Hello all.
I’ll start for apologising for the length of this post.
While the forum states it is strictly moderated, I would still let to set a few ground rules if this post spawns multiple posts.
No ad hominem attacks, not only is this type of attack a logical fallacy it is also pointless and gets the discussion nowhere. So no name calling or claiming people to be shills or trolls. Lets keep it clean and well mannered.
I on occasion have had a look at this site as I am interested in what others believe, whether it be religious, political or in this case the form, or shape of the earth.
As far as we can tell the Earth was first thought to be spherical over 2500 years ago.
No one single person in any one nation could be said to have made this discovery as it was observed to be the case in many parts of the world from the middle east to India and China.
It is clear the the belief that the earth is indeed a sphere predates not only NASA but the discovery or the founding of the USA. I will endeavour not to use the ’N’ word again as it appears to provoke much hostility and it is not by a long chalk the only agency to have ‘launched’ vehicles or probes into earth orbit or space, currently around 80 nations have launched satellites into space for a wide variety of uses.
Claiming that a conspiracy exits among all these nations would have to have some believable evidence for it to be taken seriously and be used as a valid argument to refute the spherical nature of planet Earth.
Even before we ventured into space astronomy and the study of the heavens has a long pedigree that again predates even the founding of the USA. The study of the motion of the planets is well understood and thanks to Newton, predictions can be made of planetary positions and alignments thanks to his mathematical discoveries. Anyone is free to observe and verify these calculations as all the information is freely available.
Some people on this site claim that satellites that orbit the Earth are a myth. This can very easily be disproved by going out to a dark sky area in your country on a clear moonless night and just looking up. A telescope of binoculars will help but even with the naked eye many satellites can be seen as there is over 35,000 of them whizzing along. The largest is the ISS and is travelling at around 27,000K/H meaning it makes around 15 orbits each day. Again this is free for everyone on the planet to see and witness. There is also China's Tiangong-1 space laboratory, which is a bit smaller. If you want to find the best times for your own location have a look here...
http://www.heavens-above.comPhotographs taken in space by the Chinese are freely available and are nothing to do with the agency that shall not be named. They include photos taken of both the moon and the earth.
http://www.planetary.org/multimedia/space-images/index.jsp?keywords=change-programThe flat earth theory calls for a small sun with a diameter or around 32miles as opposed to its actual measured size of 432,376 miles. There is a big problem with the flat earth sun and its rather paltry size and that is nuclear fusion and how this process works and takes place. Our sun is a main sequence star and is around 4.6bn years old fusing its hydrogen fuel to form helium in a process that is well known and understood. If the sun did indeed have a diameter of 32miles it could not support nuclear fusion and even if it did would not have had enough hydrogen fuel to enable it to have lived for 4.5bn years. For our sun to be 32 miles in diameter the world of physics and astronomy would have to be turned upside down. Flat earth believers would have to come up with a whole new robust physics and astronomy that could withstand scrutiny.
The world has thousands of universities and dos of these will have physics and astronomy departments. How many of these teach flat earth theory? My guess would be none. Why? Is it it because there is a global conspiracy that involves millions of people over hundreds of nations, or is it because the world is a sphere?
At the end of the day it matters not to our daily life if we inhabit a planet that is flat, round or square. We are all born, live our futile lives then we die. If truth matters to you at all consider what underpins our technological world…..it is the very same physics and science that points to and proves the world is spherical.
On a more personal note I have been around a few years and have travelled widely visiting both hemispheres and all five continents including Antartica. I am fortunate enough to have gone on holiday to Antartica and have seen it as it really is. If you don't believe me then just save up and go…its that simple. There are no armed groups stopping people nor is there any ice wall other than the glaciers that cover that continent. All these beliefs that the flat earth community have that surround Antartica as so easy to disprove by anyone who has a desire to find out the truth.
Many people on this site go to great lengths trying to convince themselves and others by putting forward propositions that have no real credible mainstream peer reviewed science behind them. I am not trying to convince FE believers that they are mistaken as I think that is impossible, rather I would encourage them to really examine the evidence.
Thanks for reading