[Magicalus]

I've been digging through the proposed FE maps recently, and have noticed that every single map I've seen is a circle. What I don't understand is why.

If the Earth is flat, why not a rectangle? Or a square? Why not any other shape? Things like flying over the north pole could be explained with simply going to the ice wall on that edge, flying for a while, then coming back south. If we're allowing conspiracies (which is a given for FE to be true), then we can explain any of these models. Plus, then the whole distortion issue could have an actual solution, with the Earth just being a wonky shape.

To be clear, I'm a Round Earther. I'm not proposing these things to be true, I'm wondering why I haven't seen any discussion on this topic in my years of looking at arguments in these forums, and some more recent, and admittedly shallower, digs through the wiki.

Edited for clarity. Thanks Pete!

[AATW]

A lot of FE belief stems from an attempt to take certain parts of the Bible literally. That was certainly Rowbotham’s motivation. And this verse talks about the “circle of the earth”

https://biblehub.com/isaiah/40-22.htm

So I think that’s a factor in it being a circle in some models.

[Pete Svarrior]

I've been digging through the proposed FE maps recently, and have noticed that every single map I've seen is a circle.

It's hard to comment on what you have and haven't seen. However, while many maps of the Earth are circular, most come with a prominent proviso: we're only covering the extent of the known Earth. There are exceptions to that, too, with some more extreme wings of the movement trying to expand past that (though that seems to be done based on nothing but the authors' imagination).

So, most maps with Antarctica acting as a rim around the known Earth are drawn as circles for simplicity, and you're overthinking is massively.

That said, I'm surprised that your years of wiki-binging didn't lead you to Rowbotham's or Ferguson's maps, both of which are square in shape.

[Magicalus]

I've been digging through the proposed FE maps recently, and have noticed that every single map I've seen is a circle.

It's hard to comment on what you have and haven't seen. However, while many maps of the Earth are circular, most come with a prominent proviso: we're only covering the extent of the known Earth. There are exceptions to that, too, with some more extreme wings of the movement trying to expand past that (though that seems to be done based on nothing but the authors' imagination).

So, most maps with Antarctica acting as a rim around the known Earth are drawn as circles for simplicity, and you're overthinking is massively.

That said, I'm surprised that your years of wiki-binging didn't lead you to Rowbotham's or Ferguson's maps, both of which are square in shape.

I should've specified; I've been looking through the forums at the threads for years. I only recently started digging through the wiki. My bad!

[GoldCashew]

I've been digging through the proposed FE maps recently, and have noticed that every single map I've seen is a circle.

It's hard to comment on what you have and haven't seen. However, while many maps of the Earth are circular, most come with a prominent proviso: we're only covering the extent of the known Earth. There are exceptions to that, too, with some more extreme wings of the movement trying to expand past that (though that seems to be done based on nothing but the authors' imagination).

So, most maps with Antarctica acting as a rim around the known Earth are drawn as circles for simplicity, and you're overthinking is massively.

That said, I'm surprised that your years of wiki-binging didn't lead you to Rowbotham's or Ferguson's maps, both of which are square in shape.

I should've specified; I've been looking through the forums at the threads for years. I only recently started digging through the wiki. My bad!

As Pete stated, there is a wealth of information in TFES regarding the possible shape of the flat earth, including being a circle or a square.

Taking this a step further, there are other flat earth theories which propose the flat earth plane as being infinite, where other lands and oceans exist beyond that which we currently have knowledge of.

[jimster]

One aspect of how science works is to come up with multiple possibilities and eliminate the wrong ones. In FE, there seems to be no elimination of wrong ones. The maps in the wiki are different, only zero or one can be right. I have posted before on why they don't eliminate the wrong ones, no enthusiasm for that, no methodology. There was a FE meeting in UK where they did not agree on their ideas of what's up, so at the end the chanted. "The earth is not round!" because it was the only thing they could all agree on. I have seen FE proposals of infinite plane, doughnut, inside a sphere, non-Eucldean bafflegab, etc.

They seem reluctant to invalidate each other's ideas, although enthusiastic to invalidate RE. This makes sense, as the small FE world fragmenting into competing factions would hurt their cause. So expect all FE options to be accepted as possible with no invalidation, while RE is held to very high standard of proof. It actually makes sense to rename TFES to "The Anything but Round Forum". Endless proposals, no invalidation. Every single map in the wiki has Australia wider than USA, so using that as a criteria invalidates them. FE, to be viable, must always remain many possibilities with none invalidated.

[Tom Bishop]

If you can come up with a way of measuring large distances which does not involve pseudoscience and a series of assumptions let us know. After you come up with that method feel free to perform and document that experiment in a paper or documentary project and let us know which FE model it supports so we can add that as a bullet point in the Wiki as a piece of evidence for that particular model.

[AATW]

If you can come up with a way of measuring large distances which does not involve pseudoscience and a series of assumptions let us know.

Surveying is not pseudoscience.
It does of course involve assumptions - Euclidean geometry for example. Any scientific pursuit involved that. Rowbotham’s experiment involved assumptions, it presupposes that light travels in straight lines - something you actually reject.

The distances between places have been known for centuries and there are multiple ways they have been tested. You have previously said you accept GPS as accurate. I asked you several times how that could be so without the distances between places being known, you ignored the question. Because of course you did. Either the distances are known, in which case the earth cannot be flat, because know FE map is possible with those distances. Or the distances are wrong in which case you need to explain how GPS works and how industries get people and goods around the world.

[stack]

Back and 1792, Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Delambre & Pierre-François-Andre spent 7 years traipsing from Dunkirk to Barcelona and back measuring all the way. Specifically, they were charged with establishing this distance by precisely measuring the length from Dunkirk to Barcelona along the meridian that passes through Paris and the Paris Observatory. They ended up establishing the meter.
As the crow flies, that's about 1000KM. Pretty far.

For decades the USGS has had armies of surveyors walking around the US measuring the land. Tons of data from that. All seems pretty accurate and repeatable and corroborated by all kinds of transportation devices and mechanisms over the years.

I'd say, in 2022(3) we have an extremely precise handle on distances between waypoints all over the world. 

[Tom Bishop]

Your position is flawed. Unless they did something like walking around with a digital measuring wheel and physically measured the earth with a tactile method, there were assumptions in measuring long distances.

[inquisitive]

Your position is flawed. Unless they did something like walking around with a digital measuring wheel and physically measured the earth with a tactile method, there were assumptions in measuring long distances.

The WGS83 model gives all the details you need.  Also the angles of dishes for broadcast satellites.

[markjo]

Your position is flawed. Unless they did something like walking around with a digital measuring wheel and physically measured the earth with a tactile method, there were assumptions in measuring long distances.

Actually, they generally used chains back in the day.

surveyor’s chain, also called Gunter’s chain, measuring device and arbitrary measurement unit still widely used for surveying in English-speaking countries. Invented by the English mathematician Edmund Gunter in the early 17th century, Gunter’s chain is exactly 22 yards (about 20 m) long and divided into 100 links. In the device, each link is a solid bar. Measurement of the public land systems of the United States and Canada is based on Gunter’s chain. An area of 10 square chains is equal to one acre.

[AATW]

Your position is flawed. Unless they did something like walking around with a digital measuring wheel and physically measured the earth with a tactile method, there were assumptions in measuring long distances.

If they used a digital measuring wheel then that would also mean making an assumption - that the wheel is calibrated correctly and accurate.

Your objection to “assumptions” is very selective. The Bishop Experiment makes assumptions, Rowbotham made assumptions. You have no issues with that. Only when an experiment or technique yields results you don’t like do you switch to the skeptical context and start objecting to “assumptions”.

You have previously agreed that GPS can accurately give your longitude and latitude. How can it do that without distances being known? Leaving aside how that would work in the middle of an ocean, as it demonstrably does, which rules out any land based solution

[Tom Bishop]

The WGS83 model gives all the details you need.  Also the angles of dishes for broadcast satellites.

WGS83 takes data from small flat maps: https://wiki.tfes.org/World_Geodetic_System_1984

I haven't seen a study of triangulation of satellites to prove that we live on a globe. This is an assumption that such studies exist.

Your position is flawed. Unless they did something like walking around with a digital measuring wheel and physically measured the earth with a tactile method, there were assumptions in measuring long distances.

Actually, they generally used chains back in the day.

surveyor’s chain, also called Gunter’s chain, measuring device and arbitrary measurement unit still widely used for surveying in English-speaking countries. Invented by the English mathematician Edmund Gunter in the early 17th century, Gunter’s chain is exactly 22 yards (about 20 m) long and divided into 100 links. In the device, each link is a solid bar. Measurement of the public land systems of the United States and Canada is based on Gunter’s chain. An area of 10 square chains is equal to one acre.

This is equivalent to saying that surveyors had rulers. Maybe they did have rulers. But it doesn't prove that they measured long distances with them.

If they used a digital measuring wheel then that would also mean making an assumption - that the wheel is calibrated correctly and accurate.

Your objection to “assumptions” is very selective. The Bishop Experiment makes assumptions, Rowbotham made assumptions. You have no issues with that. Only when an experiment or technique yields results you don’t like do you switch to the skeptical context and start objecting to “assumptions”.

You have previously agreed that GPS can accurately give your longitude and latitude. How can it do that without distances being known? Leaving aside how that would work in the middle of an ocean, as it demonstrably does, which rules out any land based solution

There are ways to test whether a digital measuring wheel is calibrated and accurate. This would be more of an experiment where the conditions can be controlled.

Other methods are not as controlled, and assume a lot about astronomy or the weather.

Latitude and Longitude are references ultimately based on astronomical phenomena. The Latitude is based on the angle of the North Star in the sky (for the NH) and Longitude is related to clocks and time zones. You might know your Lat/Lon coordinate point, but this would do nothing to show the distance between those points. This is how GPS, and formally the land-based LORAN, operate. The station knows its own coordinates and it is giving you your own coordinates based on triangulation.

Much of professional GPS and GIS work, by the way, assumes that the earth is flat.

From https://www.e-education.psu.edu/geog862/book/export/html/1644

“ Welcome to Lesson Six of this GPS course. And this time, we'll be talking about two coordinate systems. And I have a little bit of discussion concerning heights. We've touched on that a little bit. Now these coordinate systems that we're going to discuss are plane coordinate systems based upon the fiction that the earth is flat, which, of course, immediately introduces distortion. However, much of GIS work—and GPS work as well—is done based upon this presumption. ”

[markjo]

This is equivalent to saying that surveyors had rulers. Maybe they did have rulers. But it doesn't prove that they measured long distances with them.

What do you consider "long distances" and how else would you suggest measuring them with 17th century technology?

[DuncanDoenitz]

Chains, of course are flexible, so why not measure distance using steel bars of known length? 

Between 1888 and 1937, several companies, using different gauges, laid a rail track from Sydney to Perth; traversing Australia from East to West coast.  In the 1970s the unified Australian Rail Track Corporation converted the entire length to Standard Gauge. 

They seem to think they laid 4352 kilometres of track.  I'm pretty sure that trains also have speedometers and clocks so, well, you know .....

[Tom Bishop]

This is equivalent to saying that surveyors had rulers. Maybe they did have rulers. But it doesn't prove that they measured long distances with them.

What do you consider "long distances" and how else would you suggest measuring them with 17th century technology?

By long distances I mean continental or inter-continental distances. Much of surveyor work was plotting small parcels of land or water, and didn't really seek to measure the earth. They had tools to do the job of direct small-scale measurements, but they weren't measuring long distances with ruler tape.

For long distance measurements in the 17th century and prior the first step was to get your longitude and latitude. From that you could know how far away another place with a known latitude and longitude was if you knew how many miles a degree took upon the earth. It was "known" how many miles a degree took upon the earth based on a study, to which they would take and apply to Lat/Lon coordinates on a theoretical basis. They were not stringing ruler tape or chains for all long distance work. Long distance 'measurement' worked, and still works, based on a series of assumptions.

[markjo]

Long distance 'measurement' worked, and still works, based on a series of assumptions.

So you agree that the series of assumptions that intercontinental surveying is based on work.  Good to know.

[stack]

Your position is flawed. Unless they did something like walking around with a digital measuring wheel and physically measured the earth with a tactile method, there were assumptions in measuring long distances.

They walked around between Dunkirk and Barcelona for 7 years measuring using these:

Developed from the reflecting circle, the repeating circle is an instrument for geodetic surveying, invented by Etienne Lenoir in 1784,[1] while an assistant of Jean-Charles de Borda, who later improved the instrument. It was notable as being the equal of the great theodolite created by the renowned instrument maker, Jesse Ramsden. It was used to measure the meridian arc from Dunkirk to Barcelona by Jean Baptiste Delambre and Pierre Méchain (see: meridian arc of Delambre and Méchain).


In lieu of having anything "digital" back in the 1790's, they basically measured with a theodolite. So yes, per your request, they "physically measured the earth with a tactile method".

So I guess that resolves your complaint.

[Pete Svarrior]

So you agree that the series of assumptions that intercontinental surveying is based on work.  Good to know.

markjo, you've stumbled into the upper. Please act accordingly.