[Emily Ames]

Great question, what shines light on the moon? Obviously, in that diagram, the sun's rays do not reach the moon...

[Thork]

Actually the sun would have to follow various latitudes during the year, slowly changing track with the seasons. 

Indeed it would. It was just a basic diagram. Getting it to move in and out on a diagram to show diurnal change would be confusing. It of course would migrate between the tropics as in the diagram below.

I did ask that you excuse the basic nature of the diagram.

Excuse the crudity of the diagram.

The moon also looks like a ball, not a spotlight.  Especially when I point my telescope at it.  I see mountains with shadows that point away from the direction of the sun.

This I highly doubt. What kind of a telescope do you have? A Mauna Kea?

If the moon is lit up by the sun, how does the sun spotlight it at the same time it's spotlighting earth?  Or is there some other spotlight for the moon?  Is the moon also flat like the earth

Classical flat earth theory tells us that the moon is self-luminating. My own suspicion is that it is the bright light of the earth that illuminates it. The crescent shapes are made from the spot-light effect of the sun. Obviously as the moon and sun are both above earth and adjacent, it cannot be light directly from the sun.

[Teamonger]

I can excuse the crudity of the diagram, but I can't excuse the arbitrariness of the hypothesis.  What flat earth theory explains why the sun would circle around in the sky,  precisely following such a complex, migrating track?  What keeps it in place?  You forgot to answer that part...

I see moon mountains with my garden variety 8 inch Newtonian.  The Montes Appeninus range is quite pretty during the waxing gibbous phase, casts great shadows.  The shadows always point away from the direction of the sun.  Likewise the crescents always face the sun direction, just as you can simulate by holding up a ball to one side of a bright light behind it.  So my own suspicion is that the sun is illuminating the moon from far away.

I further suspect that the geometry of round balls (sun, moon, and (gasp!) the earth) explains the evidence far more simply than your diagrams, whether crude or complex.  With round earth theory, the diagrams can stay simple.  Parsimony, man, parsimony!
t

[Thork]

Round earth is easy to explain? Ok, without Markjo jumping in to have this same debate with me for 8 millionth time, I'd like you to explain with a diagram how you get a full moon. Use the sun, earth and moon.

Draw them in a little line. And tell me where the sun has to be, I have to be and the moon has to be for me to get a full moon. Then draw a second picture showing again where everything is for a lunar eclipse. If your pictures look identical when one has a full glowing moon and one has no light on the moon at all, maybe you should consider your model as inadequate?

Go, draw.

[Rama Set]

Do you seriously think only in 2 dimensions Thork? That could be the only explanation for your flaccid "gotcha" post.

[Thork]

Do you seriously think only in 2 dimensions Thork? That could be the only explanation for your flaccid "gotcha" post.

This particular conundrum has nothing to do with only 2 dimensions. A full moon is not possible with round balls. The earth is in the way when the sun is directly below you to produce a full moon. Ergo a full moon is impossible. Despite me witnessing one 5 days ago and my calendar telling me the next one is due on 14th May.

[Rama Set]

Do you seriously think only in 2 dimensions Thork? That could be the only explanation for your flaccid "gotcha" post.

This particular conundrum has nothing to do with only 2 dimensions. A full moon is not possible with round balls. The earth is in the way when the sun is directly below you to produce a full moon. Ergo a full moon is impossible. Despite me witnessing one 5 days ago and my calendar telling me the next one is due on 14th May.

It has everything to do with two and three dimensions.  Let me ask you this pointed question.  Do you think a full moon is only when a full hemisphere of the moon is lit?

[Teamonger]

Round earth is easy to explain? Ok, without Markjo jumping in to have this same debate with me for 8 millionth time, I'd like you to explain with a diagram how you get a full moon. Use the sun, earth and moon.

Draw them in a little line. And tell me where the sun has to be, I have to be and the moon has to be for me to get a full moon. Then draw a second picture showing again where everything is for a lunar eclipse. If your pictures look identical when one has a full glowing moon and one has no light on the moon at all, maybe you should consider your model as inadequate?

Go, draw.

The sun/earth/moon system is three-dimensional, Thork.  It's not easy to depict a three-dimensional situation in a two-dimensional drawing.  Since the moon's orbit is tilted about 5 degrees from the earth's, usually the moon will pass under or over the earth's shadow.  Sometimes it just grazes the shadow, so that it only darkens a little.

Hope that helps or hinders.
t

[Teamonger]

Do you seriously think only in 2 dimensions Thork? That could be the only explanation for your flaccid "gotcha" post.

This particular conundrum has nothing to do with only 2 dimensions. A full moon is not possible with round balls. The earth is in the way when the sun is directly below you to produce a full moon. Ergo a full moon is impossible. Despite me witnessing one 5 days ago and my calendar telling me the next one is due on 14th May.

In one sense, you are correct.  The moon is never "really" full.  When the moon passes above or below the earth's shadow, we're not seeing a tiny portion of the lit-up side.  When the moon passes under the shadow, we would miss a tiny sliver on the bottom, and vice-versa.  But this effect is so small that we don't notice it.  Just like people don't notice if the moon is one day before or after full, it just looks full.

Even at full moon, in a telescope you can still see a terminator at the very edge (dividing line between night and day).  Here's a page that explains this to some extent... from NBC no less!  After all, I'm sure you place full trust in the mainstream media ;-)
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/4402294/ns/technology_and_science-space/t/full-moon-merely-fallacy/#.U1MlMlVdWSo
t

[Tintagel]

Even at full moon, in a telescope you can still see a terminator at the very edge

I am so sorry.

[Teamonger]

Even at full moon, in a telescope you can still see a terminator at the very edge

I am so sorry.

Yep, you better be sorry... trivializing our earnest discussion! 
t

[Teamonger]

Seriously though, Thork's objection did get me thinking... usually that's a good thing

So the moon is never actually full during a "full moon"... except, oddly enough, during a total lunar eclipse.  At that time, the moon is lit up only by the rays of the sun being refracted through earth's atmosphere.  Looked quite dark up there last week...

But that's the only time when the illuminated face is directly facing the earth, with no terminator at all.  Hasta la vista, baby!
t

[Yaakov ben Avraham]

@ the risk of having Miss Emily rip out my eyeballs, I'll introduce myself. I'm a Rounder, & a Traditional Jew. Interestingly enough, the Ancient Hebrews perceived the Earth as flat. I wish this dumbphone could display images, as I've got a few good ones of the Ancient Hebrew perspective. If I can get to a wi-fi hotspot, I'll see about displaying some of those. When you think about it, in a time when people didn't travel further than 50-100 miles from their birthplace, it shouldn't be surprising that they would imagine the world as flat. Why wouldn't they? I'm no scientist. My degrees are in history & philosophy. I won't try to debate the science/math of the thing. But purely by logic, Miss Emily is right. Why would every celestial body but this one be round? & arguing that only Earth has life is simply unverifiable. We don't know that. The universe of round planets may be teeming w/ life, w/ our technology being just too primitive to find it. Unlike Miss Emily, I'm prepared to have a discussion that

[Yaakov ben Avraham]

includes sacred literature & religion. But you FEers need to stop relying on a book that is 133 yrs old w/ experiments of doubtful value. I mean, come on people, its time to get past ENaG if you want to be taken seriously.

[Thork]

So the moon is never actually full during a "full moon"

Indeed. On a round earth model, a full moon is impossible. Just another example of how the flat earth model is superior.

[Tintagel]

But you FEers need to stop relying on a book that is 133 yrs old w/ experiments of doubtful value. I mean, come on people, its time to get past ENaG if you want to be taken seriously.

ENaG is an important and valued part of our society's history and a testament to the spirit of zetetic inquiry.  It is also by no means infallible.

[Yaakov ben Avraham]

Well, I've got a copy, & have read a large part of it. I'm reading it again now. But reputable scientists reject the findings of ENaG as a case of SEVERELY misinterpreted data. The experiments have never been peer reviewed, @ the time they were performed, or since, to my knowledge. What does that say for their value, then? EDIT Please note I am texting from a dumbphone w/ character & space limitations. Some of my posts will be broken into 2 or 3 parts for that reason.

[Teamonger]

So the moon is never actually full during a "full moon"

Indeed. On a round earth model, a full moon is impossible. Just another example of how the flat earth model is superior.

You quoted me out of context, Thork.  Left out "... except, oddly enough, during a total lunar eclipse".  That's when the moon really IS full, though poorly illuminated because of the shadow.  So a full moon is quite possible from this nicely rounded planet 
t

[Thork]

The experiments have never been peer reviewed, @ the time they were performed, or since, to my knowledge.

Actually they have.

[Rowbotham, Samuel B.] Zetetic astronomy. A description of several experiments which prove that the surface of the sea is a perfect plane, and that the earth is not a globe. Being the substance of a paper read before the Royal Astronomical Society on the evening of Dec. 8, 1848. By ‘Parallax' [pseud.] Birmingham, W. Cornish, 1849. 16 p. illus.

[Rama Set]

The experiments have never been peer reviewed, @ the time they were performed, or since, to my knowledge.

Actually they have.

[Rowbotham, Samuel B.] Zetetic astronomy. A description of several experiments which prove that the surface of the sea is a perfect plane, and that the earth is not a globe. Being the substance of a paper read before the Royal Astronomical Society on the evening of Dec. 8, 1848. By ‘Parallax' [pseud.] Birmingham, W. Cornish, 1849. 16 p. illus.

The results of which were obviously not compelling enough to persuade the scientific community. Perhaps this presentation is where it was first noted that his set up introduced too great a source of error to be reliable, namely superior refraction mirage?