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Offline Tumeni

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #20 on: August 10, 2020, 12:51:21 PM »
If you are instructing people to hold out an object and get it to point like the moon and align them near each other you are just telling them to use close range perspective effects to get your desired result.

That's not what I'm telling people to do. I'm telling them to hold the object between their eye(s) and the Moon, such that the object is as close to the Moon as is possible without it getting in the way and obscuring the Moon altogether.

The principle is to be looking at the Moon at the same angle at which you are looking at the object, and vice versa. The idea is not to move the object around to get a desired result by looking from a different angle.

Please review the last page of this thread; https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=16106.100 to save me writing it all out again.

Review diagrams in a moment... 

(EDIT - we should continue this discussion in the above thread, in order not to derail this one - however, your diagrams observe from a position outwith the three objects, but we're discussing a situation where the Earth observer is at one point of a triangle, the other points being Sun and Moon. He is one of the three objects or points.

The observer CANNOT look down on the triangle, since he is at one point. Likewise, he cannot look up at the triangle above him, for the same reason. His only view is along the plane of the triangle, along one side toward the Sun, along another side to the Moon, or along the plane of the triangle looking at points between. He can look AWAY from the triangle, but that view is of no relevance.)
« Last Edit: August 10, 2020, 01:49:26 PM by Tumeni »
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Offline AATW

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #21 on: August 11, 2020, 09:46:46 AM »
What other possibilities are there for a test of FE?
Right. The trouble here is first you need to define what experiment would help you discriminate between a FE and a RE.
In your description of the Bishop experiment you say:

Quote
With a good telescope, laying down on the stomach at the edge of the shore near Lovers Point 20 inches above the sea level it is possible to see people at the waters edge on the adjacent beach 23 miles away near the lighthouse. The entire beach is visible down to the water splashing upon the shore.

But then when you're shown video of the Turning Torso experiment which clearly shows the building being occluded more with distance you invoke "waves" or something.

If you think your Bishop Experiment is a good test of a FE - and I agree it is although I'm sceptical about your results - then some more controlled versions of that would make sense. I believe some FE people had a go at recreating the Bedford Level experiment but I don't think they documented it well.

In brief, first you need to design an experiment along the lines of the Bishop Experiment - predict what you'd expect to see on a RE and on a FE and then make some observations and document them well. The trouble with your experiment is it's just you saying "I saw a thing". And it's compounded when you're shown videos which indicate you probably didn't see a thing and you hand wave them away.
Tom: "Claiming incredulity is a pretty bad argument. Calling it "insane" or "ridiculous" is not a good argument at all."

TFES Wiki Occam's Razor page, by Tom: "What's the simplest explanation; that NASA has successfully designed and invented never before seen rocket technologies from scratch which can accelerate 100 tons of matter to an escape velocity of 7 miles per second"

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #22 on: August 11, 2020, 04:52:23 PM »
What type of weighing instrument do you propose using? I checked out the Kern (‘gnome’) results again, and the accuracy was not great, probably due to it being an ordinary weighing machine with an ordinary spring. The change in g per 1000 metres of height is about 0.30 Gals, the change per 5 degrees of latitude is 0.45 Gals at 45 degrees latitude, so you need an instrument with accuracy of about 0.1 Gal, otherwise the experiment is meaningless.

For that type of experiment getting reliable readings from a scale put into a vacuum would be the most difficult part, so there would need to be a discovery stage which will determine which type of equipment is most appropriate for a vacuum and pressure changes - as it is possible that calibration can be messed up in that process to produce an unreliable result if they are not designed for that. That's the part I have doubts on. Reaching out to precision scale manufacturers would probably be best for suggestions. It is also possible that there might already be special precision scale devices on the market that have a built-in vacuum chamber, and would be the best case scenario.

Luckily the expected result for UA is a null result (at least under a 'pure-UA' theory), which would makes things easier if there is some sort of unmitigated error somewhere.

Quote
But then when you're shown video of the Turning Torso experiment which clearly shows the building being occluded more with distance you invoke "waves" or something.

If you think your Bishop Experiment is a good test of a FE - and I agree it is although I'm sceptical about your results - then some more controlled versions of that would make sense. I believe some FE people had a go at recreating the Bedford Level experiment but I don't think they documented it well.

For a water convexity test, I think by this stage everyone agrees that it is possible to see further than should be possible on an RE. The next step in that sort of test is to do some of the following:

- Take long duration time-lapse photography of the effect and catch how it transitions between obscured and visible scenes, to try to determine which one is an illusion. That might involve leaving a telephoto camera set-up on the shore of a lake for a timespan of a few hours. The risk is that it is possible that only one version is seen, an inconclusive result. But it would provide evidence of limits - how long one version could last if it was an illusion.

It would basically be looking for more transition evidence of this: https://wiki.tfes.org/Sinking_Ship_Effect_Caused_by_Refraction

Something that clearly shows that a refraction transition event is going on.

- Make a long line of posts like in Rowbotham's second experiment in ENAG and set up a long duration time-lapse photography device that observes how the top of the poles are aligned for a long period of time. This would provide a set of known point of reference for points along the length of the scene. May take more effort.

I consider the water convexity tests to be "harder" since a single observation taken down at the waterline is no longer sufficient, and the purpose is now to catch something in the act. Since there is an element of refraction, any result for this kind of experiment will still be questioned, since anyone can say that there are multiple layers of refraction effects.

Anyone can say anything, really, and a comprehensive test would require a lot of thought.

For RE evidence that sinking reflects a globe:

- Determine that the sinking consistently occurs to produce something in accordance with the predictions of RE, without needing another theory about "refraction did some of this". That was one of the problems that came up when RE has doubled down on the sinking images in the past.

This sort of investigation relies on an 'analysis', and so it becomes more questionable if the results are not what is predicted by an RE, like what was seen when we had past discussions.
« Last Edit: August 11, 2020, 06:26:37 PM by Tom Bishop »

Offline edby

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #23 on: August 11, 2020, 08:57:52 PM »
What type of weighing instrument do you propose using? I checked out the Kern (‘gnome’) results again, and the accuracy was not great, probably due to it being an ordinary weighing machine with an ordinary spring. The change in g per 1000 metres of height is about 0.30 Gals, the change per 5 degrees of latitude is 0.45 Gals at 45 degrees latitude, so you need an instrument with accuracy of about 0.1 Gal, otherwise the experiment is meaningless.

For that type of experiment getting reliable readings from a scale put into a vacuum would be the most difficult part, so there would need to be a discovery stage which will determine which type of equipment is most appropriate for a vacuum and pressure changes - as it is possible that calibration can be messed up in that process to produce an unreliable result if they are not designed for that. That's the part I have doubts on. Reaching out to precision scale manufacturers would probably be best for suggestions. It is also possible that there might already be special precision scale devices on the market that have a built-in vacuum chamber, and would be the best case scenario.
 

But why do you need the vacuum chamber?  Just to illustrate, suppose we are in Prague where g would equal about 981 Gals at sea level. Then suppose we take the weighing machine up to 1000m. That would reduce (observed) g to about 980.70, i.e. a reduction of 0.30 Gals, which the instrument could easily detect. The effect of pressure is much smaller, however, being about 35 micro Gals, i.e. 35 millionths of a Gal. Nothing beyond a high accuracy ballistic gravimeter would detect that. So, given that the difference attributable to pressure would be undetectable, why bother with the vacuum stuff?

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #24 on: August 11, 2020, 09:36:21 PM »
Any assessment of an element of the atmosphere is an analysis, and is less empirical than experimental demonstration. An analysis just brings in more questions.

To double down on an analysis we would need to know things like:

- Exactly how that determination of the affect of pressure at different altitudes was achieved. If it is based on the pressure variations combined with readings seen in precision scales at a particular high altitude over the course of the day, for example, the assumption could be totally off the mark. May be assuming that gravitational variations is affecting the scale.

- If it was assumed that gravity plays a part in the original determination of the variables of any particular atmospheric model; if the gravitational variations actually do not exist those variables may play more of an affect than originally assumed.

- How all the elements of the atmosphere combine to affect a scale. Atmospheric properties such as humidity, air viscosity, pressure, and thermal diffusivity could all be interrelated and combine in ways to affect the buoyancy in the atmospheric medium, which may be unclear.

If we sat here questioning each and every property of the atmosphere, which there are a good number of, and questioned how it could all affect the buoyancy, and how assumptions were determined for all of that, I really doubt that we would get solid answers. It's more than just pressure that can affect a scale - https://wiki.tfes.org/Weight_Variation_by_Latitude#Scales_Affected_by_Atmosphere
« Last Edit: August 15, 2020, 04:36:13 AM by Tom Bishop »

Offline edby

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #25 on: August 11, 2020, 09:39:17 PM »
Any assessment of an element of the atmosphere is an analysis, and is less empirical than experimental demonstration. An analysis just brings in more questions.
My point was that the effect of atmospheric pressure is very very tiny.

You could easily test this by getting a precision scale and a good barometer and weighing the object over a long period while monitoring air pressure and temperature. If change of air pressure and temperature make no difference then they make no difference.

[EDIT] Have you thought about the price of scales? A really good instrument with the precision you require would cost at least $5,000.
« Last Edit: August 11, 2020, 09:41:14 PM by edby »

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #26 on: August 11, 2020, 09:43:02 PM »
Any assessment of an element of the atmosphere is an analysis, and is less empirical than experimental demonstration. An analysis just brings in more questions.
My point was that the effect of atmospheric pressure is very very tiny.

You could easily test this by getting a precision scale and a good barometer and weighing the object over a long period while monitoring air pressure and temperature. If change of air pressure and temperature make no difference then they make no difference.

In this example we are measuring the variations though, not the full affect of pressure.

- A barometer is a scale that weighs the atmosphere, and produces a reading which tells us the weight of the atmosphere, and this reading shows the 'atmospheric pressure'.

- A barometer changes slightly over the course of the day

Therefore, if you are describing the variations, you are not describing the total weight of the atmosphere, which averages 14.7 lb/square inch at sea level.
« Last Edit: August 11, 2020, 09:47:06 PM by Tom Bishop »

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #27 on: August 11, 2020, 09:45:30 PM »
In this example we are measuring the variations though, not the full affect of pressure.

- A barometer is a scale that weighs the atmosphere, and produces a reading which tells us the weight of the atmosphere, and this reading shows the 'atmospheric pressure'.

- A barometer changes slightly over the course of the day

Therefore, if you are describing the variations, you are not describing the total weight of the atmosphere, which averages 14.7 lb/square inch at sea level.
I understand that. My point is that if you find that variations in atmospheric pressure do not affect the measurement, then they do not affect the measurement. Right?



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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #28 on: August 11, 2020, 10:19:58 PM »
It would be pretty tough for me to determine. The variations could just be caused by the variations of the non-pressure elements.

There still might be a constant effect, just as the temperature ranges by some amount throughout the day on a thermometer (variations), but does not get anywhere close to Absolute Zero, 0 degrees Kelvin, at any point because there is a constant main temperature of some kind.

« Last Edit: August 11, 2020, 10:57:53 PM by Tom Bishop »

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Offline JSS

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #29 on: August 11, 2020, 10:32:18 PM »
Why not use one of these? It's a gravimeter where the sensor is already contained within a vacuum chamber making it immune to any pressure acting on the device.

https://www.muquans.com/product/absolute-quantum-gravimeter/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6098009/

"The sensor head houses the vacuum chamber where the measurement of gravity is performed"

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Offline Tom Bishop

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #30 on: August 12, 2020, 04:06:06 AM »
Why not use one of these? It's a gravimeter where the sensor is already contained within a vacuum chamber making it immune to any pressure acting on the device.

https://www.muquans.com/product/absolute-quantum-gravimeter/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6098009/

"The sensor head houses the vacuum chamber where the measurement of gravity is performed"

Take a look at this page: https://wiki.tfes.org/Gravimetry

It is possible that the gravimeter isn't directly measuring gravity. The gravity anomalies are generally associated with the seismic zones, and have a negative association with mountain ranges and continents.

Offline edby

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #31 on: August 12, 2020, 07:19:36 AM »
It would be pretty tough for me to determine. The variations could just be caused by the variations of the non-pressure elements.
Wrong way round. If you find, after an exhaustive series of measurements at the same elevation, that change in pressure and temperature have no effect on the reading, then you can reasonably safely conclude that change in pressure and temperature have no effect on the reading.

Offline edby

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #32 on: August 12, 2020, 07:22:17 AM »
It is possible that the gravimeter isn't directly measuring gravity. The gravity anomalies are generally associated with the seismic zones, and have a negative association with mountain ranges and continents.
We have discussed this at length elsewhere. A ballistic gravimeter simply drops a weight in a vacuum over a known distance, and measures the time the drop takes. Knowing the distance and the time you can then infer the acceleration. The more sensitive devices can even compensate for the difference in gravity over the drop itself.

So a gravimeter is an accelerometer. Of course, an accelerometer can also be used as a seismometer, no one ever denied that.
« Last Edit: August 12, 2020, 09:07:33 AM by edby »

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Offline JSS

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #33 on: August 12, 2020, 10:50:28 AM »
Why not use one of these? It's a gravimeter where the sensor is already contained within a vacuum chamber making it immune to any pressure acting on the device.

https://www.muquans.com/product/absolute-quantum-gravimeter/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6098009/

"The sensor head houses the vacuum chamber where the measurement of gravity is performed"

Take a look at this page: https://wiki.tfes.org/Gravimetry

It is possible that the gravimeter isn't directly measuring gravity. The gravity anomalies are generally associated with the seismic zones, and have a negative association with mountain ranges and continents.

The device has an active system to cancel out vibrations and seismic activity, as well as a 2Hz sample rate which alone acts as a low-pas filter against any noise from intermitant motion like small earthquakes or other noise.

"The vacuum chamber is protected from external magnetic fields by two layers of mu-metal shields. A high-performance accelerometer is attached to the top of the vacuum chamber in order to implement an active compensation of vibrations and to make the instrument robust against seismic noise without the need of an isolation device"

This seems to cover two of your big concerns, atmospheric pressure and seismic zones.

All indications are that these devices certainly are measuring gravity directly, they time the speed an object falls, either a weight or using quantum measurements on atoms like this device. If an object falls faster, that is a very clear indication that gravity is pulling that object with more force, thus stronger gravity.

Offline edby

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #34 on: August 12, 2020, 11:30:09 AM »
This seems to cover two of your big concerns, atmospheric pressure and seismic zones.

All indications are that these devices certainly are measuring gravity directly, they time the speed an object falls, either a weight or using quantum measurements on atoms like this device. If an object falls faster, that is a very clear indication that gravity is pulling that object with more force, thus stronger gravity.
See also this project https://www.bipm.org/utils/common/pdf/final_reports/M/G-K1/EURAMET.M.G-K1.pdf and this https://www.bipm.org/utils/common/pdf/final_reports/M/G-K1/SIM.M.G-K1.pdf which are specific projects to determine the uncorrected numbers from high precisision gravimeters. Table 3 in the first link gives the measurements at Walferdange. Table 5 in the second link gives measurements at Colorado.

I checked both sets of measurements against the IGS formula which is a theoretical value using inputs of just latitude and height. They agree closely, although the absolutely gravimeter values are clearly going to be ‘correct’.

The results conclusively indicate

(i) that observed acceleration changes significantly both with latitude and height. Thus the acceleration at Walferdange (lat 50.884635, elevation 405) is 980.96395 cm/s^2. At Colorado (lat 40.13080, elevation 1682) it is 979.62274 cm/s^2.

(ii) that observed acceleration agrees closely with predicted acceleration. My predictions were 981.02707 for Walferdange and 979.66495
for Colorado.

So to some extent Tom’s experiment is repeating existing scientific results, although I like the idea of an old school approach using spring based mechanisms that people can understand, and I fully support his idea for a project.
« Last Edit: August 12, 2020, 11:31:54 AM by edby »

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Offline AATW

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #35 on: August 12, 2020, 12:02:48 PM »
For a water convexity test, I think by this stage everyone agrees that it is possible to see further than should be possible on an RE.
Well, let's define what we mean by that. You can generally see further than you would if we lived on a perfect sphere with no atmosphere.
No dispute there, but that's not what the RE model is.

I agree that refraction does confuse things somewhat. In some ways observations over water would seem ideal as I think both sides agree that "water finds its level" - whether that level is flat or following the contours of a sphere is in dispute of course. But refraction will yield inconsistent results.

Rowbotham's line of posts using water as a baseline seems sensible. Takes more effort but I believe that observations higher off the water surface mitigates the issue of refraction.

There are some observations we make which I'd suggest are characteristic of a sphere. The distance to the horizon varying with height is one. This is what you'd expect on a sphere, you can see further over the curve. But then you explain it away in ways I don't really understand:

https://wiki.tfes.org/Viewing_Distance

And this is the issue I have with "you lot", and makes this sort of investigation difficult. If you're going to suggest mechanisms which explain why observations fit what you'd expect on a globe then what experiment can you do which would actually discriminate between the two models? That has to be the starting point.
Tom: "Claiming incredulity is a pretty bad argument. Calling it "insane" or "ridiculous" is not a good argument at all."

TFES Wiki Occam's Razor page, by Tom: "What's the simplest explanation; that NASA has successfully designed and invented never before seen rocket technologies from scratch which can accelerate 100 tons of matter to an escape velocity of 7 miles per second"

Offline edby

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #36 on: August 12, 2020, 12:56:11 PM »
If you're going to suggest mechanisms which explain why observations fit what you'd expect on a globe then what experiment can you do which would actually discriminate between the two models? That has to be the starting point.
A quantitative approach would be a good start. There are many long discussions about how much of the height of a building has been obscured, or how tall a chimney might be. Find a way of clearly labelling a structure so that the points which are obscured (if any) are clear from a distance. Take temperature, pressure and humidity readings, document the height of the camera and make many many measurements at different times.

If FE research is going to be successful and make an impact on the scientific world, it needs to follow the scientific method, i.e. careful attention to how you are measuring things.

[EDIT] The time lapse below is a good example of the problem. Both sides claim it supports their model, because it is not clear how much of the buildings are obscured, nor do we know the height above lake level the film was taken.

« Last Edit: August 12, 2020, 01:04:05 PM by edby »

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Offline Tumeni

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #37 on: August 12, 2020, 10:21:45 PM »
For a water convexity test, I think by this stage everyone agrees that it is possible to see further than should be possible on an RE.

How can you "agree" on this if you're not yet convinced that light propagates in straight lines?

If you assert that light is or could be bending in a fashion you have not measured or determined, how can you form a conclusion such as you have above?
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Offline Iceman

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #38 on: August 26, 2020, 10:05:21 PM »
Some cheap community-based tests to evaluate aspects of claims/predictions of FE and RE models:

1. Get a group of people, spread over as broad a range of latitudes (north and south of the equator) as possible, to measure the shadow length of n object of fixed height at their local solar noon on the upcoming fall equinox. Have them record their coordinates, take photos of their setup and shadow measurement, and conduct it in a public place, with identifiable landmarks. Post pictures and readings so that all reported coordinates, and measurements can be cross-validated by anyone who wishes to do so.

2. Minimum 3 people - one in southern america, one in southern africa, one in southern Australi/New Zealand - point their cameras due south, record star trails on the same night.

3. Take a long-haul southern hemisphere flight, bring a GPS with you. Take way point measurements every ~15 minutes or so. Plot the path you take, use the distance between points and time interval to evaluate for any changes in speed during the flight.

4. Obtain tide gauge data (public domain) for ports along oceans following seismic events that produce a  tsunami. Time interval between the seismic event (also public domain) and the arrival of tsunami waves at different coasts allows for the calculation of distance the wave has travelled.

5. Conduct your own pendulum experiments

6. Evaluate refractive effects of light bending over water by adding observers and instrumentation ( temperature, humidity etc) in between land-based observers, and ships dissapearing over the 'apparent' horizon.

Those are the cheapest and easiest experiments I can come up with. There are undoubtedly many others. In this age of instant communication, remember that it doesnt necessarily take big money to produce big data. Just ensure strict protocols are followed and record everything you do so that others can verify and replicate your work. Best of luck to you!


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Offline AATW

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Re: Brainstorming Community Tests of FE
« Reply #39 on: August 27, 2020, 03:27:52 PM »
1. Get a group of people, spread over as broad a range of latitudes (north and south of the equator) as possible, to measure the shadow length of n object of fixed height at their local solar noon on the upcoming fall equinox. Have them record their coordinates, take photos of their setup and shadow measurement, and conduct it in a public place, with identifiable landmarks. Post pictures and readings so that all reported coordinates, and measurements can be cross-validated by anyone who wishes to do so.

This has been done. Good video here showing the method and results.



Well, I say good. It's a bit overly long really but if you skip some of the bits where he goes through thanking each participant and showing the results one by one it makes the point well.

I don't know what the FE explanation is. Possibly EA although I'm not sure if you can get the light to bend from any one point in a consistent way such that it matches the observed angles. The other possibility is that the points are mapped on to the plane incorrectly, the lack of a definitive FE map makes that placement tricky.

On the Wiki Zeteticism is described as:

Quote
In questioning the shape of the Earth the zetetic does not make a hypothesis suggesting that the Earth is round or flat and then proceed testing that hypothesis; he skips that step and devises an experiment that will determine the shape of the Earth, and bases his conclusion on the result of that experiment. Many feel this is a more reasonable method than the normal scientific method because it removes any preconceived notions and biases the formation of a hypothesis might cause, and leaves the conclusion up entirely to what is observed.

https://wiki.tfes.org/Zeteticism

The issue here is how do you design an experiment to test that? I mean, you could, say, get in a rocket and observe the earth from space I guess. That experiment has been done of course, but it's not accessible to many people!

An observation can be made over water. Let's assume that the Bishop experiment is as described. What is the significance of being able to see the opposite beach? The conclusion drawn is the earth must be flat, but that's only true if light goes in straight lines in all cases and elsewhere the Wiki argues that is not a valid assumption. Or maybe that section of water really is flat, does that mean that all sections of water are? What has that experiment actually taught us? The conclusion can only be drawn if other assumptions are made.

The only experiments I can see which help here are ones of the form where you predict what the results should be in the heliocentric model or a FE model, do the experiment and see which model the results fit better. The trouble is from past experience if the results appear to back up a heliocentric model they are dismissed.

TL;DR, short of getting in a rocket and observing the earth, I don't know what experiment you can do which will determine the shape of the earth which can't be explained in some other way if you're determined to.
Tom: "Claiming incredulity is a pretty bad argument. Calling it "insane" or "ridiculous" is not a good argument at all."

TFES Wiki Occam's Razor page, by Tom: "What's the simplest explanation; that NASA has successfully designed and invented never before seen rocket technologies from scratch which can accelerate 100 tons of matter to an escape velocity of 7 miles per second"