rigorousintuition.ca

That's funny, seeing that this whole 'debate' (ha) was stale before the invention of the telescope. To think that NASA has played any kind of role in determining (/imposing) ideas about the shape of the Earth is to illustrate ignorance. And talking about digital what what is especially ironic coming from people who don't have the wits to go outside at night and look up.

stefano » Wed Aug 31, 2016 3:04 pm wrote:That's funny, seeing that this whole 'debate' (ha) was stale before the invention of the telescope. To think that NASA has played any kind of role in determining (/imposing) ideas about the shape of the Earth is to illustrate ignorance. And talking about digital what what is especially ironic coming from people who don't have the wits to go outside at night and look up.

The sky was put there by freemasons

My IQ has dropped 20 points reading this thread.

The surface of the Earth is has zero curvature (flat?) -- is on the level -- at any "point" on the surface but has a curve over any "line" along the surface (of course this assumes the surface of the Earth is smooth as a billiard ball).

The "Flat Earth" idea is an example of the map is not the territory. There are many quite useful and used models of the flat Earth (two dimensional maps instead of three dimensional globes for example).

That reminds me of something I read a long time ago. If you shrunk the Earth down to the size of a billiard ball, the Earth would be smoother.

82_28 » Wed Aug 31, 2016 1:20 pm wrote:I don't think Neon was defending them he was just saying that they are out there. Which if he has witnessed it, it definitely does exist.

Which I do not understand.

One of my dearest friends is a woman who had a series of strokes that left her blind and also destroyed her personality. She no longer had a personality when it was over. Over the years, she slowly "rebuilt" herself, and her vision gradually came back. Her (re)learning curve was quite steep but she attacked knowledge with a vengeance. She is now one of the very wisest people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. And yes, she's a flat-earther. Her new-found knowledge is admittedly self taught, but she has done a lot of research on things like the angle of the sun's rays, airline flight patterns, NASA footage from various space missions, etc. I really enjoy the back-and-forth we have about this issue.

Hugo Farnsworth » Wed Aug 31, 2016 7:55 pm wrote:My IQ has dropped 20 points reading this thread.

Weird. Mine has gone up by about the same amount.

...I don't think its perfectly spherical either let alone "smooth" - isn't it sort of squashed a bit like pinching a rubber ball between your finger and thumb - maybe the Coriolis effect I'm thinking of....the earth rotates faster at the equator than at the poles...

NeonLX » Thu Sep 01, 2016 11:07 am wrote:

82_28 » Wed Aug 31, 2016 1:20 pm wrote:I don't think Neon was defending them he was just saying that they are out there. Which if he has witnessed it, it definitely does exist.

Which I do not understand.

One of my dearest friends is a woman who had a series of strokes that left her blind and also destroyed her personality. She no longer had a personality when it was over. Over the years, she slowly "rebuilt" herself, and her vision gradually came back. Her (re)learning curve was quite steep but she attacked knowledge with a vengeance. She is now one of the very wisest people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. And yes, she's a flat-earther. Her new-found knowledge is admittedly self taught, but she has done a lot of research on things like the angle of the sun's rays, airline flight patterns, NASA footage from various space missions, etc. I really enjoy the back-and-forth we have about this issue.

Doesn't science requires critical thinking, the willingness to question assumptions, question beliefs without fear of attack? If so, this is not the place for scientific inquiry...much too religious for that.

semper occultus » Thu Sep 01, 2016 4:25 pm wrote:...I don't think its perfectly spherical either let alone "smooth" - isn't it sort of squashed a bit like pinching a rubber ball between your finger and thumb - maybe the Coriolis effect I'm thinking of....the earth rotates faster at the equator than at the poles...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_ellipsoid

It [the Earth] is an ellipsoid of revolution, whose short (polar) axis (connecting the two flattest spots called geographical north and south poles) is approximately aligned with the rotation axis of the Earth. The ellipsoid is defined by the equatorial axis a and the polar axis b; their difference is about 21 km or 0.335 percent.

The World Pool-Billiard Association Tournament Table and Equipment Specifications (November 2001) state: "All balls must be composed of cast phenolic resin plastic and measure 2 ¼ (+.005) inches [5.715 cm (+ .127 mm)] in diameter and weigh 5 ½ to 6 oz [156 to 170 gms]."

(or 0.2222.... percent)

so, if you shrunk the Earth to the size of a billiard ball it would be (approx.) 0.1127...% out of round - by WPBA standards.

trivia fact : the white ball on UK pay-to-play tables is significantly bigger than the rest !

trivia fact : the white ball on UK pay-to-play tables is significantly bigger than the rest !

Same with pay to play tables in the US. That's how the cue ball pops out and the other balls get collected.

divideandconquer » Thu Sep 01, 2016 10:48 am wrote:

NeonLX » Thu Sep 01, 2016 11:07 am wrote:

82_28 » Wed Aug 31, 2016 1:20 pm wrote:I don't think Neon was defending them he was just saying that they are out there. Which if he has witnessed it, it definitely does exist.

Which I do not understand.

One of my dearest friends is a woman who had a series of strokes that left her blind and also destroyed her personality. She no longer had a personality when it was over. Over the years, she slowly "rebuilt" herself, and her vision gradually came back. Her (re)learning curve was quite steep but she attacked knowledge with a vengeance. She is now one of the very wisest people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. And yes, she's a flat-earther. Her new-found knowledge is admittedly self taught, but she has done a lot of research on things like the angle of the sun's rays, airline flight patterns, NASA footage from various space missions, etc. I really enjoy the back-and-forth we have about this issue.

Doesn't science requires critical thinking, the willingness to question assumptions, question beliefs without fear of attack? If so, this is not the place for scientific inquiry...much too religious for that.

Yes. My arrogance kept me from giving this issue even a second glance, in spite of months and months of my friend's urging to simply consider the "what if" side of the issue. "What if" is the key to advancing our knowledge. I'm not saying that the Earth is flat; I'm merely suggesting that we need more "what if" in our thinking. Or at least I do.

I'm sure once blinded for a time the horizons matter not.

smoking since 1879 » Mon Aug 29, 2016 5:58 am wrote:is this some kind of honey pot for stupid people?

It's also a honeypot for educated people to make fun of gullible people.

I once poured honey on a large carpenter ant and watched as it slowly pulled itself out and painstakingly cleaned itself off. And then I poured more honey on it. In some ways perhaps the cruelest thing I ever did.

NeonLX » Thu Sep 01, 2016 11:26 am wrote:

divideandconquer » Thu Sep 01, 2016 10:48 am wrote:

NeonLX » Thu Sep 01, 2016 11:07 am wrote:

82_28 » Wed Aug 31, 2016 1:20 pm wrote:I don't think Neon was defending them he was just saying that they are out there. Which if he has witnessed it, it definitely does exist.

Which I do not understand.

One of my dearest friends is a woman who had a series of strokes that left her blind and also destroyed her personality. She no longer had a personality when it was over. Over the years, she slowly "rebuilt" herself, and her vision gradually came back. Her (re)learning curve was quite steep but she attacked knowledge with a vengeance. She is now one of the very wisest people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. And yes, she's a flat-earther. Her new-found knowledge is admittedly self taught, but she has done a lot of research on things like the angle of the sun's rays, airline flight patterns, NASA footage from various space missions, etc. I really enjoy the back-and-forth we have about this issue.

Doesn't science requires critical thinking, the willingness to question assumptions, question beliefs without fear of attack? If so, this is not the place for scientific inquiry...much too religious for that.

Yes. My arrogance kept me from giving this issue even a second glance, in spite of months and months of my friend's urging to simply consider the "what if" side of the issue. "What if" is the key to advancing our knowledge. I'm not saying that the Earth is flat; I'm merely suggesting that we need more "what if" in our thinking. Or at least I do.

There are way more questions than answers, by orders of magnitude. It therefore follows logically that one has to choose which questions to ask in order to conserve one's time and resources. But to each his own.