2741

Flat Earth Theory / Re: NASA claim on mass doesn't matter in a vacuum.

« on: January 27, 2018, 08:39:19 PM »

I've honestly no idea how this got onto black holes. My physics is a bit rusty but I think this is correct. The formula for gravitational attraction is:

f = G (M1 x M2) / r2

G being a constant, M1 and M2 being the masses of the two objects. r being the distance between the two objects' centre of gravitys
So if M1 is my mass, M2 is the earth's mass then the above gives you the force the earth exerts on me (which is my weight, that's what weight is).

But we also know that

f = ma

F = force, m = mass, a = acceleration.

This can be arranged as

a = f/m

This, by the way, is what makes super sonic travel so expensive, the more "m" there is, the more "f" you have to provide to produce "a".

So the acceleration on me because of gravity is the force of gravity on me divided by my mass. Using the above two formulas that is:

(G (M1 x M2) / r2) / M1.

The two M1s cancel themselves out so it's:

(G M2 / r2)

Point being, this force is independent of MY mass, it only relies on the mass of the earth which pretty much remains constant and my distance from the earth's centre of gravity - which does vary slightly because the earth is not a perfect sphere. But the headline is that objects of different mass will fall at the same rate.

That is what Galileo proved by dropping cannonballs of different sizes out of high buildings and observing that they hit the ground at the same time. The reason this doesn't work with feathers and hammers on earth is air resistance which slows the feather's fall (and the hammer's, but not enough so's you'd notice because of the mass of the hammer). On the moon there is no atmosphere and so no air resistance so they fall at the same rate, hence the astronaut's exclamation "what do you know, Mr Galileo was right!"

The effect was recreated in a vaccuum chamber for a BBC series

2742

Flat Earth Theory / Re: "The stars are not light-years away"

« on: January 27, 2018, 08:07:43 PM »

With respect, the level of ignorance in that post is pretty spectacular.
The way this works is that certain elements have distinctive "signatures".
The Doppler effect shifts those signatures which shows they are moving, just as the pitch of a siren indicates that an emergency vehicle is moving and whether it's higher or lower than its pitch at rest indicates whether it is moving towards you or away.

2743

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Disproof: Clouds lit from below at sunset.

« on: January 27, 2018, 07:57:41 PM »

The error in your experiment is that you just put your camera below the cube. The cube is not seeing the light source parallel to it, as would be possible if it were distant enough. The cube and the light source would become eye level to each other with long distance perspective. If the light were at the horizon the cube would see it at 90 degrees, and would be lit from its side rather than from the top, just as your face is lit from the side and not from the top during sunset.

OK. Thank you for your response. Your mistake is that cubes and mountains can't see. I know you're using the term metaphorically but perspective is NOT a factor in how shadows are cast.

You said:

If we have a series of lamp posts stretching into the horizon, it is possible to raise your hand to be above a small lamp post on the horizon in the distance. The distant lamp post is now looking up at your hand. The distant lamp post has the opposite perspective. It sees you at the horizon and it sees your hand slightly above the horizon, and therefore its photons are angled upwards at it.

That just isn't how things work in real life. This is what an observer would see:



So while yes, I could raise my hand and it would look from my perspective as though my hand was above the far lamp post, the lamp post light is still physically above the level of my hand. You can extend that row of lamp-posts as far as you like, all that would change is the angle which would become shallower but the shadow would always be angled downwards. The only way a shadow can be cast upwards is if the light source is physically below the level of the object which the shadow is cast of.

So, coming back to the sun and the mountain, I drew this very rough diagram. To even show them on the same scale I have imagined a mountain 1000 miles high.
The sun is 3000 miles high in your model, right?
I've shown the angle of the shadow if the sun is 4000 or 9000 miles away horizontally. From what I understand it can never actually be much further than that in daylight.
You can see that all that changes is the angle of the shadow:



What can never happen in your model are shadows being cast upwards. What is also not possible are the long shadows you get at sunrise or sunset:



The physical angle between the sun and the people would never be shallow enough to cause that.
So, the earth might well be flat BUT the sun cannot be 3000 miles above it at sunrise at sunset, the angle of the shadows proves that.

2744

Flat Earth Theory / Re: "The stars are not light-years away"

« on: January 27, 2018, 08:45:01 AM »

The wiki shows that we can use the same data that computed the sun to be millions of miles away, to be thousands of miles away. The data used is the same.

Yes, that is another possible explanation - distant sun means pretty much parallel rays so for the shadows to be different the surface must be curved.
It is possible that IF the sun is much closer then the same effect could be seen on a flat surface, but the article your own Wiki links to concludes:

We conclude that the flat earth/near sun model does not work.

You are the one claiming that the alternative interpretation of the data is the correct one - contrary to basically everyone else in science.
So prove it. You can take some observations, do some triangulation.
You keep dodging this because at some level you know would happen.

And it's bit rich pretending to talk knowledgeably about shadows and how to interpret data from experiments on them when you have claimed that if I raise my hand above my head then because a distant lamp appears below my hand level the photons from that lamp are angled up towards it. 

2745

Flat Earth Theory / Re: "The stars are not light-years away"

« on: January 26, 2018, 10:42:02 PM »

As explained many times before do the measurements from more than 2 locations.  Why do you not understand this and do the experiment?

If you are claiming that a specific observation that favors your model of the earth will be seen if some specific experiment is performed simultaneously from three different location on earth, it is your responsibility to organize that experiment. Why would you expect me to do your work for you? Are you funding me?

Hang on. The burden of proof lies with the person making the claim. The accepted explanation of the stick experiment is that the sun is distant and the earth is therefore spherical.
You are the one making the claim that the earth is in fact flat and the sun is much closer. The burden of proof lies with you. And it's a relatively easy thing to prove.
All you have to do is take some measurements of the sun or the moon from a few cities, measure the angles, do the maths and you can triangulate to find the sun or moon's distance.
Do that and if the maths works out how you think it will then congratulations, you've won yourself a Nobel prize.

2746

Flat Earth Theory / Re: You Can Neither Demonstrate Nor Defend Flat Earth Without Invoking Conspiracy

« on: January 26, 2018, 06:02:10 PM »

Usually Tom will answer everything. At some point you won't accept something he says or some evidence he points to. He may give further examples. You won't accept them either. Where is he going to go from there? He's showed you his reasons, you don't agree ... that's the end of the debate. He told you everything he could, he told you why he thinks what he thinks and you didn't accept it. What are you hoping to acheive? Are you expecting to be the person who convinces Tom the world is round? Or are you expecting Tom to convince you that it is flat? There is no winner. It is an exchange of ideas and once those ideas are exchanged, the thread is done and Tom will leave it.

That really isn't my experience of threads where I've seen Tom debating stuff. Look at this thread for example, the one I mentioned above
https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=6875.160
His explanation for the angle of shadows is ludicrous. I did an experiment which proved how silly it was and have provided photographic proof. Later down the page I provided a diagram showing he is wrong. How is that the end of the debate? He has made a claim about why the shadows are angled as they are. He provides no evidence or proof, he just states it. I take the time to do an experiment which proves him wrong and he ignores it. He hasn't showed his reasons, he just stated his position and when I proved him wrong he walked away from the thread. I've seen him do it to other people too.
I guess I don't expect Tom admit he is wrong. He has staked too much on this, the cognitive dissonance just won't let him. But there are other people looking here who might see the things I and others post and it might sway them. One could argue why does it matter what shape the world is. I just think the truth is important and worth standing up for, especially in the "post truth" world we find ourselves in where it increasingly doesn't seem to matter to people what is true. It does matter. Sensible debate has to start with a shared model of reality.
If you can't answer basic questions like "how can the sun shine sideways to illuminate the moon so we can see it but not shine diagonally so we can see it at night" then you have to question how well your model works. Which doesn't mean there is no possible flat earth model which could work, but the one presented in your Wiki doesn't.

2747

Flat Earth Theory / Re: You Can Neither Demonstrate Nor Defend Flat Earth Without Invoking Conspiracy

« on: January 26, 2018, 04:16:18 PM »

Imagine you have been a flat earther for 10 years. You've made 50,000 posts, gone over every topic again and again. And someone signs up with a new account and asks you about gravity, or Coriolis, or satellites. How enthusiastic are you going to be about having that 'debate' for the 400th time? Meanwhile someone is talking about a new film that has come out or some new game or hardware in the lower fora. Which thread are you going to engage in?

Fairly reasonable. But my frustration is my thread about the FE sun was based on your Wiki. I had some questions which I didn't feel were answered in the Wiki so they seemed like reasonable questions and while the thread did generate a few pages of debate there were some fairly fundamental questions which just weren't answered. It feels like if you (plural) don't have answers you don't engage. If you're serious about a FE model that works you should be engaging with this stuff. Or, if you have and there are reasonable responses then you could at least point us in the right direction.

My frustration with Tom in particular is he does engage with debates but then walks away from them when he's shown to be wrong. He then says "there are 100 REs for every FE, I can't reply to everyone". But actually the upper fora aren't that busy here, he has time to engage when he wants to, he just stops doing so when someone proves him wrong about something as he did when I proved him wrong on perspective and shadows. I even took the time to do an experiment to demonstrate my point. The two reasonable responses then are either a reply which explains why I am mistaken and my proof is inadequate or to admit he's wrong. He did neither, he just walked away from the thread.

2748

Flat Earth Theory / Re: You Can Neither Demonstrate Nor Defend Flat Earth Without Invoking Conspiracy

« on: January 26, 2018, 03:33:56 PM »

When I first went to this website I wanted to debate, but I've learned that you don't debate on this website, you just bring up points and get no complete responses.

Same. I signed up because I am genuinely fascinated by FE Theory, the idea that people in this day and age can still believe this is interesting.
So I signed up to debate the issues and try and understand how their model works.

The issue is, their model doesn't work on any level. I posted a thread about the FE Sun - I read through their Wiki first and my questions were based on what it says there. It did generate some debate but most of the difficult questions I asked remain unanswered - how the sun's orbit works, how it can be a spotlight and yet still illuminate the moon sideways etc. I guess the reason is there are no answers to these things. Which makes me wonder if this whole site is a joke and we are being trolled. Pretty much the first question in their FAQ is "is this site a joke" and they claim not, but the FE model they currently have falls so flat (pun intended) and so spectacularly fails to explain observations that you have to wonder whether they really believe it. There is a lot of confirmation bias and cognitive dissonance going on, but still.

2749

Flat Earth Investigations / Re: why would the government want to hide it if the earth was flat?

« on: January 26, 2018, 02:46:14 PM »

 

Yes I do...

Although let's pretend I meant round as in a disc is round.

2750

Flat Earth Theory / Re: You Can Neither Demonstrate Nor Defend Flat Earth Without Invoking Conspiracy

« on: January 26, 2018, 01:10:36 PM »

Correct. Tom said

as per the argument of how the sun can be lower than the mountain in order to look up at it, this was discussed earlier in this thread. If we have a series of lamp posts stretching into the horizon, it is possible and raise your hand to be above a small lamp post on the horizon in the distance. The distant lamp post is now looking up at your hand.
The distant lamp post has the opposite perspective. It sees you at the horizon and it sees your hand slightly above the horizon, and therefore its photons are angled upwards at it.

And I as I said to him in my reply, this is the same level of logic as "when I close my eyes I can't see anything, therefore nothing can see me and I have thus become invisible".
It's the reasoning of a young child.

The angle of a shadow depends on the PHYSICAL relative positions of the light source and the object which the shadow is cast of, not your perspective.

2751

Flat Earth Investigations / Re: why would the government want to hide it if the earth was flat?

« on: January 26, 2018, 01:05:48 PM »

This.

I consistently see Flat Earthers reference huge sums of money ($19 billion/year!!!; 52 million/day!!!1!), and claim that NASA keeps all of this money. What they fail to consider is the costs of the conspiracy. First, NASA spends much of its money on private/public contractors. These include Lockheed, Boeing, ESA, SpaceX, ULA, Aerojet Rocketdyne, etc. Billions are given to these companies to manufacture NASA's parts, and pay salaries. And, continuing with salaries, NASA needs to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to pay their own employees. NASA needs to pay for rocket fuel, to launch the rockets, maintain the facilities they use, fund research and development, pay for satellites, and so much more. The accusation that NASA could keep any of that money is ridiculous.

The point is, even if it did emerge that NASA had been lying to us all the time, we never went to the moon, the ISS is fake, they can't launch satellites into space, it's all a big racket.
Let's pretend all of that is true. That still doesn't prove the earth is round. What NASA and other space agencies are doing simply confirm what we've known for millennia, we're living on a globe.
Eratosthenes' famous stick experiment shows that. A possible alternative explanation is that the sun is much closer and nearer than supposed, but there are easy ways to verify that - take some measurements, do some triangulation. That is literally all they have to do.

To be a flat earther you have to start with the assumption that the earth is flat and then work everything around that. So when NASA come along and do their thing then that has to be explained away.
Although my satellite TV was working just fine last night, and that relies on a satellites which weren't put up by NASA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astra_(satellite)#Manufacture_and_launch
So I guess they're "in on it" too?

Makes zero sense. And, to respond to the original post, I have no idea what the motive of any government would be to hide this great "truth" from us about the shape of the world.

2752

Flat Earth Theory / Re: You Can Neither Demonstrate Nor Defend Flat Earth Without Invoking Conspiracy

« on: January 26, 2018, 10:35:30 AM »

Tom basically stops replying when he's shown to be wrong. In the "clouds lit from below" thread Tom claimed that perspective causes the effect (he claimed that If I raise my hand so it looks like it is above a distant light then the shadow is cast upwards). I did an experiment to prove him wrong, posted photographic evidence. No response. I subsequently drew this diagram to say how ridiculous his claim was:



There is no way to cling to flat earth theory without invoking conspiracy. NASA, every other space agency, the airline industry, the cruise line industry, the satellite TV industry, the GPS industry.
A LOT of people would have to be "in on it". And why? Why is the "fact" that the earth is flat such a terrible truth which must be hidden from us. I know the answer to some of that are that "NASA think it's a sphere so their CGI images show it that way" but it's still a conspiracy because they are hiding the truth that they can't go into space, as are some of the other people I mentioned.

Their Occam's Razor page says:
"What's the simplest explanation; that NASA has successfully designed and invented never before seen rocket technologies from scratch which can accelerate 100 tons of matter straight up at 7 miles per second, and that NASA can do the impossible on a daily basis, explore the solar system, and constantly wow the nation by landing a man on the moon and sending robots to mars; or is the simplest explanation that they really can't do all of that stuff?"

I would counter that by saying something like:
"What's the simplest explanation; that NASA, every other space agency, the people who run GPS, satellite TV, weather and communication satellites, the airline and cruise line industry who plot their routes based on a spherical earth...is it simpler to think that they are all lying to us to us for reasons which are not well explained and that all of science is wrong; or is the simplest explanation that the earth is indeed spherical?"

2753

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Is it possible to make accurate Flat Earth map? How?

« on: January 24, 2018, 05:16:40 PM »

Actually, I think it is the other way a round.

I think the flat paper needs to be altered even be placed on a globe.

Remember, the flat paper concept came first!

Maps necessarily have to be flat for ease of storage and use, but given that the reality is we live on a globe there has to be some transformation from the globe (exact representation) to a map (projection).
But it is the globe which reflects reality.

Can you perfectly describe reality?

No.

Man and humanity are incapable of perfection, period.

End of sentence.

Drops mic.

I have literally no idea what definitive point you think you've made there. At best you've scored a semantic point. Fine. No map is going to be perfect. But if the earth is flat (it isn't) and a map is flat (it is) then no projection is required, a flat earth map of a flat earth could be made to scale with no transformation or projection.

No.

I, personally, have made and took some notes about some observations.

I found no cause to believe that Flat Earth conflicted with those particular observations.

OK. Well, every sunset contradicts you. You can shout perspective all day long, I've yet to see a diagram or model which shows how a sun 3,000 miles above a flat plane can appear to intersect the flat horizon like you'd observe at sea. Feel free to provide one though.

2754

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Is it possible to make accurate Flat Earth map? How?

« on: January 24, 2018, 01:05:18 PM »

All maps are flat already.

I am unaware of any map that was ever drawn on a globe first then ripped off of the globe to be placed in a flat position.

Yes, maps are flat and they all have to make compromises to map the reality of a sphere onto a square. There is no perfect map, common projections squash the poles for example so Greenland looks tine when it is actually massive.

But flat earth should have no such problem. If the earth IS flat then you should be able to produce a map which perfectly matches the reality. Can you?
From what I understand you're still debating whether there are one poles or two. Don't fundamental problems like this not give you a clue that the flat earth model doesn't actually work or match observations?

2755

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Why is TFE the right model?

« on: January 21, 2018, 07:19:51 PM »

We have not been "shown to be wrong". It is only wrong if you preconditon certain rationalizations so much as "if this is true and if that is true then Flat Earth is impossible". No direct evidence has been presented to show that the earth is round. It is all rationalization.

The only arguments in favor of a globe we have seen involve numerous assumptions that need to be true for the conclusion to have merit. It seems impossible for you guys to provide direct evidence for a direct conclusion.

Where are errors in measuring distances, path of fhe sun and satellite tv dish angles?

See, here is an example I am going to rightfully ignore. It does not really relate to the OP or the topic we were discussing.

Fair enough, but my experimental proof and evidence was in direct reply to you in a thread about underlit clouds. Here:

https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=6875.160

2756

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Why is TFE the right model?

« on: January 21, 2018, 07:18:01 PM »

We have not been "shown to be wrong". It is only wrong if you preconditon certain rationalizations so much as "if this is true and if that is true then Flat Earth is impossible". No direct evidence has been presented to show that the earth is round. It is all rationalization.

That is the only reason why this website exists.

Tom. I showed you wrong about perspective and shadows, I did an experiment and everything and posted photos. You completely ignored it.
There are plenty of photos showing the earth as a globe from multiple space agencies, you just shout "FAKE!" at everything which shows you to be wrong or you ignore it.

If you want a response start a thread then. After I answer a thread my energy is spent. I'm probably not going to continue to engage with ten different people in ten different conversations.

I started this thread and I mentioned The Bishop Experiment

https://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=8448.0

You didn't respond, nor did anyone else. I've mentioned my proof about underlit clouds several times meaning the sun must be physically below the level of the clouds several times. You have never responded. There has been no FE response - oh, there was one claiming reflection, implausible but a better answer than perspective.

2757

Flat Earth Theory / Re: Why is TFE the right model?

« on: January 21, 2018, 07:07:06 PM »

We have not been "shown to be wrong". It is only wrong if you preconditon certain rationalizations so much as "if this is true and if that is true then Flat Earth is impossible". No direct evidence has been presented to show that the earth is round. It is all rationalization.

That is the only reason why this website exists.

Tom. I showed you wrong about perspective and shadows, I did an experiment and everything and posted photos. You completely ignored it.
There are plenty of photos showing the earth as a globe from multiple space agencies, you just shout "FAKE!" at everything which shows you to be wrong or you ignore it.

2758

Flat Earth Theory / Re: The Burden of Proof

« on: January 21, 2018, 07:01:51 PM »

The kangaroo is space travel. There is no reasonable doubt that space travel is faked, and there is an abundance of public knowledge and material evidence demonstrating its history and ongoing use; people insist that kangaroos aren't real.

This is my chosen sticking point for flat Earth debate. Prove the space travel conspiracy; without it, nothing else matters. (See also the Burden Of Proof link in my signature)

The thing is, even if it did transpire that NASA and all the other space agencies are faking it - obviously it won't, you can actually SEE the ISS from earth and NASA publish a site telling you when and where, and GPS and satellite TV demonstrably work. Where are they getting their signals from if it's not satellites? Anyway, even if it did...that still wouldn't show that the earth is flat. We have known for millennia that the earth is a globe, long before we could fly much less get into space.

2759

Flat Earth Theory / Re: The Death of Heliocentricity

« on: January 21, 2018, 06:38:16 PM »

You defined the model in such a way that one probably doesn't exist, most models of the solar system - and you were given plenty in the other thread - will not model the sun spinning as that is not what they are intended for, they are meant to model the movement of the planets, which they do. What would a spinning sun add to the model? And the models aren't going to show the sun's movement because that would mean a model of the whole galaxy.

It is ludicrous logic "A model to these exact incredibly specific specifications doesn't exist, ergo heliocentricity is dead!"

Maybe you should think about whether a flat earth model exists which can explain sunset (without making up perspective rules which don't reflect reality), let alone anything else.

2760

Flat Earth Theory / Re: The Burden of Proof

« on: January 20, 2018, 10:28:58 PM »

You need to set aside preconceived prejudices in order to participate in a debate in a reasonable manner. That FE is more "fantastic" than RE is purely a subjective opinion and can't be used to decide something so important as who has the burden of proof. We have the most basic empirical evidence on our side; the Earth looks flat. Therefore it's up to you to prove that it's not. With so much "proof" at your disposal it should be easy so what's the problem?

Well, it is subjective in that it is my opinion that FE is the more fantastic claim but I'd suggest if you polled random people the vast majority of people would agree.
And the problem is all the proof which has been presented is just declared to be fake. I'd suggest that the burden of proof that it is fake lies with FE.
Which brings us back to kangaroos. If I declared all photos and videos of kangaroos fake and called all people who have seen them liars then I could convince myself I was right about that too. You can do that with anything.

I and others have pointed out quite a few issues with the FE model, I've presented proof that for clouds to be lit from below the sun must be physically below the level of the clouds, and that perspective cannot account for things disappearing below the horizon on a flat plane. There has been little or no FE response. So the problem is the proof has been presented, it is just being ignored.