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-   -   Experimental evidence for a flat earth. (https://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=320104)

Cosmic Yak 1st June 2017 01:17 AM

Experimental evidence for a flat earth.
 
Given the now lengthy threads on the subject of the earth being flat, and thewholesoul's insistence on being shown experimental evidence for a spherical earth and all that that entails, my question, then, is this:

Have any experiments been performed showing that the earth is flat?

If so, what has the reaction been from the wider scientific community?

If not, what experiments could be done?

Tomtomkent 1st June 2017 01:38 AM

The last video I saw on it (I have no link, a friend was showing me at work) had a few experiments. There were the old ones to produce evidence of the aether, misrepresented, and a guy measuring long structures (bridges, railways, etc) to show they were a constant level, where as a flat object on a curved world would be askew. Unfortunately their measurements were all taken relative to sea level, not realising that sea level is constant around a curved world.

Worm 1st June 2017 01:47 AM

To be clear, the current lengthy thread is on the earth being stationary, not flat.

Cosmic Yak 1st June 2017 01:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Worm (Post 11863642)
To be clear, the current lengthy thread is on the earth being stationary, not flat.

Perhaps, but this thread is about it being flat:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com...6#post11861516

Porpoise of Life 1st June 2017 02:03 AM

If I drop a ball, it falls down and stays there. If the world were curved, it'd never stop rolling.

Kid Eager 1st June 2017 02:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Porpoise of Life (Post 11863656)
If I drop a ball, it falls down and stays there. If the world were curved, it'd never stop rolling.

That only proves that your ball is deflated.

Mojo 1st June 2017 04:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cosmic Yak (Post 11863635)
Given the now lengthy threads on the subject of the earth being flat, and thewholesoul's insistence on being shown experimental evidence for a spherical earth and all that that entails, my question, then, is this:

Have any experiments been performed showing that the earth is flat?

If so, what has the reaction been from the wider scientific community?

If not, what experiments could be done?


Bedford Level experiment:

Quote:

Samuel Birley Rowbotham, who conducted the first observations starting in 1838, claimed he had proven the Earth to be flat. However, in 1870, after adjusting Rowbotham's method to avoid the effects of atmospheric refraction, Alfred Russel Wallace found a curvature consistent with a spherical Earth.

See also the flat Earth wager relating to the same experiments:

Quote:

The judge for the wager, the editor of Field magazine, declared Wallace the winner, but Hampden refused to accept the result. He sued Wallace and launched a campaign, which persisted for several years, of writing letters to various publications and to organisations of which Wallace was a member denouncing him as a swindler and a thief. Wallace won multiple libel suits against Hampden, but the resulting litigation cost Wallace more than the amount of the wager and the controversy frustrated him for years.

Cosmic Yak 1st June 2017 04:44 AM

There are several sciencey-sounding experiments in this video (3.42 minutes only!).
I don't have the background to comment on whether they are valid or not: perhaps a more learned member could have a look?
Mentioned are Michelsom-Morley; the Sagnac experiment; the Lorenz Contraction and Airy's Failure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXrM191t_nc

Praktik 1st June 2017 07:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cosmic Yak (Post 11863753)
There are several sciencey-sounding experiments in this video (3.42 minutes only!).
I don't have the background to comment on whether they are valid or not: perhaps a more learned member could have a look?
Mentioned are Michelsom-Morley; the Sagnac experiment; the Lorenz Contraction and Airy's Failure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXrM191t_nc

I am not familiar with any of these but I would expect that the Lorenz Contraction is so named due to the action of the muscle which contracted to produce said results.

That muscle being a sphincter.

Just conjecture on my part, hope this helps!

PhantomWolf 1st June 2017 09:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cosmic Yak (Post 11863753)
There are several sciencey-sounding experiments in this video (3.42 minutes only!).
I don't have the background to comment on whether they are valid or not: perhaps a more learned member could have a look?
Mentioned are Michelsom-Morley; the Sagnac experiment; the Lorenz Contraction and Airy's Failure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXrM191t_nc

Michelsom-Morley is often misused by Flat Earthers and Stationary Earthers. They do this by lying about what the experiment was supposed to be testing. They claim it was to test the motion of the planet and that it failed to show anything. In reality it was to try and locate the mythical Aether, the medium that it was though that light needed to have to propagate through. The experiment was designed to detect the drag on the Aether that the Earth created as it passed through it, just as an object passing through a fliud does. The results were that it failed to find any evidence of the existence of Aether, something we now understand as we learned that light is a self propagating electromagnetic waveform and so doesn't need any medium to travel through, not that the Earth wasn't moving.

A quick check also indicates that the Sagnac experiment and Airy's Luminiferous aether were also experiments that were attempting to locate a Aether medium. That they failed was more to do with that Aether doesn't exists that anything else.

Dave Rogers 1st June 2017 09:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cosmic Yak (Post 11863753)
There are several sciencey-sounding experiments in this video (3.42 minutes only!).
I don't have the background to comment on whether they are valid or not: perhaps a more learned member could have a look?
Mentioned are Michelsom-Morley; the Sagnac experiment; the Lorenz Contraction and Airy's Failure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXrM191t_nc

The Michelson-Morley experiment, the Sagnac interferometer and Airy's Failure are all experiments that were intended to investigate whether the aether exists; the first and third demonstrated that it doesn't, while the second was originally believed to demonstrate that it does but was later explained successfully by General Relativity. The Lorentz-Fitzgerald Contraction is the observed shortening of objects in their direction of motion when travelling at speeds close to the speed of light relative to the observer. All four are very significant results or hypotheses in the development of Special and General Relativity, but none appear to me to have any bearing on determining the curvature of the Earth's surface. I haven't tried to watch the video yet; is it a serious scientific discussion of relativity, or some nutter raving on about how he's the only person in the world to realise that Einstein's theories of relativity are charades foisted on the world by scientists to further their unspecified, but definitely evil, secret agenda and this is why the Earth is flat? If the latter, I'll pass, thanks.

Dave

CORed 1st June 2017 10:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Porpoise of Life (Post 11863656)
If I drop a ball, it falls down and stays there. If the world were curved, it'd never stop rolling.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kid Eager (Post 11863679)
That only proves that your ball is deflated.


Therefore Porpoise of Life is Tom Brady. Congrats on that super bowl win.

CompusMentus 1st June 2017 10:35 AM

A useful simple project to help determine the global nature of Planet Earth.

From HERE


Quote:

Originally Posted by sciencebuddies.org
Measuring the Diameter of the Earth's Core with Seismic Waves Around the Globe

This project uses the Global Earthquake Explorer program to download and analyze data from a global seismic network. In order to do this project you will need to be comfortable installing and working with a new program on your computer. This project requires a computer with high speed Internet access. You will also need to understand some basic trigonometry. You should be comfortable with determining the lengths of the sides of right triangles when given an angle and the length of one side. Experience looking at seismograms is useful but not required.

Abstract
When an earthquake occurs, seismic shock waves travel out through the earth from the source of the event. The shock waves travel through the earth or along the Earth's surface, and can be recorded at remote monitoring stations. Some of the waves that travel through the earth are blocked or refracted by the Earth's liquid core, which means that monitoring stations located certain distances from the earthquake do not detect these waves. This creates a "seismic shadow" that you can use to estimate the diameter of the Earth's core. This geology science project shows you how.

Compus

Cosmic Yak 2nd June 2017 12:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dave Rogers (Post 11864099)
The Michelson-Morley experiment, the Sagnac interferometer and Airy's Failure are all experiments that were intended to investigate whether the aether exists; the first and third demonstrated that it doesn't, while the second was originally believed to demonstrate that it does but was later explained successfully by General Relativity. The Lorentz-Fitzgerald Contraction is the observed shortening of objects in their direction of motion when travelling at speeds close to the speed of light relative to the observer. All four are very significant results or hypotheses in the development of Special and General Relativity, but none appear to me to have any bearing on determining the curvature of the Earth's surface. I haven't tried to watch the video yet; is it a serious scientific discussion of relativity, or some nutter raving on about how he's the only person in the world to realise that Einstein's theories of relativity are charades foisted on the world by scientists to further their unspecified, but definitely evil, secret agenda and this is why the Earth is flat? If the latter, I'll pass, thanks.

Dave

Thanks for this: it does rather undermine the so-called scientific basis for a flat earth-proving experiment.
You can be reassured that there is little to no raving in the video: this is why I chose it. Sure, it does mention that Einstein was part of the conspiracy to hush up the uncomfortable results proving a flat earth, but the tone is relatively (pun intended) sane.
Where, I wonder, is thewholesoul? I would have thought he would be all over this with a huge list of the experiments either he himself has done, or that others have done and he can link to.
Most peculiar.

Trebuchet 2nd June 2017 09:04 AM

I keep clicking on the flat/stationary earth threads then wondering why I did that. One of the things I don't get is tws's insistence on experiment. Apparently he thinks that's the only way science works. He's wrong, of course, observation is just as important if not moreso.

Dave Rogers 2nd June 2017 09:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trebuchet (Post 11865891)
I keep clicking on the flat/stationary earth threads then wondering why I did that. One of the things I don't get is tws's insistence on experiment. Apparently he thinks that's the only way science works. He's wrong, of course, observation is just as important if not moreso.

Well, he refers to observations too, but he seems to think he can decide in advance what those observations will be rather than actually making them.

Dave

sts60 2nd June 2017 09:20 AM

Every time I've looked around from the launch pads at KSC and the Cape, the Earth looks pretty flat. So that's evidence.

beachnut 2nd June 2017 09:21 AM

gaseous proof, the earth is flat
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xM9S4QiEHEY
10 minute you can't get back, but it boils down to - flatulence.

The earth is flat because of Venus and Uranus... or something, when you spell these planets backwards, SUNEV, SUNARU, you get sun... related to the sun, and gas, and the earth is flat, it is flatulence.

Dave Rogers 2nd June 2017 09:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by beachnut (Post 11865928)
The earth is flat because of Venus and Uranus... or something, when you spell these planets backwards, SUNEV, SUNARU, you get sun... related to the sun, and gas, and the earth is flat, it is flatulence.

And flatulence, of course, is always associated with Uranus.

Dave

Porpoise of Life 2nd June 2017 09:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sts60 (Post 11865923)
Every time I've looked around from the launch pads at KSC and the Cape, the Earth looks pretty flat. So that's evidence.

Well, if you've worked there, you're in on the NASA conspiracy, so you can't be trusted.

Which in this case means the world isn't flat :jaw-dropp

Cosmic Yak 3rd June 2017 01:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trebuchet (Post 11865891)
I keep clicking on the flat/stationary earth threads then wondering why I did that. One of the things I don't get is tws's insistence on experiment. Apparently he thinks that's the only way science works. He's wrong, of course, observation is just as important if not moreso.

This is the main reason for my starting this thread. It should, after all, work both ways. tws insists on experimental evidence, even including the name of the experimenter, but has not yet, as far as I can tell, presented a single, solitary experimant showing the earth is flat, or stationary. (I think these things go together, btw: correct me if I'm wrong).
I wonder, then, in the absence of what he considers proof, how tws came to his somewhat left-field conclusions?
It is unfortunate, then, that he seems to be avoiding this thread like the plague.

CompusMentus 3rd June 2017 04:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dave Rogers (Post 11865939)
And flatulence, of course, is always associated with Uranus.

Dave



Unless Uranus wind is objectively stationary! How then would you feel an objective movement?

Compus

threadworm 3rd June 2017 07:49 AM

Six different satellites, six different images showing a full Earth disk, all taken at roughly the same time (in infra-red).

All of them look flat! Which is real??!?!??11?

http://i.imgur.com/VXQZj3G.jpg

sphenisc 3rd June 2017 08:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cosmic Yak (Post 11866880)
This is the main reason for my starting this thread. It should, after all, work both ways. tws insists on experimental evidence, even including the name of the experimenter, but has not yet, as far as I can tell, presented a single, solitary experimant showing the earth is flat, or stationary. (I think these things go together, btw: correct me if I'm wrong).

He presented Airy's Failure

http://www.internationalskeptics.com...&postcount=195

Cosmic Yak 4th June 2017 01:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sphenisc (Post 11867118)

You're right: I must have missed that.
It's a shame the experiment wasn't devised to show the earth is flat, though. As mentioned above, it was designed to prove the existence of ether.
thewholesoul: have you got anything else?

The Great Zaganza 4th June 2017 05:35 AM

1.) find a place where you can see a nice sunset
2.) grab a ladder
3.) sit on the ground (preferable with a love interest and a bottle of wine) and watch the sun go down
4.) climb the ladder: if you can see the sun again, the earth is not flat.

GT/CS 4th June 2017 05:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by threadworm (Post 11867073)
Six different satellites, six different images showing a full Earth disk, all taken at roughly the same time (in infra-red).

All of them look flat! Which is real??!?!??11?

http://i.imgur.com/VXQZj3G.jpg

Well, we all know that Australia isn't real, so #4 is a fake.;)

PhantomWolf 5th June 2017 12:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GT/CS (Post 11868742)
Well, we all know that Australia isn't real, so #4 is a fake.;)

darn, who told, now we're going to have to move the whole set again, Peter Jackson is going to be so upset!

EvilBiker 5th June 2017 12:07 PM

Well, here's your argument for a flat earth, quoted verbatim:

Quote:

To get off the spinning, CAPped ball/oblate spheroid/pear-shaped globe that is hurtling at speeds through the nothingness that has very aptly been named S P A C E and force fed into the minds of men and womb-men is a choice. It's a CHOICE. A choice between beLIEving you're on a limited (CAPped with 2 polar ice CAPs), CAPitalist prison where the centre of the universe is somewhere (but we don't know where) OR knowing you are on an infinite level, even (even-heaven, ball-hell) plane of density between earth and ęther where each of us is the centre of the universe. It would be good to realise that everything we think (or "thought" in some of our cases) we know about the heavens above and the earth below has been force-fed into our minds by others through a very complex system of spells and tricks through the use of symbols, letters and SPELLings (words). If the universe is a vacuum of S P A C E then that is what is in your mind. S P A C E. I'd like to know from all those still hurtling through space on their ball is where they are headed to and how do the star constellations manage to stay looking exactly the same each and every night for thousands of years at the speeds and distances we are hurtling.

You got it? No, neither did I, but apparently it's all in the CAPS. Let me try again:

Quote:

I do not see why we should beLIEve we are on a spherical ball just because the wandering stars / heavenly gods above us are spherical (and only look like balls courtesy of NASA's fakery and CGI abilities) that we too should also be on a spherical ball. Earth has awareness on it and is unique in every way from the stars and planets we are able to perceive in the aether. It is the religion (legion of RA) of science that believes everything must be measured and reduced to something. Reductionist science. Interesting that the word "nasa" means "to deceive" in Hebrew.
Nope, nope, still not there yet. Enlightenment eludes me.

Lurch 5th June 2017 02:00 PM

Is it conceded by flat earthers that the Universe surrounds us so that we see it as though the interior of a *sphere*? If so, then how do they account for the opposite side of this sphere being seen simultaneously by folks far away (as in, for sane folk, on the opposite side of the globe of Earth)?

As you can tell, I've not delved into this flat Earth rubbish in any detail at all.

Nay_Sayer 8th June 2017 10:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by threadworm (Post 11867073)
Six different satellites, six different images showing a full Earth disk, all taken at roughly the same time (in infra-red).

All of them look flat! Which is real??!?!??11?

http://i.imgur.com/VXQZj3G.jpg

All nasa cgi! the real earth has never been photographed! WAKE UP SHEEPLE!

bytewizard 8th June 2017 02:17 PM

If the Earth is round, then every movement we make, regardless of direction, would be downhill. Proof. End of thread.

sphenisc 8th June 2017 02:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bytewizard (Post 11874866)
If the Earth is round, then every movement we make, regardless of direction, would be downhill. Proof. End of thread.

In that case the Earth became round when I was 21.

Shrike 14th June 2017 08:27 AM

Earth is round. Like a pancake.

bobdroege7 14th June 2017 09:22 AM

I have a four foot spirit level, I laid it on the earth, and yes, the earth is flat.

EHocking 14th June 2017 08:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobdroege7 (Post 11883646)
I have a four foot spirit level, I laid it on the earth, and yes, the earth is flat.

I have a six foot spirit level, I laid it on the earth, and no, the earth is not flat.

Puppycow 14th June 2017 08:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Porpoise of Life (Post 11863656)
If I drop a ball, it falls down and stays there. If the world were curved, it'd never stop rolling.

Yes. I've got another one: If the world were round, then the people on the "other side" would be upside down and fall off!

Cosmic Yak 15th June 2017 02:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Puppycow (Post 11884935)
Yes. I've got another one: If the world were round, then the people on the "other side" would be upside down and fall off!

And there's our experiment.
No-one is falling off the earth in Australia, therefore the earth is flat! QED.
thewholesoul: we have done your work for you, but I will kindly allow you to present this conclusive experimental proof to the scientific institution of your choice, as your own work. The Nobel Prize awaits!

jadebox 15th June 2017 04:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bytewizard (Post 11874866)
If the Earth is round, then every movement we make, regardless of direction, would be downhill. Proof. End of thread.

When people are arguing that the Earth is flat or not spinning, then it is easy to believe that everything has gone downhill​.

-- Roger

bobdroege7 15th June 2017 05:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by EHocking (Post 11884917)
I have a six foot spirit level, I laid it on the earth, and no, the earth is not flat.

Are you sure that you don't have a turtle under there? Could throw the spirit level reading off.


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