Introduction to my thoughts.

Hello,

I've been looking for something like this for a while.  Whilst studying for a Physics degree a few years ago, it became clear to me that whilst the earth MAY be round, there is no reason that it must be, and either a flat earth or a round earth may be geometrically possible.  I think the worlds attitude to this is like many scientific discoveries/disagreements.  The round earth hypothesis took greater hold than the flat one, due only to a snowballing effect of the small, but greater number of round earth believers in the early days.  Like the old Betamax/VHS debate, sometimes the wrong answer can be deemed correct by consensus.

For a while I didn't really know what was true, but some research over the last few years has made me think the flat hypothesis seems much, much more reasonable.  I think it's important for both sides to keep an open mind (and not to let discussions like this bcome a flame-fest), surely the evidence for a flat earth must be nearly overwhelming.

Anyhow, just to introduce myself, and say how pleased I am to find a sensible debate on this important subject.

Peter

Sounds like you will be one of the posters who actually contributes to the argument, thank you

Welcome to the site, Peter!

I'm glad somebody with such a high level of qualification in a relevant field has reached the conclusion that the Earth may be flat.

I look forward to your presence here.

Whilst I said it might be round, let me be clear: I think it's very unlikely.

Peter....

Pleae answer thesse questions honestly and quickly.

Do you believe there is such a place known as Antartica?

Are satelites real? Having said this, are the pictures of th earth real?

Do you believe the world can maintain such a conspiracy?

I just want to gauge how in line with the "FE" theory you are and whether you believe it all?

Thanks

Quixotic - I'm newer to the field than some others, but here's what I think...

1. unclear - yes, but not in the way you think.
2. yes they are real, but the photos we are given are not the untouched images.  Again, why we are not shown the true images is not clear to me.  the whole "why" question is the most interesting unanswered questions here.  I'm not the reasons for the conspiracy here are the whole, or potentially even partial truth.
3. Yes. Again, for reasons unknown to me.

Peter, if you're interested in why exactly the conspiracy may be concealing the Earth's shape, check out my hypothesis at http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3498&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=7.

Welcome to the site, Peter!

I'm glad somebody with such a high level of qualification in a relevant field has reached the conclusion that the Earth may be flat.

He has done no such thing, hes keeping an open mind about it.


Peter,

Prepare yourself for a lot of feelings of anger and frustration. Flat Earthers have a tendancy to ignore threads that post evidence or ask questions like 'proove satellites dont exist' So be warned they are a very dogmatic crowd who reside here.

The funny part is that noone can claim the google earth and similar are not doctored images.  They are clearly doctored, I am aware of a military base near where I live, in fact, I have gotten close to it, and know exactly where it is.  It does not show up on google earth, and I can only assume it doesn't show up on other programs either.

it's not that open, I think I'm 95:5 flat:round...

Prepare yourself for a lot of feelings of anger and frustration. Flat Earthers have a tendancy to ignore threads that post evidence or ask questions like 'proove satellites dont exist'

It may have something to do with the fact that requests such as that are nonsensical. I don't think that anyone here owns any spaceships, so it's impossible for us to prove that satellites don't exist. Asking someone to prove the non-existence of satellites is like asking someone to prove the non-existence of the Easter Bunny. I sure as heck can't prove that the Easter Bunny doesn't exist somewhere, I can only postulate that it is ridiculously unlikely that there is a bunny who hides eggs around Easter.

I think if you see "anger and frustration" from the flat-earthers here, it mostly comes from seeing pointless questions or logical fallacies here again and again, as well as people who just don't read the FAQ.

Also, one thing that often frustrates me is that people come up with arguments that in their opinion should convince flat-earthers that the Earth is a sphere, but they are not willing to be convinced that the Earth is flat when their arguments are proven wrong. Instead, in the large majority of cases, they fail to acknowledge the fact that they were wrong and just move on to the next argument. In fact, ironically enough, the discussions with round-earthers that I have seen here remind me a lot of discussions I have had with creationists or other religious fundamentalists.

So be warned they are a very dogmatic crowd who reside here.

So far, the vast majority of dogmatic people here are the round-earthers, because they are the ones who usually post stuff like "The Earth is round, and it's true, and you are stupid to believe otherwise. Period." That is dogmatic.

Hello everyone, I have been reading this site for a little while now but this is my first post.  I was inspired to post something after reading Peter's well-balanced and honest views, and I come to this site as a well-intentioned cynic in all matters.  Like Peter, I am a physicist by training, but I now work in the field of applied-knowledge-engineering.  I do not have a dogmatic view of anything but I was wondering if, like me anyone else had serious doubts about the one thing that underpins the whole round earth hypothesis, that is that light travels in straight lines.  This antiquated view has already had to be modified in order to sustain the so-called theories of modern physics, but a universe in which light is not constrained in this arbitrary way is completely compatible with the earth being flat.

Regards

John

(not trying to steal you thread peter. welcome aboard.)

tangent:

It may have something to do with the fact that requests such as that are nonsensical. I don't think that anyone here owns any spaceships, so it's impossible for us to prove that satellites don't exist.

though i do not personally own a satellite nor a rocket, i did work with them. while @ Auburn University, prior to public GPS and Google Earth, i worked with the city to map the coordinates of the major buildings in town via satellite. We had a van, you may have seen the mapping vans, while a bunch of satellite communication stuff on top, and laid the groundwork for the portable GPS systems that are commonplace today.

We basically drove to a location and set up a few tripods and moved on. Other ppl would use these markers with plans of the city and got exact locations of them. Using these plots, satellite images, and city plans the end result was a map, similar to google Earth, with different filters for images, plots, overlays, etc...

the cool thing about this was i could get a satellite image of ANYTHING i wanted in town. I used this to make flyers for the kegs we threw in college. This was years before it was free on the web. We were the only kids in town with satellite pics of our house with an overlay of the surrounding streets giving clear directions to the party, and more importantly where to park so the cops wouldn't break it up. The alternative was to have the normal clip art flyers with the name of the band playing like everyone else had. Why go to a normal party when you can visit these 2 engineering students cool enough to have satellite images of their house (and 3 dollar all you can drink bud light)?

Again sorry to steal you thread Peter welcome aboard!