The flat-Earth conspiracy is spreading around the globe. Does it hide a darker core?

[rangerrebew]

The flat-Earth conspiracy is spreading around the globe. Does it hide a darker core?

By Rob Picheta, CNN

Updated 10:37 AM ET, Mon November 18, 2019

(CNN)"I don't want to be a flat Earther," David Weiss says, his voice weary as he reflects on his personal awakening. "Would you wake up in the morning and want everyone to think you're an idiot?"

But Weiss is a flat Earther. Ever since he tried and failed to find proof of the Earth's curve four years ago, he's believed with an evident passion that our planet is both flat and stationary -- and it's turned his world upside down.
"I absolutely freaked out," Weiss tells CNN in a phone interview. "It literally whips the rug out from underneath you."

https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/16/us/flat-earth-conference-conspiracy-theories-scli-intl/index.html

[goatprairie]

If the flat-earthers sincerely believe they're right, it would be a simple matter for them to go to one of edges and send some object, maybe themselves, off the edge proving their theory.
Somehow, I think it's just a way for screwballs to get attention.

[thackney]

[Ghost Bear]

More evidence that these are The Crazy Years.

[Gefn]

Ceiling Cat Approves.

[240B]

[Cyber Liberty]

Ceiling Cat Approves.

So does Basement Cat. 

[verga]

They used to have in their ledger "We have members on all corners of the globe."

[roamer_1]

"It seems that increasingly, people don't trust scientists and experts, or their motives," Douglas says.

I can heartily agree with this much!

This is actually a fun game.
Prove the earth is round without reliance on information from other sources...
Newtonian science.

I am not a flat-earther - The evidence for a round earth is contained in the different stars in southern skies, and in opposing seasons southern v northern hemispheres... 

But I will submit that some of their evidences ring true - There is certainly something wrong with the math used to determine earth circumference. It is true that one can see way further than the circumference of the earth should allow... Boats out to sea with modern optics... Distances across water (water is self leveling) which defy that math:

I have seen the lights of Chicago at night from the other side of lake Michigan... Traveling toward them by sailboat, right to the docks... That is no mirage.

I have looked across Flathead lake on a clear summer morning from Bigfork bay to see the beach at Polson...

Both of the above, with my own eyes, which the math says cannot be true. But true it is.
Y'all are welcome to disabuse me of the notion, as I would like a reasoned answer.

[DB]

I can heartily agree with this much!

This is actually a fun game.
Prove the earth is round without reliance on information from other sources...
Newtonian science.

I am not a flat-earther - The evidence for a round earth is contained in the different stars in southern skies, and in opposing seasons southern v northern hemispheres... 

But I will submit that some of their evidences ring true - There is certainly something wrong with the math used to determine earth circumference. It is true that one can see way further than the circumference of the earth should allow... Boats out to sea with modern optics... Distances across water (water is self leveling) which defy that math:

I have seen the lights of Chicago at night from the other side of lake Michigan... Traveling toward them by sailboat, right to the docks... That is no mirage.

I have looked across Flathead lake on a clear summer morning from Bigfork bay to see the beach at Polson...

Both of the above, with my own eyes, which the math says cannot be true. But true it is.
Y'all are welcome to disabuse me of the notion, as I would like a reasoned answer.

Nothing wrong with the math. Its physics. The atmosphere can form a lens bending light. Layers of different air density (different temperatures and water vapor content) creates a boundary between them that bends light forming a lens. Over large distances it doesn't take much "bending" to see much further than a straight line would allow.

[roamer_1]

Nothing wrong with the math. Its physics. The atmosphere can form a lens bending light. Layers of different air density (different temperatures and water vapor content) creates a boundary between them that bends light forming a lens. Over large distances it doesn't take much "bending" to see much further than a straight line would allow.

@DB
Right. two problems:
Light refraction causes a lens effect - mirages tend to be upside down. What I saw was not upside down. Or, alternatively, mirages that are right-side-up tend to be higher in the sky. what I saw was ground-level.

Atmospheric interference tends to be much less at night. On a winter night, below zero, where there is no moisture in the air, such refraction should not be present, or at least, more or less insignificant... Yet I have seen lights way futher than 20 miles away (again, across Flathead lake) when the math should say that is impossible...

And in fact, I have argued this with scientists that would rather believe their math and called me a liar.

[thackney]

@DB
Right. two problems:
Light refraction causes a lens effect - mirages tend to be upside down. What I saw was not upside down. Or, alternatively, mirages that are right-side-up tend to be higher in the sky. what I saw was ground-level.

Atmospheric interference tends to be much less at night. On a winter night, below zero, where there is no moisture in the air, such refraction should not be present, or at least, more or less insignificant... Yet I have seen lights way futher than 20 miles away (again, across Flathead lake) when the math should say that is impossible...

And in fact, I have argued this with scientists that would rather believe their math and called me a liar.

Not refraction, light bending typically caused by a temperature gradient.

https://aty.sdsu.edu/explain/atmos_refr/bending.html

[roamer_1]

Not refraction, light bending typically caused by a temperature gradient.

https://aty.sdsu.edu/explain/atmos_refr/bending.html

@thackney

Right. What temperature gradient is available at say, 10 below in the dead of winter with no inversion (smoke going up) in the dead of night?

Any such gradient would be minimized, wouldn't you say?

[thackney]

@thackney

Right. What temperature gradient is available at say, 10 below in the dead of winter with no inversion (smoke going up) in the dead of night?

Any such gradient would be minimized, wouldn't you say?

I would suggest reading the link.  It is caused by changes of density, which temperature is one of the factors.

[Gefn]

So does Basement Cat. 

Don’t knock basement cat. He’s awesome too. @Cyber Liberty 

[roamer_1]

I would suggest reading the link.  It is caused by changes of density, which temperature is one of the factors.

@thackney

Right - But that's what I did...

My proposal was that according to indicators, where the mean temp is far below zero (the moisture is frozen out of the air), where the temp of the air is somewhat equal to the earth, and where there is no pressure differential (crystal clear night, no real pressure when the smoke is going up, and where there is no wind [barometric indifference]), and where the dead of night supposes no interaction with warming from the sun...

In this condition, as close to optimal conditions as possible in my real world, I can still see headlights on a beach some 40 miles away.

[DB]

What does the near surface air temperature have to do with higher elevations many miles above? There are layers of different density air as you go up in elevation. There are also streams of moving air at different elevations where it can be perfectly still at near ground level and moving quickly just beyond the boundary between them. When you fly through these layers in an airplane you can feel them.

Light travels slightly slower in more dense air. If the air is denser near the surface (which is common with cold air) and at some higher elevation the air quickly transitions to less dense then the light wave front skimming this boundary will travel ever so slightly faster on the upper part of the wave front causing it to bend downward. If the downward bend is greater than the curvature of the earth you see further over the horizon.

[roamer_1]

What does the near surface air temperature have to do with higher elevations many miles above? There are layers of different density air as you go up in elevation. There are also streams of moving air at different elevations where it can be perfectly still at near ground level and moving quickly just beyond the boundary between them. When you fly through these layers in an airplane you can feel them.

Light travels slightly slower in more dense air. If the air is denser near the surface (which is common with cold air) and at some higher elevation the air quickly transitions to less dense then the light wave front skimming this boundary will travel ever so slightly faster on the upper part of the wave front causing it to bend downward. If the downward bend is greater than the curvature of the earth you see further over the horizon.

Alright... Prove that by observable science (that is the game).

I have proposed optimal conditions to see those lights on the beach 'go away' with the curvature... Yet they do not... pretty much ever, except in cases where atmospheric conditions interfere with sight (Yes that far shore goes wobbly in summer heat)

Give me a test.
That's the fun of it.

[bigheadfred]

Alright... Prove that by observable science (that is the game).

I have proposed optimal conditions to see those lights on the beach 'go away' with the curvature... Yet they do not... pretty much ever, except in cases where atmospheric conditions interfere with sight (Yes that far shore goes wobbly in summer heat)

Give me a test.
That's the fun of it.

If you sit nekked in a beanbag chair eating cheese balls what color are they?

[roamer_1]

If you sit nekked in a beanbag chair eating cheese balls what color are they?

Which they are them?

[bigheadfred]

Which they are them?

1.Too.

2.Two

[roamer_1]

1.Too.

2.Two

3.Fore.

4.Four

[bigheadfred]

3.Fore.

4.Four

5. For

6. Sure

Is this a test or a trial he asked quizzically.

[roamer_1]

5. For

6. Sure

Is this a test or a trial he asked quizzically.

Two for you and four for thee...
But we forgot about the friggin three.
 

[240B]

There are cases of sailors jumping ship to swim to an island or land mass which seemed to be right in front of them. Because of a woman or an attempt to go AWOL. It looks like it is within reach. This is an optical illusion and they drown. That land was actually much farther away than it seemed. We were all warned about this when I went aboard ship.