Now while I am a FE activist, I have been trying to convince some friends of mine the flat earth model. Here was his response, just want to know how the flat earth theory would contradict these things.
"Shadows are shorter near the equator. One of the first measurements of the earth's curvature occurred in Egypt a few thousand years ago (way before Columbus) and involved light hitting the bottom of a well at exactly noon (so it was vertical). On the same day, at noon, in another city (Alexandria?) the shadow of a certain object (a column?) was
measured. Comparing the size of that shadow, and taking into account the distance between the two cities, one of the first calculations for the size of the earth was created. Then there's the fact that if you go in any one direction for long
enough, you end up back where you started. This is a principle of round geometry.
And then there's the time zone thing: half the earth (basically) is illuminated at any given time, regardless of the season. During Dec-Feb, more of the southern hemisphere is illuminated, and hours of darkness are longer in the north. Vice versa during June-August.
If you go north or south far enough, the sun angle is low. In fact, on the equinoxes the angle of the sun away from vertical is THE SAME angle as your latitude, anywhere on earth. So if you're on the equator, 0degrees is your latitude, and the sun is directly overhead (90 degrees from the horizon). Here at 40deg north, the sun is 40 degrees from vertical (or 50 degrees from the horizon). If you were going to model this, a sphere produces exactly this result, and I'm not sure of any other shape that does."