LF: *One-Stop Complete Resource Directory For Flat-Earth EvidenceHERE*

Title: *One-Stop Complete Resource Directory For Flat-Earth EvidenceHERE*
Source: Flat Earth Science And The Bible
URL Source: https://flatearthscienceandbible.co ... t-works-and-why-we-believe-it/
Published: Mar 31, 2019
Author: Flat Earth Science and the Bible
Post Date: 2019-03-31 15:02:34 by Liberator
Keywords: FLAT-EARTH, RESOURCE, DIRECTORY
Views: 5868
Comments: 78

Introduction to the Flat Earth, How it Works, and Why We Believe It

If this is your first time hearing about the flat earth, your first reaction may be like most people: shock, laughter, scoffing, and avoidance. But the Flat Earth Movement is exploding like wildfire and it’s not because it’s just cool or a good distraction. Surprisingly the Flat Earth belief is backed by solid science and undeniable visual evidence.
So what is the Flat Earth all about and how does it work?

INTRODUCING THE FLAT EARTH:

The Earth

The Flat Earth is set on a flat non-moving stationary foundation (1 Samuel 2:8; 1 Chronicles 16:30; Psalms 93:1; Psalms 96: 9-11). All the continents center around the North Pole and are surrounded by Ocean. Surrounding the flat earth 360 degrees on all sides is Antarctica. It is also known as the Antarctic ice wall and has been measured at 200 ft high and and thousands of miles long. Captain Cook sailed along the ice wall for 60,000 miles and never found an inlet. Bet you never heard about that in your history books.
The "South Pole" does not exist.

The Dome

There are different opinions on what is above the flat earth, but the general flat earth belief is that the earth’s sky is surrounded by a sky dome the holds in the air and protects us. The Bible says it is made of glass (Job 37:18). The Bible clearly describes a firm dome (firmament) IN which the sun and moon were placed (Genesis 1:14-19).

(Below are typical "Planetariums, which coincidentally utilize their own respective "Dome" which precisely mirrors the Firmament as described in the Bible, along with its depiction of the stars, Moon, Sun, and planets.):

The Sun and Moon The sun and moon are close and small and are located inside the dome/Firmament. They circle around and above the flat earth creating day and night and the seasons.

This is the most spectacularly extensive and comprehensive online site I've seen with respect to Flat Earth. Categorized and sub-categorized neatly, Flat Earth issues are addressed, examined, explained both scientifically and Biblically.

1) FLAT EARTH PROOF
2) HOW IT WORKS
3) GLOBE DECEPTION
4) BIBLICAL PROOF
FLAT EARTH FAQ:

http://flatearthscienceandbible.com/2016/02/10/flat-earth-frequently-asked-questions/

Many links are available -- although many have been purged and are still being removed as Flat Earth information is considered dangerous to the Powers That Be.

Bookmark the site for present/future reference. We don't know when this site or others which are deemed "dangerous conspiracy theories" may suddenly be erased.

"And the teachers and those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the firmament, and those who turn many to righteousness shall give forth light like the stars forever and ever.

But you, O Daniel, shut up the words and seal the Book until the time of the end. Then many shall run to and fro and search anxiously through the Book, and knowledge of God's purposes as revealed by His prophets shall be increased and become great. ~ Daniel 12:3-4

Do you believe in gravity? How about the other basic laws of Newtonian (to keep it simple) physics?

If so, how does the flat-earth gibberish account for geostationary satellites? You know, the ones the provide DirecTV, phone calls, weather photos and launch-warnings for the commies? They can exist in exactly only one orbit, approximately 22,236 miles up. That's not "low". Low orbit is where the ISS, GPS and spy satellites play.

And yeah, I worked on synchronous, asychronous and even interplanetary vehicles; have held in my hands stuff that's now sitting on Venus and my father polluted the Moon, Venus and Jupiter with his machines. Or was all that faked as well?

I'm still wondering how we can gaze through our telescopes (including the ones orbiting our flat Earth somehow) and not spot a single other flat-bodied planet. We're just special that way?
And don't get me started on the perversions of orbital mechanics needed to get the sun to orbit a flat earth.

There's unlimited wonderment to gaze at, study and speculate about without having to make crap up.

Here's a thought experiment: why WOULDN'T the Earth be round? It would cause observations to look exactly the same and wouldn't require magic-physics to make it work.

Occam's Razor, more or less is defined as, "simpler solutions are more likely to be correct than complex ones." I have always seen a flat earth. So had the rest of the world until Galileo suggested it 500 years ago. The maps were all flat.

Did you check out the green screen NASA was using, caught accidentally as Poppy was wheeled through> And the others?

Of course not EVERYTHING is fake. The problem now must be conceded by all of us: Our "reality" CAN be manipulated visually. So our eyes CAN really lie to us, can't they? There's no way to discern between CGI in many cases and the real thing. Once NASA and "science" established their "Global" dogma = along with public ostracizing through controlled media and academia, it's easy to see how difficult it would be to ever discredit them.

Isn't it a lot more sensible to believe that the writings have been faked a few generations ago rather than that the Universe has been faked?

The Universe thought to be geocentric until 300-500 years ago. (yeah, along with the writings" of Science's "Global Warming," "Evolution," etc.

I'm repeating myself here but I expect NONE of these possibilities to be acceptable immediately. MAYBE a few of people would investigate it and consider the whole NASA/Flat Earth quagmire. It's info I'd never seen until fairly recent myself and had never considered.

Fwiw I haven't believed in NASA or Moon landings in at least 20 years. Occam's Razor (the other side) applied ;-)

I find it absolutely kooky that many who absolutely distrust gummint as total liars, see their agenda, note their propaganda, and acknowledge they are purposely ruining of the country....but happen to believe in NASA, the same members of "Science" shoving "Global Warming" and "Evolution" down our throat without a shred of evidence.

At least that would prove you're just one more obedient zombie nodding his/her head at the same old dogmatic BS "knowledge" the corrupt, lying Public School system, colleges, politicians and Hollywood

In addition to Magic Physics, that would require a decades-long conspiracy involving at least hundreds of thousands of people "in on it", with nobody leaking the scam or offering deathbed revelations. I don't trust most of Big Stupid Government, but I also believe most of them are to dumb to even conceive of such a hoax, much less maintain one.

It's probably easier to believe the Scientology crap about DC-8s flying around in space hauling clams or whatever their insanity preaches.

By the way, did you know God created Scientologists so the Mooslums would have someone to laugh at, and vice versa?

Then again, who knew the truth about Pearl Harbor, JFK, 911, and 0bama's entire life would ALL also be quashed for so long? Secrets *can* apparently be kept (or officially sealed.) For a loooong time.

That requires opening a door outside the usual paradigm of belief. The "payoff" is risky and costly; Financially AND socially. It requires surrendering an entire Belief System. And being called a "kook" or being ostracized and alienated from family. It's why many people in the world won't convert religion, their political party, and won't even dare consider challlenging established history and science issues.

By the way, did you know God created Scientologists so the Mooslums would have someone to laugh at, and vice versa?

Used to be the case. Till criticism ANF laughing at Mooses in public (or on TV) were considered VERBOTEN. Just ask Judge Jeanne, right?

Btw, who are those bald chanters who used to hang out at airports? I thought they were #1?

1. look at the map Africa is not thousands of miles away from South America, one part of Antartica is not thousands of miles away from another on the other side of the world

2. Cook did not follow the coast of Antartica for 60,000 miles. In a vessel of the type he had he would still be sailing.

3. the volume of the ocean has been calculated, and your map would make it massively larger

Typically, the "chromaky" screens (that term is new to me, I admit) are a single solid color, usually green as that's the color people are least likely to wear. They are often used for weather reporters as they have full size maps they want people to see in the backdrop.

I'm uncertain of the specifics but it seems a grid pattern screen would be less useful as a backdrop for chromaky purposes. I would speculate the grid pattern to be useful in being able to visually measure the distances things move in a zero G environment. That's assuming it wouldn't have a more mundane purose of simply acting as a curtain of sorts.

Another thought looking at the flat earth map... is the distance from Chile to New Zealand. It seems I can book a flight from Santiago Chile to Auckland New Zealand that is about a 13 hour flight non stop. The shortest route on that flat earth map would take that flight up the US west coast and Alaska, and roughly using the width of the USA as a 3000 mile measure, it would seem that distance would be about 18,000 miles, give or take.

Covering that distance in 13 hours would require a speed of about 1380 MPH, close to mach 2, which is far above the speeds conventional airline aircraft are capable of.

I'm sure you are aware of the enormity of contradictions that a flat earth model must explain. What ever information is on that comprehensive web site, I'm sure it will need much more.

Job 38:1-7 1 . He said: 2 “Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge? 3 Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me. 4 “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand. 5 Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it? 6 On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone—7 while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?

Tim Peake did not appear in front of a chromakey screen. It has been entirely debunked and didn't make any sense to begin with (to anyone who understands chromakey video).

Despite this, there are a pile of YouBoob trolls making these endless videos about NASA being a big fraud. Some of them are flat-earth idiots like Liberator, others subscribe to or promote other kookeries.

That checkerboard/grid pattern shown it the video is NOT a chroma-key green screen.

The guy who claims this in this video has absolutely no idea what he's talking about.

There have been instances of CGI fakery, most notably a few years a go when CNN used the technique to claim a reporter was somewhere far away when they were actually right outside the building.

This video is laughable - I noticed the comments at YouTube were closed - guess the guy couldn't defend his ridiculous claim.

I tried to find a YT vid that is 5 minutes or less that proves a point. Without context and technical explanation, it's a difficult task.

This singular video wasn't posted as a stand-alone deterrence for those who believe NASA, the ISS, and the images projected. It does however pose questions.

To your point -- ok, so it's not technically "green screen." (How do we know the blue-screen grid isn't a backdrop for *other* Virtual Reality programs? Sure. It is possible "astronaut" Tim Peake is just hanging out in front of a stationary blue grid screen for a perfectly good reason. MAYBE.

At the 1:30-1:40 Tim Peake is standing in front of a blue grid. He's also *simultaneously* also seen in front of typical NASA innards of a supposed ISS interior shot. (Note he is playing with a green tennis ball. YT link explains below)

Deckard, as someone who works in a studio, yes, CGI and older Green Screen tech *is* essential used by MSM for whether shots and background shots. But does your studio possess the latest greatest VR technology? CNN used available 20 old-tech CGI to fake onsite real-time "news." How often and to what extent is GI/VR tech being used to create illusions within "news" stories? (Mind-boggling proposition): To what extent have CGI/Virtual Reality technology evolve these days?)

In THIS context: Would a logical extension of thought be: WOULD NASA USE THE LATEST VIRTUAL REALITY/CGI TO DECEIVE US?

Would the PTB allow THE citizenry THE most advanced Virtual Realty? OR... would they restrict this technology? We have to assume VR technology is far beyond what we're told to begin with.

WHO are "Virtual Reality's" biggest clients? Turns out it is NASA. NASA has contracts with Apple, Microsoft, etal.

If you'd prefer to an "accredited" person to examine Virtual Reality and contemporary SFX advancements and capabilities, here's a guy you might respect; He is quite familiar with "Virtual Reality," CGI, Photo Shop and the like.

Both of you will find meat on this bone. I realize 13 minutes is pushing the envelope, but...

The problem is TROLLS, shills, and pigeons who crap on the chess board, making civilized exchanges impossible.

These are the same trolls whose sole job is to distract, deflect from truth and make jokes of "CTs" and its adherents on subjects like 911, Dubya and his "Religion of Peace," gummint hoaxs, False Flags, Chemtrails, "Moon Landings," Vaccines, 0bama's fake BC and ZERO docs, etc. Yes, like TooConservative.

With which parts of Genesis, God's account of Creation, and reinforcement from the Bible do you disagree?

You might be surprised by scripture that even many Christians have totally overlooked.

(Moreover, to WHOM are "good Christians" supposed to be "looking bad" TO?? The same Atheist/Pagan "Science" world that insists "Evolution" was man was created? That the "Big Bang" started the process of life? That a growing baby in the womb, heart-beating is NOT "life"?)

Either one believes the word God or word of Man. We have been conditioned to believe Man.

2) At a website with thousands of facts, I have not scientifically vetted all of them. I will also concede that not all of them will be correct. (SAME of most "history" and "science" books, and public school/University teachings and knowledge)

3) Captain Cook's "60,000 mile" journey is just one singular incidental point/issue addressed at that site. Some sources do cite that 60,0000 number (technically, 63,000 miles), but that number of miles apparently included his TOTAL sailing mileage.

Cook simply did NOT circumnavigate Antarctica because he could not. NOR does a supposed "Antarctica yacht race."

4) This singular incidental point can nor does not discredit the entire voluminous amount of data at the site. Just like one fatty piece of T-Bone doesn't taint the entire steak

5) I posted the first part of the introduction page. It might be helpful and informative to access the other categories and sub-categories.

Yes, many of us have been familiar with the Green Screen for what? 20 years plus? Yup, routinely used as the backdrop for news reporters and weather.

Your theory that the blue grid is used for measurements and precision in a Zero G environment is both logical and sensible.

The reason and function for it can be explained far more precisely and specifically by someone far more familiar with the technology at Post #23. IMO its an excellent rebuttal to "It's fake!!"

Covering that distance in 13 hours would require a speed of about 1380 MPH, close to mach 2, which is far above the speeds conventional airline aircraft are capable of.

I agree with your assessment of that particular map and how it would drastically distort time/distance as the crow flies. But again, the map is not to scale.

I'm sure you are aware of the enormity of contradictions that a flat earth model must explain. What ever information is on that comprehensive web site, I'm sure it will need much more.

The site is as "comprehensive" as I've seen thus far in that it categorizes subjects, issues, and FAQ more than any thus far. Only the patient or those with sufficient interest will access it.

There is a vast expanse of new knowledge and information on the Flat earth subject. I am still digesting the logical, probable, plausible and proven. At the same time I have been trying to vet, discard, and sift through the opposites. I've also had to be discerning about disinfo/misinfo sites and its individuals.

I see no appreciable curvature from the air (high altitude balloon with no convex lens (The rebuttal is obvious that "from Space" the earth appears curved/round. The author and source of all those photos are one and the same: NASA.)

I will say (from my honest perspective) that the more I research the subject, stronger the evidence for Flat Earth becomes. In one video, the subject addressed was your forte: "Geometry."

Do you believe God's Word should be believed literally? (It's not a trick-question.)

God in addressing Job's complaints actually become one of the Bible's best sources describing His earth. (Examine Genesis more closely, "The Firmament", etc.) Regarding The Almighty's "Foundation," His measurements and "stretching" lines, "marked" off "dimensions," earth's "footings" and "cornerstone" -- does all of that describe a "Globe"? Notice the footings, pillars, Firmament and respective location of Shoel or "The Abyss"or Pit of "Hell" -- often described as a location BELOW us.

This entire model of our earth and universe is especially extremely difficult to embrace after a lifetime of instiutional "science" conditioning from birth.

Either you believe EVERY single morsel and crumb you're told by the gummint and every institution available. OR, you've been trolling us.

Looking at it, there's no indication I get it was simultaneous. Same guy, same shirt, same object on the left possibly, but it certainly was at a different time, and looks to be a different angle. Like after they took the blue curtain down. There's nothing amiss there.

I watched about half the 13 min vid, but all it is doing is making a case for how things could have been faked. But that's far below the threshold required to prove the earth is flat.

One Bible verse I will quote to you, as it's very applicable here: "Seek and ye shall find". Though I'd append: "even if it's not there". If you look for evidence that NASA has faked everything, you WILL find lots of it. If you look for evidence the world is flat, you will find that too. But... evidence is not proof.

The challenge for flat earth advocates is to prove the world is flat. Not to prove that it's not round or to show how NASA could have, might have, maybe faked all their videos and pictures. It is impossible for NASA to prove the video footage of the ISS station or the moon landings were NOT faked, as that's proving a negative and no one can do that. So if you want to prove the world is flat, you need to leave NASA completely out of the picture in your arguments.

I accept that it may not be to scale. However, my estimate of the distance would have to be off by more than double in order to bring the required speed down to what conventional airline jets are reputed to be capable of flying. And if the distance from Santiago to Auckland is only 9000 miles via the northern Pacific ocean, then it means the distance of everything else is also, more or less, halved.

I would press you on this particular contradiction as to me it's a glaring clear fact that seems to singlehandedly destroy the flat earth theory. I searched for an airline ticket from Santiago, Chile to Auckland, New Zealand. and found one advertising a 13 hour flight, non stop.

This site, which presumably bases this distance on a spherical earth, claims the distance as 6010 miles. Covering that distance in 13 hours (I recall the time being 12:55 but 13 is close enough) would yield a speed of about 462 MPH, well within the speed a standard airline is reputed to be capable.

Maybe the properly scaled flat earth map shows these 2 cities far closer than I estimated.

Maybe commercial airlines are secretly capable of mach 2 speeds (and also have enough fuel to sustain that speed for 13 hours).

Whatever. Take your pick, but no more posts about NASA being a fake entity. That is immaterial to your flat earth case.

You've hit paydirt with your circumnavigation examples. Nicely done. For obvious reasons, the flat earthers won't ever tell us exactly where the "seam" is that we allegedly use to join together the edges of the flat earth into our phony Globe Of Deception.

I hope you're not expecting a gracious concession 'cause that ain't gonna happen. You're obviously debating a known cultic personality.

I have had many serious, in-depth and thoughtful discussions with Liberator, so much so that I will vouch for his honesty and integrity in spite of our disagreements, unlike the several here I have on bozo. While I am honestly surprised to see him take this position, I had already come to appreciate the incredible and very underrated ability of the human mind to believe things that are not true. In that way, it could be said that someone believing in a flat earth is not demonstrating anything any more unusual than someone honestly believing socialism would lead to economic utopia for all, or a Muslim jihadist honestly believing that an all powerful God would need help in destroying people who don't believe in Allah.

A look around here on LF shows just how abundantly diverse beliefs systems are on all manner of topics whether related to religion, law, politics, Trump, evolution, health... you name it. You and I disagree on what is proper US foreign policy too. This is normal and natural. We all think we are right, and I respect someone not because of what they believe but how they treat others. And so far as I've seen Liberator treats others very, very well.

As a proponent of reincarnation, I can empathize a little bit with Liberator's predicament of convincing others of a perceived reality that others don't give the time of day (though there is little to no evidence against reincarnation as -- I contend -- there is in abundance against flat earth).

Moonies and other cult members also treat their potential recruits very, very well. It only proves that cultists find it easier to recruit people that they are lovebombing.

The nice thing about science is that it is true even if the scientist is a complete asshole. As long as he has the evidence required to prove his theory.

Would we have a higher opinion of Hitler or Stalin or Mao just because they treated others "very, very well"? I think not. Nor should we.

Ping, I would absolutely concede that I don't possess nearly all of the technical knowledge and answers to questions that Flat Earth presents; By the same token, I can also say the same of explaining much this world and its geography (not to mention explaining the physics and mechanics of "Space Travel"/"Moon Landing.")

Our lower Southern Hemisphere, especially the entire continent of Antarctica remains mysterious. But I digress.

It should be noted that many contemporary scientists and astro-physicists still cannot either understand nor explain technical dynamics of say...dealing space travel, landing a man on the moon, then somehow returning him to earth a half-century ago. That knowledge, THAT "technology" was literally said to have been "lost." HOW can THAT be explained rationally??

As usual, you are contemplating and analyzing the subject at hand and issues you see as the biggest problems in the implausibility of Flat Earth. As well as it should be scrutinized as much as any theory.

At simple, conceptual geometry, I'm adequate; But it's not my forte as it is with you. I can not explain these types of flight measurements, distance/time you've presented.

It's still my opinion having considered countless information and my own eyes (I'm repeating myself, but the earth is demonstratively absolutely flat as seen from high-altitude balloons.) I'd like to present a lot more information, but it's an imposition and not considerate to spam LF with a hundred posts on this subject to make points and other reinforcement.

Again -- I readily concede I cannot answer your question and provide you a sliver-bullet answer. Because I can not, it nor any single issue should relegates Flat Earth into the trash heap. If for some reason things can't be explained, we don't deep six them, do we? That said, your point/questions can't be ignored either.

Many scientists and geo-physicists count themselves at Flat Earthers. So it's not as though they are ignore legit concerns as your flight/distance conundrum and other inconsistencies.

2) The mapping/measurement data that's been established and presumed as an empirical geographical base-line is somehow different and/or erroneous in a mostly oceanic Southern Hemisphere and SW Pacific.

*Thorough investigation of the continent of Antarctica just doesn't exist. Exploration of the Northern Hemisphere and entire area surrounding the North Pole *has* been been thoroughly investigated.

(We haven't even access to validating exactly what lies within the inaccessible interior of 5,000,000+ sq mi of inaccessible continent Antarctica.)

At a discussion board link below, the subject you raised is hashed out on both sides of the flight/distance argument, titled 'Flight Time On Flat Earth'. If ever you carve out a few minutes:

Take your pick, but no more posts about NASA being a fake entity. That is immaterial to your flat earth case.

I beg to differ strongly, Hoss. NASA is more de-legitimized the closer it's scrutinized. NASA actually *is* material to Flat Earth in that it's the biggest *active* advocate of the Globe and geocentric system we've all been taught. It's supposed "photos" depicting a round globe, images that serve as constant reminders and reinforced mental imprinting. It's inculcated pop-culture, history books, mapping, geography, "space-culture."

Flights over the Antarctica that shorten flights appreciably are FULLY RESTRICTED. Reason: "Weather is too cold."

Proving as usual you write/think WITHOUT researching the subject and truth at hand.

That you infer or imply that this world is about the Truth says everything about you and your worldview.

Really? Then you'll have no problem naming these recognized Flat Earth scientists.

At least we now know which of the Kook theories of a flat earth you subscribe to.

You are trying to map a sphere to a flat circle. And that has implications mathematically. None of which will help your Kook theory of a flat earth.

Let's see a map of your choosing which shows the actual layout of the flat earth as you understand it. All these kooks that you're following produce maps. Which one is the one you're willing to show us?

I submit that if those three had truly treated others "very, very well" we would already have higher opinions of them.

Thank you again for your respect and integrity and manner in which you routinely conduct our respective exchange of ideas and conversation.

As you note, though we may not agree with one another on points or perspective, there is still value and mutual respect in our exchange as we share respective information. It also takes a patience and consideration that many struggle to have due to lack of interest or time to begin with.

Yes, I concur when you speak of our inherent ability to believe things that are un-true. Or even unlikely, improbable, and...even impossible. How *does* that happen? What processes are involved? Are these opinions developed as a matter of systematic conditioning and imprinting from an early age? Are they developed over time as we process accumulated data? Do we believe what Mom and Dad believed? (ll is true, isn't it?) If not critical to living day to day, how important actually are our "systems of beliefs"?

All challenged dogma -- whether scientific, religious, historical, political, cultural -- WILL naturally be met with visceral emotional objection. That is a given. (This is why we are often warned, "NEVER discuss religion or politics" in a social setting.)

At the periphery of most dogmas however lie some hazy, un-clarified, cloudy areas. Some will declare themselves "Gate Keepers" or "Defenders of the Faith." It is *my* opinion that the most susceptible of these dogmas to challenge is "Science," a definition that literally changes often.

In that way, it could be said that someone believing in a flat earth is not demonstrating anything any more unusual than someone honestly believing socialism would lead to economic utopia for all, or a Muslim jihadist honestly believing that an all powerful God would need help in destroying people who don't believe in Allah.

... Except "Flat Earth" is not a religious or philosophical dogma. It's a theory that at its foundation is the Bible's account of Creation in Genesis (reinforced by several chapters and verses within scripture), supported by circumstantial scientific evidence, observation, and speculation. It can't be dis-proven nor can it be proven.

Well stated and honorable ethic regarding "respect" we'd all do well to learn by.

Your additional observations are patently true; We may well find consensus on some subjects and opinion, partial agreement and quibbling; then full divergence of opinion on other matters.

To be honest, my "Flat Earth" discussion was never intended as a case to convince others of its validity; It has been presented as a case that warrants further (Read: ANY) investigation. It provides a possible alternative reality to explore for the first time as its bits and pieces are considered.

Admittedly, the recent and historical blatant rash of lies and censorship from all manners of governance and its depts, its obvious un-holy "marriage" to Mainstream Media/Social Media, the Academe, together with and coercive bureaucracy had been the facilitator of such exploration and skepticism of previous etched-in-stone government "truths."

As to a belief, the philosophy or theory of reincarnation as a matter of addressing and resolving a system of eternal justice is a compelling concept. I've presume many Christians at one time may have not only examined but considered.

In the final analysis for me personally during the first go-round many years ago, its possibility was examined and back then, those kinds of philosophies and it's various angles were shared and discussed by many.

I'd also taken a solid look as well into Newtonian Model, which is an adjusted model of reincarnation, relying first on deep hypnoses and past life regression as validation of as its underpinnings -- as well as truth as presented.

Imperfect man naturally wants and needs a second chance. Like reincarnation, The Newton Model accommodates in this respect. But maybe its too much of a good thing with little to no downside including an eternally patient "self-salvation." It's short on details, but necessarily so.

The Christ-God model is complete. It indeed *does* give second, third, tenth chances to learn the truth. His Laws. Our Responsibility. Our Free Will. His Judgement.

It begins with explaining Creation, the basis and purpose of life and wisdom, encouragement, the need for salvation outside of ourselves and explanation of attaining this goal, world history, prophecies fulfilled and yet to be fulfilled, and finally the explanation of eternal justice, eternal Salvation, eternal Judgment, and eternal Authority/Arbiter/Creator, and eternal Final Resolution/Home (Heaven/Hell.)

Again, let me reinforce "Flat Earth"; It is NOT a Religion. It is a Theory. Just like all other theories which have NOT been "proven by scientific methods."

The above theories are fully dismissed as "scientifically proven," which IS true.

Heliocentricity is a theory. Evolution is a theory. "Space Travel" is theory. A spherical global is theory. Global Warming is a theory. "Black Holes" are theory. "Outer Space" is theory. The Big Bang" and 13 billion year old universe are theories. NONE are "scientifically" proven.

The above theories are NOT SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN. (should we redefine "Science"?)

We currently are not allowed to independently venture anywhere *near* Antarctica. Air travel is restricted. People are restricted from exploring Antarctica proper.

If no one but international governments, military, and "scientists" are allowed access, we must either rely on said governments for the "truth" of what comprises the 5,000,000 sq mi (and beyond); Rely SOLELY on recent "maps" (ancient mapping displays flat earth); And rely on artists renderings and "satellite" photos) to validate exactly what lies within the interior and beyond of the Antarctica. Fact is, 5 million square miles of ANTARCTICA IS UN-SURVEYED. UN-EXPLORED. UN-DISCUSSED.

Pinguinite: "I submit that if those three had truly treated others "very, very well" we would already have higher opinions of them."

Right after you admit you chose the "too conservative" moniker to begin with as a trolling device.

People have sailed around the world. Are they lying. In the 1500's. Have they been making this stuff up for 500 years?

Your position is just insane. I don't respect it and there is no need to debate it. It is just nonsense.

As a reminder, there can be no "debate" of anything if one side refuses to listen to the others case.

But first tell me why you fully believe Flat Earth theory is "nonsense"? And I'm "insane." AND...why you feel it's "unnecessary to debate" the subject?

Is it because since you were a child you have seen nothing but "round earth" images? The "moon landings"? Books? Scientists? Schools? TV, movies, advertising images?

IF you or anyone else hasn't the time, determination or curiosity to bypass all the usual roadblock and gate-keepers of the Powers That Be, I understand. BUT...you will never find any real truth of this physical world; So much has been hidden. Like most people, you will merely succumb to what you've been told, and fully accept the world in which you are presented.

95% of all people fall into this category, so I'm not going to criticize your position or deride your attitude.

As to my coming to learn the truth about a "reality" to which we've all been presented...It does NOT happen over night.

....whether it is me or others, there are many stages that must necessarily must occur. My particular revelation or discovery that the earth is NOT globe (as we have been led to believe) was fairly recent. There are innumerable observations and increasing circumstantial AND scientific evidence to support a Flat Earth. But if you continue to remain blindfolded, fully determined to be obstinate about the case made by the other side, there's no budging you an inch off your belief system. That is what it is.

Q: Do you believe the world's governments and authorities have conspired to manipulate, mask or hide human history and the truth?

Q2: Do you believe in "Evolution"? Do you believe man has "evolved" from apes? If not, and you instead believe in Creationism, "Science" considers IT "nonsense" and you a "kook."

Q3: Do you believe Jesus Christ is God? Born of a virgin birth? Believe in His miracles? Believe He rose from the dead and returned?

(If so, the vast number of "Scientists" believe IT is "nonsense," "impossible" ergo, you are a "kook.")

Q4: Do you believe Genesis is true? Noah's Flood? The Bible is "God's Word"? If so, "Science" considers YOU a "kook" and the Bible "nonsense."

Dis-Believing in Global Earth has been a cumulative process. But first and foremost, Genesis and God's account of His Creation was a consideration. (Do you believe it literally, or do you dis-believe God's word?) IF you believe the Bible literally, even some "Christians" will consider you a "kook." Government's "school" system refuses to allow it, instead cramming the "Evolution" Big Lie down our throat.

The number of Lies advanced and promoted s dogmatic FACT -- Big and Small, piled up to the sky from "official sources" -- should be questioned altogether, if not discredited or discarded. That is until, unless they can be reasonably verified and validated. Whether politically. BUT ESPECIALLY INCLUDING "SCIENCE."

For 500 years, "Science" has aimed to replace The Bible and its dogma as the official "authority" of "Truth"; Simultaneously, pagan/Lucifarian Man has also aimed to replace God as THE authority of all Truth.

If you agree with my posits, then you may want to reconsider and be more open about some of your positions and become more curious and inquisitive.

Now if you position again is etched in stone -- "I WON'T DEBATE THE CASE OF FLAT EARTH/CASE AGAINST ROUND EARTH", then by all means don't.

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Why Write about a Flat Earth?

Many people will probably wonder why it is necessary to write an article defending a round earth. Or, more specifically, an earth that is spherical. You see, the earth could be both round and flat, if it were disk shaped. Recently I had a conversation with some people about a Christian young man they know who frequently argues that the earth is flat. Mind you, this young man does not actually believe that the earth is flat. Rather, he finds the topic interesting and the discussion of it stimulating. Indeed, it can be. In my years at the university, I always asked the same sort of question in my introductory astronomy classes to motivate my students into thinking more deeply. By raising the question, I challenged our cultural mythology that, until the time of Christopher Columbus five centuries ago, nearly everyone thought the earth was flat. Supposedly, with our sophistication and intelligence today, we know better than the ignorant people of the past. Most of my students were surprised to learn that the facts of history are very different. The question of the earth’s true shape had been settled two millennia before Columbus. Rarely could any of my students give a good reason why the earth is spherical. So much for our modern smug superiority over the supposedly ignorant people of the past.

Consequently, with no idea of the reasons we know that the earth is spherical, most people long ago entered a complacent state of more or less taking someone else’s word for the matter.

Most people have not given this question any thought, because they have been taught their entire lives that the earth is spherical, so why worry about it? Consequently, with no idea of the reasons we know that the earth is spherical, most people long ago entered a complacent state of more or less taking someone else’s word for the matter. When someone comes along, such as this young man, who has given this some thought and begins to raise what appear to be simple objections to the earth’s spherical shape, it doesn’t take much to fluster most people. When cornered in this manner, people generally respond with the observation that we have photos from space that clearly show a spherical earth. However, the clever speaker will respond that such photos easily can be faked. Indeed, because we all know that it is very easy to fake such photos, perhaps those photos don’t prove much after all. Furthermore, those sorts of photos have been available only for a little more than a half-century. Belief in a spherical earth goes back much earlier than this, so obviously there must be better responses.

Once the space photos of a spherical earth are shot down, the vast majority of people usually have one of two responses. The most common response is to dismiss the person asking the questions as a crank or fool, because “everyone knows that the earth is round.” The other response is to pay more attention to the “flat-earthers,” looking for errors in their facts or logic. However, rarely having the knowledge readily at hand to refute the case for a flat earth, most people who take this approach soon look for help. That search for help usually is on the Internet, whereupon they quickly find a slew of websites and videos promoting the flat earth, but precious little, if any, refuting it. Some people emerge a few hours later, their egos bruised and their intelligence a bit insulted, because they still think that the flat earth is nonsense but are frustrated that they can’t seem to answer many of the arguments they’ve just encountered. Still others never emerge from this rabbit hole and end up thinking that maybe the conspiracy theories that they have encountered along the way may be right—perhaps for a long time we’ve all been fed a whopping lie about the true shape of the earth.

Reasons We Know That the Earth Is Spherical

Earth’s Shadow

So how did people in the ancient world know that the earth is spherical? The earliest recorded discussion of a spherical earth is from Pythagoras in the sixth century BC. Pythagoras correctly understood that the cause of lunar eclipses is the shadow of the earth falling on the moon. This can happen only when the moon is opposite the sun in our sky, which coincides with full moon. The earth’s shadow is larger than the moon, so we cannot see the entire shadow at once. However, during a lunar eclipse we see the earth’s shadow creep across the moon. Because the edge of the earth’s shadow always is a portion of a circle, the earth’s shadow must be a circle. If the earth were flat and round, similar to a disk, it could cast a circular shadow, but only for lunar eclipses that occur at midnight. For a lunar eclipse at sunrise or sunset, the earth’s shadow would be an ellipse, a line, or a rectangle, depending upon how thick the disk was compared to its diameter. However, the earth’s shadow during a lunar eclipse is always a circle, regardless of the time of night when the eclipse occurs. The only shape that consistently has a circular shadow, regardless of its orientation, is a sphere.

The only shape that consistently has a circular shadow, regardless of its orientation, is a sphere.

Visibility of the Stars

Another argument involves the stars that are visible in the northern and southern parts of the sky. The North Star lies within a degree of the north celestial pole, the direction in space that the earth’s rotation points at. As the earth rotates each day, the stars, the sun, and the moon appear to spin around the north celestial pole, so the north celestial pole remains fixed in the sky. In the ancient world, many people thought that the celestial sphere rotated each day around a non-spinning earth. For our purposes here, it doesn’t matter which is the case. The north celestial pole makes an angle with the northern horizon. We call this angle the altitude of the north celestial pole. Since the North Star is so close to the north celestial pole, we can approximate the altitude of the north celestial pole with the North Star’s altitude.

Vela and surrounding constellations. Photo from Wikimedia Commons.

The altitude of the North Star is noticeably higher in the sky at northern locations than it is at southern locations. For example, the North Star is much higher in the sky in the northern United States and Canada than it is in Florida, as anyone who pays attention on a trip, such as a vacation, can attest. This can happen only if north-south motion is along an arc. This is further underscored by other considerations. There is a region around the North Star in which the stars do not rise or set but instead are continually up and appear to go in circles around the north celestial pole. We call these circumpolar stars, meaning “around the pole.” The region of circumpolar stars is larger at northern locations than in southern locations. Likewise, there is a circumpolar region below the southern horizon whose stars are always below the horizon. The northern circumpolar region, where stars are always visible, is very large, and the southern circumpolar region, whose stars are never visible, is also large. Closer to the earth’s equator, the two circumpolar regions are smaller. For example, for many years I lived in South Carolina, about four degrees farther south latitude from where I now live in Northern Kentucky. I can see that the North Star is slightly higher in Northern Kentucky than it was in South Carolina. Furthermore, during winter in South Carolina, the bright star Canopus barely rose above the southern horizon each night; but in Kentucky I can never see Canopus. This is because in Northern Kentucky, Canopus is in the southern circumpolar region where stars are never visible, while in South Carolina it is not. This too shows that the earth is curved in the north-south direction.

Curvature of the Earth

Not only is the earth curved in the north-south direction, it also is curved in the east-west direction. There is a time difference of three hours between the east and west coasts of the United States. That is, the sun rises and sets approximately three hours earlier on the east coast than it does on the west coast. This is easily verified by anyone who has flown between the east and west coasts of the United States. Not only will your watch show that there is a time difference of three hours, but your body will notice the difference in time as well. If one drives from one coast to the other, the trip will take several days, so our bodies will not notice the time difference as much. However, our watches reveal that the time has changed. Such rapid transportation was not possible in ancient times, but the ancients could see this time difference a different way. A lunar eclipse obviously must happen simultaneously for everyone on earth, but it will be different times at different locations. For instance, a lunar eclipse may start shortly after sunset in the eastern Mediterranean, such as in Greece. However, in the western Mediterranean, such as in Spain, the moon would already be in eclipse when the moon rose that night. This means that the lunar eclipse began before sunset/moonrise in Spain, but after sunset/moonrise in Greece. Communication was such in the ancient world that people were aware of this effect. This shows that the earth is curved in the east-west direction. If the earth is curved in both the north-south and east-west direction, the most likely shape of the earth is a sphere.

Ancient Sources

Ancient sources, such as Aristotle, also mentioned that the hulls of ships disappeared before their masts did as ships sailed away. This would happen only if the earth is spherical. Without optical aid, this is difficult to see. However, one easily can see a related effect. If one is perched atop the mast of the ship, one can spot land or other ships before people on the deck can. This is why spotters often were placed in a crow’s nest high above a ship’s deck. If the earth were flat, there would be no advantage to being above the deck. A similar thing can be observed on land. The Door Peninsula in Wisconsin forms the eastern shore of Green Bay. The distance across Green Bay from the northern portion of the Door Peninsula to Northern Michigan is more than twenty miles. Looking across Green Bay from the beach on the west side of the Door Peninsula, one cannot see Northern Michigan. However, if one ascends the bluffs above the beach, one can see the shoreline of Northern Michigan. This is possible only if the earth is spherical.

View of sunset from Potawatomi State Park, Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin. Photo from Wikimedia Commons.

Eratosthenes. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

Not only did ancient people know that the earth was spherical, one of them accurately measured the size of the earth around 200 BC. Eratosthenes worked at the Great Library in Alexandria, Egypt. Eratosthenes is the father of geography because he coined the term and commissioned the creation of many maps. One particular year on the summer solstice, Eratosthenes was in southern Egypt near modern-day Aswan. Being on the northern limit of the tropics, the sun was directly overhead at noon on the summer solstice. Eratosthenes realized this, because he could look down into a deep well and see the bottom.

Normally, the bottom of a well is not visible because the sun’s light does not shine directly on the bottom, but it did at noon on the summer solstice because the sun was directly overhead. The sun never was directly overhead in Alexandria, because it is not in the tropics. Back in Alexandria the following year, Eratosthenes measured the altitude of the sun at noon on the summer solstice. He did this by constructing a vertical pole of known height and measuring the pole’s shadow at noon. Trigonometry allowed Eratosthenes to compute the sun’s altitude. The difference between ninety degrees and the altitude was how far the sun was from being vertical. Eratosthenes found that the angle was about one-fiftieth of a circle. This meant that Alexandria and Aswan were separated by one-fiftieth of the earth’s circumference. Eratosthenes knew the distance between those two locations, so multiplying that distance by fifty gave him the earth’s circumference.

Why do so many people today assume that everyone thought that the earth was flat until the time of Columbus? The argument at the time of Columbus was not over the earth’s shape, but over the earth’s size. Muslims had closed to Europeans the overland trade routes to the Far East. Everyone realized that travel to Asia by sailing west from Europe was possible, but why would you want to? There was a vast ocean (they didn’t know about the two American continents in between) separating Europe and Asia. It was much shorter to sail eastward from Europe, perhaps around Africa, to reach Asia. In the small ships used at the time, it was not advisable to sail more than a few days out of sight of land. Columbus was proposing a voyage of a few months over open, uncharted waters. That was very dangerous. To make his proposed voyage more palatable, Columbus overestimated the eastward distance from Europe, and at the same time he decreased Eratosthenes’ measurement of the earth’s circumference. The difference in these two was Columbus’ expected distance to Asia by sailing westward from Europe. In Columbus’ estimation, it was shorter to reach Asia by sailing westward than eastward. A glance at a modern globe or map of the world reveals that this is false. In other words, Columbus was wrong, and his critics were right!

Accusation of Christianity

In the late nineteenth century, two atheistic skeptics, Andrew Dickson White and John Draper, created the conflict thesis that Christianity held back the progress of science. One of their major arguments was that throughout the Middle Ages the church had taught that the earth was flat. In creating this myth, Draper and White suggested that the church could redeem itself for this supposed error on the earth’s shape by getting in on the ground floor of Darwinism. This ploy was very successful in that much of the church capitulated on evolution. It also falsely altered history. It is this false version of history that most people have learned.

Descent into the Rabbit Hole

Within days of my conversation with the people about the young man who espoused a flat earth, I had two additional, yet independent, conversations with people having similar concerns about two other Christian young people. However, while the first young man merely talked about a flat earth as an intellectual exercise, these two young men apparently had become convinced that the earth may actually be flat. With three conversations over less than a week, I wondered, “Is there something going on out there?” There had been a few warning signs along the way. During the previous six months I had been asked about the flat earth several times. One was from the department that handles correspondences and questions directed to Answers in Genesis. It seems that people submit a question about this to Answers in Genesis often enough. Two of our speakers here at Answers in Genesis recently had received questions about the flat earth while traveling. Two other creation speakers not associated with Answers in Genesis had asked me about it. More recently I had someone raise this question after a talk that I gave at the Creation Museum. All of this suggested that there must be some sort of movement out there within Christianity promoting the flat earth. This immediately raised two questions: who are the people responsible for this recent interest in a flat earth, and what is their motivation?

The search for those answers required that I disappear inside the flat-earth rabbit hole in the Internet for a while. Before I share what I found, I need to make one point very clear—as in the story of Alice in Wonderland, not everything is as it appears. Most people are aware that there is a Flat Earth Society, thinking that the Flat Earth Society is a serious group of people dedicated to promoting their own peculiar view of the world. The situation is far murkier than that. Actually, there have been several Flat Earth Societies. Some of them clearly have been tongue-in-cheek, while others appear to be far more serious. Some flat earth advocates obviously are having fun, and they don’t seem to mind if their audience is in on the gag. However, some people promoting a flat earth appear to enjoy watching people squirm uncomfortably when confronted with an argument that they disagree with but can’t quite manage to refute. Of course, these people are not about to let on that they are anything but serious about the flat earth. This is perverse.

Examples of Flat-Earth Proponents

An example of someone who may not be serious about the earth being flat is Matthew Boylan. According to some sources on the flat earth, Boylan is an artist who was an independent contractor with NASA. He supposedly left that job after NASA employees took him into their confidence and invited him to join the conspiracy promoting the lie that the earth is spherical. According to Boylan, NASA fakes nearly everything that it does. Boylan has several videos on the Internet, but some of them appear to be comedy routines. For instance, this video has an audience that reacts as if audience members understood that they were watching a comedy routine.

Boylan’s delivery, including his frequent use of profanity, is similar to so many comedy routines today. In this routine, Boylan included a photo that he says shows the Apollo 11 Lunar Excursion Module (LEM) landing on the moon. According to him, because there had to be a camera crew already on the moon to take the photo, NASA faked the moon landing. However, the photograph clearly shows the curved edge of the moon, indicating that the LEM was far above the lunar surface. Actually, this photo was taken by Michael Collins, who remained aboard the Apollo 11 Command Module (CM), as the two other astronauts, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, landed on the moon. Collins took the photo shortly after separation of the LEM from the CM. Similarly, Boylan shows an image of the Galileo probe arriving at Jupiter. Boylan mockingly notes that the Galileo probe must have been followed very closely by another spacecraft carrying a camera. NASA frequently produces this sort of image of spacecraft superimposed with an image of some space object relevant to the spacecraft. In other words, this is an artist’s rendition. As an artist, Boylan must understand this. He must be very amused that so many people think that he is serious.

“Support” for a Flat Earth

Let us discuss some of the more frequent claims that supposedly prove that the earth is flat rather than spherical. Most of the supposed evidences are negative; that is, they are attempts to show that the earth is not spherical. However, at least one, the Bedford Level Experiment, is positive, an attempt directly to show that the earth is flat. In 1838, Samuel Birley Rowbotham claimed to have conducted an experiment on the Old Bedford River on the Bedford Level near Norfolk, England. The Bedford Level is a six-mile stretch of the Old Bedford River that is straight, allowing an uninterrupted view along the six miles. Furthermore, there is no gradient there, so that portion of the river amounts to a slow-flowing drainage canal. If the earth is curved, then the drop from one end to the other is about 24 feet. That is, if one were to use a telescope at water level to view along the water on one end of Bedford Level, a mast or pole 24 feet high on the other end would not be visible.

Diagram of Rowbotham’s experiment on the Bedford Level. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

Rowbotham waded into the river and used a telescope held eight inches above the water to observe a rowboat with a five-foot high mast row away. Rowbotham claimed that he could see the mast when it was six miles away, even though the spherical earth required that the top of the mast be about eleven feet below his horizon (as viewed from eight inches above the water). Rowbotham concluded that the earth must be flat, or it is more likely that he already thought this and this experiment proved his thesis, at least to his satisfaction. Rowbotham, using a pseudonym, published his results in a pamphlet titled Zetetic Astronomy in 1849, which he expanded into a book in 1865.

Most people ignored Rowbotham’s work. However, in 1870 John Hampden, another flat earth proponent, offered a wager of a hefty sum to anyone who could demonstrate a convex curvature of a large body of water, as a spherical earth would require. The famous Alfred Russell Wallace took the challenge. Apparently unaware of Rowbotham’s result, Wallace altered the technique a bit. He placed two identical objects at different locations along the Bedford Level. Wallace examined either object from a telescope mounted on a bridge. He found that the nearer object appeared higher than the more distant one, consistent with the results predicted by a spherical earth. Why the difference? The density of air decreases with increasing height. Because this causes a slight change in the index of refraction in air, rays of light passing close to the earth’s surface are bent downward. As can be seen in the following figure, this makes distant objects appear higher than they actually are.

$Atmospheric Refraction$

Incidentally, this well-understood effect causes the sun to appear to rise about two minutes earlier than it actually does. A temperature inversion, where the temperature increases with height, is common at low heights along the Bedford Level and other bodies of water. Temperature inversions accentuate refraction. If the rate of increase of air temperature with height is great enough, a temperature inversion can even cause objects in the distance to appear above the horizon. In 1896, Ulysses Grant Morrow conducted a similar experiment on the Old Illinois Drainage Canal under these conditions, and found results consistent with the earth being curved concavely (there are people who think that the earth’s surface is the inside of a shell). Apparently, Wallace was aware of these effects, while Rowbotham was not. This is what prompted Wallace to conduct his experiment high enough above the water to eliminate the major contribution of refraction due to a temperature inversion at low height.

Those who promote the flat earth often mention the Bedford Level Experiment as proof that the earth is flat. They seem to think that Rowbotham’s 1838 experiment settled the matter for all time. They are willfully ignorant that the experiment has been repeated many times since 1838. When those experiments are properly conducted to minimize the effect of refraction, they are consistent with a spherical earth.

Some Internet videos promoting the flat earth show a time-lapse film of the midnight sun. The sun appears to move rightward along the horizon, slowly bobbing up and down once each day. The claim is made that the midnight sun is visible anywhere north of the Arctic Circle (around 66.6 degrees north latitude), but that if the earth were spherical, the midnight sun would be visible only at the North Pole. The following figure shows the correct situation.

On the summer solstice, the earth’s Northern Hemisphere has its maximum tilt toward the sun. Consider an observer on the Arctic Circle. At point A, it is noon, and the sun is as high in the sky as it can be, nearly 47 degrees. To an observer facing the sun with the North Pole to his back, the sun would appear in the southern part of the sky. However twelve hours later, the earth’s rotation will take the observer to point B. This will be at midnight. As you can see, the sun’s rays pass over the North Pole and reach point B tangent to the earth’s surface. The sun’s rays being tangent to the earth’s surface means that the sun is on the horizon. Since the observer must face the North Pole to view the sun, the sun is in the northern part of the sky.

On the Arctic Circle, the midnight sun is visible only on the summer solstice. At higher latitudes, the midnight sun is visible for more days. At the earth’s North Pole, the sun is above the horizon for six months. The sun does not appear to bob up and down each day at the North Pole. Instead, the sun appears to circle each day at about the same altitude. Actually, the sun rises on the vernal equinox and slowly gains altitude until the summer solstice, whereupon the sun slowly descends again until it sets on the autumnal equinox. The sun’s maximum altitude, on the summer solstice, is 23.4 degrees.

There is an irony here. While supporters of the flat earth falsely claim that the midnight sun on the Arctic Circle cannot happen if the earth is spherical, it is the flat earth that has difficulty explaining the midnight sun. Most flat earth models have the North Pole at the center of a disk-shaped earth, as in the following illustration.

Suppose that the midnight sun is visible at the North Pole as well as on the Arctic Circle. This is indicated by lines from the sun to the North Pole and at point A on the Arctic Circle. Notice that on a flat earth, we can draw a line from the sun to any point on the earth not within the Arctic Circle (such as point C). Hence, if the earth were flat, the midnight sun must be visible everywhere, not just within the Arctic Circle. Because this clearly is not the case, the earth must not be flat.

Some of the flat earth promotional videos that deal with the midnight sun show the sun orbiting each day around the earth’s North Pole. Mysteriously, there is a shadow on the earth on the other side of its North Pole from the sun. As the sun orbits the North Pole, so does the shadow. Apparently, the shadow indicates where it is night on the earth. However, because the sun clearly is above the horizon for locations in that shadow, it ought to be day there. The origin of this shadow producing night is never explained. Furthermore, since the sun clearly is above the horizon for the entire flat earth, it ought to be day everywhere on the earth. This, too, is not explained.

Another claim made against the spherical earth is that if the earth were a spinning globe that orbited the sun each year, the earth’s spin axis would not stay aligned with the North Star. This is because, as we shift from one side of the earth’s orbit to the other, our perspective changes, as can be seen in the following visual.

If the earth’s axis were aligned with the North Star at point A, then the earth would not align with the North Star six months later when the earth arrives at point B. This effect is well enough known to warrant a name: parallax. At least one of the videos gives what astronomers think is the distance to the North Star (four quadrillion km, but it’s actually about twice that distance) and the radius of the earth’s orbit (150 million km). We can use these numbers to find how much the parallax angle, À, is. As we shall see, the angle À is a small angle, so we can use the small angle approximation. If an angle is small, we can express the angle, in radian measure, as the ratio of the baseline to one of the other sides. The baseline is the earth’s orbital radius, r, and the other side is the distance to the North Star, d. That is,

À = r/d = (150 million km) / (2 quadrillion km) = 7.5 x 10^-8 radians.

To convert this to degrees, we must multiply by 57.3. After doing this, the angle is 4.3 x 10^-6 degrees, or a little more than four millionths of a degree. That is the apparent diameter of a dime when viewed 150 miles away. Actually, the total shift that we would see would be twice this amount, but remember, the distance given in the video is about half the true value. Obviously, this is a very small angle, far too small for our eyes to notice. Therefore, this supposed proof that the earth is flat is specious.

In an interview, flat earth promoter Eric Dubay discussed parallax. Dubay has written several books on the flat earth, such as The Flat Earth Conspiracy, and he is featured or is credited with several videos on YouTube. In this interview, Dubay explicitly stated that there are no parallax measurements. This is patently false. Despite being very small, it is possible to measure parallax for the stars closest to earth. The first parallax measurements were in the 1830s. Technology has improved tremendously since then, so that today there are parallax measurements for several hundred thousand stars. The HIPPARCOS mission of the early 1990s was most helpful in this. From this mission, we have parallax measurements of most stars within 600 light years. The Gaia spacecraft, launched late in 2013, is greatly adding to this. The Gaia mission ought to give us parallax measurements out to 6,000 light years. It is not clear if Dubay is ignorant of the status of parallax measurements, or if he knows better and has chosen to say otherwise.

In the interview, Dubay made a number of false statements. He said that the North Star is visible down to latitude 23 ½ degrees south of the equator. This is untrue: the North Star is not visible south of the equator. Dubay said that the moon is not solid, because we can see stars through the moon. This is nonsense, because from time to time the moon passes in front of a bright star, an event that we call a lunar occultation. Astronomers measure how long it takes the lunar limb (or edge) to block out stars during lunar occultations, because the time measure reveals something about how large stars are.

If Dubay understood even elementary physics, he would know that because of Newton’s first law of motion, an object requires a force in order to orbit.

Dubay clearly does not understand physics. He claims that rockets cannot work in space because there is no air. Rockets work because of Newton’s third law of motion (action-reaction) not because they push off air. Dubay protests that gravity seems to have two contradicting properties: making things stick to the earth and causing other things to orbit the earth. If Dubay understood even elementary physics, he would know that because of Newton’s first law of motion, an object requires a force in order to orbit. Gravity provides that force. This is no different from any object that goes in a circular path. A weight whirled around a string is compelled in its orbit by tension in the string. In similar manner, gravity provides the force required to make the moon orbit the earth.

Many of the arguments put forth by Dubay and others for a flat earth are so poor, that one has to wonder how serious these people must be. Dubay seems serious enough, but could he really fail to understand so many things? There may be a hint very early in the interview that suggests that the entire thing was a gag. The interview was done via Skype. Both the interviewer and Dubay sound as if they are American. The interviewer stated that Dubay was in “sunny Thailand,” Dubay replied that Thailand then was “moonlit.” Apparently, it was daytime where the interviewer was, but it was night in Thailand. That would be difficult to explain on a flat earth, but relatively easy to explain on a spherical earth.

Christians Supporting the Flat Earth Belief

As I searched around, I wasn’t able to find a single source responsible for renewed interest in the flat earth among Christians. I did, however, find a long documentary film on the subject apparently produced by Christians, “The Biblical Flat Earth Series: The Global Lie Flat Earth Revelation Documentary.” There are four people credited in the documentary: Philip Stallings, Rob Skiba, Robbie Davidson, and Emmanuel Lokonga. There isn’t much information about Emmanuel Lokonga. Robbie Davidson apparently is the filmmaker and primarily responsible for the production of the documentary. Both Rob Skiba and Philip Stallings have other videos promoting flat earth, as well as other ideas, on the Internet. Stallings is identified as the founder of the Bible Flat Earth Society. An organization called Celebrate Truth also was involved in the documentary. It is not clear what Celebrate Truth is or who is behind it. Both Celebrate Truth and the Bible Flat Earth Society appear to have a presence solely on social media.

While the documentary appears reasonably well done from a technical standpoint, much of the material in the program is poor. For instance, between 53:00 and 55:30, the documentary makes the claim we do not see stellar parallax, and so concludes that the earth must not be moving. As already mentioned, this is patently false. This is so easily refuted, it makes me wonder if this documentary is a serious attempt to support the flat earth or if it merely is yet another subtle, tongue-in-cheek project to reel-in unsuspecting people.

Meteor Crater-Arizona. Image by NASA Earth Observatory, via Wikimedia Commons.

Around 56:30 there is a list of various odd things thrown together. One item on the list is a denial of the existence of extrasolar planets (they exist). Another denies that stars are far away (they are). There is a denial that meteors strike the earth. (There is abundant evidence meteors do strike the earth. For instance, the Arizona Meteor Crater is a well-documented meteor impact). Also included is a denial that the sun’s source of energy is nuclear, even though there is evidence for that. The old Aristotelian claim that a moving earth would leave its atmosphere behind is there too. A variation of this latter point is made at 1:22:30, where the claim is made that an airplane could not land on a runway if the earth were moving. As the earth moves, the atmosphere moves with it, so the atmosphere is not left behind. Furthermore, because aircraft move with respect to the air, as air moves with the earth, aircraft are carried along with both the air and the earth. The only difficulty is if there is significant wind across the flight path, but pilots deal with this every day. Again, this is all so bad that I have to consider the possibility that this entire documentary is satire or lampoon. Around 1:29:11, an appeal is made to the foundational importance of Genesis. This sounds similar to the message of Answers in Genesis. Is this some sort of slam of Answers in Genesis?

Photograph of earth by Apollo 17 astronauts. Image courtesy of NASA.

Once one postulates a flat earth, it leads to other preposterous claims. If the earth is flat rather than a sphere, then it is inconceivable that we have ventured into space. In the previously mentioned interview with Eric Dubay, he denied that there are any satellites orbiting the earth or that astronauts have gone into space. He claims that all photos and videos taken from space are faked. For example, Dubay says that the famous photograph of the earth taken by the Apollo 17 astronauts is a computer-generated image. Of course, this line of argumentation automatically requires belief that the Apollo moon landings were hoaxes. However there are good reasons to believe that we really did land on the moon during the Apollo program.

Christians who want to entertain this nonsense ought to know that during his six-month stay on the International Space Station in 2006, astronaut Jeffrey Williams photographed the earth more than any astronaut in history. Some of Williams’ photos are found in his book, The Work of His Hands: A View of God’s Creation from Space. Many of the photos show that the earth is spherical. It ought to be apparent from the book’s title that Williams is a Christian, but the book’s content makes it abundantly clear. Hence, to doubt that the earth is spherical or that astronauts have gone into space is to accuse a Christian brother of perpetuating a tremendous lie.

But Williams is not the only Christian to have gone into space: Jim Irwin and Charles Duke were among the twelve men who walked on the moon. Recently, I asked Charles Duke to respond to those who think that the earth is flat and those who think that we faked the Apollo moon landing. This is what he wrote:

I was the lunar module pilot on the Apollo 16 mission to the moon. We launched from KSC (Kennedy Space Center) in Florida on April 16, 1972. We left earth orbit for our three day trip to the moon about three hours later. As we maneuvered our spacecraft to dock with our lunar module, the earth came into view about 20,000 miles away. It was an awesome sight. As you can see in the photo, it is obviously a sphere and not a flat circle. As we journeyed to the moon, we would look out our windows and see a smaller earth, and each time we would see different landmasses, so it was obviously rotating on its axis.

Some people are questioning the fact that we landed on the moon, alleging that it is a big hoax. Well, we did land on the moon six times, and the evidences are overwhelming. If we faked the landing, why did we fake it 6 times? One needs only to look at the photos from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter from my mission. The photos of our landing site shows the descent stage, the lunar rover, the experiments package, and the tracks we left on the moon. Every landing site has similar evidence. There are many other proofs that conclusively show that Apollo actually landed on the moon six times.

Again, Christians who think that the earth is flat or that men never set foot on the moon are effectively accusing several Christian brothers of lying about one of the biggest things that ever happened in their lives. Are the Apollo moon landing deniers prepared to make this accusation?

Conclusion

Are these people who believe in a flat earth for real? It’s hard to say. They could be well-intentioned but seriously misguided people. Or they could be attempting to discredit the Bible and Christianity. If the latter, their approach probably is “If you think that the Bible is literally true, then I’ll show you just how literally true that the Bible is!” But this is a false dichotomy. We here at Answers in Genesis don’t say that the Bible is literally true. Rather, we understand that the Bible is true because it is inspired by God. As such, it is authoritative on all matters and is reliable. The Bible contains imagery and poetry. However, those passages are easy to identify. When it comes down to the sorts of questions that matter here (such as “Did God create the world?”), the Bible must be read and understood historically and grammatically. That is, historical narrative does not lead to symbolic interpretation. Hence, the creation account is literally true.

At least some of the people behind this upsurge in the flat earth movement may be lampooning the creation movement. As such, they clearly are no friends of the church; rather, they oppose Christ and His kingdom. I recommend that Christians be very discerning about their teachings.

It seems from your postings that your primary basis for believing the world is flat is from the Bible. The questions you presented to Stone above challenge someone who is a Bible believer to choose between accepting the Bible as the literal "Word of God" or renouncing it as not having any divine authority whatsoever. That the Bible's story of creation might be metaphorically accurate but not literally accurate (as many Christians take it to be) is not an option, it seems.

As for deriding "science" as though it were a free willed entity capable of an agenda to stamp out truth, I find that biased and disingeuous. Unlike, say, the arts, the goal of science is to discover the truth, not to dictate it. Obviously there are those within the science field that are compromised but most are not. Most scientists would love to be challenged with a near insolvable mystery, as it's the discovery of the truth of the mysteries of the universe is the reward itself. I seem to recall one Bible verse: "It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, and the glory of man to seek out a matter". Seems to me a tacit, implied endorcement for man to seek to understand the universe we are in.

I count myself as a scientist, and as you know, I don't believe the Bible to be of any divine significance. Not because I believe God has lied to us, but because I believe the Bible, while it does contain some theological truths, also has some false things in it. Namely about the origin of life (evolution poses no threat to my theology unlike your own and Stone's) and the implied age of the universe. It does seem the oldest passages at least imply the world is flat. But instead of that being evidence the world is actually flat, it is instead, to me, evidence that the ancient authors were human and not God, and being human, were subject to human error. (At least ot what ever extent one promotes the idea that the earth is flat because the Bible imples/claims it is flat. I.e., the more one advocates that the earth is flat due to Biblical claims, the more inclined I am to argue to that person that, because the world is not flat, their Biblical-based theology is flawed.

Lets face it. If you were to go into a tribe of isolated pigmies who have never heard of either the Bible or any modern claims about the shape of the earth and put the question to them, they would probably find the concept of a spherical earth to be incomprehensible, largely because they would not have any reason to associate gravity, which is a force they would certainly take for granted, as having anything to do with planetary mass. And whomever, many thousands of years ago authored the original story of creation that became what is now Genisis had no more advantage in his understanding the spherical world model than any inhabitant in a modern day, but remote isolated tribe.

You mentioned you have heard a compelling abundance of evidence in favor of a flat earth, and I've mentioned that the challenge for a flat earth advocate in explaining the myriads of phenomenon we see in our universe, from moon phases, planetary retrograde, eclipses and the like -- which are all explained extremely well with the spherical earth in a heleocentric solar system model -- are enormously problematic for a flat earth model to explain. You said you understood the challenges, but I frankly don't think you do. I think they are far, far greater than you appreciate right now. An example is explaining the moon phases. You posted a video purporting to do that, but I assure you the model presented is enormously flawed from a geometric perspective.

I almost think that, for you, the question of the worlds shape is not a matter of science fact, but a matter of faith. It seems as though you have reached a point where the question you put to Stone is one you have put to yourself. That is: Do you believe the Bible is the Word of God, or not? And the only way your faith in the Bible can survive is if the world is flat.

If that is the case, I can appreciate the dilemma of that kind of a choice. If the world is not flat then, for you, it means the Bible is a lie and your whole belief system collapses. If I'm correct in that assessment of your thinking, I unfortunately cannot help you, as each of us is on our own individual path in life. I could only assure you that we are immortal entities in spite of the shape of the earth, the age of the universe, and regardless of whether the human race descended from apes. Everything is okay.