[AATW]

We have made the observation first, and reached a conclusion from it.

So, out of interest, what is the observation?

This conversation is about sunset so let's go with that. We can both observe that if we're looking out to sea in the right direction the sun sets below the horizon. You know the RE explanation. EA is an alternative explanation and I agree it would work. So how from that observation do you determine which explanation is correct?
One further observation of a sunset, and the way the sun travels across the sky generally, is a consistent angular size. That implies a constant distance. But you reject that despite that observation.

Your Wiki page on Zeteticism says:

...in questioning the shape of the Earth the zetetic does not make a hypothesis suggesting that the Earth is round or flat and then proceed testing that hypothesis; he skips that step and devises an experiment that will determine the shape of the Earth, and bases his conclusion on the result of that experiment.

OK, so what's the experiment? What experiment can you do which determines the shape of the earth? I mean, in the RE world the definitive experiment is that people have gone up and observed it but you reject that. And of course you're right, that is not an experiment accessible to many people. So what experiment can we do or observation can we make which allows us to determine the shape of the earth?

We have gravity, you have UA.
We have variations in gravity, you have celestial gravitation.
We have a rotating earth, you have EA
We have a consistent angular size, you have some magnification effect.

I know you're going to disagree with this, but all the above feels like you trying to explain why observations better match a rotating globe, by replacing bits of RE with ad-hoc mechanisms which explain those observations.

What observation can one make which indicates that EA is a better explanation for that observation than us living on a rotating globe?

[RhesusVX]

@AllAroundTheWorld, the overarching feeling I get is that FET is basically RET, but with equivalence theories that in of themselves can't be proven nor disproven.  The problem is, this introduces contradictions so you end up with a patchwork of other unproven assumptions.  One such contradiction relates to the distance of the Sun, and hence how we observe sunsets:

https://wiki.tfes.org/Distance_to_the_Sun

The entire thing harks back to the experiment that Eratosthenes carried out where contrary to what the Wiki says, he didn't just "assume" the Earth was round, he had observed several other phenomenon that he used to conclude that the Earth must be round before testing his hypothesis.  But anyway, the experiment and equivalence shown here is such that either:

• The Earth is round, he was measuring the circumference, and the Sun is 93 million miles away
• The Earth is flat, he was measuring the diameter, and the Sun is 3,000 miles away

The contradiction against flat Earth theory is that the distance of 3,000 miles is calculated assuming (correctly, as it happens) that light to all intents and purposes travels in a STRAIGHT line.  Yet, in order to account for the fact that the Sun behaves like a spotlight, the very same flat Earth theory needs to make light curve the further it travels, so it introduces the theory of Electromagnetic Acceleration (EA).  If you look at the Wiki for the page describing EA, you can see that they show how light curves on its way to Earth, which is in complete contradiction to the diagram show in the sun distance experiment using pure triangulation:

https://wiki.tfes.org/Electromagnetic_Acceleration

If light curves, how can the flat Earth model for estimating the distance to the Sun be correct?  It can't be.  Light would be curving away, producing much longer shadows compared to those produced by light travelling straight.  So, light travels straight to justify one part of the theory (sun distance) and it curves to justify another (daylight "spot").  That's just one contradiction amongst many that I'm sure will have some explanation, but unlikely to be one that is consistent with the rest of the flat Earth model.

This all seems to be less about believing that the Earth is flat and at the centre of everything, and more about disbelieving the overwhelming evidence that supports the widely accepted globe Earth model.  Just saying on paper that something is equivalent doesn't prove or disprove anything.  Cherry picking poor science articles that cast doubt over good science doesn't prove or disprove anything.  Just saying that something like a photograph of the Earth is fake doesn't actually mean that it is fake unless you can prove otherwise.  I'd love to know what people think to this view, because I also want to know what observation(s) can be made that supports us living on a flat Earth as opposed to a rotating globe.

[Longtitube]

I would like to know if “Electromagnetic Acceleration” is just a handy name or if the EA effect proposed is due to actual electromagnetism. If EA is due to actual electromagnetic effects it should be measurable, so have any measurements been made and how are they distinguished from Earth’s own magnetic field?

[RhesusVX]

I would like to know if “Electromagnetic Acceleration” is just a handy name or if the EA effect proposed is due to actual electromagnetism. If EA is due to actual electromagnetic effects it should be measurable, so have any measurements been made and how are they distinguished from Earth’s own magnetic field?

I think that rather than focus on its name, if we focus on what it shows, we end up at another contradiction, or at least something unanswered.  According to EA, light perpendicular to the Earth does not curve, but as the angle of incidence, and therefore distance, increases, so does the curvature.  Now,  the following is all contingent on just believing actual measurements, but...

Light has been shown, multiple times, to travel in a straight line unless acted upon.  Key word there, acted upon.  In the case of EA, you could infer that the Earth is acting upon it, because the light curves away from it.  Reasonable assumption.  Except that the magnetic field of the Earth is extremely weak, its surface is only weakly charged, and its gravity is also very weak.  As far as is detectable by modern experimentation, light travelling to the Earth from the Sun does not curve, and diffraction due to changes in air density is nowhere near enough to account for the curvature postulated by EA.  Light and other EM radiation emitted from the surface of the Earth also travels straight regardless of orientation, as show by experiments with lasers and comms equipment.

Indeed, the only forces known to bend light are those equivalent to that produced by massive objects such as stars, and even then the arc is slight compared to that shown in EA.  In FET the Sun, our closest star is only 32 miles across so that wouldn’t have enough of an effect to account for the extreme curvature we see.

So, if it’s not Earth itself, and it’s not the Sun we see, what is it and where is it?  Logic would say that it must be something massive under the flat Earth, or an unknown force/object that hasn’t yet been explained by FET.