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Offline Tom Bishop

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The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« on: September 08, 2022, 11:48:30 AM »
If you perform a search for "flat earth" on youtube one of the top videos that comes up is a piece from National Geographic, which claims to have tested the curvature of the earth and found it to be round. Specifically, they brought in the Independent Investigations Group who were promoted as a group of science professionals to "test" the matter. They determined that the earth was curved and this was heavily promoted and featured by National Geographic in the video.

This is the National Geographic video:



Specifically, they lied about how many lines were seen when the boat and the board went into the distance:

At 7:54 the CFI Investigations Group says:

"We've lost about one and a half stripes; so this can only
happen because of the curvature of the earth"


In the video preview on the YouTube search page there is also a teaser for the video featuing the Independent Investigation Group stating that this can only happen because of the curvature of the earth.

However, it is clearly not the case that one and a half stipes were missing. If you look at the striped board from other views before it went into the distance the red line was always at the bottom.

Close up; boat leaves and begins going into the distance:



In the distance:





There are no other shots of the boat in the distance. From this they concluded that one and a half stripes went missing. There is a little compression there, and it is possible that a very small portion of the bottom red line nearest the water might be missing for whatever reason, but it is clearly not the case that one and a half stripes went missing.

It is also apparent that the horizon is still behind the boat and the and the striped board, still intersecting it. If the boat and board were sinking into the horizon, then the bottom edge of the board is the waterline horizon and that is where the water would end. There should not be additional water seen behind the boat and the board cutting through behind it. If the bottom of the board and boat was the horizon then the surface of the water should curve away at that point.

If the boat is curving behind the horizon, you should not see a water horizon further in the distance. There is a diagram animated scene in the National Geographic video showing the boat receding from the observer, showing the surface of the Earth curving away into the red beneath the line of sight:



Embarassing.

It is possible that all of this is a simple mistake. But considering all of the National Geographic production effort put into this, the hiring and promotion of an independent "science" group, and the fact that this was played on television as an educational video; the inability to count the lines on the target, or look at their own diagrams and see that the water horizon is still behind the boat, can be interpreted as a lie via negligence. If it is a matter of severe negligence then it is still a lie because they claimed to the public that they at least performed basic due diligence on the matter and did not. The video eggregously promotes this as the science truth.

Especially if this is pointed out to them and they still do not remove the video; if YouTube and National Geographic keeps the video up and promoted then it is a heinous lie to the public. I would go as far as to advocate that tfes makes this one of its next front page posts, demanding an apology and retraction of the video content from National Geographic. If they do not remove it then it is clear evidence of a lie to the public by a high profile science and education organization.
« Last Edit: September 08, 2022, 01:39:57 PM by Tom Bishop »

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Offline Pete Svarrior

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #1 on: September 08, 2022, 03:05:14 PM »
I would go as far as to advocate that tfes makes this one of its next front page posts, demanding an apology and retraction of the video content from National Geographic. If they do not remove it then it is clear evidence of a lie to the public by a high profile science and education organization.
I will happily support this. Would you like to put together a post to that effect? Just post in any board and ping me so I can move it to Announcements.
Read the FAQ before asking your question - chances are we already addressed it.
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Offline Tumeni

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #2 on: September 08, 2022, 05:06:21 PM »
Why don't you conduct a similar experiment which conclusively proves your point of view, then?

Make it a nice, clear view, with no "compression", so that there's no doubt your point is proved. 

I've already been out and done mine. The seas around East Scotland, at least, are Not Flat.
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BillO

Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #3 on: September 08, 2022, 07:33:30 PM »
That was one poorly done experiment.  It really is quite astonishing that National Geographic actually let this get published.

National Geographic has been declining over time, but I had no idea they had sunk to these depths.

Heck, I'll even get on the band wagon to have them pull this rubbish.  All it shows is there can be variable refraction over water.  It certainly does not demonstrate the earth's curvature.

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Offline stack

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #4 on: September 08, 2022, 07:50:53 PM »
Yeah, that was a pretty lousy test. I'm not sure why that guy said in the Nat Geo video, "One and half stripes missing..." but from the CFI video (The folks who performed the test for Nat Geo, says at around 5:15:

"We did lose the majority of one stripe..."



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Offline AATW

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #5 on: September 08, 2022, 07:55:29 PM »
Yeah, that was a pretty lousy test. I'm not sure why that guy said in the Nat Geo video, "One and half stripes missing..." but from the CFI video (The folks who performed the test for Nat Geo, says at around 5:15:

"We did lose the majority of one stripe..."
But even in that screenshot it looks like the horizon is behind the boat.
It is a complete mess, nothing wrong with the principle of what they did but they've documented it really poorly and if one and a half stripes did disappear when the boat was further away they've shown the wrong screenshot.
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 stack

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #6 on: September 08, 2022, 08:31:53 PM »
Yeah, that was a pretty lousy test. I'm not sure why that guy said in the Nat Geo video, "One and half stripes missing..." but from the CFI video (The folks who performed the test for Nat Geo, says at around 5:15:

"We did lose the majority of one stripe..."
But even in that screenshot it looks like the horizon is behind the boat.
It is a complete mess, nothing wrong with the principle of what they did but they've documented it really poorly and if one and a half stripes did disappear when the boat was further away they've shown the wrong screenshot.

Yeah, I agree, terrible "experiment". I was just speaking to what was up with that guy saying 1.5 stripes missing in the Nat Geo vid. Obviously not.

Offline Kokorikos

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #7 on: September 09, 2022, 05:27:02 AM »
Where do NG say that they "hired" this Independent group? They never claim that these are scientists or that they were hired by NG.
All they say is that there are some people that try to hit back on the flat Earth claim (and it seems that they found some of the most lazy/incompetent ones).

They do not focus on the particulars of the experiment at all. They probably should have, but the purpose of this video is not to prove that the Earth is round (it is clear that they take it for granted), but to discuss briefly about the flat Earth movement.

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Offline Clyde Frog

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #8 on: September 09, 2022, 12:41:19 PM »
If I were to play apologist for NatGeo here, I'd guess they are counting the white stripes as stripes. Stripes can be white, too, after all. So they are counting all of the white on the bottom, plus half of the red stripe. Doesn't excuse the fact that you can you can clearly see the horizon behind the boat which runs counter to what they are claiming to show here, but I have a feeling that's where they are getting the "one and a half stripes" from.

SteelyBob

Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #9 on: September 09, 2022, 03:17:08 PM »
Whilst I think we all agree on the general sloppiness and inaccuracy of the experiment, isn’t the bigger point that it is somewhat irrelevant? If I’ve understood the FE position correctly, Tom, you would not accept such an experiment as being evidence for a round earth anyway, would you? One stripe or five, you would presumably argue that other factors were at work - right?

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Offline stack

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #10 on: September 09, 2022, 06:24:14 PM »
If I were to play apologist for NatGeo here, I'd guess they are counting the white stripes as stripes. Stripes can be white, too, after all. So they are counting all of the white on the bottom, plus half of the red stripe. Doesn't excuse the fact that you can you can clearly see the horizon behind the boat which runs counter to what they are claiming to show here, but I have a feeling that's where they are getting the "one and a half stripes" from.

Funny, this didn't even occur to me. I was too fixated on the colors, not the white stripes. So yeah, if this is the case, the guy's statement kinda makes sense now.

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Offline Clyde Frog

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #11 on: September 09, 2022, 06:45:34 PM »
If I were to play apologist for NatGeo here, I'd guess they are counting the white stripes as stripes. Stripes can be white, too, after all. So they are counting all of the white on the bottom, plus half of the red stripe. Doesn't excuse the fact that you can you can clearly see the horizon behind the boat which runs counter to what they are claiming to show here, but I have a feeling that's where they are getting the "one and a half stripes" from.

Funny, this didn't even occur to me. I was too fixated on the colors, not the white stripes. So yeah, if this is the case, the guy's statement kinda makes sense now.
I mean, it's an extremely generous interpretation of their words, I am by no means trying to stand in their corner and champion that video as a paragon of excellence in science communication, but I think it might still be a fair interpretation. They need to be better though.

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Offline stack

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #12 on: September 09, 2022, 09:20:36 PM »
If I were to play apologist for NatGeo here, I'd guess they are counting the white stripes as stripes. Stripes can be white, too, after all. So they are counting all of the white on the bottom, plus half of the red stripe. Doesn't excuse the fact that you can you can clearly see the horizon behind the boat which runs counter to what they are claiming to show here, but I have a feeling that's where they are getting the "one and a half stripes" from.

Funny, this didn't even occur to me. I was too fixated on the colors, not the white stripes. So yeah, if this is the case, the guy's statement kinda makes sense now.
I mean, it's an extremely generous interpretation of their words, I am by no means trying to stand in their corner and champion that video as a paragon of excellence in science communication, but I think it might still be a fair interpretation. They need to be better though.

I agree all around. A craptastic "experiment" at best - A bobbing dinghy, stripes smeared on a bedsheet, and basically 2 miles distance (3 miles was hard to see apparently...)

They did another experiment at the same time that Nat Geo didn't show. Something with balloons. But I couldn't be bothered to even look at it thoroughly considering how lame the boat thing was.

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Offline J-Man

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #13 on: September 11, 2022, 02:44:42 AM »
This whole flat earth thinging has become obvious from these scientific studies. TY Tom
What kind of person would devote endless hours posting scientific facts trying to correct the few retards who believe in the FE? I slay shitty little demons.

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Offline Tumeni

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #14 on: September 11, 2022, 01:25:40 PM »
Seems like NG just came along to film it, and weren't responsible for protocol or method

https://cfiig.org/earth-curvature-test/

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Offline Iceman

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #15 on: September 11, 2022, 04:51:39 PM »
Seems like NG just came along to film it, and weren't responsible for protocol or method

https://cfiig.org/earth-curvature-test/

Sure but if they film, edit, produce, release, and promote it - the blame for the content is theirs to share.

Offline Action80

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #16 on: September 12, 2022, 12:41:24 PM »
If I were to play apologist for NatGeo here, I'd guess they are counting the white stripes as stripes. Stripes can be white, too, after all. So they are counting all of the white on the bottom, plus half of the red stripe. Doesn't excuse the fact that you can you can clearly see the horizon behind the boat which runs counter to what they are claiming to show here, but I have a feeling that's where they are getting the "one and a half stripes" from.
Your explanation might make sense, except for the fact there are only three white stripes. At what point does one of those white stripes go missing in order to add up to one and one-half?
To be honest I am getting pretty bored of this place.

SteelyBob

Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #17 on: September 12, 2022, 12:56:45 PM »
Your explanation might make sense, except for the fact there are only three white stripes. At what point does one of those white stripes go missing in order to add up to one and one-half?

Would any number of missing stripes, of any colour, have persuaded you that the earth might, in fact, not be flat?

Offline Action80

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #18 on: September 12, 2022, 03:38:21 PM »
Your explanation might make sense, except for the fact there are only three white stripes. At what point does one of those white stripes go missing in order to add up to one and one-half?

Would any number of missing stripes, of any colour, have persuaded you that the earth might, in fact, not be flat?
No, because I understand the farther away you are from objects, especially those at ground or water level, the less likely you are to see them. Imperfections in the surface and atmoplane being what they are.
To be honest I am getting pretty bored of this place.

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Offline AATW

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Re: The Blatant Lies of National Geographic
« Reply #19 on: September 12, 2022, 03:46:21 PM »
No, because I understand the farther away you are from objects, especially those at ground or water level, the less likely you are to see them. Imperfections in the surface and atmoplane being what they are.
But in this timelapse you can clearly see a ship starting to sink and another rising



This is behaviour you'd expect if the objects are going behind something, or coming from behind something.
The parts of the ship you can see are clear as day, where's the rest of the ship? What's it behind?
EDIT: If this is about visibility then you'd surely expect parts of the ship to fade out but that isn't what is shown in that video.
« Last Edit: September 12, 2022, 03:50:26 PM by AllAroundTheWorld »
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"