The world is flat

[BrightOranges]

I learnt today that there are 'flat earthers' who seriously believe the conspiracy theories of a flat planet rather than a spherical one.
AIBU to think you can't fix stupid? Or is that too harsh?

"Because surely the Moon would be accelerating at the same speed as the Earth, or it would be left behind."

Don't leave the moon behind! I like the moon!

The 'universal accelerator' which might be dark matter/energy or magic. Or the discworld turtle

Relatively (or is it Special Relativity?) means it can accelerate forever without ever reaching light speed or so said Einstein.

Of course the moon landing was faked and NASA is a conspiracy to make us think the world is round/make sure no one realises the US didn't win the space race. Obviously the Russians realised the same thing and also keep it secret. Oh and the conspiracy runs the ice wall guards

See, the person who wrote what Natsku quoted clearly isn't unintelligent so, I have to ask, why subsume that intelligence in willful obtuseness? Every 'proof' FE-ers put forward - flat water, water off a ball, straight canals etc - has been thoroughly and comprehensively debunked over and over again. They talk of icewalls and dark energy and a vast global (lol) conspiracy that would have lasted for centuries and involve millions, not thousands - millions, of collaborators.

Where are all the whistleblowers? Where are the photos, video footage - we do have the technology which is freely available even to FE-ers (my FE coworker has an iPhone) - at least we Round Earthers are trying with our 'photoshopped' and cgi--ed images of space and the Earth from said space.

Show me a photo of one Watcher on The Wall (or one glimpse of a White Walker or wilding from beyond the Wall that isn't directly lifted from Game of Thrones), give me one sound argument as to what the purpose is of convincing everyone the world is round, tell me what the Endgame is for the Powers That Be. And, if the TPTB ARE so bloody powerful as to gag millions of colluders for centuries to keep such a dangerous secret from the masses, why aren't they powerful enough to shut you FE-ers the fuck up? Come on FE-ers, enough with the nebulous theorising and twisting of actual science into a vague approximation of same, where's the meat?

Like I said:
"eventually it would reach the speed of light, or at least very close to it."

I'd be looking forward to entering Warp 1 and beyond, though.

Obviously the Russians realised the same thing and also keep it secret.

Presumably the Chinese and the Indians are also on it?
Faking Mars missions and all. The bastards.

What about Scott? Was he going to spill the beans?

While Shackleton was prepared to go along with it? >

Does the FE map look something like the one posted upthread? How do flights (and ocean crossings) manage to get quickly from near one edge to the other?

Why do other bodies on the solar system (viewable with telescopes) work, eg the rings of saturn, orbiting moons, the way the moon looks so obviously like a sphere... are they allowed to be spheres and it's just the earth which is the exception?

Loving the idea of watchers on the wall.

I am often driven to despair over how stupid people are.
reading Ben Goodman's Bad Science is enough to make you weep. The things people still believe after it has been disproved.

I am a Christian (don't shoot me) and I have met some really 'interesting' people in my time.
I sat in a small meeting at someone's house once where one of the other guests was sharing about how all the sedimentary rocks proved Noah's flood. Apparently they are all stirred up in the water, and then settle down into nice layers, on top of the mountains (Ha - see, no need for tectonic activity over centuries, get the shells on top of the mountains) and so hey pretso, sedimentary rocks.
I was a guest and I was sitting on my hands, biting my tongue. When we had a coffee break, I did go over and gently explain a couple of reasons why that was complete crap.

Then another time was invited along to someone's church with her. Not in UK (think Deep American Bible belt type church, but not in US)
Afterwards over coffe she introduced me to a Very Important Person and we stood chatting. He was seriously telling us how rock music was soooo bad for us because the rhythms were on the off beat with our heart beat and so it physically made us ill. I couldn't say anything as it would have been rude to to lady who had invited me, but I backed out quietly and never went back.

Once went to a brilliant lecture at Southampton Uni Christian Union. It was by a leading astrophysicist who was a Christian, and he was amazing, really good. Then questions. Someone asked him about the supposed age of stars. Reply "well obviously there are a few people who believe that the world was created in 7 days, but apart from that, most Christians would say..."
Interrupted by the questioner - "well I believe it was"
lecturer "okaaay, riiight". I could see him thinking - and how the f* am I supposed to engage in sensible conversation with you starting at that basis?????

Yeah the map looks like the one posted earlier.

I think that other planets are allowed to be spheres, its just Earth that's super special and all. And the sun and moon are spotlights that circle around above the Earth giving us day and night.

What about Scott? Was he going to spill the beans?

Oh for sure, and the Conspiracy certainly couldn't let that happen... I think we can safely assume any one high up in government that dies under strange or suspicious circumstances were potential whistleblowers being silenced by the Conspiracy... God I've missed the fun of this.

Whenever I hear that notion (can't even call it a theory as it's so ridiculous to call it that would be degrading science) that the world is accelerating upwards I always think of that Emilio Estevez scene in the first Mission Impossible film.

Yeah the map looks like the one posted earlier.

So what's the answer to journey times and routes which work on a globe with 'great circles' but don't on the flat projection?

And WTF should the earth be an exception to the rules?

I don't remember, probably super fast wind and currents which makes planes and ships go faster on those routes. And probably 'Earth is special rar rar rar'

Errol - the earth is an exception because the whole world view springs from the premise that the world is created for humans by God and the stars, sun and planets exist only in relation to the earth. So we are not equal to the other planets, we are the centre of unviverse and the others are just twinkles in our night sky.
They are refered to as heavenly spheres I think, hence they are allowed to be round.

I can't remember, but I think it also goes with the sun and planets being quite small.

The sky is a dome over the earth (called the firmament I think) and the stars are all in it/on it

For your entertainment.
www.atlanteanconspiracy.com/2015/01/flat-earth-horizon.html

I want to scream at them:
IT'S A BLOODY HORIZON YOU FOOLS. IT'S A HORIZON BECAUSE THE EARTH IS ROUND. OTHERWISE YOU COULD SEE TO THE END OF IT.
MORONS.

The idea there is no gravity and we are all just accelerating is er....not a very good one.

There's no problem with accidentally hitting the speed of light as indicated, but given we have been living with this 10ms-2 acceleration for thousands of years we have very definitely entered the near speed of light regime. So all the stars should look seriously blue or red shifted. Also while we could take the moon with us on this it is going to look very odd due to the relativistic effects also.

Hitting some stationary space dust would basically blow the whole thing out of imaginary sky.

Occams razor. If it looks like a sphere, smells like a sphere, behaves like a sphere, moves like a sphere and all the other celestial bodies we can see are spheres, it's probably a fucking sphere!

I think they were made to shut up. Signed some sort of non-disclosure agreement. Like everyone who's seen the Mousetrap.

We have a rule, at least in Biology, and I think it applies for most things:

The simplest explanation is probably true.

If you have to invoke a huge complex conspiracy, then it's probably not true.

Lweji - that's Occam's Razor. It applies in all fields almost all the time. It essentially says that, if all else is equal, the simplest theory is to be preferred. But don't expect it to convince conspiracy theorists!

I'm fascinated by all things space so have just been watching balloons go up into space on youtube.
Then on scrolling into the comments reading them like
Seriously, how can anyone think the world is flat and what they're seeing is fake?
It's batshit.
I thought "I know, I'll go on MN and see if there's a flat earth thread." Yay, there is.