Why I Believe in a Spherical Earth

Quote from: Tom Dipshit on December 20, 2007, 04:00:08 PM

Quote from: GeneralGayer on December 20, 2007, 03:56:28 PM

Quote from: Tom Dipshit on December 20, 2007, 03:53:27 PM

Quote from: GeneralGayer on December 20, 2007, 03:51:50 PM

Quote from: Tom Dipshit on December 20, 2007, 03:50:45 PM

Quote from: GeneralGayer on December 20, 2007, 03:48:08 PM

Quote from: Tom Dipshit on December 20, 2007, 03:46:30 PM

Quote from: Tom Bishop on December 20, 2007, 03:32:42 PM

Quote

Vut you are right: this consensus is the outcome of many centuries of research into these issues, dating back to the ancient Greeks. That is why it is trustworthy.

Who conducted experimental research demonstrating the earth to be a globe?

Everyone who isn't you.

even me?

Baaa Baa! *translation* Even you!

Woo-baaaaa!

BAAA! BAAA! BA**A!

  don't swear in sheep! Baaaa

Baaaa! BAA

Oh go baa yourself

bark! Baa! Meow!

Quote from: cpt_bthimes on December 20, 2007, 04:11:18 PM

tech support: how do you unsubscribe from a thread on this forum software?  please!

wait, you can subscribe to threads?

yeah, just start one or make a post in one.  then are stuck, forever for life, having it pollute the list that shows up in "show new replies to your posts", no matter how irrelevantly it gets hijacked.

please.  god.  i'm asking you.  i'll start believing in you if you just unsubscribe me from this godforsaken thread.  what have i ever done to you!  see, you don't even exist.  i fucking hate you!  you and your bastard son.  oh yeah, "immaculate birth".  i call bullshit on that one.  friggin lying slut, that mary.  what kind of stupid jackass would fall for that line?  (oh yeah - the equally make-believe joseph and the very real millions of christians.)  not that i believe in you to hate you, god.  but if i did, you'd be in trouble.  just get me off this thread.  please.

no offense to christians.  just the biggest christian, "jesus the christian".  and his christian dad.

why don't you just get over it? Or not click on 'show new replies to your posts'

get over what?  i came here to debate, not read a myspace message blog.  or whatever you call the typical juvenile antics on myspace.  not that i am a myspace-ologist.

now you have something to get over.  i suppose.  or not.

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.

Quote from: Richard Kilgore on December 20, 2007, 03:31:10 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?

Quote

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.

The difference is that people who supported Witch-Craft were mostly un-educated and religiously devout. The intellegencia of the age condemned the burnings. This is an anagolous to the FE theory. It has been disproven by the scientific community and is only followed by those who are blind to scientific reasoning and devout to the FE cult.

The difference is that people who supported Witch-Craft were mostly un-educated and religiously devout. The intellegencia of the age condemned the burnings. This is an anagolous to the FE theory. It has been disproven by the scientific community and is only followed by those who are blind to scientific reasoning and devout to the FE cult.

Whose scientific community are we talking about here (there's a scientific community which severely doubts the Earth's rotundity - FES)?

As for lack of education, blindness to scientific reasoning, and devoutness; are you of the opinion that these qualities are not demonstrated by the huge majority of the human population who believe in globularism solely on the basis of having been told so?

I don't believe this site.

The FEers seem to post petty, meaningless remarks when they are unable to think of a meaningful post. Either that or: "the facts are in this dudes book", but wait a second, that would make them sheep then, eh?

Quote from: Quarrior on December 20, 2007, 06:06:53 PM

The difference is that people who supported Witch-Craft were mostly un-educated and religiously devout. The intellegencia of the age condemned the burnings. This is an anagolous to the FE theory. It has been disproven by the scientific community and is only followed by those who are blind to scientific reasoning and devout to the FE cult.

Whose scientific community are we talking about here (there's a scientific community which severely doubts the Earth's rotundity - FES)?

As for lack of education, blindness to scientific reasoning, and devoutness; are you of the opinion that these qualities are not demonstrated by the huge majority of the human population who believe in globularism solely on the basis of having been told so?

lol Globularism???
Root Word - Globule
Dictionary : Globularism - No results found for Globularism...did you mean Globalism?

Globalism - the attitude or policy of placing the interests of the entire world above those of individual nations.

Damn, has nothing to do with the shape of the Earth...

And all this time I never realised I was a globulist...

I rest my case...

Note also that the "Scientific Community" who believe in the Flat Earth are not a real scientific community because they do not abide by the laws which govern scientific thinking.

Quote from: Quarrior on December 20, 2007, 06:06:53 PM

The difference is that people who supported Witch-Craft were mostly un-educated and religiously devout. The intellegencia of the age condemned the burnings. This is an anagolous to the FE theory. It has been disproven by the scientific community and is only followed by those who are blind to scientific reasoning and devout to the FE cult.

Whose scientific community are we talking about here (there's a scientific community which severely doubts the Earth's rotundity - FES)?

The FES members invariably lack the qualifications of the experts who have been rigorously trained in fields relevant to evaluating reasoning pertaining to the Earth's roundness. How many of them have doctorates in any relevant field? None that I can see. Charles Johnson was a mechanic. Tom Bishop puts "Phd" after Rowbotham's name even though such degrees were not awarded in England till the twentieth century. What academic credentials do any of the prominent FES thinkers have?

As for lack of education, blindness to scientific reasoning, and devoutness; are you of the opinion that these qualities are not demonstrated by the huge majority of the human population who believe in globularism solely on the basis of having been told so?

It's not just that they have been told so: it's that they hear of no dissent at all from anyone with any decent academic credentials in the relevant fields.

Medical researchers have now reached a consensus that smoking has harmful effects on the human body. Do you not think this is a good enough reason for laypeople to accept that smoking is a risky activity? Or does everyone have to spend years and years collecting data and evaluating it for themselves before they accept this?

How impossible life would be if we all behaved like FEers and refused to trust qualified expert opinion!

Please note that I am not saying that qualified expert opinion is infallible. Obviously, it is not. But when a consensus among rigorously trained, qualified experts exists, it places the burden of doubt on those who would oppose it.

I am prepared to reject the views of the experts on the matter of the earth's sphericality: but the reasons had better be really, really, really, really good! If I do a few experiments and seem to get the result that the earth is flat....it is overwhelmingly more likely than not that I have misunderstood something or made a mistake.

Globularism...its the future!

So in other words, you believe in RE because you're a sheep.

lol how ironic.... so how many of Rowbotham's experiments have you done? or wait... non!!! that makes you a sheep which makes you look stupid.

many other people have done Robotham's experiments...and not one of those people got the same results he claims to have gotten!

Ok I only read most of the first page and I came up with this..

If we believe what the RE'rs tell us we are sheep.

But if we believe what the FE'rs tell us are we not sheep too?


My point being is that part of the argument is that we listen to what "X" group of people say then we are wrong, but in order to believe we are wrong we have to listen to "X" group of people telling us that the first "X" group of people are wrong.

Doesn't that just put us into a big circle were no matter which side you choose you are always "wrong" ?

Quote from: Richard Kilgore on December 20, 2007, 03:31:10 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?

Quote

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.

Appeal to authority is a fallacy.

99% of the defense and reasoning used for FE on this forum are fallacies. Let's not get into technicalities, here. You don't want to keep score.

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.

Back in the 1600s, priests were considered trustworthy sources regarding witchcraft.

Should someone growing up at the time have taken it for granted that witchcraft existed, and witches must be killed, because that's what the consensus was?  The obvious conclusion drawn from this would be that witches were burned at the stake for just reasons.  Do you feel that that is the case?

Case in point.

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.

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.

The fact that the more education one has , the less the likelihood of one subscribing to FE theory has to say something.

Technology and advancement in any field would be crippled if we only believed in what we can see and  touch , or could "prove" for ourselves.

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.