Flat Earth

Have you ever wondered if the Earth is really a sphere? Or if it's actually flat? Well, you're not alone. There are a growing number of people who believe that the Earth is flat, and they have some pretty convincing arguments. In this episode of our podcast, we're going to take a deep dive into the flat Earth theory and explore all the evidence, both for and against it. So, whether you're a believer or a skeptic, strap in and get ready for a wild ride. Things are about to get strange.

Transcript

Have you ever wondered if the Earth is really a sphere? Or if it's actually flat? Well, you're not alone. There are a growing number of people who believe that the Earth is flat, and they have some pretty convincing arguments. In this episode of our podcast, we're going to take a deep dive into the flat Earth theory and explore all the evidence, both for and against it. So, whether you're a believer or a skeptic, strap in and get ready for a wild ride. Things are about to get strange.

The flat earth theory is a scientifically disproven theory that the shape of the earth is a disk or a plane. Many ancient cultures believed in the flat earth theory. We are going to dive into the history of the flat earth theory and how it came to be.

Let’s start off with some history on the flat earth theory. In early Mesopotamian and Egyptian thought, the world was portrayed as a disk floating in the ocean. The Israelites also imagined the earth to be a disk floating on water, with an arched firmament above it separating the earth from the heavens. The sky was a solid dome with the Sun, Moon, planets, and stars embedded in it.
In Ancient Greece, philosophers Thales, Leucippus, and Democritus all believed that the world was flat. The ancient Germanic and Norse peoples believed in a flat earth with the earth surrounded by an ocean, with the axis mundi, a world tree (Yggdrasil), or pillar (Irminsul) in the center.
In ancient China, there was a prevailing belief that the earth was flat and square, while the heavens were round. This belief was virtually unquestioned until the introduction of European astronomy in the 17th century. Chinese astronomers such as Zhang Heng used the model of an egg to describe the heavens as spherical, saying: “The heavens are like a hen’s egg and as round as a crossbow bullet; the Earth is like the yolk of the egg, and lies in the center.”
The spherical view continued to be widely held during the early period of the Christian Church. However, the Quran mentions that the earth was “spread out”, which led some Muslims to reject the spherical world theory. By the 10th century, though, some Muslim traditionalists began to accept that the world was a sphere. 

The modern flat Earth movement was started by English writer Samuel Rowbotham in the 19th century. Rowbotham believed that the Earth was a flat disc centered at the North Pole and bounded along its southern edge by a wall of ice. He also believed that the Sun and Moon were 3,000 miles above the Earth and that the "cosmos" was 3,100 miles above the Earth.
Rowbotham published his beliefs in a book called "Earth Not a Globe" and in a leaflet called "The Inconsistency of Modern Astronomy and its Opposition to the Scriptures." In these works, he argued that the Bible, alongside our senses, supported the idea that the Earth was flat and immovable. He also claimed that the spherical Earth model was a "system based solely on human conjecture."
Rowbotham's ideas were not widely accepted, but they did inspire a small group of followers. In 1883, he founded Zetetic Societies in New England and New York. After Rowbotham's death, Lady Elizabeth Blount, a mistress of Henry VIII and an activist, established the Universal Zetetic Society in 1893. The objective of the Universal Zetetic Society was "the propagation of knowledge related to Natural Cosmogony in confirmation of the Holy Scriptures, based on practical scientific investigation."
The Universal Zetetic Society published a magazine, The Earth Not a Globe Review, and remained active well into the 20th century. Lady Blount also edited another journal called Earth: A Monthly Magazine of Sense and Science. It ran between 1901 to 1904.

In 1956, Samuel Shenton founded the International Flat Earth Research Society (IFERS), also known as the Flat Earth Society. Shenton was a British civil servant who became interested in flat Earth theories in the 1920s. He believed that the Earth was a flat disc centered at the North Pole and bounded along its southern edge by a wall of ice.

Shenton founded IFERS to promote his flat Earth beliefs and to challenge the prevailing scientific consensus that the Earth is a sphere. He published a quarterly newsletter called The Earth Not a Globe Review and gave lectures on flat Earth theory around the world.

IFERS's membership grew slowly in the early years, but it received a boost in the 1960s with the advent of the space race. Shenton argued that the space program was a hoax and that the photographs of the Earth from space were faked. He also claimed that the curvature of the Earth could not be seen from high altitudes because it was too small.

Shenton died in 1971, but IFERS continued to operate under the leadership of Charles K. Johnson. Johnson was an American airplane mechanic who became a flat Earther after reading Shenton's books. He believed that the Earth was a flat disc with a circumference of 3,000 miles. He also believed that the Sun and Moon were much smaller than they appear and that they orbited the Earth at a height of 3,000 miles.

Johnson was a prolific writer and speaker on flat Earth theory. He published a quarterly newsletter called Flat Earth News and gave lectures around the world. He also appeared on several television shows and documentaries to promote his beliefs.

IFERS's membership peaked in the 1980s, but it has declined in recent years. There are now estimated to be only a few hundred active flat Earthers worldwide. However, the flat Earth movement has seen a resurgence in popularity in recent years, thanks to the internet and social media.

The Flat Earth Society believes that the Earth is a flat disk with the North Pole at the center and a 150-foot-high wall of ice, Antarctica, at the outer edge. The sun and moon are much smaller than they appear and orbit the Earth at a height of 3,000 miles.

There are two main models of the flat Earth. In the first model, the atmosphere is encased in a large snowglobe shape. In the second model, the atmosphere is not enclosed, but the Earth is surrounded by a wall of ice.

Flat Earthers believe that the day and night cycle is caused by the sun moving in circles around the North Pole. The sun is said to be a spotlight that shines down on the Earth, creating the illusion of a spherical shape.

The Flat Earth Society recruits members by speaking out against all US government agencies, particularly NASA. They believe that NASA is part of a government conspiracy to hide the truth about the shape of the Earth.

The flat Earth community has its own celebrities, conferences, and merchandise. It has even been endorsed by the rapper B.o.B. B.o.B even went so far as to start a GoFundMe to launch a satellite to prove that the Earth is flat.

Robbie Davidson, the founder of the Dallas conference, states that the number of members is going to be astounding. He stated about flat-earthers: "None of us believe that we're a flying pancake in space" and that the community merely believes that space does not exist, the world sits still, and the moon landing was faked.

So let’s break down what would happen if the world was actually flat, and some of the theories that flat-earthers use…and why they aren’t true. 

The earth isn’t flat and doesn’t rotate. This is false. This has been proven by several scientists. The rotation of the earth impacts daily functions, and the curvature of the earth can be seen from an elevated vantage point.
Antarctica is an ice wall that surrounds a flat earth, This is false. Satellite imagery shows the shape of the continent, and is not an ice wall that surrounds a flat earth. There are also people who visit Antarctica every year. 
The earth is flat because cities cannot be upside-down. This is false. Gravity pulls objects to the center, no matter where cities or people are located on the earth. There is no “up” or “down” in space. 
Photos of the solar eclipse taken at the South Pole prove that the earth is flat. This is false. There have been scientists that have explained that there is a variety of factors, including time and location the photos were taken which account for why the sun appears to be moving in a straight line. 
Planes flying in a straight and level path prove the earth is flat. This is false. This concept does not mean that plans are flying in a literal straight line. It is something that involves flying at a consistent altitude in the same direction. Pilots consistently have to make adjustments to keep a consistent speed and altitude. A plane flying from one location to another would never end up upside down. This is because the earth does not have a top or a bottom.
Lack of stars in space photos means they were created with a green screen. This is false. This is because stars don’t show up in many space photos because stars are too dim to be detected with the camera settings required to capture brighter objects. 
Space is a hoax because astronauts don’t train in vacuum chambers. This is false because, according to a NASA spokesperson, NASA astronauts train in both pools and vacuum chambers to prepare for life in space. 
The moon being visible in the daytime proves that the earth is flat. This is false. Planetary scientists say that the visibility of the moon and the sun during the day does not prove that the earth is flat. It actually proves the motion of the sun, moon, and earth in space, along with the earth’s rotation. 

One of the biggest problems with the flat Earth theory is that it is not clear how gravity would work on a flat Earth. Flat-earthers often assume that gravity would pull straight down, but there is no evidence to support this.
In fact, what we do know about gravity suggests that it would pull towards the center of the disk. This means that gravity would only pull down at one point on the disk, and it would tug horizontally the farther out from that point you were.
This would have a number of strange consequences. For example, air pressure would range from no atmosphere at the edge of the disk to massive amounts at the center. If you lived at the center, you would be crushed by the weight of the atmosphere.
This would also have a strange effect on plants and trees. They would grow horizontally, as they would be pulled towards the center of the disk. The water would also be sucked to the center, creating a massive ocean at the center of the disk.
The solid core of the earth generates the planet’s magnetic field. With a flat earth, that would need to be replaced with something else. Without a magnetic field, charged particles from the sun would fry the planet. It could strip away the atmosphere like when it happened to Mars. The air and the oceans would escape into space. On a flat earth, there would also not be an explanation on what would happen with the tectonic plates. It could be thought that they might fall off, but that may jeopardize the “wall” that prevents people from falling off of the side of the earth. 

According to Flat-earthers, the sun is 32 miles wide. They argue that the sun goes around and around in circles 3000 miles above the earth. Because of this, the sun would never set. Because the earth is “flat”, there would be nothing for the sun to set below if there were to travel such an arc. Based on what flat earthers say, the sun would never drop below 14.7 degrees altitude in Washington, DC in the dead of winter. That would be about 7 PM in the peak of summer. 

Flat earthers also have an explanation to eclipses. In reality, it is an alignment when the earth intercedes between the moon and the sun. This would not be possible according to flat earthers . They say that the sun and the moon are constantly drifting in circles above the flat earth’s surface. Flat-earthers stated that a “shadow-object” orbiting the lineup between the moon and the sun, which is called the antimoon, is apparently translucent. If the flat-earth theory were to be true, millions of people perpendicular to the moon-sun lineup would see a fully eclipsed first or last quarter moon, and that does not happen. Moon phases are a struggle to explain for flat earthers. 

The weather would go crazy. Without a rotating system, there would be no jet stream snaking its way about the poles. There would be no nor'easters or spinning areas of high or low pressure. Hurricanes could also not form. It is for the same reason why there are no hurricanes near or at the equator- the force of the Coriolis force is zero there.

The southern lights would also not exist. The flat earth movement says that the southern edge of the world is bordered by ice, which is Antarctica. According to their model, there is no definitive South Pole. The Southern Lights are routinely visible in Antarctica and sometimes in Tasmania and New Zealand, which is because these places are close to the South Pole. No South Pole means that there are no southern lights. Moreover, the earth has a magnetic field that results from its spinning. Magnets have a north and a south pole. If the North Pole exists like it does in the flat earth theory, then the south pole should be beneath it. It would be on the “underside” of earth rather than near Antarctica, and that is another thing that flat earthers cannot explain. 


So whether you believe that the earth is flat or sphere, there is overwhelming evidence that the earth is a sphere. It can be scary to think that there is a thought process that is different from your own that could possibly be true. Either way, think for yourself.

FUN FACTS:
It is a common misconception that the earth was believed to be flat until a few hundred years ago. This is not true. It has been widely accepted in the Western hemisphere that the world was a sphere since at least 323 BC- 31 BCE. It wasn’t until the 19th century that the flat earth conspiracy resurfaced. 
According to Chandra Jayasuriya, a cartographer with the University of Melbourne, it made sense for people to believe in a flat earth. Ships would sail off toward the horizon and often never return. Those left behind did not have access to info outside of their communities.
Polling data from the firm Datafolha indicates that 7% of the Brazilian population, about 11 million people, believe that the world is flat. 
A recent YouGov poll found out that two-thirds of Americans aged 18-24 believe that the Earth is round. 

QUESTIONS
Do you believe that the earth is flat or sphere?
Why do you think people live on a flat earth?
Do you think that flat-earthers will ever change their minds?
What would you do if you met a flat-earther and they were adamant that the world is not a sphere?  


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_flat_Earth_beliefs

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

https://physicsworld.com/a/fighting-flat-earth-theory/

https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/why-do-some-people-believe-the-earth-is-flat

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2022/12/07/fact-check-roundup-what-scientists-say-flat-earth-evidence/10802218002/

https://u.osu.edu/vanzandt/2019/04/03/the-flat-earth-theory/

https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2018/01/24/flat-earth-what-would-happen/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/02/24/weather-helps-disprove-flat-earth-hypothesis/

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Elizabeth_Blount