[robinofloxley]

Like many, I came across the flat earth movement a while back and the idea that anyone would believe in such an idea seemed ridiculous. However I was intrigued, came on here and watched various videos. I quickly realised that I had been guilty of sloppy thinking in some areas - for example, I had just assumed that I could see the curve from a commercial airliner at 35k feet. No, you can't, realise that now. I learned a lot of really interesting stuff as a by-product of what I read and watched. I know a lot more about maps and map projections then I ever did. I now know that the zero longitude line is actually 100 metres away from the marking strip at Greenwich I stood astride for my pointless selfie a couple of years back - and I know why. I watched the 2017 eclipse (unforgettable, magical experience), watched the shadow move from West to East - and I now know why that happened too. All thanks to questions raised here and elsewhere.

There have been many great questions and great answers too, but to me it's all going a bit stale now. Same old re-hashed questions over and over again, haven't seen a new or interesting one in ages. On the YouTube side, there are some thoroughly excellent FE debunkers out there who (to my satisfaction) have utterly debunked pretty much every FE argument. Trouble is they now seem to have run out of new and interesting stuff to debunk and it's all a bit flat there too. Now it seems FE is debunking itself, examples are Bob Knodel and the farcical ring laser gyroscope experiment and Jeranism's "interesting" experiment. And now we have Eric Dubay attacking pretty much everybody else.

So has the whole thing simply run out of steam now?

[Tim Alphabeaver]

My main experience of the flat earth scene is from youtube (🤮). I feel like I used to be able to watch videos by FE'ers that were at least thought-out. Now it seems like every upload is just a 2.5 hour stream where they shout at each other. The very few well-thought-out videos are debuked pretty quickly (Mount San Jacinto anyone?).

So yeah, it's certainly going downhill on youtube. Not sure if there are many other popular places that they hang out.
Case in point:

[robinofloxley]

My main experience of the flat earth scene is from youtube (). I feel like I used to be able to watch videos by FE'ers that were at least thought-out. Now it seems like every upload is just a 2.5 hour stream where they shout at each other. The very few well-thought-out videos are debuked pretty quickly (Mount San Jacinto anyone?).

So yeah, it's certainly going downhill on youtube. Not sure if there are many other popular places that they hang out.
Case in point:

SciManDan and Baldy/Conspiracy Catz are two channels I've watched a lot. They've done such an effective job of debunking FE videos that it doesn't surprise me that the only response available is just to throw insults. Sad in a way if that's where it's all ended up.

[Tom Bishop]

The song is catchy and has some good points. Paraphrased: "They claim the earth is spinning. Unless they demonstrate that they are never going to win."

Those claims need to be proven beyond doubt else FE will continue to grow. FECore and others are continuously performing experiments.

RE doesn't seem very passionate about their ball.

[Science Supporter]

RE doesn't seem very passionate about their ball.

Einstein is rolling in his grave from that comment.

[stack]

Hardly scientific, but interesting anecdotal data in Google Trends. Spikes generally attributed to things like b.o.b. saying he was a flat earther, reactions to Bumgartner's leap, SpaceX Tesla in space and even Logan Paul's messing around with the movement, etc. Interesting how the trend kind of makes this search look like it jumped the shark on YouTube back in 2017. Again, not very scientific.

This is the past 5 years, worldwide, web search 'flat earth':



This is the past 5 years, worldwide, YouTube search 'flat earth':

[Tumeni]

Paraphrased: "They claim the earth is spinning. Unless they demonstrate that they are never going to win."

Doesn't even make sense. Why would they demonstrate "that they are never going to win" ?

[J-Man]

Hardly scientific, but interesting anecdotal data in Google Trends. Spikes generally attributed to things like b.o.b. saying he was a flat earther, reactions to Bumgartner's leap, SpaceX Tesla in space and even Logan Paul's messing around with the movement, etc. Interesting how the trend kind of makes this search look like it jumped the shark on YouTube back in 2017. Again, not very scientific.

This is the past 5 years, worldwide, web search 'flat earth':



This is the past 5 years, worldwide, YouTube search 'flat earth':

Google? really google? Don't make me cry,

https://www.reddit.com/r/googlecensorship/

Search engines such as Google covertly censor webpages because of their political, social, economic or corporate content. This is evident from the fact that search queries on Google and other search engines often do not return the results that they should. I believe that ending search engine censorship begins with bringing people together to report keywords that don't return the results that they should.

[stack]

Hardly scientific, but interesting anecdotal data in Google Trends. Spikes generally attributed to things like b.o.b. saying he was a flat earther, reactions to Bumgartner's leap, SpaceX Tesla in space and even Logan Paul's messing around with the movement, etc. Interesting how the trend kind of makes this search look like it jumped the shark on YouTube back in 2017. Again, not very scientific.

This is the past 5 years, worldwide, web search 'flat earth':



This is the past 5 years, worldwide, YouTube search 'flat earth':

Google? really google? Don't make me cry,

https://www.reddit.com/r/googlecensorship/

Search engines such as Google covertly censor webpages because of their political, social, economic or corporate content. This is evident from the fact that search queries on Google and other search engines often do not return the results that they should. I believe that ending search engine censorship begins with bringing people together to report keywords that don't return the results that they should.

I think you missed the point. Like I wrote, 'hardly scientific'. Just an observation using the only tool I have and the one search tool that is used the most to navigate the interwebs. But it's a barometer on what people are searching on, not necessarily what they censor for a returned result.

There's no real "ending search engine censorship". At least not in Google's case. They are under no obligation to provide an 'uncensored' search result. They are a for profit company and will act accordingly. In their best interest, not yours or mine.

There are other search engines out there that perhaps don't filter/censor as much as google. I don't know how to get at their metrics.

All I know is that google has 92% of the worldwide search market:



As for what google should return as a result based upon a search versus what it doesn't, probably case by case. Maybe a way to explore that is by comparing it to maybe a duckduckgo. And if you find the latter more to your liking, google's response would be, "great, use that search engine instead of ours..."

[Bikini Polaris]

Those claims need to be proven behind doubt else FE will continue to grow. FECore and others are continuously performing experiments.

RE doesn't seem very passionate about their ball.

Sometimes I wish some experiments are made involving not being low on the surface of water. For example, FEs collecting real distances between cities would be a cheap and immediate deal-breaker.

It's plenty of REs here defending  the ball with passion.

[Tim Alphabeaver]

The song is catchy and has some good points. Paraphrased: "They claim the earth is spinning. Unless they demonstrate that they are never going to win."

Those claims need to be proven behind doubt else FE will continue to grow. FECore and others are continuously performing experiments.

RE doesn't seem very passionate about their ball.

The song is super catchy. Also paraphrased: "SciManDan's a wanker, he wears a wanker's hat", "Creaky is a wanker, he wears a wanker's hat. He's fairly new on YouTube and he's bald like BaldyCatz!"
I agree that these claims do need to be proven beyond doubt in order for the FE to grow. Just how new is Creaky? Do they actually wear wanker's hats? I'm really glad we have the flat earth crew answering these important questions for us, as I've seen no RE-supporters investigating the length of anyone's hair.

[AATW]

Those claims need to be proven beyond doubt else FE will continue to grow.

Well, they have been. Hundreds of people have been to space. A load of countries have sent up satellites and other craft. Private companies are doing it now. Lots of technology we use every day relies on this. The level of proof you demand is impossible to satisfy, you simply dismiss anything which shows you to be wrong. Meanwhile you cherry pick out of context quotes which appear to indicate you may be right.
The internet allows you to promote your views, and that's fine, I'm all for freedom of speech. You're not going to convince anyone who knows enough science but luckily for you a lot of people are very ignorant of scientific ideas and are easy to sway.

RE doesn't seem very passionate about their ball.

Well, I don't really feel the need to preoccupy myself doing experiments about something which has long since been proven.
This place makes me more interested in doing so but when you are show experiments which show you to be wrong you dismiss them which gives me pause.
And you refuse to repeat any of the experiments yourself - you don't seem very passionate about your disc.

[Science Supporter]

Agreed. I don't have to do experiments but I could if I wanted too. I can plant a stick in the ground and record its shadow every hour. It will change 15 degrees every hour. I could take a trip to the South Pole for a couple weeks if I wanted to, but it would cost too much. I could take a trip from Perth to Johannessburg and see Antarctica for myself, predicted by the globe model, but FAR from the fastest route on the flat earth.


Many more experiments that I haven't mentioned. If flat earthers are so interested in this "truth" they can do these things. They can travel to the South Pole, but they choose not to. They are scared of the real truth.