested to by the actual photographs. Here is a more recent example also sited and reproduced by many FE blogs, articles, videos, etc,
Below is an actual photograph of the Chicago skyline taken from the shore of the state of Michigan directly opposite Chicago. The "straight-line" distance is 60 SIXTY miles.
Now consider the curvature, at 60 miles the curvature is 2400 feet. The Willis Tower (Tallest building to the left is 1450 feet tall to the Skydeck or to the twin antennas 1729ft. Clearly the none of the building should be visible from 60 miles standing on the shore UNLESS the Earth is indeed FLAT
First a bit of history: FEers (Flat-Earthers) often refer to the Rowbotham experiments or the Bedford Level Experiments -
The Old Bedford River had a six-mile drainage canal marked at each end by a bridge. The canal was so long and straight that, if the world were round, a boat at one end would not be visible to a boat on the other end. They would each be hidden from each other by the curve of the Earth.
*NOTE* The curvature of the Earth on average is 8in for the first mile; 32in for two miles; 72in for three miles; etc. Thus at 6 miles the curvature would produce a drop of 288in or 24 feet.
Parallax — whose real name was Samuel Rowbotham, in the summer of 1838, waded into the river and used a telescope held eight inches (20 cm) above the water to watch a boat, with a flag on its mast three feet (0.91 m) above the water, row slowly away from him. He reported that the vessel remained constantly in his view for the full six miles (9.7 km) to Welney bridge, whereas, had the water surface been curved with the accepted circumference of a spherical earth, the top of the mast should have been some 11 feet (3.4 m) below his line of sight. He published this observation using the pseudonym Parallax in 1849 and subsequently expanded it into a book, Earth Not a Globe, published in 1865. Rowbotham often took people out on the water and showed them the boats at the other end of the canal convincing many that the world, therefore, was flat.
On 11 May 1904 Lady Elizabeth Anne Blount, who would go on to be influential in the formation of the Flat Earth Society, hired a commercial photographer to use a telephoto lens camera to take a picture from Welney of a large white sheet she had placed, touching the surface of the river, at Rowbotham's original position six miles (9.7 km) away. The photographer, Edgar Clifton from Dallmeyer's studio, mounted his camera two feet above the water at Welney and was surprised to be able to obtain a picture of the target, which should have been invisible to him given the low mounting point of the camera. Lady Blount published the pictures far and wide.
The above is True and Correct as attested to by the actual photographs. Here is a more recent example also sited and reproduced by many FE blogs, articles, videos, etc,
Below is an actual photograph of the Chicago skyline taken from the shore of the state of Michigan directly opposite Chicago. The "straight-line" distance is 60 SIXTY miles.
Now consider the curvature, at 60 miles the curvature is 2400 feet. The Willis Tower (Tallest building to the left is 1450 feet tall to the Skydeck or to the twin antennas 1729ft. Clearly the none of the building should be visible from 60 miles standing on the shore UNLESS the Earth is indeed FLAT
