Announcement

Collapse

Amphitheater Guidelines

In the Amphitheater we sit back and share a good song, offer a movie review, discuss sports, or anything in entertainment and family enjoyment.

If you need to refresh yourself on the decorum, now would be a good time.

Forum Rules: here
Steam Group: here

Thanks!
See more
See less

Behind the Curve - Flat Earthers

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Behind the Curve - Flat Earthers

    So I was watching this documentary on Netflix called "Behind the Curve" about the Flat Earther movement.



    It was very interesting and entertaining. It talked about the movement from the point of view of the Flat Earthers and from the view of scientists and psychologists.

    It also juxtaposed some very interesting scenes. Like a scientist explaining how science works, how it is a process where you don't have a goal in mind, but are open to whatever you find. and how if you go the other way (have a goal and then try to find evidence to support it) you will have a false process.

    Then it showed a flat earth "scientist" who had decided that he had a way to test if the earth was round or flat. Gyroscopes. He said, "If the earth really is rotating 360 degrees per day, a gyroscope would precess 15 degrees per hour. If it was flat, it would not. So they got a really expensive, highly accurate gyroscope and did the experiment. It precessed 15 degrees. "Hmm, we must have done something wrong. It must be measuring the presession the dome of the sky while it rotates above the earth" -- so they put it in a metal can to shield it. Same result. So now he has to rethink the experiment to figure out how to shield the gyroscope properly.

    It also showed some other pretty ironic moments where the flat earthers basically admitted that nothing would falsify their belief because it would cost them their standing in the community.

    It sounds like a cult!

    I always though that John Martin was just playing at believing in geocentrism and the flat earth. That is was a big joke. Apparently not. And they tie the flat earth to all sorts of conspiracies, from vaccinations to the airline industry.

    Go watch this, it is fascinating.
    https://www.netflix.com/title/81015076


  • #2
    Here is the scene from the movie with the gyroscope:


    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by Sparko View Post
      So I was watching this documentary on Netflix called "Behind the Curve" about the Flat Earther movement.



      It was very interesting and entertaining. It talked about the movement from the point of view of the Flat Earthers and from the view of scientists and psychologists.

      It also juxtaposed some very interesting scenes. Like a scientist explaining how science works, how it is a process where you don't have a goal in mind, but are open to whatever you find. and how if you go the other way (have a goal and then try to find evidence to support it) you will have a false process.
      This view has been expressed repeatedly by legitimate scientists. For instance:
      • "If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties." --Francis Bacon in Book I of The Advancement of Learning 1605
      • "I keep my theories on the tips of my fingers so that the merest breath of fact can blow them away." --Michael Faraday
      • "I have steadily endeavored to keep my mind free so as to give up any hypothesis, however much beloved, as soon as the facts are opposed to it." --Charles Darwin (who also wrote: "A scientific man ought to have no wishes, no affections - a mere heart of stone.")
      • "Sit down before a fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abysses nature leads, or you shall learn nothing." --Thomas Henry Huxley
      • "The hallmark of science is not the question ‘Do I wish to believe this?’ but the question ‘What is the evidence?’ It is this demand for evidence, this habit of cultivated skepticism, that is most characteristic of the scientific way of thought." --Douglas Futuyma
      • "A scientist should every morning eat one of his favorite theories for breakfast." --Konrad Lorenz
      • "Any real systematist [or scientist in general] has to be ready to heave all that he or she believes in, consider it crap, and move on, in the face of new evidence." --Mark Norell (in his Unearthing the Dragon)
      • "In science it often happens that scientists say, ‘You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,’ and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day.[1] --Carl Sagan


      Recently after the discovery of a 14 myo fossil of a type of honey bee in North America Michael Engel of the University of Kansas and co-author of Evolution of the Insects excitedly said "I got to overturn some of my own stuff"

      Donald Prothero in his book Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters cites a couple examples of just such occurrences taking place, such as with the issue of continental drift and plate tectonics. He notes that, "‘The Old Guard’ who had a lot of time and research invested in fixed continents tended to be skeptical the longest, and many held out until the evidence became overwhelming. Eventually, they all had to concede their cherished beliefs were wrong."

      Prothero revealed how the famous geologist Marshall Kay, who had spent his entire life explaining the complexities of geology based on the assumption that continents did not move (even publishing a major book on the topic), ended up embracing plate tectonics when the evidence for it started to amass. Even though he was near retirement age Kay began redoing his life's work using the new concepts and his work ended up providing a good deal of the geological evidence used in support of the theory.

      And everybody's favorite Richard Dawkins has repeatedly recounted one instance that he has witnessed:

      I have previously told the story of a respected elder statesman of the Zoology Department at Oxford when I was an undergraduate. For years he had passionately believed, and taught, that the Golgi Apparatus (a microscopic feature of the interior of cells) was not real: an artifact, an illusion. Every Monday afternoon it was the custom for the whole department to listen to a research talk by a visiting lecturer. One Monday, the visitor was an American cell biologist who presented completely convincing evidence that the Golgi Apparatus was real. At the end of the lecture, the old man strode to the front of the hall, shook the American by the hand and said--with passion--"My dear fellow, I wish to thank you. I have been wrong these fifteen years." We clapped our hands red.


      I can continue giving example after example of this including debates over whether humans were in the Americas prior to the Clovis culture; the megaflood in eastern Washington that resulted in the formation of the Scablands; how a champion of the idea that whales arose from mesonychids abruptly changed his mind and agreed they actually arose from artiodactyls (an idea he had adamantly opposed) when he discovered a bone that contradicted his presumptions. But I think this should suffice.







      1. As Sagan notes it doesn't happen enough and I'll add that there will always be holdouts but in general science advances when new information demonstrates an old view does not reflect reality. If it didn't we would still think that the earth was immobile and the sun revolved around it or the elements consist of air, earth, fire and water.

      I'm always still in trouble again

      "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
      "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
      "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

      Comment


      • #4
        So, how do we know this guy is not just spoofing? I mean.... you think that's legit? That he honestly sincerely believes, or is this just to get attention?
        The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

        Comment


        • #5
          Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
          So, how do we know this guy is not just spoofing? I mean.... you think that's legit? That he honestly sincerely believes, or is this just to get attention?
          When someone spends a great deal of time and effort over the course of many years promoting a crackpot idea at some point you gotta concede that they're likely not trolling but are a legitimate crackpot.

          That's one of the reasons that I didn't consider JohnMartin to be was faking it.

          I'm always still in trouble again

          "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
          "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
          "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

          Comment


          • #6
            Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
            So, how do we know this guy is not just spoofing? I mean.... you think that's legit? That he honestly sincerely believes, or is this just to get attention?
            Watching the movie it is clear they actually believe this stuff. It really is like a cult. They believe that Nasa and the airline industry and world governments all know the Earth is flat but spread the lie that it is a globe. It boggles the mind.

            A lot of the leaders of the movement seem to be treated like celebrities on youtube and at these various conventions they have. That alone seems to lock them into their view, because it feeds their egos. If they had to admit they were wrong, it would cost them their standing with others and they would become nobodies or worse, hated people who are just "part of the conspiracy"

            Most of them don't seem actually nuts, but just so completely paranoid that they distrust any "science" evidence and believe the globe is some sort of conspiracy. But there are a few that are genuinely bonkers and so insane they actually distrust other members of the flat earthers. One guy who goes by the handle Math Powerland thinks that some other guy and woman who was in the film, are CIA plants, working for Warner Brothers who is owned by the government. Here is one of his vids:

            Last edited by Sparko; 08-20-2019, 07:41 AM.

            Comment


            • #7
              Originally posted by Sparko View Post
              Then it showed a flat earth "scientist" who had decided that he had a way to test if the earth was round or flat. Gyroscopes. He said, "If the earth really is rotating 360 degrees per day, a gyroscope would precess 15 degrees per hour. If it was flat, it would not. So they got a really expensive, highly accurate gyroscope and did the experiment. It precessed 15 degrees. "Hmm, we must have done something wrong. It must be measuring the presession the dome of the sky while it rotates above the earth" -- so they put it in a metal can to shield it. Same result. So now he has to rethink the experiment to figure out how to shield the gyroscope properly.
              https://www.netflix.com/title/81015076
              The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia used to have, maybe still does, a large pendulum, several floors tall, with a heavy metal cylinder at the base, about an inch above the floor. A circle of dominoes surrounded the base. As the pendulum's direction of swing rotated throughout the day, it would progressively knock down the dominoes. Each night they would reset the dominoes. But it illustrated the earth's rotation.

              Yeah, still there. Foucault's Pendulum. Check it out at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbFwDdCr6zo.
              Last edited by Faber; 08-20-2019, 07:53 AM.
              When I Survey....

              Comment


              • #8
                Originally posted by Faber View Post
                The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia used to have, maybe still does, a large pendulum, several floors tall, with a heavy metal cylinder at the base, about an inch above the floor. A circle of dominoes surrounded the base. As the pendulum's direction of swing rotated throughout the day, it would progressively knock down the dominoes. Each night they would reset the dominoes. But it illustrated the earth's rotation.
                The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History used to have a giant Foucault pendulum that did the same thing. The Cleveland Museum of Natural History also has one but it uses a giant ball that knocks several dominos over at a time which isn't nearly as elegant.

                I'm always still in trouble again

                "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
                "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
                "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by Faber View Post
                  The Franklin Institute in Philadelphia used to have, maybe still does, a large pendulum, several floors tall, with a heavy metal cylinder at the base, about an inch above the floor. A circle of dominoes surrounded the base. As the pendulum's direction of swing rotated throughout the day, it would progressively knock down the dominoes. Each night they would reset the dominoes. But it illustrated the earth's rotation.

                  Yeah, still there. Foucault's Pendulum. Check it out at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbFwDdCr6zo.
                  obviously it was measuring the movement of the sky due to heavenly emanations!

                  LOL I found the guys youtube video where he continues to argue why the gyroscope setup continued to show a 15-degree precession no matter what they did.

                  https://youtu.be/Qlnox5RYIzE?t=9157

                  starts at 2:32:37 and goes for about an hour.

                  They make excuse after excuse (with no science to test those excuses) and end up claiming the ring laser gyroscope isn't accurate and has some built in drift or some nonsense.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                    The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History used to have a giant Foucault pendulum that did the same thing. The Cleveland Museum of Natural History also has one but it uses a giant ball that knocks several dominos over at a time which isn't nearly as elegant.
                    The Houston Museum of Natural Science has one too, but theirs has a short of upside down finial on the bottom that knocks over one domino at a time. I think most of these types of museums have a Foucault pendulum.
                    Curiosity never hurt anyone. It was stupidity that killed the cat.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Originally posted by QuantaFille View Post
                      The Houston Museum of Natural Science has one too, but theirs has a short of upside down finial on the bottom that knocks over one domino at a time. I think most of these types of museums have a Foucault pendulum.
                      That's what makes the world spin. All those pendulums working together to cause the earth to turn.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by QuantaFille View Post
                        The Houston Museum of Natural Science has one too, but theirs has a short of upside down finial on the bottom that knocks over one domino at a time. I think most of these types of museums have a Foucault pendulum.
                        That's what the one at the Smithsonian was like.

                        I'm always still in trouble again

                        "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
                        "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
                        "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          I almost want to become a flat earther just to troll people. I bet I could come up with better "reasons" and "science" to prove the world is flat than the real flat earthers.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            This is WAY weirder to me than moon landing deniers.
                            The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
                              This is WAY weirder to me than moon landing deniers.
                              I think it is all part of the same personality type. There seems to be some people who get a thrill believing they have secret knowledge and everyone else is being fooled by some secret conspiracy. Whether it is denying the moon landing, thinking that vaccinations are a government mind control plot, Aliens are here among us, A secret society is controlling the world, or the earth is flat.

                              It makes their mundane lives more exciting. Like living in a movie. And they gain prestige among their peers and sometimes get a feeling of "belonging"

                              I think there is probably even a certain number who join religions for the same reason. They either end up in cults, or sometimes even in Christian churches, but maybe fall away or turn into those weirdos we get sometimes on tweb with those oddball ideas when there isn't enough "secret" stuff in a regular church. Like Mikiel. Or the Bible Wheel guy.

                              Comment

                              Related Threads

                              Collapse

                              Topics Statistics Last Post
                              Started by RumTumTugger, 02-06-2024, 11:54 AM
                              5 responses
                              39 views
                              0 likes
                              Last Post rogue06
                              by rogue06
                               
                              Started by Ronson, 08-13-2023, 02:09 PM
                              57 responses
                              523 views
                              0 likes
                              Last Post Ronson
                              by Ronson
                               
                              Working...
                              X