1

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Which side of the FE vs RE debate has the burden of proof?

« on: March 20, 2019, 12:46:37 PM »

Since very few major universities teach that the Earth is flat

Very few?!? 

Indeed. I don't know of many. Do you?
 

2

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Comparing Stellar and Lunar Spectra

« on: March 19, 2019, 10:11:10 PM »

Yeah, that's not red shift. Red (or blue) shifting is where the peaks are moved slightly along the x axis, aka the Doppler effect.

This is just different amounts of reflectivity at different wavelengths.

I have only two questions:

Do you disagree that light is red-shifted by reflection?

Do you believe that the spectra of cold moonlight being emitted by a self-illuminated Moon should be very similar to the spectra of the hot Sun?

3

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Which side of the FE vs RE debate has the burden of proof?

« on: March 19, 2019, 09:40:48 PM »

Since very few major universities teach that the Earth is flat, and since millions of people directly or indirectly make a living based on the assumption that the Earth is not flat, then if the FE people want to change all those minds then they have the burden of proof.

Unless the FE people can convince enough scholars, academicians, and scientists that the Earth is flat, then the RE will continue to be taught and believed because that is where the money is.

This seems to be a very heavy burden of proof required for the FE people. The RE people's burden is very light, since most of the schools and textbooks and news media are already on their side.

4

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Comparing Stellar and Lunar Spectra

« on: March 19, 2019, 09:10:24 PM »

I only have two questions:

Why do you think it should be red-shifted?

Why do you think it is red-shifted?

Well, I think it should be red-shifted because when a light beam reflects off a surface it loses energy. This is due to a transfer of momentum from the photon to the reflecting surface.

According to greater minds than my own, if a photon has a momentum p = E/c then when it reflects it has -p (same magnitude, opposite direction). As a result there is a deficit of 2p which is transferred to the reflective surface, this increases the kinetic energy of the reflective surface and as such must decrease the energy of the reflecting photon.

But light always travels at the same speed. The loss of energy actually amounts to a drop in frequency. Since a photon's energy and frequency are intimately related (E=h*f) then a reduction in energy means a reduction in frequency.

This reduction of frequency is a "red-shift" since the frequency is shifted towards the red end of the spectrum when a photon loses energy.

As for your other question, I think it is red-shifted because people who have measured it say that it is. I don't actually have the equipment to measure it personally. I can't actually measure the speed of light, either. Some of these things I have to take other people's word for, unless someone else has better evidence to show it's wrong.

5

Flat Earth Debate / Comparing Stellar and Lunar Spectra

« on: March 19, 2019, 05:07:10 PM »

If moonlight is reflected sunlight, then we would expect the spectra of moonlight to be very similar to the spectra of sunlight, except  red-shifted. But when we compare these spectra, we see instead that they actually are very similar, except for the lunar spectra being red-shifted. How can this be if moonlight is reflected sunlight?

6

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Stellar Spectra?

« on: March 17, 2019, 09:32:06 PM »

Given you're talking to a REer, it's not really up to me to come up with evidence, it's just interesting to see how certain questions can be addressed.

Oh. I wondered why you were being so rational and reasonable.  That would explain it. 

... if you want to have fun, be fun.

That's good advice for everyone, I think. I don't really expect to see any minds changed here by anyone, but it's fun watching the gears spin to see where they go.

7

Flat Earth Debate / Re: I proved gravity

« on: March 17, 2019, 09:22:10 PM »

I started reading this fascinating book about anti-gravity and I can't put it down!

8

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Where do the birds fly?

« on: March 16, 2019, 10:08:54 PM »

South for the winter.   

So they just fly around in circles all winter and then return home in the spring?

9

Flat Earth Debate / Where do the birds fly?

« on: March 16, 2019, 09:45:51 PM »

In the RE model, some birds fly south for the winter. In the FE model, where do those birds fly?

10

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Proving flat earth with an expensive tool by Pius Bisong

« on: March 16, 2019, 12:06:57 PM »

The guy in this video starts out by saying "the camera never lies" and then uses his camera to "prove" that the Earth is flat.

If the camera never lies, then what about all the cameras that have lied when proving that the Earth isn't flat?

If wise says something and you have an objection then you have discovered yet another real life example of what the dictionary defines as an oxymoron.

11

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Stellar Spectra?

« on: March 16, 2019, 08:46:01 AM »

Given you're talking to a REer, it's not really up to me to come up with evidence, it's just interesting to see how certain questions can be addressed.

Oh. I wondered why you were being so rational and reasonable.  That would explain it. 

12

Flat Earth Debate / Re: What do RE and FE agree on?

« on: March 16, 2019, 08:38:56 AM »

It's no wonder then that someone who believes in the Flat Earth would insist that all knowledge is limited to only that which can be experienced through crude animal senses. Truths which require precise observations and measurements to determine, and more than a primitive animal's intellect to conceive of, combine perfectly to completely undermine the premises of a Flat Earth based on physical senses and feelings.

And yet we have so many things that show even our crude animal senses that the earth is curved and that gravity exists.

Well, okay. I was giving their crude animal senses the benefit of a doubt. You can't actually smell or taste the curvature of the Earth. 

13

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Stellar Spectra?

« on: March 15, 2019, 09:55:19 AM »

...there are plenty of ways to speculate upon a resolution to that from just luck to the solid mass itself somehow 'capturing' this gas or holding it close. (One easy example would be to suppose the Sun is concave, tying to the spotlight Sun notion, and the gas is kept inside by the same force that keeps the Sun aloft).
...
or we could posit those clouds captured in a similar way to the one around the Sun; after all, two objects do not need to be the same for similar forces to hold sway, an upwards force 'pinning' elements to them is an easy inclusion in FE models that requires them to stay aloft.

Thanks for your response, Jane. Your response does show that you are thinking creatively and exploring ways to make FE conform with reality - and not just trying to avoid reality entirely by denial or resorting to conspiracy theories.

During a solar eclipse stars can be seen in the area near the Sun in the sky. (The displacement of starlight from other stars passing near the Sun matched Einstein's predictions about Gravity, BTW.) If the spectra of stars is influenced by passing through the gaseous clouds you proposed then the same effect should occur on the spectra of starlight from different types of stars which passes through the gaseous cloud surrounding the Sun. Such changes in spectra indicating the presence of that cloud and causing that effect have not been observed, as far as I know.

As for gaseous clouds clinging to the Sun and the stars, the attractive force drawing those clouds in and keeping them would obviously be gravity in the RE model. In the FE model where gravity doesn't exist but is actually due to the Earth's acceleration, then how is it that the gases of the Earth's atmosphere press downwards - making the air more dense near the surface of the Earth and thinner at higher altitudes -  but somehow those same gases press upwards in the opposite direction around the Sun and stars which are also accelerating? Also, gases being pushed into an open concave container wouldn't stay there without gravity to hold them there.

Increases of temperature increases the motion of gas molecules, according to the science of Brownian motion, kinetic theory of gases,  the Maxwell–Boltzmann distribution, and etc. With the extreme high temperatures of the Sun the gas cloud would dissipate itself into space unless held either by a closed container or by gravity. A concave-shaped accelerating hot Sun against which an accelerating cloud of hot gas would be held without gravity just doesn't work, at least in my admittedly limited and non-expert understanding of the subject.

NASA's Parker Solar Probe recently dove deeper into the sun's atmosphere than any spacecraft before and will be approaching and analyzing the Sun's atmosphere even closer as it continues its mission. It hasn't detected the clouds of gas such as you proposed to influence stellar spectra. Scientific instruments haven't detected it either. Since Flatlanders reject all such evidence from NASA and astronomers then what contrary evidence do they have to substantiate their claims about the existence of those clouds of gas that travel in synchronous motions with the Sun and stars?

It seems to me that one the one hand we have a large body of scientific principles and theory - including gravity, thermodynamics, nuclear physics, astronomy - and also a huge amount of observational and experimental data which together unite to provide a cohesive self-consistent explanation of what the Sun and stars actually are and how they work. And on the other hand we have numerous tangential FE speculations unsupported by actual observational or experimental evidence.

14

Flat Earth Debate / Re: What do RE and FE agree on?

« on: March 15, 2019, 09:13:57 AM »

We both agree that as much truth as one can be had can be discerned through experience.

Many more truths can be had than simply those which can be experienced. For example, we can't experience radio waves, building the pyramids of Egypt, geometry, or what another person is feeling. Nonetheless, these truths are evident.

I disagree; the only way we know anything - whether its about radio or history or geometry is through sense experience. That and mysticism.

Really? Do you claim to possess some unique extraordinary sense of radio waves which is not shared by any other human beings?

That's easy enough to test with a simple experiment where I have a radio transmitter and you have no receiver at all except just your own senses. I will transmit at random intervals and you will indicate when I am transmitting or not.

Please forgive me for being skeptical but I am dubious of you (or anyone's) ability to pass this test.

How do you read the results of the radio receiver without use of your eyes, ears, or touch? I imagine you use ESP?

You actually proved my point. There are truths which can't be experienced directly with the senses and can only be demonstrated indirectly by some other means. When you hear sounds coming from your radio you are hearing sounds from your radio. You aren't directly sensing radio waves with your body's radio ESP. You are hearing an analog representation of radio waves after they have been converted to sound with the aid of an external apparatus which does have a sense of radio waves even though you do not.

And the only way to have it demonstrated indirectly is through sense experience.

Physical senses are crude, imprecise, and easily deceived.

Wild animals can see, hear, smell, taste, and feel. That's adequate for hunting/gathering, self defense, and mating. A monkey can be trained to ride a bicycle but will never invent one. A human limited to only sense experiences of the world is a merely a feral creature that can be trained to speak but will never create a dictionary.

Physical senses are incapable of determining size, mass, or velocity with any degree of precision. The pyramids of Egypt weren't built by eyeballing some chunks of rock and deciding to heap them in a pile. Instruments, from rulers and scales to spectroscopes and volt meters are required to measure what our senses cannot. And creating such instruments requires recognition of truths which our senses can't perceive.

Professional magicians make a living by creating illusions which deceive easily fooled senses.  Likewise, video deceives the eye into seeing motion where in actuality merely a sequence of still images is presented on the screen.

It's no wonder then that someone who believes in the Flat Earth would insist that all knowledge is limited to only that which can be experienced through crude animal senses. Truths which require precise observations and measurements to determine, and more than a primitive animal's intellect to conceive of, combine perfectly to completely undermine the premises of a Flat Earth based on physical senses and feelings.

15

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Back Side of the Moon

« on: March 14, 2019, 09:03:56 AM »

It's an image projected on the dome!

Projected by what projector located where?

Is "projection" really the Flatlander explanation? LOL

16

Flat Earth Debate / Re: What do RE and FE agree on?

« on: March 14, 2019, 08:56:32 AM »

We both agree that as much truth as one can be had can be discerned through experience.

Many more truths can be had than simply those which can be experienced. For example, we can't experience radio waves, building the pyramids of Egypt, geometry, or what another person is feeling. Nonetheless, these truths are evident.

I disagree; the only way we know anything - whether its about radio or history or geometry is through sense experience. That and mysticism.

Really? Do you claim to possess some unique extraordinary sense of radio waves which is not shared by any other human beings?

That's easy enough to test with a simple experiment where I have a radio transmitter and you have no receiver at all except just your own senses. I will transmit at random intervals and you will indicate when I am transmitting or not.

Please forgive me for being skeptical but I am dubious of you (or anyone's) ability to pass this test.

How do you read the results of the radio receiver without use of your eyes, ears, or touch? I imagine you use ESP?

You actually proved my point. There are truths which can't be experienced directly with the senses and can only be demonstrated indirectly by some other means. When you hear sounds coming from your radio you are hearing sounds from your radio. You aren't directly sensing radio waves with your body's radio ESP. You are hearing an analog representation of radio waves after they have been converted to sound with the aid of an external apparatus which does have a sense of radio waves even though you do not.

17

Flat Earth Debate / Re: What do RE and FE agree on?

« on: March 13, 2019, 09:13:39 AM »

We both agree that as much truth as one can be had can be discerned through experience.

Many more truths can be had than simply those which can be experienced. For example, we can't experience radio waves, building the pyramids of Egypt, geometry, or what another person is feeling. Nonetheless, these truths are evident.

I disagree; the only way we know anything - whether its about radio or history or geometry is through sense experience. That and mysticism.

Really? Do you claim to possess some unique extraordinary sense of radio waves which is not shared by any other human beings?

That's easy enough to test with a simple experiment where I have a radio transmitter and you have no receiver at all except just your own senses. I will transmit at random intervals and you will indicate when I am transmitting or not.

Please forgive me for being skeptical but I am dubious of you (or anyone's) ability to pass this test.

18

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Stellar Spectra?

« on: March 13, 2019, 07:39:21 AM »

Spectroscopy methods errors:

http://www.ldolphin.org/univ-age.html

Thorium/Neodymium Ratio and Age of Universe

Your answer wasn't responsive to the question posed. I wasn't asking about the age of the Sun or the universe, or about x-rays, I was asking why sunlight spectra is the same as many stars if it is not a star as astronomers say it is?

19

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Back Side of the Moon

« on: March 13, 2019, 07:21:43 AM »

When airplanes fly overhead, as they are coming toward us we see the front of the plane and after it passes us overhead and goes away from us we see the back of the plane.

How is it that we always see the same side of the Moon coming and going?

Airplanes are a few miles up.

The moon is a few hundred thousand miles up.

It's perspective.

Of course, from the perspective of rational science. But I meant from the Flat Earth perspective.

20

Flat Earth Debate / Back Side of the Moon

« on: March 12, 2019, 10:16:58 AM »

When airplanes fly overhead, as they are coming toward us we see the front of the plane and after it passes us overhead and goes away from us we see the back of the plane.

How is it that we always see the same side of the Moon coming and going?

21

Flat Earth Debate / Stellar Spectra?

« on: March 12, 2019, 10:14:43 AM »

When starlight is passed through a prism the spectrum of light isn't continuous, but rather has a series of dark lines superimposed on it which can be observed and documented with a spectroscope. Each dark line indicates a particular chemical element or molecule which is present in the reaction which is causing the light to be emitted. The line strength indicating the abundance of that element. The strengths of the different spectral lines vary mainly due to the temperatures of the emitting source.

Hot solid objects produce light with a continuous spectrum, hot gases emit light at specific wavelengths, and hot solid objects surrounded by cooler gases show a near-continuous spectrum with dark lines corresponding to the emission lines of the gases.

By observing the spectra of starlight it is seen that although there are many stars, there are only a small number of distinct patterns in their spectral lines. This leads to the Morgan-Keenan (MK) system classifications used by astronomers: O, B, A, F, G, K, and M, a sequence from the hottest (O type) to the coolest (M type) and is illustrated in the Hertzprung-Russell diagram which groups the spectral types of stars by magnitude, luminosity, and temperature.

Analysis of the spectra of sunlight demonstrates that it matches the characteristics of G type stars. The standard scientific explanation for this match is that the Sun is a star.

What is the Flatlander position on this? Is the Sun a star? If so, then why are all the other stars so small? If not, then why does sunlight share the same characteristics as starlight from G type stars?

22

Flat Earth Debate / Re: What do RE and FE agree on?

« on: March 12, 2019, 10:10:22 AM »

We both agree that as much truth as one can be had can be discerned through experience.

Many more truths can be had than simply those which can be experienced. For example, we can't experience radio waves, building the pyramids of Egypt, geometry, or what another person is feeling. Nonetheless, these truths are evident.

23

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Disproving strong Round Earth arguments

« on: March 09, 2019, 04:18:17 PM »

LOL you know you are trackable, right?

Trackable by what, satellite? Impossible, since they don't exist according to FE theory.

24

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Disproving strong Round Earth arguments

« on: March 09, 2019, 03:57:56 PM »

We will not know the truth.

After reviewing with some interest (actually, morbid curiosity) the F.A.Q.s, the Revised F.A.Q.s, and much of the conversation on this site, I propose that the above statement by Heavenly Breeze should be adopted as the official motto of the FES, since it is essentially the ultimate answer to all the technical questions posed by FE skeptics here.

Were you so morbidly curious you decided to create an alt, Pi31415?

Excuse me?

25

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Alternative explanation of Gravity

« on: March 07, 2019, 10:11:28 AM »

Andresb posted

I'm not going to answer the rest of what you say because many have mostly pointed out your misconceptions and you seem to blatantly ignore the corrections already made on what you say.

In a non-relativistic universe - a universe in which Relativity Theory is NOT applicable - an object accelerating continuously forever would at some point eventually be moving faster than what we call the speed of light in our universe. Yes/No?

The corrections (arguments) explaining how an object can accelerate continuously without ever exceeding the speed of light are based on Relativity Theory. Yes/No?

If Relativity Theory provides a satisfactory explanation of how the Earth could be constantly accelerating without ever exceeding the speed of light, then the Earth's constant acceleration isn't needed to explain gravity since Relativity Theory already provides a satisfactory explanation of gravity which doesn't require that acceleration. Yes/No?

So to summarize my fundamental misconception ( the corrections of which I have blatantly ignored), EITHER Relativity Theory is incorrect, and the Earth is by now travelling faster than the speed of light, OR ELSE Relativity Theory is correct and we don't need an accelerating Earth to explain gravity since Relativity Theory already provides the explanation.

That's my misconception, and I'm sticking to it, because I'm too dense or slow to escape it's attraction.

 

26

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Why doesn't all the air leak over the edge wall?

« on: March 07, 2019, 08:33:33 AM »

Shifter posted

What you believe to be stars ARE the vent holes.

Vent holes that glow in the dark and circle around in the night sky? Yeah, that make sense and should be easy to prove with logic.

It must be colder out there on the outside of the universe, where the vent holes are venting the heat to. All we have to do is apply the formula for heat transfer, Q = mcΔT, plug in the appropriate values, and bingo, a whole new picture to replace the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram.

So, it's just a coincidence that so many of those vent holes happen to glow the same as the Sun (Class G stellar spectra)? Oh, wait, the Sun must be one of those vent holes too! Well, that's good. Being so close to the Earth, and so much bigger than all those other vent holes, the Sun helps to keep the Earth cool.

I love it when all the facts fit together so well to give us a better understanding of the universe.

27

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Explanation of meteors?

« on: March 07, 2019, 07:47:37 AM »

AroundWeGo posted

Lol you’re right, I haven’t been around here much. Still trying to find out who Here is crazy and who isn’t. Cheers.

I'd say we all have to be crazy here. Anyone living in this century who believes the Earth is flat is crazy, anyone who thinks they can use logic to change that belief is crazy, and those who just come here to be entertained watching all the other crazies are crazy too.

28

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Explanation of meteors?

« on: March 06, 2019, 10:16:21 AM »

You mean like this? Mysterious metal objects falling from the sky? That no one can identify?

Well, those are obviously proof of alien technology, maybe fell from UFOs from another dimension?
 

But I meant the ones that look like rocks and can't be identified as UFO parts.

29

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Why doesn't all the air leak over the edge wall?

« on: March 06, 2019, 09:28:33 AM »

Well, if the FE is covered by a sky dome, then the dome could be touching and pressing down all the way around Earth's rim, making an air tight seal which keeps the atmoscircle inside.

Seems like this would act as a greenhouse as well, trapping heat inside.... Hmm, this must be the REAL cause of Global Warming!!!

We need to figure out how to drill some vent holes in the sky dome to let some of the heat out before it's too late. Instead of spending billions of dollars on NASA for it to photoshop fake pictures of the RE, (which as we know is a very expensive process,) we should get NASA to shoot some rockets up there and blast holes in the sky dome.

Probably a couple 100 megaton nukes might do the trick, but this depends on how strong the sky dome is. I don't know what material the sky dome is made of or how thick it is, but I'm sure one of the FE scientists can figure it out.

We would probably want to set those nukes off above the North Pole or the Ice Wall where the fallout would only be a risk to polar bears or penguins instead of to people. Although over Washington D.C. might be OK too, since that would put a stop to the politicians who keep perpetuating the RE myth.

30

Flat Earth Debate / Explanation of meteors?

« on: March 06, 2019, 08:55:16 AM »

Occasionally, objects "fall" from the sky to the Earth. These objects (meteors) are usually rocks of some kind with a high iron content. In the FE model, where do meteors come from? Are these pieces of the sky dome, or perhaps pieces of the Sun or Moon, which have crumbled off? Or maybe they are separate objects circling around up in the sky along with the Sun and Moon and then for some reason move towards the Earth?