[GreatATuin]

Jean Meeus is a Belgian astronomer. He published a book called Astronomical Formulae for Calculators and another called Astronomical Algorithms. As their name suggest, they detail ways to implement formulas and algorithms to calculate position of celestial bodies and other astronomy-related calculations.

His algorithms have been implemented in a variety of languages:

https://developer.aliyun.com/mirror/npm/package/meeusjs
https://www.npmjs.com/search?q=keywords:meeus
https://crates.io/crates/meealgi
https://pypi.org/project/PyMeeus/
http://libnova.sourceforge.net/

His formulas and algorithms use angular values: latitude and longitude for terrestrial location, declination and right ascension for positions of celestial bodies. They use values such as the eccentricity of the Earth's orbit or the obliquity of the ecliptic, that only make sense in a spherical Earth model. They are, most definitely, built on a round Earth model.

There is a live implementation here of the formulas for sunrise and sunset times: https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/grad/solcalc/index.html and details here https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/grad/solcalc/calcdetails.html , you can even download a spreadsheet to run it on your computer with Excel or OpenOffice.

Anyone can check that the calculations are pretty accurate. The sunrise and sunset calculations are just a small subset of Meeus' algorithms and formulas, but they are an obvious example because everyone will know what they mean and will be able to check their accuracy.

Is there a flat Earth equivalent, that works equally well, based on EA or anything else?

[jack44556677]

If the earth is flat, then the flat earth jean meeus, is jean meeus.

This may be hard for you, but it is critical to learn - all models are wrong, some are limitedly useful for a time.

The conceptual assumptions built into the models are irrelevant and have no bearing on manifest objective reality.  Reality does not care how we think it is composed or how it works etc.  A model is always wrong, and yet useful in some cases.  Models are for use, NOT understanding.  it is a popular misconception that models are a part of science, they are tangential / meta tools / scientific medleys which are in no way part of the scientific method.  It's analogous to calling a metrologist a physicist.  They aggregate and study physics, but they are librarians.  "Modelers" are much the same.

If the model is useful, use it! Trying to divine external objective reality from model (without experimental validation) is profoundly stupid, and goedel has a few things to say about it as well.

While I'm on the subject of profoundly stupid things, looking up to determine the shape of the thing in the opposite direction is unscientific and powerful dumb.  There is only one way to determine the shape of physical objects with certainty, and like most things in life - astronomy is in NO way involved.

[GreatATuin]

All models are wrong. Correct. Still, some are wronger than others.

A model is an abstraction, a simplification. A model has properties, and when it's good, these properties accurately represent the properties of the reality.

When you model the Earth as an oblate spheroid, and get correct results from that model's properties, you prove that the Earth has (at least some of) the properties of an oblate spheroid. Does it prove that the Earth is actually an oblate spheroid? Not formally, it could be anything else that has the same set of properties. But you can conclude that observation is consistent with the oblate spheroid model. That was my question: is there a model based on a flat Earth that gives equally good results? Obviously, it's a rhetorical question. If it existed, we would know by now. The implicit question is: why doesn't it exist?

Also, the model isn't the reality, but it cannot completely disconnected from reality either. If I have a field, and it's more or less shaped as a square, I'd better model it as a square rather than as a circle if I want to calculate its area and perimeter.

[jack44556677]

"these properties accurately represent the properties of the reality. "

Wrong.  This is a logical error.  The model can be (and historically always is) completely wrong, and still be useful enough to last for centuries and beyond.  It is self-delusion/bias which the scientific method is designed to avoid.  Models are not a part of the scientific method.  Reality is not contained within them - it's out here!

"you prove that the Earth has (at least some of) the properties of an oblate spheroid."

More delusion.  There is only one way to prove the shape of things in reality.  Comparison with models isn't it.

"That was my question: is there a model based on a flat Earth that gives equally good results?"

Of course not.  The presumptive model you are discussing took millennia and is still incorrect and incomplete today (as it always has been).  It should be expected to take significant time to build models to replace it once discarded as the garbage it is.  It is not something that many flat earth researchers are working on because models were a big part of how we got into this mess and they will not be helping us to dig our way out.  Experiment is the only means of knowledge at our disposal, all else is poetry and imagination.  The scientific method has no "model" or "compare with model" step.

[GreatATuin]

"these properties accurately represent the properties of the reality. "

Wrong.  This is a logical error.  The model can be (and historically always is) completely wrong, and still be useful enough to last for centuries and beyond.  It is self-delusion/bias which the scientific method is designed to avoid.  Models are not a part of the scientific method.  Reality is not contained within them - it's out here!

"you prove that the Earth has (at least some of) the properties of an oblate spheroid."

More delusion.  There is only one way to prove the shape of things in reality.  Comparison with models isn't it.

You're not actually answering anything I said. That's strawmanning and cherrypicking at its finest.

"That was my question: is there a model based on a flat Earth that gives equally good results?"

Of course not.  The presumptive model you are discussing took millennia and is still incorrect and incomplete today (as it always has been).  It should be expected to take significant time to build models to replace it once discarded as the garbage it is.  It is not something that many flat earth researchers are working on because models were a big part of how we got into this mess and they will not be helping us to dig our way out.  Experiment is the only means of knowledge at our disposal, all else is poetry and imagination.  The scientific method has no "model" or "compare with model" step.

The scientific method is about making conjectures, deriving predictions, and verifying these predictions. What gives you predictions you can verify, if not a model? Also, the current model seems very correct to me. It gives very good and accurate predictions. Can you prove otherwise?

[jack44556677]

You're not actually answering anything I said. That's strawmanning and cherrypicking at its finest.

I DO like that it's at its finest at least! Could you clarify with an example? I'd like to avoid doing both of those things!

The scientific method is about making conjectures, deriving predictions, and verifying these predictions.

No, it isn't.  Deriving (novel) predictions is a nice fringe benefit of the scientific method sometimes, but the only verifying of conjecture (hypothesis) in the scientific method is by experiment. Novel predictions also have significant use in marketing. Relativity is, perhaps, the quintessential modern example.

What gives you predictions you can verify, if not a model?

Data.  You extrapolate from data.  We are maybe skating the semantic line here, depending on the definition of "model".  Often you collect raw data, formalize/generalize that data by mathematical description, and then sometimes analysis of that mathematical description suggests something novel.  Models are in no way required to provide novel predictions, and most often do not.  If you consider the mathematical description above to be a "model", then ok - models are often used for predictions.  If you consider the totality of the scientists knowledge and conception of the world, also brought to bare, as the "model" - then models are always used for prediction.  Aren't semantics fun?  THOSE semantics aside, hypothesis is prediction - and the only thing required to guess is a mind (you don't even really need data or observation of any kind).

It gives very good and accurate predictions. Can you prove otherwise?

Its giving good and accurate predictions is not proof of its actual consistency with manifest objective reality - this is the logical error. It establishes it as useful, not correct. Only experiment can provisionally provide that.

Along with the good and accurate predictions, all models produce incorrect and inaccurate predictions.  Even if there were no known/measured inconsistencies between model and observation - something that no model in the history of science has ever achieved - this still would not establish anything beyond the usefulness of the model in the limited/finite contexts in which it is evaluated/used.  To prove that your conceptions are consistent with manifest objective reality, as opposed to merely being useful, requires experiment (and even then, it's provisional).

[geolguy29]

It's funny though isn't it. That you can use this book to accurately predict all sorts of astronomical movements. Especially when it uses numbers taken from the globe Earth model. I mean things such as eccentricity of the Earth's orbit or the obliquity of the ecliptic. They couldn't even exist on any flat earth model. You see, one correct prediction you could put down to coincidence. Maybe even two. But millions?

It must be really unfortunate as a flat earther to have all these formulas that use the Earth's sphericity in calculations that actually provide accurate predictions. Maybe globers invented maths to fool all of us. I mean, is 2+2 even 4?. I am looking at my fingers, and I count four, but who knows. Maybe it is a coincidence as well.

I apologise for being patronising, but I came here to have a sensible debate. But if you are going to talk absolute nonsense that this doesn't support a globe earth model then you are clearly lying to yourself or are a fake flat earther.

If you can show me some calculations of astrological positions that consistently give you accurate results/predictions, that use the Earth's planar nature then there is a conversation to be had. 
 

[Longtitube]

If you can show me some calculations of astrological astronomical positions that consistently give you accurate results/predictions, that use the Earth's planar nature then there is a conversation to be had.

Fixed that for you, I hope?

[geolguy29]

If you can show me some calculations of astrological astronomical positions that consistently give you accurate results/predictions, that use the Earth's planar nature then there is a conversation to be had.

Fixed that for you, I hope?

Yep, cheers.

[jack44556677]

@geolguy29

It's funny though isn't it. That you can use this book to accurately predict all sorts of astronomical movements.

Astronomical movements are cyclical/periodic.  We can "predict" them, only because they happened before (and are cyclical/periodic)!  There is no magic to it, and it doesn't involve the shape of the earth.  It is all based on simple charts and observations of things that occur like clockwork.  It is roughly as impressive and difficult as "predicting" it will be 12:00 at some point over the next day.

They couldn't even exist on any flat earth model.

Don't delude yourself.  In potentia there is virtually never only one possibility - and if you think there is, it is most likely a failure of imagination.  Most all the high priests of scientism involved in astronomy / astrophysics recognized and admitted that there was no discernible difference between a heliocentric spinning and moving (through "space") world and a geocentric fixed one that has the universe whirling around it.  This was the line of reasoning originally used to convince the pope that the earth was not central and fixed, in contradiction to what the bible clearly teaches.

But millions?

Yes, even millions.  There are not millions, but even if there were it would never establish the hypothesis (or model) as validated or BE science/scientific at all. It would merely validate the usefulness of that model in that million instances (within margins of error, of course).  It establishes the model as (limitedly) USEFUL in those million contexts, not correct and consistent with manifest objective reality which ONLY experiment can provisionally provide in science.  All bayesians fall prey to this logical error.

It must be really unfortunate as a flat earther to have all these formulas that use the Earth's sphericity in calculations that actually provide accurate predictions.

I don't know any flat earthers, but nature cares not for our consistently wrong descriptions and conceptions of it.  Our equations have no bearing on manifest objective reality.  The earth's sphericity exists ONLY in equation.  It can ONLY be calculated, and has never been (and cannot be) measured.  Once again, providing accurate predictions shows that (in that limited context and with accompanying error) it is useful, not correct! All bayesians make this mistake.

Maybe globers invented maths to fool all of us.

You have no idea how close you are to accidentally cracking this subject open.  I have found a lot of support for this view historically. The globe iconography FIRST appears on coinage, and it shouldn't surprise you in whose hand this globe is depicted...

I mean, is 2+2 even 4?

Only by convention! Math worship is a real problem.  Blame those ancient pedophiles and their super gay clubs!

I recommend goedel's proof.  Math is a symbolic language for efficient description and conveyance/communication.  It is not magic - it's just another language.

I apologise for being patronising, but I came here to have a sensible debate.

I don't think you were at all! Your questions are rudimentary/fundamental and very much valid and important to explore - even if you may not have consciously intended them that way.

However, debate is merely base pageantry for the egotistical sycophants who perform and the entertainment of the audience and judges.  It has no place in effective learning/teaching, communication, or science.  I do not mean to be patronizing, but it is beneath me and all smart people.  I prefer rational discourse!  I can recommend a place to debate this subject if you are truly hellbent on it, however.  Some people enjoy playing the silly game, and I don't see anything wrong with that essentially.

But if you are going to talk absolute nonsense that this doesn't support a globe earth model then you are clearly lying to yourself or are a fake flat earther.

I've been accused of worse! In truth it is a bit weirder than that.  My experience has been that there are virtually no flat earther's that fit the popularized stereotypes (slanders) associated with the term, and virtually none that self identify with the title.  "Flat earther" is merely used as a derogatory by most.

What "absolute nonsense" are you referring to? I am prepared to defend and expound upon my ideas and claims!

If you can show me some calculations of astrological positions that consistently give you accurate results/predictions, that use the Earth's planar nature then there is a conversation to be had.

Again, this demonstrates a failure of imagination on your part.  There is no inherent problem in describing the world as a flat and stationary plane with all the lights and motions thereof above us.  You can do it in any language, including mathematics - but it will have no impact on manifest objective reality.  Is it clear to you what I mean?  Please let me know if not - this is critical to grasp and although simple, can still be a little tricky.

The antikythera device is an example of an ancient (>2000) computer with profound "predictive" ability that "models" the world as a flat fixed euclidian plane.  It could even predict the color of the eclipse!  I am quite sure that this working "model" has done nothing to convince you of the reality of a flat earth (nor should it!). Is my point clear, or does this all sound like rambling to you?

[GreatATuin]

Astronomical movements are cyclical/periodic.  We can "predict" them, only because they happened before (and are cyclical/periodic)!  There is no magic to it, and it doesn't involve the shape of the earth.  It is all based on simple charts and observations of things that occur like clockwork.  It is roughly as impressive and difficult as "predicting" it will be 12:00 at some point over the next day.

The cyclical part isn't true for every astronomical movement. Recently, astronomers predicted with great accuracy the path of comet C/2020 F3 (aka NEOWISE). There were no previously recorded passages. That's just an example: astronomers routinely predict the movements of bodies they've just discovered. Some do have a periodic orbit, some don't. There is no magic to it: it's science.