I'm trying to understand what the FE position is about things disappearing over the horizon at sea.
The conversation generally goes something like:
RE: "Ships disappear below the horizon, hull first. That can only be explained by a round earth"
FE: "No, the hull can be restored by a telescope, it does not disappear behind a hill of water"
RE: "OK, how about this <insert picture/video>? That clearly shows the hull/building behind the curve of the earth"
FE: "Waves..."
It's "Heads I win, tails you lose" reasoning. If the hull can be "restored" then that proves a flat earth.
If it can't then it doesn't prove a round earth, it's just waves. Is the claim that this video:
Is caused by waves? He shows where the different shots were taken from, looking at the times when he shows the GPS readings it looks like the same afternoon and the weather doesn't seem significantly different. While the channel does connect with the ocean, you can see that the water is pretty calm in all the shots as you would expect in a fairly narrow channel like this. It's not the open ocean. If waves were a factor you would expect the amount of the building you can see to vary significantly as the swell comes and goes, but you can't.
Also, the infamous Bishop Experiment (
https://wiki.tfes.org/Experimental_Evidence )
claims that:
With a good telescope, laying down on the stomach at the edge of the shore on the Lovers Point beach 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. Upon looking into the telescope I can see children running in and out of the water, splashing and playing. I can see people sun bathing at the shore and teenagers merrily throwing Frisbees to one another. I can see runners jogging along the water's edge with their dogs. From my vantage point the entire beach is visible.
No photographic or video evidence of this claim is supplied on the Wiki. Tom also says that:
Whenever I have doubts about the shape of the earth I simply walk outside my home, down to the beach, and perform this simple test. The same result comes up over and over throughout the year under a plethora of different atmospheric conditions.
(my emphasis).
These observations are across a bay which, like the above channel is open to the sea. Arguably more open to the sea than the channel. So why aren't waves a problem here? Tom claims he can reproduce this result "over and over throughout the year", waves are apparently never an issue. But videos like the above are simply explained by waves? You can't have it both ways...
Tom says that
Samuel Birley Rowbotham has proven that sinking ships are restored when looking at them with a telescope, proving that they are not really behind a "hill of water".
I'm interested by the world "proven" here. Rowbothom makes this claim and says it is backed up by what he saw but that is all. Apparently this is enough proof for Tom which is strange given the levels of proof he demands for anything which doesn't fit in with his world view. Which brings me on to Rowbothom's claims about perspective:
In a long row of lamps, standing on horizontal ground, the pedestals, if short, gradually diminish until at a distance of a few hundred yards they seem to disappear, and the upper and thinner parts of the lamp posts appear to touch the ground
http://www.sacred-texts.com/earth/za/za32.htmFrom this and other examples he concludes that:
upon a plane or horizontal surface the lowest parts of bodies receding from a given point of observation necessarily disappear before the highest.
http://www.sacred-texts.com/earth/za/za33.htmThe only evidence Rowbothom provides for any of this is him saying that is what he saw. So my rebuttal is "No they don't".
The lowest parts of "bodies receding from a given point of observation" do NOT disappear before the highest parts IF the two objects are on a plane. Assuming no refraction or other atmospheric conditions the entire object should be visible no matter how far away it gets.
The whole object is just less clear as it recedes and on the sea if the hull and sea are similar in colour they may be hard to distinguish. All optical zoom will do is make things bigger and make them easier to distinguish again. The way to demonstrate this is to think about how we see things at all. Light bounces off objects and in to our eyes. So long as there is clear line of sight between me and all of an object then I will be able to see all of it which, on a flat plane, there should always be. The only limiting factor would be atmospheric conditions. Here is a diagram showing how the light travels from the bottom of a distant person and the top of the person into my eye:
So I should be able to see the whole person, just less clearly as the person gets further away. If you think about it, the closer the person is the larger the angle between the top and bottom lines and thus the bigger the image formed on my retina. Other than the size I perceive something, perspective is NOT a factor here. If photons can physically travel from both the bottom and the top of the object then I see the whole object.
If I was on a curve though then I would see less of the object because the curve in between me and the object and physically blocks the photons from the bottom, so in this diagram I only see the person's head:
If the person was closer there would be less of a curve between us and I would see more of them
When considering how seriously to take Rowbothom's claims about perspective, it's worth noting he also wrote:
During a partial solar eclipse the sun's outline has many times been seen through the body of the moon. But those who have been taught to believe that the moon is a solid opaque sphere, are ever ready with "explanations," often of the most inconsistent character, rather than acknowledge the simple fact of semi-transparency. Not only has this been proved by the visibility of the sun's outline through segments, and sometimes the very centre, of the moon, but often, at new moon, the outline of the whole, and even the several shades of light on the opposite and illuminated part have been distinctly seen. In other words we are often able to see through the dark side of the moon's body the light on the other side.
http://www.sacred-texts.com/earth/za/za63.htmHe also believed the moon to emit its own light and that light to be cold (Hint: Light is made up of photons. Photons have energy. Heat is also a type of energy. If you think you have discovered cold light then another Nobel prize awaits).
I have yet to understand why Rowbotham's claims are given such credence by some on here.