Flat Earth Weather Systems

This may get a little mathsy. I'll try to keep it simplified though.
The Sun is the primary source of energy on Earth, and through that, a major instigator of our weather system. In RET, the Sun roughly shines down on the equator. the rays that go up to the North, or down to the South, however are more spread out, hence the areas are cooler. This is why the Equator's warm, and the Poles are cold.

The rotation of the Earth, under RET, is also another major factor. Typically pressure flows from high pressure systems to low (simply as a way of balancing out), but the Earth's rotation adds in the Coriolis Force. The technical explanation is u_i = u_r + omega x r, which means the wind speed in an inertial frame of reference (outside the movement of the Earth) is the wind speed within the rotational frame of reference (on the Earth), as well as the omega cross product r, where omega is the vector of the Earth's rotation.
As probably no one wants to read the technical equations (though I'm happy to supply them if you want justification), I'll hurry through the next steps. We take the material derivative, and use a definition for the wind speed derived from the equations of motion, and we end up with something called 'geostrophic wind', which essentially diverts the flow from high to low pressure, thanks to the Earth's rotation. It moves things clockwise around high pressure systems in the Northern Hemisphere, and anticlockwise in the Southern.
Under FET however, the world typically doesn't rotate: it's the Sun that moves. While this will have an effect, there is no rotational system present on the Earth. There is no need to change reference systems, as we did above from u_i (inertial) and u_r (rotational). What this should mean, is that the primary driving force for the weather systems under FET, is the movement from high to low pressure: giving a radically different map than what we see.

To pre-empt immediate responses, I know a lot of people are going to talk about verification and how unreliable weather models are. On the latter point, the equations to predict the weather are non-linear partial differential equations, and non-linear anythings are hard enough to solve, let alone PDEs. Most of what's done is approximation (such as perturbation theory: modelling everything as a small divergence from a constant), or treating the atmosphere as a shallow liquid. These approximations all fall down in certain situations (eg: thunderstorms), and the difference between approximation and reality increase with time. For short term weather predictions, though, such maps are generally accurate: and these are the calculations from which they develop. This also gives us a way to verify what I'm saying: if any weather forecast, short term, works, then there's your evidence.

So, two questions:
One, how does weather forecasting work, given its reliance on RET? Is every meteorologist part of this 'Conspiracy'?
Two, why is the Southern hemisphere (or hemiplane under FET) not radically cooler than the Northern hemisphere/plane? After all, there's far more ground, on the outer portion of a circle, for the Sun's rays to cover. Admittedly there is a difference of 2C, but this is exactly what we'd expect from the varying rate at which water and land maintain heat, and the amount of sea in the southern hemisphere/hemiplane. We would expect a radically greater change under FET, where the Sun apparently heats the smaller inner hemiplane by about the same amount as the dramatically larger outer one. If you want the numbers, the outer's about three times larger: how is the rate of heating at all comparable?

It's going to be ignored.

On-Topic:
I'm suprised this never came up before, as far as I know.

It's going to be ignored.

On-Topic:
I'm suprised this never came up before, as far as I know.

If this does get ignored, which it won't, it's because these questions are asked all the time.  The fact that you've never heard it addressed really speaks more to the amount of reading you've done here than anything else.  In addition, it's frowned upon to post like this:

-Flippant response.
-On-topic caveat.
-low-content post.

Announcing that something is on-topic does not make it so.


Now, to address the OP.  The Coriolis effect is a made up term that round-earth scientists have invented to explain phenomena that the round-earth model cannot account for.  It can throw a bullet off target while leaving transcontinental flights unaffected.  People used to always say that the Coriolis effect spun drains in different directions according to where you were on earth but thankfully people are starting to realize how silly that was.  Soon people will stop evoking this magical term for bullets and weather as well.

Q1 Weather forecasting:
-Part of the reason that weather forecasting is so unreliable is that it's based on a round-earth.  If the models used to predict weather were built with a flat-earth, the predictions would be much more reliable.  Saying that the calculations are just hard does not change this.

Q2 Southern hemisphere temperature:
-As you mentioned, it is cooler there.  Also, the ice rim helps reflect and insulate the heat from the sun.

People used to always say that the Coriolis effect spun drains in different directions according to where you were on earth

It was never claimed by physicists.  There are too many imperfections in a normal sink, however the effect has been demonstrated in laboratory experiments lots of times, for example:

In 1908, the Austrian physicist Ottokar Tumlirz described careful and effective experiments which demonstrated the effect of the rotation of the Earth on the outflow of water through a central aperture.[33] The subject was later popularized in a famous article in the journal Nature, which described an experiment in which all other forces to the system were removed by filling a 6 ft (1.8 m) tank with 300 U.S. gal (1,100 L) of water and allowing it to settle for 24 hours (to allow any movement due to filling the tank to die away), in a room where the temperature had stabilized. The drain plug was then very slowly removed, and tiny pieces of floating wood were used to observe rotation. During the first 12 to 15 minutes, no rotation was observed. Then, a vortex appeared and consistently began to rotate in a counter-clockwise direction (the experiment was performed in Boston, Massachusetts, in the Northern Hemisphere). This was repeated and the results averaged to make sure the effect was real. The report noted that the vortex rotated, "about 30,000 times faster than the effective rotation of the earth in 42° North (the experiment's location)". This shows that the small initial rotation due to the earth is amplified by gravitational draining and conservation of angular momentum to become a rapid vortex and may be observed under carefully controlled laboratory conditions

  Soon people will stop evoking this magical term for bullets and weather as well.

Well, meteorologists and artillery engineers evoke it all the time, and they are just doing their job.  Are they in on the conspiracy?

Well, meteorologists and artillery engineers evoke it all the time, and they are just doing their job.  Are they in on the conspiracy?

I was a forward observer for artillery, and I can tell you that artillery rounds do not necessarily land where they are intended to, whether the coriolis effect is calculated or not. 

Now, to address the OP.  The Coriolis effect is a made up term that round-earth scientists have invented to explain phenomena that the round-earth model cannot account for.  It can throw a bullet off target while leaving transcontinental flights unaffected.  People used to always say that the Coriolis effect spun drains in different directions according to where you were on earth but thankfully people are starting to realize how silly that was.  Soon people will stop evoking this magical term for bullets and weather as well.

You really shouldn't say something like that to someone who actually understands the mathematics. The water-drain phenomenon holds in theory, but not when the flow is governed by the actual, physical properties of bathtubs and drains.
The Coriolis Effect comes from changing frame of reference from in-earth to outside of its rotation. It's irrelevant to regular bullets, only long-range, long-term projectiles. And note bullets are hardly manned and controlled: flights are.
You're failing to acknowledge that weather was merely my example of how we can observe and verify. Maps of pressure systems are the backbone of a lot of weather prediction: there we can measure, and the Coriolis terms measure how these systems will move: and do so correctly. It's either a hell of a coincidence, or something that needs explanation. Even if the maps are faked, how could they be used in weather prediction?

Q1 Weather forecasting:
-Part of the reason that weather forecasting is so unreliable is that it's based on a round-earth.  If the models used to predict weather were built with a flat-earth, the predictions would be much more reliable.  Saying that the calculations are just hard does not change this.

Nice theory: less useful in practice. As I said, weather prediction is generally accurate in the short term. This shouldn't be the case if the inertial wind speed and rotational wind speed are one and the same: huge chunks of the calculations just vanish. Under FET, the pressure maps we use would not work at all. There's no shifting frame of reference: high-to-low should be the dominant force. This simply isn't true.
Also, the calculations aren't 'hard'. To do properly, they're basically impossible. It's hard to make this clearer: there are several equations which are solved to give functions, except they're Partial Differential Equations. A simple PDE would be df/dx = y, (imagine those are partial d's), which gives the answer f = xy + g(y) where g is a function of y. That g could be literally anything. And the equations needed aren't all first-order, and are far more complicated, with many variables in each: and just to top it off, they're non-linear. Even with simple non-differential equations, non-linear equations are a pain to solve. Approximate, iterative methods are generally the only way: and it's nigh-impossible to have anything comparable for ODEs, let alone PDEs.
So, we approximate. We judge the general scale of each element, and ignore those an order of magnitude smaller. We apply perturbation theory and remove the products of two smaller terms. All this simplifies the equations to a point where they can be solved: but all this is approximation.
If, as you propose, we start with entirely wrong preconceptions and rules and equations, and then proceed to further approximate and make less accurate, any correct weather forecast should not be possible. Weather prediction isn't perfect, but it's a lot more than random guessing.

Q2 Southern hemisphere temperature:
-As you mentioned, it is cooler there.  Also, the ice rim helps reflect and insulate the heat from the sun.

Barely cooler: exactly as much as we'd expect with the volume of water, and nowhere near as much as it should be with the same heat going to three times the area. Plus the ice wall can't be affected by much sunlight: if it did, it'd melt.

I was a forward observer for artillery, and I can tell you that artillery rounds do not necessarily land where they are intended to, whether the coriolis effect is calculated or not.

Congrats, you've noticed wind speed and friction exist. No one's proposed the Coriolis Effect is the only force acting on anything.

Quote from: JimmyTheCrab on January 22, 2015, 07:03:05 AM

Well, meteorologists and artillery engineers evoke it all the time, and they are just doing their job.  Are they in on the conspiracy?

I was a forward observer for artillery, and I can tell you that artillery rounds do not necessarily land where they are intended to, whether the coriolis effect is calculated or not.

Yes, you repeat this point ad nauseum.

The gunners build in the coriolis effect into their tables as the effect is real.  They are gunners, not people interested in fantasies.

It is funny how FEers claim that RET is a big hoax and there is a secret society of the privileged few.  But none of the science is secret, it is all over the place.  For example, anyone can download the source code for the WRF weather model:
http://www2.mmm.ucar.edu/wrf/users/downloads.html
it is open to the public.  If FET was real, why wouldn't it show up in the source code?  If FET worked, would an FET equipped mind be able to improve the WRF model and make even better weather predictions? 

Could someone please explain how equatorially trapped Kelvin waves exist on a flat earth, without the coriolis force?

http://www.met.wau.nl/education/MWS/waves/modules/module4/Chapter%204.pdf

Without the "trapping" of these waves at the equator, the Madden-Julian Oscillation, and several other modes of atmospheric variability, would cease to exist.

Without the coriolis force, you wouldn't get close to predicting the weather to the same extent we currently do.

EDIT - another point to consider is that our limitations to weather prediction don't necessarily come from inaccuracies in the models, but rather biases and errors in the observations. There's a bit of both at play, but the error in the physics is far less than you'd think.

Quote from: Misero on January 22, 2015, 05:47:41 AM

It's going to be ignored.

On-Topic:
I'm suprised this never came up before, as far as I know.

  The Coriolis effect is a made up term that round-earth scientists have invented to explain phenomena that the round-earth model cannot account for.  It can throw a bullet off target while leaving transcontinental flights unaffected.  People used to always say that the Coriolis effect spun drains in different directions according to where you were on earth but thankfully people are starting to realize how silly that was.  Soon people will stop evoking this magical term for bullets and weather as well.

Part of the reason it gets brought up all the time is because when FErs get trounced on it they ignore what was said and then post their same explanations all over again.

case and point

It can throw a bullet off target while leaving transcontinental flights unaffected.

How many times do we need to bring up the difference between a bullet which has no self propulsion or self guidance, and therefore needs to have its path mathematically calculated before it is launched taking the Coriolis effect into account whereas a plane has a pilot and engines. Meaning the computer continues to adjust its flight path and the pilot just keeps pointing the plane along it. The flight path having the Coriolis effect constantly applied to it to adjust his heading.

Just for fun, I got bored, and mapped out the approximate weather system under FET.
First, a note. I've seen some suppose there's some rotation of the world going on in FET, as one possible explanation, likely due to the ever-elusive aetheric whirlpool: this fails with the trivial observation that, on a disc, the outer limits must be travelling far faster than the inner. This would give us radically different weather mechanics in the southern hemisphere/outer hemiplane: this should be readily apparent. Of course, it's not.

So, if there's no rotation going on, the primary driving force will be the fact pressure moves from high to low, and the Sun in its cycle. The Sun only imparts heat, however: which can be translated to areas of high pressure.

There are a few things to say here. First, I apologize for my awful diagram skills. Second, I recognize that in no way resembles a map of the Earth, but there's no consensus on a FE map, consider that my input.
Third, is an explanation. The yellow circle represents the Sun, the arrows the direction pressure will travel: the high pressure imparted by the Sun, to the lower pressure areas that receive less heat. With no geostrophic wind, the path is simple: away from the Equator, toward the Poles.
The only remotely complicated addition is the area immediately ahead of where the Sun travels: it will have the lowest pressure of anywhere along the Equator. However, it's a small zone, the only such thing in existence, and will quickly be pushed ahead as the Sun goes on. Its effect will be minimal due to the far greater disparities elsewhere, but I included it simply for completion's sake.
The overall behavior is toward-the-Poles. There's no deflection, no rotation: just a simple motion. The only thing that might happen, would be that there would end up being such high pressure at the Poles that it would end up going outward again: this is possible, but achieves no change beyond flipping the direction of the arrows. It will also clearly happen faster at the smaller North Pole/centre, so this is yet another source of what should be drastically different behaviour in the North and South/inner and outer hemisphere/planes.

The second image gives a very rough picture of the pressure systems. In the inner hemiplane, everything goes towards the centre, in the outer everything heads to the Wall. Without geostrophic flow, it's really quite simple. Whatever other oddities pop up (eg: wind flow over mountains), these may cause temporary, small-scale anomalies, but with no deflection pressure will cleanly flow from high to low, and sort things out. And of course, there's no geostrophic wind, so no circular flow around the pressure systems.
For comparison's sake, an actual map of a pressure system: which comes from observation, and could be used to predict later weather patterns successfully (thus demonstrating it must somehow be genuine as it has a practical benefit):


Not even remotely close.

EDIT: minor correction.

Just for fun, I got bored, and mapped out the approximate weather system under FET.
First, a note. I've seen some suppose there's some rotation of the world going on in FET, as one possible explanation, likely due to the ever-elusive aetheric whirlpool: this fails with the trivial observation that, on a disc, the outer limits must be travelling far faster than the inner. This would give us radically different weather mechanics in the southern hemisphere/outer hemiplane: this should be readily apparent. Of course, it's not.

So, if there's no rotation going on, the primary driving force will be the fact pressure moves from low to high, and the Sun in its cycle. The Sun only imparts heat, however: which can be translated to areas of high pressure.

There are a few things to say here. First, I apologize for my awful diagram skills. Second, I recognize that in no way resembles a map of the Earth, but there's no consensus on a FE map, consider that my input.
Third, is an explanation. The yellow circle represents the Sun, the arrows the direction pressure will travel: the high pressure imparted by the Sun, to the lower pressure areas that receive less heat. With no geostrophic wind, the path is simple: away from the Equator, toward the Poles.
The only remotely complicated addition is the area immediately ahead of where the Sun travels: it will have the lowest pressure of anywhere along the Equator. However, it's a small zone, the only such thing in existence, and will quickly be pushed ahead as the Sun goes on. Its effect will be minimal due to the far greater disparities elsewhere, but I included it simply for completion's sake.
The overall behavior is toward-the-Poles. There's no deflection, no rotation: just a simple motion. The only thing that might happen, would be that there would end up being such high pressure at the Poles that it would end up going outward again: this is possible, but achieves no change beyond flipping the direction of the arrows. It will also clearly happen faster at the smaller North Pole/centre, so this is yet another source of what should be drastically different behaviour in the North and South/inner and outer hemisphere/planes.

The second image gives a very rough picture of the pressure systems. In the inner hemiplane, everything goes towards the centre, in the outer everything heads to the Wall. Without geostrophic flow, it's really quite simple. Whatever other oddities pop up (eg: wind flow over mountains), these may cause temporary, small-scale anomalies, but with no deflection pressure will cleanly flow from high to low, and sort things out. And of course, there's no geostrophic wind, so no circular flow around the pressure systems.
For comparison's sake, an actual map of a pressure system: which comes from observation, and could be used to predict later weather patterns successfully (thus demonstrating it must somehow be genuine as it has a practical benefit):


Not even remotely close.

I love this so much haha. I will show this to one of the lecturers at my uni and get back to you as to how accurate the proposed mechanics for FET are. Pretty sure you are correct though!

I love this so much haha. I will show this to one of the lecturers at my uni and get back to you as to how accurate the proposed mechanics for FET are. Pretty sure you are correct though!

It's not going to be 100% accurate, but it should be a decent approximation. Some oddities will sneak in via wind flow over mountains (if the top of the atmosphere's modeled as a rigid lid, then the wind essentially has to go through a smaller gap), etc: plenty of things may cause new areas of high or low pressure, but with no rotation of the Earth, there's no way for the circular motion we observe to come about. This means pressure can flow directly from high to low, and things get evened out pretty quickly.
I recall my lecturer for the mathematics of weather explicitly saying that, if it weren't for the Earth's rotation, we'd basically just get wind flow to and from the Poles.

Quote from: ryangilchrist92 on January 23, 2015, 04:50:27 AM

I love this so much haha. I will show this to one of the lecturers at my uni and get back to you as to how accurate the proposed mechanics for FET are. Pretty sure you are correct though!

It's not going to be 100% accurate, but it should be a decent approximation. Some oddities will sneak in via wind flow over mountains (if the top of the atmosphere's modeled as a rigid lid, then the wind essentially has to go through a smaller gap), etc: plenty of things may cause new areas of high or low pressure, but with no rotation of the Earth, there's no way for the circular motion we observe to come about. This means pressure can flow directly from high to low, and things get evened out pretty quickly.
I recall my lecturer for the mathematics of weather explicitly saying that, if it weren't for the Earth's rotation, we'd basically just get wind flow to and from the Poles.

Excellent posts, thanks. Actually, this conspiracy theory doesn't make sense in this case. I'm a pilot and our upper wind predictions (made hours before departure) are accurate to about 1 knot of difference in speed and 2 degrees difference in direction - how would that work if their models (which are all based on a round earth) were so totally wrong? I think the accuracy shows that the models do work. Also, fly towards a low pressure system on the northern hemisphere and notice the wind direction - cross the equator and do the same thing on the southern hemisphere - voila, how can FET explain this?

FL390

Quote from: BiJane on January 23, 2015, 05:05:48 AM

Quote from: ryangilchrist92 on January 23, 2015, 04:50:27 AM

I love this so much haha. I will show this to one of the lecturers at my uni and get back to you as to how accurate the proposed mechanics for FET are. Pretty sure you are correct though!

It's not going to be 100% accurate, but it should be a decent approximation. Some oddities will sneak in via wind flow over mountains (if the top of the atmosphere's modeled as a rigid lid, then the wind essentially has to go through a smaller gap), etc: plenty of things may cause new areas of high or low pressure, but with no rotation of the Earth, there's no way for the circular motion we observe to come about. This means pressure can flow directly from high to low, and things get evened out pretty quickly.
I recall my lecturer for the mathematics of weather explicitly saying that, if it weren't for the Earth's rotation, we'd basically just get wind flow to and from the Poles.

Excellent posts, thanks. Actually, this conspiracy theory doesn't make sense in this case. I'm a pilot and our upper wind predictions (made hours before departure) are accurate to about 1 knot of difference in speed and 2 degrees difference in direction - how would that work if their models (which are all based on a round earth) were so totally wrong? I think the accuracy shows that the models do work. Also, fly towards a low pressure system on the northern hemisphere and notice the wind direction - cross the equator and do the same thing on the southern hemisphere - voila, how can FET explain this?

FL390

They can only claim it is a conspiracy and that the models are really computed with secret FET models.  But there are some really good weather models that are open source, so the model can be verified by anyone that cares to have a look.
Yet another thread that ends with silence from FET.

They can only claim it is a conspiracy and that the models are really computed with secret FET models.  But there are some really good weather models that are open source, so the model can be verified by anyone that cares to have a look.
Yet another thread that ends with silence from FET.

Plus I've studied it so if they refuse to look it up, I'm happy to explain several details. In fact, I have already: first post included a much more basic example too. (How FET would have radically different temperatures in each hemisphere/plane).
Here's hoping for a response other than crickets.

So I showed the flat earth theory to one of my lecturers (Including the diagram). 30+ years of experience in modelling the atmosphere, world leader with regards to investigating the MJO.

He said it was a very good attempt. He also told me to "tell anyone crazy enough that believes in a flat earth to go and speak to him" haha.

If you listen real hard you can hear the footsteps of the flaties running in the distance.

If you listen real hard you can hear the footsteps of the flaties running in the distance.

There's no running if they barely show up: which is a pity. At the very least, the explanations are interesting.
So far there've been about two points, one mostly irrelevant, and the one simply mathematically wrong. I mean, if FEers would prefer I supply detailed calculations on any point, just ask. Any explanation would be nice.
Weather systems require rotational motion: and there's no such motion on a flat Earth. Even supposing some aetheric whirlpool, as Vauxhall does, and blaming that, the southern/outer hemisphere/plane would have radically different behaviour due to faster movement: which we simply do not observe.

Quote from: guv on February 07, 2015, 07:38:01 AM

If you listen real hard you can hear the footsteps of the flaties running in the distance.

There's no running if they barely show up: which is a pity. At the very least, the explanations are interesting.
So far there've been about two points, one mostly irrelevant, and the one simply mathematically wrong. I mean, if FEers would prefer I supply detailed calculations on any point, just ask. Any explanation would be nice.
Weather systems require rotational motion: and there's no such motion on a flat Earth. Even supposing some aetheric whirlpool, as Vauxhall does, and blaming that, the southern/outer hemisphere/plane would have radically different behaviour due to faster movement: which we simply do not observe.

Got all that, the weather on a flat earth would be a bit boring. Imagine trying to sail a boat without Coriolis making the trade winds for you. Would be a lot easier to sail near the equator without the doldrums. Ocean currents would be different, that might be good septic would be freezing his nuts off without the gulf stream. A flat disk is unstable without gyroscopic procession, the whole joint would be on the piss if it was getting blown upward at 99.999% of the speed of light.
Good to have some woman around, don't let the jerks chase you off.

Nearly two weeks. No reply.

We have models that successfully predict the weather, which are based on Round Earth knowledge, and are publicly explained. We have the Flat Earth behavior examined, and found to be lacking.

Case closed?

Yep, case closed.

Sorry. Earth's round. If not, the models we use (with an explained basis) would not have any practical benefit.