31

Flat Earth Debate / Re: How to argue about perspective (I'm looking at you, Tom)

« on: December 28, 2007, 09:40:31 PM »

Well yet again you ignore me, Tom. I asked for math and you gave me bullshit. But I'll even translate your (read: Rowbotham's) argument into math for you (I'm so nice)!

On an infinite, perfectly flat plane (which the Earth arguably isn't) we can illustrate the phenomenon of objects above us descending to the horizon as such: the physical vertical distance between the object and the eye-level of the observer is y (constant, here), the horizontal distance between observer and object is x and the apparent height of the object would be theta, a function of x and y. theta = arctan(y/x). As x increases, y/x approaches 0, and arctan(0) = 0 so the object will appear to be at the eye-level of the observer once its distance exceeds the resolution of the human eye. That all makes perfect sense, I agree with Rowboatman.

Rhobottom sort of fudges the next bit though.

In a long row of lamps, the second--supposing the observer to stand at the beginning of the series---will appear lower than the first; the third lower than the second; and so on to the end of the row; the farthest away always appearing the lowest, although each one has the same altitude; and if such a straight line of lamps could be continued far enough, the lights would at length descend, apparently, to the horizon, or to a level with the eye of the observer. This explains how overhead bodies descend into the horizon as they recede.

True, the top of each successive lamp will have a smaller apparent height than the previous one. However, Robot-ham never actually addresses how the tops of the lamps descending causes the bottom to appear to sink into the ground. Yet again, I shall translate into mathematics.

Here we have a block with two colored sections. Roughbawtham claims that as this object moves further away, it will become smaller while sinking into the ground. X is the horizontal distance to the object, Y is the vertical distance to the top of the object from the eye-level of the observer, alpha is the apparent distance to the top of the green section, and beta is the apparent height to the top of the blue section. Y is split into y1 and y2 which label the blue/green sections respectively. Now, the claim is that the green section will "sink into the ground" due to perspective; i.e. the apparent height of the green section will be 0. Well y2 is constant, so that means that eventually X will be large enough that alpha will be approximately 0 according to the human eye (alpha = arctan(y2/x)). However, if X is large enough that arctan(y2/x) = 0 approximately, then unless y1 is very large arctan(y/x) = arctan((y1 + y2)/x) = beta = 0 approximately as well! However, that does not accurately reflect the reality observed in images such as:
(thanks, cpt_bthimes)
In this case, we're seeing the top of the ship on the horizon while the apparent height of the hull of the ship is approximately 0. However, unless this is some kind of skyscraper ship the actual height of the top of the ship isn't too much different from that of the hull! Say, for example, that the ship here is perfectly sunken in half. That is, half of the ship has sunk below the horizon due to Roabofthnam's perspective laws while half of it has yet to do so. So we have y1 = y2 and X is large enough that arctan(y2/x) = 0 approximately but arctan((2*y2)/x) = arctan(y/x) = beta does not approximately equal zero!? That just isn't possible. Especially since from the picture it is clear that x is very, very large in relation to y (the ship's height).

In non-mathematical speak, what this all means is that as objects move further away from an observer all parts of the object appear to merge with the vanishing point equally. That is, even though certain parts of the object will be closer to the vanishing point than others, they will appear to approach that point more slowly so that the entire object will merge with the vanishing point simulatenously. NOT from the bottom up as Rwotohabm claims. This is all due to the simple properties of limits at infinity with regard to fractions.

32

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Now here's an idea regarding the conspiracy

« on: December 28, 2007, 08:41:18 PM »

Alright, I hereby declare this thread back on topic!

My questions are unanswered. I believe that a worldwide conspiracy cannot be a part of any legitimate theory because it violates Occam's razor and is essentially impossible to prove or disprove. FEers out there, do you disagree with me? If so, why?

It is completely unnecessary to discuss FET specifically in this thread. In fact, please do not bring up specific arguments for/against FET as I simply want to discuss the nature of conspiracy theory as proof.

33

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Belief-O-Matic

« on: December 23, 2007, 07:38:55 PM »

How the shit is Liberal Quakers so high!? I'm an adamant atheist! Also, I think it's a little stupid to have "Unitarian Universalism" on the list since it's so general that it'll match almost anyone.

1.    Secular Humanism  (100%)
2.    Unitarian Universalism (89%)
3.    Nontheist (81%)
4.    Theravada Buddhism (75%)
5.    Liberal Quakers (71%)
6.    Neo-Pagan (62%)
7.    Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (54%)
8.    Taoism (47%)
9.    New Age (45%)
10.    Mahayana Buddhism (37%)
11.    Reform Judaism (37%)
12.    Orthodox Quaker (32%)
13.    New Thought (26%)
14.    Scientology (26%)
15.    Sikhism (24%)
16.    Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (20%)
17.    Bahá'í Faith (18%)
18.    Jainism (16%)
19.    Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (16%)
20.    Hinduism (13%)
21.    Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (13%)
22.    Seventh Day Adventist (12%)
23.    Eastern Orthodox (8%)
24.    Islam (8%)
25.    Orthodox Judaism (8%)
26.    Roman Catholic (8%)
27.    Jehovah's Witness (5%)

I also got a 32 on that spirituality test but now I'm skeptical. This site is definitely biased against the atheist. Certain questions really had no options even close to my beliefs and the results page implies that the more spiritual you are, the better.

34

Flat Earth Debate / Re: What are the key faults in Round Earth?

« on: December 23, 2007, 07:02:48 PM »

Theoretic:
Make something up (hypothesis) -> try and find evidence which might appear to back it up

Zetetic:
Examine facts -> figure out what is true on the basis of accrued facts.

I will correct this.

Theoretic:
Make something up (hypothesis) -> Check if hypothesis accurately explains all evidence

Also, while I won't question the merit of zetetic science, it does not seem apparent to me at all that a zetetic approach would lead one to support FET. In fact, your approach seems to be a complete bastardization of theoretical science rather than zetetical. If we're going to examine facts and then come to a conclusion, let's look at evidence:

• Ships sinking over the horizon
• Retrograde planetary motion
• Movement of stars
• Eclipses
• Gravity's dependence on elevation
• Expeditions to the south pole

If we simply look at this evidence and come to a conclusion, where exactly does the conspiracy, the ice wall, the crazy cycles of the sun and moon, the UA, and all of that crap come from!? The zetetic approach seems to favor RET because it doesn't require a dozen unexplained mechanisms to be thought up in order to explain all of these phenomena! That's why your approach is theoretical. You came up with FET and then immediately started cooking up explanations for how it fits with all of the contrary evidence people throw at you. But that isn't even the correct theoretical approach! That's pseudoscience. Normal people (i.e. people who aren't obsessed with rejecting things just because they are mainstream) would simply admit that their theory is incorrect in the face of contrary evidence rather than continually bullshitting there way out of every tight corner with more and more unexplained and illogical pseudoscience.

35

Flat Earth Debate / Re: If the earth is flat...

« on: December 23, 2007, 06:34:59 PM »

Also, I would hardly call a single ice shelf evidence of an all-encircling ice wall around the entire world.

Here's a quote following Tom Bishop's
" 'It would be impossible to conceive a more solid-looking mass of ice; not the smallest appearance of any rent or fissure could we discover throughout its whole extent, and the intensely bright sky beyond it but too plainly indicated the great distance to which it reached to the southward.' Two weeks and 250 miles later they had still not reached its end - although at one point it sank to a height of 50 feet, allowing Ross a glimpse from his mast of 'an immense plain of frosted silver' - and with the austral summer coming to an end they dared not risk being trapped. On 9 February they turned for Tasmania."

Therefore, obviously, the entire Earth is surrounded by a 150 foot ice wall.

36

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Now here's an idea regarding the conspiracy

« on: December 23, 2007, 06:18:58 PM »

Well that's where Occam's razor comes into play. A worldwide conspiracy is practically immune to proof or disproof, so what should one believe? Occam thinks that the position that requires the least assumptions is the one that should be adopted under lack of conclusive evidence. Hence the illegitimacy of conspiracy as proof.

I'm an REer, but if there ever pops up telling evidence of a worldwide conspiracy trying to hide the true shape of the Earth, you can bet I'll be seriously reconsidering my opinion.

37

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Why I Believe in a Spherical Earth

« on: December 23, 2007, 06:14:39 PM »

Actually, Roundy's use of the appeal to authority accusation was in correct context. However, it was ironic and amusing more than anything, considering the circumstances.

Agh, we're getting off topic but it wasn't. Either he was referring to
"When I broke my ankle, and a number of doctors told me surgery was necessary, was I a sheep for believing them? Should I have started conducting my own experiments to verify what they were saying?"
which is definitely not fallacious, or the OP who said that he believes the Earth is round because physicists, scientists, etc. think so.

I would like to think that physicists (especially astrophysicists) and geologists and the like would be dependable authorities on the shape of the Earth. Thus no fallacy. If you said "I think that the Earth is round because everyone else does" then that would be appeal to popularity. But specifically citing scientific sources as the reason would be completely logical.

38

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Now here's an idea regarding the conspiracy

« on: December 23, 2007, 06:05:53 PM »

But the conspiracy is used as a tool to legitimize FET. If you come up with a new theory then you can assume your theory is true so long as your theory accommodates for all currently existing evidence. The problem with FET is that it accommodates for currently existing evidence simply by saying that it's all faked by the conspiracy! That's why a global, all-powerful conspiracy cannot be a part of any legitimate theory! If a conspiracy were a viable element of a theory, then by your reasoning practically any crackpot theory deserves as much equal consideration as the scientifically tested, widely accepted views.

This discussion doesn't need to involve FET at all (though it concerns it greatly). The point is that conspiracy theories completely break down rational arguments and making it impossible to prove or disprove anything!

39

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Why I Believe in a Spherical Earth

« on: December 22, 2007, 11:10:30 PM »

Actually Roundy miscalled that fallacy. Appeal to authority occurs when you cite someone who is an authority in an irrelevant field.

For example, Tiger Woods drives a Buick therefore the Buick is a good car. A fallacious argument because being a good golfer has nothing to do with being a good judge of a car's worth.

Counterexample, I need to go to the hospital because my doctor told me to. Not fallacious because doctors are generally good at determining medical need.

40

Flat Earth Debate / Re: I can't see New Zealand.

« on: December 22, 2007, 11:01:59 PM »

No, the fog argument doesn't work. On all but the crappiest of days the horizon appears well before objects fuzz due to the atmosphere. The fog would obscure New Zealand in the OP's case, but it does not explain the hard horizon line he observes.

Specifically, the case in which the argument doesn't work is where we can view both a hard horizon line as well as atmospherically blurred objects partially hidden behind the horizon.

41

Flat Earth Debate / How to argue about perspective (I'm looking at you, Tom)

« on: December 22, 2007, 10:57:11 PM »

I already posted this is another thread, but it deserves its own I think. In addition to the FAQ we really need a FPBA (Frequently Posted Bullshit Arguments) so that we can refer people to it.

I honestly cannot believe that this perspective argument is still coming up. "Basic laws of perspective" they say, "obvious empirical evidence" they say. Even if the FEers are correct about the whole "sinking into the ground" thing, it cannot be due to perspective. Perspective is nothing more than the appearance of objects becoming smaller as they move further away. All of the "laws" of perspective that people love to reference so much are simply due to trivial trigonometry. I'm even going to demonstrate with a picture.



Diagram 1: Here the object's actual distance from our center of vision is y. Its apparent distance is theta. Even as y remains constant, as x approaches infinity, theta approaches 0. That is, the object appears closer to the center of our vision as it moves further away even though it is physically not moving closer. This is because theta = arctan(y/x) and arctan(0) = 0.

Diagram 2: Here the object's distance from the observer is x, it's actual height is y, and it's apparent height is theta. Yet again, as the object moves further away y remains constant, x approaches infinity, and consequently theta approaches 0. To simplify the math, let's just assume that the object is vertically centered in our vision (this only affects the coefficients). We can split the triangle in half along the horizontal and thus get theta/2 = arctan(y/2x) and yet again arctan(0) = 0. So as the object moves further away, it appears to be smaller even though its actual height is not changing.

See? All that there is is relative position and trigonometry. Now whenever you crazy FEers bring up "perspective" you have to argue it with only those two things: relative position and trigonometry. Use math, use pictures, do NOT cite Samuel "Rowboatman" Rowbotham.

42

Flat Earth Debate / Re: FE's can not possibly explain this

« on: December 22, 2007, 10:47:22 PM »

I'm sorry, I'm a right bastard. I'm posting in this thread after only reading 1 of 6 pages. But I just can't let this go by.

But my problem is this:

People come here all the time saying "X is not possible" or "is Y possible"

People talk about the FE like it's a different entity. But it's not. Anything that is observed on Earth, must be explained in either model.

This is where so many of our problems come from. You are completely wrong. Things do not have to be explained by either model. If you come up with a new scientific theory and then find some evidence that doesn't fit it then your theory is wrong. You're can't simply cook up any ridiculous theory and then say that since your theory must be true then there must be an explanation for how the contrary evidence isn't actually contrary. That would be a bastardization of science. But that's the whole basis of FET! Here's how the process works!

1. Assume the Earth is flat
2. We know there's that weird horizon effect
3. Therefore there must exist some phenomenon to explain that so that it fits with FET
4. We know the Earth's magnetic field works a certain way
5. Therefore there must exist some phenomenon to explain it so that it fits with FET
6. We know certain things about space
7. Therefore there must exist some phenomenon to explain those things so that they fit with FET
...
(ad nauseum)
...
Therefore the Earth is flat!

43

Flat Earth Debate / Now here's an idea regarding the conspiracy

« on: December 22, 2007, 10:35:54 PM »

How about instead of arguing over who's write about the shape of the Earth, we do this first:

Let's discuss whether or not a conspiracy cover up is a legitimate argument for backing up any theory.


If this can be refuted, then that's 99% of FE arguments gone kaput right there. Frankly, I'm sick of rebutting the same old conspiracy arguments over and over again for the same reasons.

44

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Why I Believe in a Spherical Earth

« on: December 22, 2007, 10:32:42 PM »

Priests were considered trustworthy sources only on the basis of religious faith in the Church. We are living in a much more scientifically advanced age, and contemporary physicists and astronomers are trained in the scientific method, unlike priests. There is no comparison here.

How exactly would this line of argument differ from a similar hypothetical argument from the 1600s?

Pagan druid leaders were considered trustworthy sources only on the basis of religious faith in the Pagan Gods. We are living in a much more scientifically advanced age, and contemporary witch-hunters and priests are trained in careful scrutiny of the Bible, unlike Pagan druid leaders. There is no comparison here.

AGH, not even! Please do not ever compare the Bible to the scientific method ever again. The whole point of the scientific method is that it requires no assumption, is completely unbiased, and is by definition most likely to result in a reasonable outcome. The Holy Bible is completely unsupported assertion - dogma - no questions asked. Since when does the Bible involve collecting evidence and challenging its own assertions with rigorous experimentation!? The reason why the volume of RE evidence is so telling is because it's from an era where "evidence" is actually clearly defined and relevant.

45

Flat Earth Debate / Re: A photograph of the South Pole

« on: December 22, 2007, 10:08:30 PM »

*sigh*, lack of contrary evidence implies truth, eh? I mean, that's the whole damn basis of this FE nonsense isn't it? Someone thought of a whole bunch of different (fallacious) ways to counter the standard arguments for a round earth and, tada! The Earth is flat.

I mean, obviously almost any evidence can be faked but that doesn't mean that is must necessarily be. As a matter of fact, when testing a scientific theory it's ridiculous to assume that all contrary evidence is faked until proven otherwise. That's completely backwards. If you come up with a theory that opposes the mainstream view you don't go around challenging all of the arguments for the accepted norm. So if we're arguing about the shape of the Earth you simply cannot say "prove it" to every single bit of evidence thrown at you! Don't you get it? The evidence is the proof. The sheer volume of round earth evidence is FET's greatest weakness (regardless of its truth). The thing is that you can't go around saying "oh well that evidence could all be faked" because that demands an epic, global cover up the existence of which is only reasonable if one assumes that FET is true! Circular logic!

1. Assume FET is true
2. Thus there exists a global conspiracy
3. Thus all of the "evidence" of RET is faked by said conspiracy
4. Thus FET is true

There are actually three problems here. First, you're obviously assuming what you're trying to prove. Secondly, existence of a conspiracy doesn't automatically imply that all evidence of a RE is fake. Finally, between 3 and 4, lack of contrary evidence doesn't imply truth! So even IF there was a conspiracy trying to make everyone think the Earth is round, they could be idiots basing a conspiracy on something that's not even true!

You just can't treat FE and RE as though they are equal. If they are, well then you could apply that to anything. For example, George Bush isn't real. Well if he wasn't real then there'd have to be a huge cover up to make all this media and such regarding him. Thus any evidence of George Bush's existence is fake. Thus George Bush isn't real. The whole "conspiracy" thing is fallacious is because its unbeatable! Picture evidence? CONSPIRACY! Anecdotal evidence? CONSPIRACY! Scientific evidence? CONSPIRACY!

46

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Suspension Bridges...?

« on: December 22, 2007, 09:48:35 PM »

I was a civil engineer for about 2 years, with about 6 months of that spent in the bridges department. I don't claim to know a great deal, but I can say that the 36mm difference between top and bottom would be near impossible to achieve on-site

Which it almost definitely isn't. If the discrepancy does exist, it's simply a consequence of building two vertical structures far apart. I'm pretty sure that engineers don't have to worry about making the ends of bridges parallel when they can ensure that each end is vertical independently using simple techniques.

47

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Sinking Ship Effect

« on: December 22, 2007, 09:46:22 PM »

Yeah, wouldn't any atmospheric affects apply to the water as well? That is, how the could the atmosphere obscure the bottom of the boat but not the water upon which it rests? It doesn't seem possible that this would result in the top of the boat appearing to be resting on the edge of the water.

48

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Sinking Ship Effect

« on: December 22, 2007, 11:07:38 AM »

I do apologize, but as soon as perspective was brought up I wanted to make sure that it did not receive fare consideration.

49

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Suspension Bridges...?

« on: December 22, 2007, 09:44:47 AM »

How would one even check that? That sounds difficult.

50

Flat Earth Debate / Re: If the earth is flat...

« on: December 22, 2007, 09:33:18 AM »

it's pure myth, and on top of that, Tom Bishop claims that if you climbed over it, you could keep walking south on ice forever and ever! rediculous, huh?

Except he used to say that the infinite plane theory was ridiculous and that no honest FEer takes it seriously. Ah, the wonders of rigorous scientific thought!

51

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Sinking Ship Effect

« on: December 22, 2007, 09:31:18 AM »

I honestly cannot believe that this perspective argument is coming up. "Basic laws of perspective" you say, "obvious empirical evidence" you say. You are insane. Even if you are correct about the whole "sinking into the ground" thing, it cannot be due to perspective. Perspective is nothing more than the appearance of objects becoming smaller as they move further away. All of the "laws" of perspective that people love to reference so much are simply due to trivial trigonometry. I'm even going to demonstrate with a picture.



Diagram 1: Here the object's actual distance from our center of vision is y. Its apparent distance is theta. Even as y remains constant, as x approaches infinity, theta approaches 0. That is, the object appears closer to the center of our vision as it moves further away even though it is physically not moving closer. This is because theta = arctan(y/x) and arctan(0) = 0.

Diagram 2: Here the object's distance from the observer is x, it's actual height is y, and it's apparent height is theta. Yet again, as the object moves further away y remains constant, x approaches infinity, and consequently theta approaches 0. To simplify the math, let's just assume that the object is vertically centered in our vision (this only affects the coefficients). We can split the triangle in half along the horizontal and thus get theta/2 = arctan(y/2x) and yet again arctan(0) = 0. So as the object moves further away, it appears to be smaller even though its actual height is not changing.

See? All that you have is relative position and trigonometry. Now, using only those two things explain to me with math (and preferably diagrams) how "simple perspective" causes the bottom of objects to appear to sink into the ground!

52

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Suspension Bridges...?

« on: December 22, 2007, 08:45:36 AM »

Well that sounds like something you wouldn't have to do intentionally. If you try to build two very tall perfectly vertical structures far enough apart there's probably going to be a somewhat consistent difference in their orientation. That particular fact was probably found out after the fact by accident. So if true, then it's neat but probably not a very good argument against FE.

53

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Altitude variance

« on: August 06, 2007, 05:27:54 PM »

This sounds like it would be difficult to calculate.

I'm pretty sure that if the Earth weren't very massive the gravitational effect could be negligible. However, this would be backwards logic since you'd be stating your conclusion (Earth is flat) and then using that determine the supporting data (Earth isn't dense). Before you know it, FEers all over the place would be saying "Well the conspiracy spreads false information saying the Earth is more massive than it actually is, so that's why you don't notice gravitation".

Well regardless, the current mass of the Earth was worked out using Newton's law of gravity and the size of the Earth, both of which are invalid for FE. If you want to be legitimate, you need to think of a way of finding out the mass of the Earth, then see if that has negligible gravitation, then start making more shit up if it doesn't fit the FE model.

54

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Flight Times

« on: August 06, 2007, 05:12:51 PM »

Probability that an FEer will actually reply to this thread and rebut the valid points made: 5%

55

Flat Earth Debate / Re: The Northen lights

« on: August 06, 2007, 05:11:04 PM »

I still want an FEer to tell me what the magnetic field of the Earth looks like...

56

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Universal Elevator?

« on: August 06, 2007, 04:56:04 PM »

Occam hardly sides with a round-earth.

Round-earth: a giant ball of mass the shoots gravitons at everything in the universe causing complicated yet regular elliptical motions which cause further distortion to the forceful patterns causing all sorts of questionable celestial phenomena and terrestrial events such as tides. The center of the earth is really really hot and has currents of hot liquid iron creating intense magnetic fields. The sun is a giant bomb that cannot explode, that moves in a regular pattern around the earth shining its nuclear light, minus the harmful radiation of course, on all the smiling creatures beneath.

Or

The earth is flat.

Occam hardly sides with a flat-earth.

Flat-Earth: a giant plane of mass this always accelerating upward for no apparent reason and due to an unknown and unexplainable force. The magnetic field of this disk is unexplainably irregular and no ones understands how the gas we need to survive manages to stay on the disk. A worldwide conspiracy involving all of the major space organizations stops people from finding out about the disk for no other reason that to simply hide the truth - they spend all of their money wasting resources on satellites and rockets that don't actually do anything or on paying people to doctor photos and to fabricate a constant stream of fake discoveries about our universe. Even though the world is a disk, all of our round-earth-based maps and traveling remain perfectly consistent with a round earth with flights in the southern hemisphere taking the exact same time as significantly shorter flights in the northern hemisphere. Antarctica doesn't exist. All of the money that has been spent on researching the continent was simply to make false evidence and discoveries. Even though several ancient cultures independently decided that the Earth was round before global communication existed, it turns out they were all wrong and eventually, somehow the conspiracy was formed to convince everyone that the Earth was a sphere for no apparent reason.

Or

The earth is round.


You see what I did there? It's called bias. FE requires thousands of assumptions. RE requires practically none - all of modern science either supports or is based on the RE model.

Keyword: probably.

Keyword: moron.

You are a moron. I show you two dice where on each one every side is a 6 except for one side that's a 5. Now, I tell you that when I roll the dice, they probably won't land on double fives. Then I bet you $10,000 that the dice won't land on double fives. So by your absolutely moronic logic, you'll go right ahead and make that bet because the dice will only probably not be double fives. You should go to Vegas, the casinos will love you.

Also, you're even more of an idiot! How? Well I'll tell you! Occam's razor doesn't say that the theory with least assumptions is the one that is "probably right".

Occam's razor states: (This feels like the 20th time I've had to say this)
You should not make assumptions beyond necessity

There is nothing there about correctness or truth. It's dead simple logic. Flat Earth theory requires more assumptions, it requires larger assumptions, it leaves more questions unanswered which means you must assume all kinds of things that haven't been discovered yet. It's not a matter of probability! You can't just say "Well, there's still a chance FE could be right, so I'm going to believe in it". That makes no sense! Why would you every believe in something that requires more hazy speculation, fabrication, and assumption!?

This seems to be the one thing that no conspiracy theorist can understand: just about ANYTHING could be true. What matters is what, logically, makes the most sense to believe.

57

Flat Earth Debate / Re: The FE Theory is Implausible

« on: August 06, 2007, 04:22:03 PM »

The perspective explanation given in Chapter 14 of Earth not a Globe is absolutely accurate and true.

Here is an unedited image The Kommunist posted here earlier: http://i8.tinypic.com/53pcsq8.jpg

When we zoom in we find that the woman on the left has missing feet: http://i19.tinypic.com/4tp574x.jpg

This "missing feet" phenomena can also be applied to every other distant person in the above image.

No, no, wrong. If you look at that picture you can clearly see that it is completely blurry and difficult to tell what you're looking at at all. You will notice that rather than her legs being "cut off" as in the case with a ship traveling over the horizon, they sort of fade and blotch into obscurity. What you're most likely seeing in the picture is the the light shining off of the floor blotting out her legs due to the exposure length as well as the poor resolution of the photograph. Also, you will notice that the person standing to the right as well as the pillars do not have any missing portions! If they are the same distance away from the camera and the floor is truly as flat as it looks, why do they not experience the effect?

If you look at this picture: http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/FindingAids/dynaweb/calher/jvac/figures/j9CA-740A.jpg
You will see that there is absolutely no cutoff effect whatsoever.
Furthermore, take the case of a person standing on the deck of a ship sailing towards a city. As the ship approaches, that person will see first the tops of the skyscrapers and be able to see progressively lower as the ship approaches. How could this ever be possible due to perspective!? The viewer is standing many feet above the water on the deck of a ship, and the skyscraper is over 1,000 feet tall! Tom Bishop, the effect you are describing requires magic in order to work, that is simple fact.
This is the same case except that the boat is moving away and the person is looking back:

I would like you to completely explain the effect to me (with diagrams) and IN YOUR OWN WORDS. That means that I don't want you to copy and paste from that stupid book like you always do.

Oh, and as usual you only answered the point that you could most easily address and even then just by copying and pasting Earth Not a Globe. I would like you to please address all three of my points.

• A ship's hull disappearing over the horizon (by the way, the Earth Not a Globe perspective/wave explanation is still utter falsehood and fallacy and I will not accept it as rebuttal)
• The view of the stars changes according to latitude
• The Greeks heard of a very deep well in Egypt with the strange property that at a certain time of the year, the sun shone almost directly down to the very bottom. They also knew the approximate distance from Greece to the well as well as the angle of elevation of the sun in Greece. Using simple trigonometry they were able to calculate the distance to the sun. This measurement would be only slightly different if the Earth were flat as opposed to spherical.

58

Flat Earth Debate / Re: Is Tom Bishop for real?

« on: August 06, 2007, 03:48:59 PM »

I don't deny that TheEngineer knows a lot about physics. I do highly doubt his intelligence and grasp of logic. Despite his seemingly extensive experience with relativity, in my opinion he rarely contributes anything to the topic at hand. He's far better at blowing off legitimate questions and derailing or over-complicating threads.

59

Flat Earth Debate / Re: The FE Theory is Implausible

« on: August 06, 2007, 02:07:09 PM »

The ancient Greeks assumed that the earth was a globe in their calculation of the earth's circumference and the distance between the sun and earth. The shape of the earth was never calculated, just assumed.

Wrong. The major points that they used:

• A ship's hull disappearing over the horizon (by the way, the Earth Not a Globe perspective/wave explanation is utter falsehood and fallacy and I will not accept it as rebuttal)
• The view of the stars changes according to latitude
• The Greeks heard of a very deep well in Egypt with the strange property that at a certain time of the year, the sun shone almost directly down to the very bottom. They also knew the approximate distance from Greece to the well as well as the angle of elevation of the sun in Greece. Using simple trigonometry they were able to calculate the distance to the sun. This measurement would be only slightly different if the Earth were flat as opposed to spherical.

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Flat Earth Debate / Re: Where did all the clouds go?

« on: August 06, 2007, 01:52:37 PM »

Everest is 29,000 feet in height.

Haha, sorry I misread my source. That's still irrelevant though, 11,500 feet is really, really tall. Why is that not visible?

There are no guards at the Ice Wall. I have never heard of a report of an army stationed at the Ice Wall. Only Diego Drew believes that.

And Erasmus, TheEngineer, bondurant, Nomad, mjk, and many more, I'm sure. Without a guarded ice wall, it becomes even more implausible that the true nature of the area around the Earth has not been made public yet. If the wall were guarded then it at least kind of makes sense that we know so much about Antarctica because then you could simply say that all of the expeditions were faked. But with no one stopping scientists from going there, how could or why would such expeditions be faked? "Well here we are at the edge of Antarctica! OH MAN IT'S COLD, FORGET IT LET'S GO BACK AND MAKE STUFF UP AND DOCTOR SOME IMAGES."

At the poles visibility is limited to just over a hundred miles. For as far as the eye can see, the tundra of ice stretches into the horizon.

The tundra stretches to the horizon... oh, except for those 11,500 foot mountains. Right.