[Rayzor]

I know this is an oversight,  or a misunderstanding,  but I congratulate the wiki authors on being honest enough to leave the reference as is.
I mentioned it  months ago  on the other forum,  but  never really got much traction.  It came up again when someone recently mentioned the Bedford Level Experiment,  which is well known for proving the earth is a globe,  and was the subject of much debate in the late 1800's..   Time to ask the question again.

Let's refer to the wiki...  The Bedford Level Experiment  http://wiki.tfes.org/Bedford_Level_Experiment

Where we find the following.

History
Diagrams explaining the experiment as documented in Earth Not a Globe by Rowbotham
The first investigation was carried out by Samuel Birley Rowbotham (1816-1884), the president of the Flat Earth Society, in the summer of 1838. He waded into the river and used a telescope held eight inches above the water to watch a boat with a five-foot mast row slowly away from him. He reported that the vessel remained constantly in his view for the full six miles 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 eleven feet below his line of sight.
Rowbotham repeated his experiments several times over the years but his discoveries received little attention until, in 1870, a supporter by the name of John Hampden offered a wager that he could show, by repeating Rowbotham's experiment, that the earth was flat. The noted naturalist and qualified surveyor Alfred Russel Wallace accepted the wager. Wallace won the bet. Hampden, however, published a pamphlet alleging that Wallace had cheated and sued for his money. Several protracted court cases ensued, with the result that Hampden was imprisoned for libel, but the court also determined that Wallace had, indeed, cheated.

In 1901 Henry Yule Oldham, a geography reader at King's College, Cambridge, conducted the definitive experiment described above.

On 11 May 1904 Lady Anne Blount 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 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 and, apart from some hypothesising concerning refraction, and dark hints of collusion between Blount and Clifton, these have not been explained.


So the wiki says the definitive experiment was carried out by Henry Yule Oldham in 1901... 

In 1901 Oldham used a plate camera and theodolite for his careful observations along the length of the river and he presented his results at an illustrated lecture held at the British Association for the Advancement of Science.[5][6] His experiment, because of its photographic proof, is regarded as definitive and was taught in schools[7] until images taken from orbiting satellites became available.

Henry Yule Oldham published his results in the following paper..

Oldham, H. Yule (1901). "The experimental demonstration of the curvature of the Earth's surface". Annual Report (London: British Association for the Advancement of Science): 725–6.

I appreciate the honest reporting in the wiki,   can we now consider the Bedford Level Experiment as proving the earth is in fact a globe.

[Rayzor]

Invitation to SexWarrior to state his case here, rather than clutter the Zetetic vs Scientifc thread.

[Pete Svarrior]

It would seem that you're either confused or dishonest. It is indeed correct that multiple people performed the experiment, and that their results weren't 100% consistent. This is hardly uncommon when controversial subjects are discussed. However, a peer review performed by Blount et al. sufficiently closed the case.

Would you prefer that we hadn't mentioned RE'ers performing the same experiment and disagreeing? There is no satisfying you people - when we're open and honest, you twist our words and go for the lowest common denominator of arguments - "Aha! Your source mentions a Round Earther, therefore the Earth must be round!"

Get the fuck out of here.

[Rayzor]

It would seem that you're either confused or dishonest. It is indeed correct that multiple people performed the experiment, and that their results weren't 100% consistent. This is hardly uncommon when controversial subjects are discussed. However, a peer review performed by Blount et al. sufficiently closed the case.

Would you prefer that we hadn't mentioned RE'ers performing the same experiment and disagreeing? There is no satisfying you people - when we're open and honest, you twist our words and go for the lowest common denominator of arguments - "Aha! Your source mentions a Round Earther, therefore the Earth must be round!"

Get the fuck out of here.

No need for insults.   So are you now saying Henry Yule Oldham's experiment wasn't definitive?

In any event, you are missing the critical point,  and that is every time the experiment is done with proper regard to establishing sight lines and being aware of refraction,  the answer is always that the earth is curved. 

The fact that Rowbotham chose to ignore this and in fact deliberately set out to maximize the effect by having his telescope a mere 8" above the water, would tell any reasonable person that Rowbotham was trying to rig the results.   The height of intellectual dishonesty,  and sadly typical of the Zetetic method.

Throwing insults and red herrings does nothing to advance your argument.

[sandokhan]

rayzor, Rowbotham, Winship, Lady Blount are great historical references, however today we have at our disposal fresh material, such as FE Experiments' lighthouse seen in Spain over a distance of some 31 km.

Here is something much better for you to focus on: the solar eclipse of March 20, 1662 AD.

Believe it or not, there are no astronomical/historical records for this total solar eclipse (other than a brief mention by Cassini), by far what should have been the most important astronomical event of the millenium, a chance to settle once and for all the Gregorian calendar reform controversy.

The Jesuits in India/China, F. Verbiest, J. Schall von Bell,  even the young N. Flamsteed fail to notice/record this most important of all the total solar eclipses.

We are told that G.D. Cassini published new tables of the sun, based on his observations at San Petronio in 1662: these observations are published in the Catalogue général des livres imprimés de la Bibliothèque Nationale, XXIV (Paris, 1905), cols. 678–682, or in the Table générale des maturès continuesdans l’Histoire et dans les Mémoires de l’Académic Royaledes Sciences, I–III (Paris, 1729–1734).

Here is Cassini's most celebrated work:

http://amshistorica.unibo.it/25 (italian/latin) (pg 28-30)


However, when the mathematicians of today examined the scientific/astronomical basis on which pontiff Gregory XIII based his decision to modify the Julian calendar, they discovered extraordinary errors: there was no way that anybody at that time could/would have modified the calendar by 10 days.

[Rayzor]

rayzor, Rowbotham, Winship, Lady Blount are great historical references, however today we have at our disposal fresh material, such as FE Experiments' lighthouse seen in Spain over a distance of some 31 km.

I always find your posts and research interesting, and worth following.   I'll be interested in following your chronology another day.

Here is a plot of theoretical lighthouse visibility distances compared with flat earth claims.   



Whoever made the claims that they should not be visible,  (Eric Dubay, copying Rowbotham) didn't know how to do the calculations.   

What I'm looking for is a documented example of something that is visible at a greater distance than the earth's curvature predicts, where proper care has been taken to establish a sight line, and allow for refraction.    I haven't found one,  and I don't believe one exists.

Whenever a geodetic survey is done, the earth's curvature is exactly what it should be.