# Thoughts While In Quarantine - WRT The Flat Earthers **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 9, 2020, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411 "2020-04-09T09:49:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2020, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/21 "2020-04-11T14:22:51Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > RIght, a dome. Forgot about that one. It’s remarkably hard to remember “facts” as created out of nothing by others. > > Now, the edge of the dome goes around the mysterious Antarctic wall. The peak is over the North Pole. Which would mean that the atmosphere would behave dramatically differently in the Arctic and Antarctic regions. Which doesn’t happen and they are completely oblivious to points such as this. > > One thing I don’t understand is this “free pass” these people get. They don’t have to specify any Physics equations, do any measurements, do any Math, etc. > > And it’s not just the Flat Earth folks. All these sorts of Science-deniers don’t have to provide any such thing. > > **Why? Why aren’t they embarrassed by their lack of the simplest formulas?** > > (Note that there seems to be some commonalities for many people of this type regarding other topics. E.g., there’s strong correlation between climate change denialism and social isolation skeptics.) Formulas/math/physics are part of the conspiracy. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2020, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/22 "2020-04-11T15:26:38Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > … > > … Which would mean that the atmosphere would behave dramatically differently in the Arctic and Antarctic regions. … What would be the way it acts differently? Also the Antarctic is colder then the arctic, the seas in the southern ocean are known as the roughest in the world, so there are some differences. But many of them believe that the oligarchy as soldiers stationed down there preventing people from accessing anything south of a certain latitude anyway because John Q Public can not be allowed to see the truth. IDK how the oligarchy gets enough manpower to defend the icewall that circles the entire um disk. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2020, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/23 "2020-04-11T16:36:18Z")
> [@kaiwik](#): > > Sitting and chatting with my daughter got me to thinking, do you all think that the Flat Earth people are truly earnest in what they are spouting, or rather that it is somewhat akin to “belief” in The Flying Spaghetti Monster? It’s commonly both. I agree that flat earthers and other conspiracy-minded folk can be otherwise intelligent; they just have short circuits in the area of critical thinking capacity. How else to explain the book reviewer I just encountered online who is fascinated with crank theories about cancer causation and treatment. This man developed throat cancer linked to smoking and HPV infection, apparently had lymph node metastasis but went into remission after chemotherapy and radiation treatment. Yet he blames unconnected environmental ‘‘toxins’’ and diet, and rants about how the Cancer Establishment doesn’t want to acknowledge real causes and alternative treatments. The guy is no moron, but there’s a severe disconnect from reality here. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2020, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/24 "2020-04-11T16:37:33Z")
The only flat Earther I know is basically an internet troll. He doesn’t actually believe it, but he spends a lot of time going out on the internet and promoting the idea. We’ve had some “arguments” at the lunch table at work about it (put in quotes because even he doesn’t truly believe it) and it is surprisingly difficult to disprove some of his arguments. Quite a bit of thought and depth goes into some of these arguments. It isn’t all just people with a poor understanding of science putting faith over provable facts. I did say to him one time that it’s entirely possible that some of the internet forums that he is trolling could in fact be made up mostly of other trolls like himself, and that there aren’t any, or at least are very few, actual trolling victims. He admitted that since he didn’t actually know any of the people that he was trolling that it was a possibility. ---
**Author:** ![RioRico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f04885/32.png) [@RioRico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RioRico)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2020, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/25 "2020-04-11T18:57:32Z")
Since GPS and sat.phones exist because devices orbit a spherical Earth, FE true believers must destroy their commo and nav devices or be revealed as mindless or hypocrites. FM broadcasts in the 100mhz area are line-of sight and signal strength falls with the planet’s curvature so believers must rip out their TVs and radios too or be known as fools or frauds. FE true believers should be tied to balloons ascending to the ionosphere so they can witness Earth’s curvature or lack thereof. It’s only moral. 🆒 Side note: I long ago modded a UFO-paranormal-conspiracy site. I quit after a few months because EVERY fucking conspiracy theory eventually blamed Jews. Modern CTs are anti-Semitic at the core. Self-proclaimed Xian fundamentalist FE believers fit the same mold, distrusting “Jewish science” but faithful to bad translations. Yikes. ---
**Author:** ![skdo23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@skdo23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/skdo23)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2020, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/26 "2020-04-11T19:02:19Z")
The problem with flat earthers, Holocaust deniers, etc. is that the rest of us do not consider them legitimate schools of thought so society does not expect us to be prepared to present counter arguments in order for our opposing beliefs to be considered valid the way we are expected to with topics like politics and economics where there can be more than one mainstream viewpoint. My response to one of those people would basically be “fuck you, you’re an idiot so don’t talk to me” which to a purely objective observer would make me out to be the idiot. Also, people making those arguments may not necessarily believe in what they’re arguing as fact, they’re just doing so as a way to attack so called elitist scientists, express their hatred and distrust of Jews, etc. and provoke those who feel otherwise. To make a comparison, a close friend of mine and I are Beatles fans and the whole “Paul is dead” thing is a sort of shibboleth between us, even though we both know deep down it is probably pure BS, because it gives us a reason to learn about and discuss the music and lives of the Beatles which is a topic of great interest to us. I can’t imagine though what the average person would think of us if they overheard one of our conversations. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/27 "2020-04-13T13:51:31Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Among those who get their flat-earth ideas from the Bible, why do they think the earth is flat-disk shaped and not square? After all, The Book does mention the four corners of the earth. [Cite.](https://biblehub.com/revelation/7-1.htm) The book of Isaiah mentions that the Earth is a circle. It’s the Big Book of Multiple Choice. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/28 "2020-04-13T14:52:07Z")
> [@RioRico](#): > > Since GPS and sat.phones exist because devices orbit a spherical Earth, FE true believers must destroy their commo and nav devices or be revealed as mindless or hypocrites. It’s not that simple. We have no way of telling how those devices work, it could be terrestrial based, or even inertial based, and since there is no outerspace, and also the concept of a orbit is just laughable as things fall down, and down is down, not ‘in’. I have no idea why we just can’t use suction cups to attach these things to the firiment. > [@](#): > > FM broadcasts in the 100mhz area are line-of sight and signal strength falls with the planet’s curvature so believers must rip out their TVs and radios too or be known as fools or frauds. And radio signals fall off over distances and also terrain features. Even sun light can only spread out so far even though it is always overhead on a flat earth. > [@](#): > > FE true believers should be tied to balloons ascending to the ionosphere so they can witness Earth’s curvature or lack thereof. It’s only moral. 🆒… They could have flown the concord which got high enough to see it, but that’s not available anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/29 "2020-04-13T15:04:24Z")
In general, many people have no idea how it is we know things. They think a bunch of people just decide which idea seems intuitively right to them. And so, if the earth seems flat to you, why is that intuitive idea not just as valid? But then, with the flat earth, you additionally have to reject all the photos of the earth, all maps, GPS, astronomy etc, so you have to combine it with CT nonsense on an epic scale. In my daily life I don’t go out of my way to correct false beliefs. But conspiracy theories, backed up by nothing but “It stands to reason!” are such a scourge, I never let them go unanswered. FE shows just the kind of bullshit people can find down that rabbit hole, often with life and death consequences (e.g. anti-vaccine CTs). ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/30 "2020-04-13T17:49:46Z")
> [@phreesh](#): > > It’s not so much crazy as simplistic. Our everyday lives are basically lived on a flat disk. I see a flat horizon. I can walk and drive for hours and hours and it still looks flat in all directions. > > It’s only once you leave everyday experience, like travelling in space or thinking about other planets/stars/other astronomical stuff that it starts to matter. Or, I don’t know, go to the beach and watch a large ship sail over the horizon. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/31 "2020-04-13T18:32:50Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Or, I don’t know, go to the beach and watch a large ship sail over the horizon. They don’t like that one, often claiming it doesn’t happen, till they can’t deny it, then they come up with atmospheric lensing, which is a real thing and allows us to see over the horizon a bit, however to make it work for FE the bending has to work the opposite way. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2020, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/32 "2020-04-13T22:28:51Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Or, I don’t know, go to the beach and watch a large ship sail over the horizon. The fact that Christopher Columbus made it back home should have settled the matter. If he had sailed off the edge, as shown in [this video starting at 4:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MInOApCkA98) and never returned, then Europeans would never have come back to conquer the New World. ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2020, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/33 "2020-04-14T16:04:03Z")
> [@kanicbird](#): > > … however to make it work for FE the bending has to work the opposite way. An annoying detail - but minor in comparison to the benefit of having a handy buzz-phrase (“atmospheric lensing”) to mention while handwaving. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2020, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/34 "2020-04-14T16:19:22Z")
I’m sure it’s just fun for some, a few fools take it truly seriously, and some people live in that in-between land where fact and fiction are interchangeable because it doesn’t affect anybody. As a Last Thursdayist I have no problem with the latter. ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2020, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/35 "2020-04-14T18:37:17Z")
> [@cormac262](#): > > If you have Netflix, there is a documentary called “Behind the Curve” that I’d recommend. We watched that at my house several months ago and I found it fascinating. One of the biggest takeaways that I got from it is that flat earthers are all conspiracy-minded and in fact don’t even trust each other many times. So there ends up being infighting between these groups of like-minded people. The other part that I thought was great was at the end. This guy is working through all these calculations to use a laser beam two prove the earth is flat. They point the beam and it doesn’t prove what he wants it to prove and his immediate reaction is “That’s interesting.” ---
**Author:** ![cormac262](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f14d63/32.png) [@cormac262](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cormac262)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2020, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/36 "2020-04-15T01:20:04Z")
> [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](#): > > The other part that I thought was great was at the end. This guy is working through all these calculations to use a laser beam two prove the earth is flat. They point the beam and it doesn’t prove what he wants it to prove and his immediate reaction is “That’s interesting.” This was the most fascinating aspect of the documentary. That there were “bright” and scientifically minded FE-thers to actually come up with these valid experiments to prove their belief: the navigational gyro guy, and the guys at the end with the laser/flashlight along the aqueduct experiments. Yet their experiments fail to prove their hypothesis: that which they already believe to be true. Their reactions were priceless, and I give them points for not immediately making some excuse up which explained the failure. As with most scientists, when the result wasn’t what they expected, they questioned the experiment and their performing of the experiment. Very reasonable and logical. The question then, is if/when they determine that their experiment was valid and performed correctly, will they be able to accept that it proves their hypothesis is false ? ---
**Author:** ![RioRico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f04885/32.png) [@RioRico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RioRico)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2020, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/37 "2020-04-15T04:23:15Z")
I still don’t quite understand how round-Earth conspirators profit from their deception. There can’t be THAT much market for school globes. > [@Senegoid](#): > > The fact that Christopher Columbus made it back home should have settled the matter. If he had sailed off the edge, as shown in [this video starting at 4:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MInOApCkA98) and never returned, then Europeans would never have come back to conquer the New World. Colombo set sail with four ships. The Santa Cruz sailed off the edge. Musk’s space-Tesla is in hot pursuit. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2020, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/38 "2020-04-15T11:18:24Z")
> [@RioRico](#): > > I still don’t quite understand how round-Earth conspirators profit from their deception. There can’t be THAT much market for school globes. Buy into the world system, including consumerism, by discrediting what God has told us, including that God will provide for our needs. So lots of money. Also as I said it gives a excuse for the rapture, they went to a mars colony. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Librarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_librarian/32/402_2.png) [@The\_Librarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Librarian)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2020, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411/39 "2020-04-15T12:55:40Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > The only flat Earther I know is basically an internet troll. He doesn’t actually believe it, but he spends a lot of time going out on the internet and promoting the idea. We’ve had some “arguments” at the lunch table at work about it (put in quotes because even he doesn’t truly believe it) and it is surprisingly difficult to disprove some of his arguments. Quite a bit of thought and depth goes into some of these arguments. It isn’t all just people with a poor understanding of science putting faith over provable facts. > > I did say to him one time that it’s entirely possible that some of the internet forums that he is trolling could in fact be made up mostly of other trolls like himself, and that there aren’t any, or at least are very few, actual trolling victims. He admitted that since he didn’t actually know any of the people that he was trolling that it was a possibility. Can you link/name some of his arguments? The stuff I’ve seen so far can be easily disproven by my 7 year old (with no particular interest in physics or astronomy). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thoughts-while-in-quarantine-wrt-the-flat-earthers/851411.md?page=1)