[Pete Svarrior]

That’s not true. The buffoonery aside, he is making clear and logical points that anyone on the opposing side must think about and address.

The problem is that he makes up his own "opposing side" - and I doubt his imaginary friends are going to respond in any way that we could perceive.

Rather than presenting an actual FE model (I'm not necessarily saying our model, but one he could actually provide a reference to), he simply asserts what Flat Earthers believe based on... well, I dunno what. His imagination?

He has done the same in every "testing <x>" series. I'm sure it's hilarious to make fun of homeopaths and whatnot, but because of his inability to restrict himself to material which actually exists, the videos are only (arguably) good for entertainment, not discussion. You'll note that, back when this conversation wasn't an extremely stale thread that someone necro'd, not even the resident Round Earthers had much love for how it depicted our beliefs. There's a good reason for that.

[edby]

Rather than presenting an actual FE model (I'm not necessarily saying our model, but one he could actually provide a reference to), he simply asserts what Flat Earthers believe based on... well, I dunno what. His imagination?

The FE model is that the earth is flat, according to him. Are you disputing that?

[Pete Svarrior]

The FE model is that the earth is flat, according to him. Are you disputing that?

It's precisely this kind of simplistic thinking that justifies the creation of strawmen.

Imagine that I said that the Round Earth model only differs from FE in that the Earth is an oblate spheroid. I could then immediately move on to talk about how Universal Acceleration would result in people being unable to live in Australia, thus concluding that the Round Earth model is [BOLLOCKS]. Rather unreasonable, is it not?

We're looking at an identical problem here. No, there is no Flat Earth model that only differs from RET in one aspect. But creating one is an appealing strawman if you just want to make some cash out of YouTube.

[AATW]

I agree that CHL does a fair bit of straw-manning, but part of the problem is there is no coherent FE model which you all agree on.
Even basic things like whether there's one pole or two or what a map looks like aren't agreed on.

[Pete Svarrior]

Hence my suggestion to pick one and reference it. Even if you make a mistake and mix up differing beliefs, at least there's a clear point of reference as to how he reached his conclusions. A huge leap forward over just making up what he thinks FE'ers must believe.

[edby]

The FE model is that the earth is flat, according to him. Are you disputing that?

It's precisely this kind of simplistic thinking that justifies the creation of strawmen.
 

Your point then is that a less simplistic version of the FE model might cut the mustard? But what do you mean by flat surface, as opposed to any other kind of surface? Do you mean a surface that obeys the postulates of Euclidean geometry? In that case, there is no FE model whatsoever that would resolve the distance problems he points out.

Now a suitable non-Euclidean geometry would resolve the problems perfectly. But there’s the crux of it: that would be the geometry of a sphere!

I agree that CHL does a fair bit of straw-manning, but part of the problem is there is no coherent FE model which you all agree on.

The problem is that there can be no such coherent model. The meaning of ‘flat’ is a surface that obeys standard Euclidean geometry. But the world’s surface does not obey standard Euclidean geometry. Ergo etc.

[Pete Svarrior]

Your point then is that a less simplistic version of the FE model might cut the mustard?

No, my point is not something else from what I said. My point is that misrepresenting your opponent makes your argument largely worthless.

[edby]

Your point then is that a less simplistic version of the FE model might cut the mustard?

No, my point is not something else from what I said. My point is that misrepresenting your opponent makes your argument largely worthless.

Can you explain clearly and coherently exactly how he has misrepresented in the case of the 'Australia' point? What particular belief or model is he supposed to be misrepresenting?

[edby]

Spelling it out. He takes two points on the same latitude, then makes three claims

1. The difference in longitude is 38 deg.
2. The distance overland is 3,687km.
3. The distance implied by any FE model is 8,885km.

What FE model or belief is he misrepresenting here?

[Pete Svarrior]

What particular belief or model is he supposed to be misrepresenting?

No, that's the problem. He's not trying to represent any model.

[hexagon]

Spelling it out. He takes two points on the same latitude, then makes three claims

1. The difference in longitude is 38 deg.
2. The distance overland is 3,687km.
3. The distance implied by any FE model is 8,885km.

What FE model or belief is he misrepresenting here?

That's not true. In the bipolar model you can place the symmetry axis such, that the distance for Australia would fit. That's the convenience of having no agreed model. You can always point out that you're arguing against the wrong model.   

[edby]

What particular belief or model is he supposed to be misrepresenting?

No, that's the problem. He's not trying to represent any model.

Yes he is. He says that the distance implied by any FE model is 8,885km. Did you miss that?

That's not true. In the bipolar model you can place the symmetry axis such, that the distance for Australia would fit. That's the convenience of having no agreed model. You can always point out that you're arguing against the wrong model.

Are you certain of that? In that case the model would have to dispute the assumption of 38 degrees longitude, no? I may be wrong.

[Pete Svarrior]

Yes he is. He says that the distance implied by any FE model is 8,885km. Did you miss that?

No, it just happens to be a lie. Thank you for reinforcing my point.

I don't think you'll be able to find a FE model that states that.

[edby]

I don't think you'll be able to find a FE model that states that.

I used the word imply. So your claim, understood properly, is that no FE model implies the calculation he uses to calculate the distance between two points of different longitude, but identical latitude? Can you confirm please?

I had assumed, perhaps wrongly, that all FE models agree in the meaning of longitude.

[hexagon]

That's not true. In the bipolar model you can place the symmetry axis such, that the distance for Australia would fit. That's the convenience of having no agreed model. You can always point out that you're arguing against the wrong model.

Are you certain of that? In that case the model would have to dispute the assumption of 38 degrees longitude, no? I may be wrong.

Yes the bipolar model is symmetric in the east-west and north-south direction. But the symmetry axis in the north-south direction is not fixed. If it  would go through Australia we would have a similar mapping of distances to longitudes/latitudes as on a globe. In general the bipolar map has less significant problems with distortions than the unipolar one.

Of course, it has other severe problems, but for discussions it is quite convenient to have it as backup to counter arguments.       

[edby]

Yes the bipolar model is symmetric in the east-west and north-south direction. But the symmetry axis in the north-south direction is not fixed. If it  would go through Australia we would have a similar mapping of distances to longitudes/latitudes as on a globe. In general the bipolar map has less significant problems with distortions than the unipolar one.

Of course, it has other severe problems, but for discussions it is quite convenient to have it as backup to counter arguments.     

Is this the model (below)? How would it not have distortions of distance? The equatorial regions for example? [edit] Also the mapping below has curved lines of longitude.

[hexagon]

That's one of endless possibilities to draw it. Of course it has distortions, but not that severe as the unipolar one has in the south. And the circular one in the wiki has even less distortions. Not for Australia, but that you can correct by putting Australia on the vertical symmetry axis.

The point is not to show one single map, that solves all problems, it's about having something that you can present for the problem that is actually discussed.

So you can draw a flat map with a more or less undistorted Australia, so you are able to refuse the claim there can be no map that shows Australia undistorted. And so easily you can disregard all arguments against a flat earth one by one.

 

[edby]

That's one of endless possibilities to draw it. Of course it has distortions, but not that severe as the unipolar one has in the south. And the circular one in the wiki has even less distortions. Not for Australia, but that you can correct by putting Australia on the vertical symmetry axis.

The point is not to show one single map, that solves all problems, it's about having something that you can present for the problem that is actually discussed.

So you can draw a flat map with a more or less undistorted Australia, so you are able to refuse the claim there can be no map that shows Australia undistorted. And so easily you can disregard all arguments against a flat earth one by one.
 

Ah right. So for any counterclaim whatsoever, you can in theory produce an arbitrary model to oppose the specific counterclaim, and also complain that it is a 'straw man'.

Of course the arbitrary model will have other flaws, perhaps even more than the original model, but that doesn't matter.

However, this is not how we do science, at least as I learned it.

[edit] Incidentally where is the map on the wiki you refer to? I could only find this https://wiki.tfes.org/Layout_of_the_Continents

[hexagon]

However, this is not how we do science, at least as I learned it.

Yes, but no one here is claiming to do science, in the opposite they have strong objections against science and scientific argumentation.

But otherwise, how would you manage to argue for years for a completely lost point? I really admire how they brought there way of arguing to perfection. Beside that the earth is flat, there is no other distinct claim. For everything they present at least two complementary explanations. None of them fully worked out into details. No formulas, no quantification, only qualitative statements. It's just perfect :-)

[edby]

Yes, but no one here is claiming to do science, in the opposite they have strong objections against science and scientific argumentation.

Could some bona fide Flatearther confirm this please? The objections in question are not against the claims of established science themselves, but rather scientific methodology itself, i.e. the method science uses to confirm or disconfirm truth claims. That's pretty important.

I thought that FE did use the scientific methodology, except they come up with different answers.