I want to prove that the earth is round.

[Slade]

I have met several people online who believe that the Earth is flat, my craziest experience is this one guy believed that "There's no universe, the sun and moon are only 30 miles away from us." I can't debate him cause I don't know a lot in those fields. Can I get some help to debate him.?

 

[ISamson]

Welcome to PF!
How can the sun and moon be both 30 miles away from us?

 

[fresh_42]

We know that the Earth is a ball for approximately 2,200 years now. Yet, there are people who refuse to accept it. I don't think you can debate with someone who is deliberately ignoring facts known for such a long time. In addition the entire situation is funny, because this internet debate very likely uses satellites to take place. If this person lives on a shore, then the answer is easy: ships at the horizon always will be seen at the top before their body can be seen, which a flat Earth would contradict. In any case, I recommend not to try it, because it is hopeless.

 

[Slade]

Welcome to PF!
How can the sun and moon be both 30 miles away from us?

I don't even know dude. I don't know a damn thing about astrophysics and even I know that's BS

 

[Asymptotic]

I have met several people online who believe that the Earth is flat, my craziest experience is this one guy believed that "There's no universe, the sun and moon are only 30 miles away from us." I can't debate him cause I don't know a lot in those fields. Can I get some help to debate him.?

Tell him this.
1. Pick an initial direction, then drive 30 miles. If this doesn't get you to the moon or sun, go back, and shift direction 90° (or by less, if you prefer).
2. Repeat step 1 until you've reached the sun or moon.
3. If this doesn't work, trade your car in for a truck and try again. Next step, a Beaver.

 

[ISamson]

I have met several people online who believe that the Earth is flat, my craziest experience is this one guy believed that "There's no universe, the sun and moon are only 30 miles away from us." I can't debate him cause I don't know a lot in those fields. Can I get some help to debate him.?

If the sun was so close to us, then we would be burnt up ages ago because the sun is so hot. So much radiation would also hit us that we would not survive along with all the living things in earth.

 

[Slade]

I have met several people online who believe that the Earth is flat, my craziest experience is this one guy believed that "There's no universe, the sun and moon are only 30 miles away from us." I can't debate him cause I don't know a lot in those fields. Can I get some help to debate him.?

His points where "If the world was a ball or a sphere, then you would feel upside down if you flew from the north pole to the south pole."

If the sun was so close to us, then we would be burnt up ages ago because the sun is so hot. So much radiation would also hit us that we would not survive along with all the living things in earth.

See he doesn't believe the sun is like that. He believes that it's like a light bulb that gives off little heat.

 

[fresh_42]

His points where "If the world was a ball or a sphere, then you would feel upside down if you flew from the north pole to the south pole."

Tell him he is absolutely right and that's exactly why we say Down Under!

Humor is your only chance to have a least a bit fun with such a discussion!

 

[fresh_42]

If you can't convince 'em, confuse 'em!

(You don't have this from me.)

 

[ISamson]

If this person lives on a shore, then the answer is easy: ships at the horizon always will be seen at the top before their body can be seen, which a flat Earth would contradict.

This is an ancient proof, very reliable, and simple to perform. This would most likely settle a debate.

 

[Asymptotic]

His points where "If the world was a ball or a sphere, then you would feel upside down if you flew from the north pole to the south pole."

See he doesn't believe the sun is like that. He believes that it's like a light bulb that gives off little heat.

Better hope they never get around to doing that LED conversion. We'll all freeze to death.:)

 

[Slade]

Better hope they never get around to doing that LED conversion. We'll all freeze to death.:)

Yea no kidding lol

 

[Noisy Rhysling]

This is an ancient proof, very reliable, and simple to perform. This would most likely settle a debate.

You haven't dealt with many of these people, have you? "Optical illusion!"

 

[OmCheeto]

Tell him he is absolutely right and that's exactly why we say Down Under!

Humor is your only chance to have a least a bit fun with such a discussion!

I spent about an hour on a "Flat Earth" wiki site last night. It was quite hilarious.
I'd never researched it before. Those people are quite clever in their explanations.

One thing I didn't see, was how the sun worked. Since they don't believe in gravity, then the sun must be just a big flash light, and no one has mentioned who changes the batteries!

 

[fresh_42]

One thing I didn't see, was how the sun worked. Since they don't believe in gravity, then the sun must be just a big flash light, and no one has mentioned who changes the batteries!

I'm still stuck on the thought: Who changes the light bulb? And how?

 

[Asymptotic]

I spent about an hour on a "Flat Earth" wiki site last night. It was quite hilarious.

You may also find Wikipedia's counterpart Conservapedia to be an interesting read.

For instance, the subject of the Bachman-Turner Overdrive song 'Takin' Care of Business' is described as "The work ethic and promoting self-employment.". This suggests the author has never sung the lyric, "If you ever get annoyed, you could be self-employed. I love to work at nothing every day. And I'm takin' care of business."

Or, in their description of electric motors, "Torque is not related to speed, a motor can have a high turning speed and low torque, and vice versa." although the single sentence in their entry for torque is, "Torque is physical force applied to an object along a circular axis. It is defined as the rate of change of angular momentum with respect to time,".

 

[OmCheeto]

I'm still stuck on the thought: Who changes the light bulb? And how?

Obviously, it's NASA. What else would they have spent billions and billions of dollars on?
They built a giant ladder type thingy at the south polar wall(where the edge of the world exists, for those of you, not in the know.), and change it during, um... Total Solar Eclipses!

And who changed the light bulb before NASA?

 

[Drakkith]

The best advice I can give you is to simply avoid debates like this. You are almost certainly never going to convince a flat-earther that they are incorrect.

Beyond that, you don't really need to know that much about science to accept that the Earth is round. You merely need to trust that thousands upon thousands of scientists (and some non-scientists) are not lying when they say that the Earth is round. And that all those pictures of a round Earth are not fakes. And the curved horizon, which can be seen from an airliner, is evidence that the Earth is round. And our space probes that have been sent to other planets and bodies in the solar system are also not fakes. And a thousand other small things that make no sense unless the Earth is round.

And remember that each individual piece of evidence is mostly worthless if you try to evaluate it alone. It's only when you combine it with thousands of other observations along with the known laws of nature and try to create a working, coherent model of the Earth that all of these small observations make sense. Sure, you could try to say that ships disappearing over the horizon is just an optical illusion. Or that the Sun and Moon behave differently than we think. But you can't create a fully functional model of the Earth and the heavens, one that explains all observed phenomenon using the fewest and simplest laws of nature, without making the Earth round.

Really this comes down to whether you trust that the scientific community isn't so horribly corrupt and evil that it boggles the mind as to how it could ever exist. How could such a community function with so many selfish liars and morally bankrupt individuals? How could so many people motivated purely by self-interest ever come to a common agreement on what to present to the public? This isn't a few dozen people running a Ponzi scheme or on a board trustees, we're talking about tens of thousands of people from different countries, religions, and classes. People that graduated from the most expensive schools working with people who graduated from community colleges and schools of much lesser pedigree. What could possibly motivate so many people of so different backgrounds to do such a thing? Greed? Criminals aren't generally known to be trustworthy. Such an institution would be so filled with backstabbing crooks, each one scrambling to get that golden funding, that the entire thing would fall apart.

To believe that the explanations by the scientific community are so horribly wrong requires that one believe that they are either united and actively working to feed misinformation to the public, or that they are absolutely and utterly incompetent. The former requires explaining the above, while the latter has so much overwhelming evidence against it in the form of modern technology and medicine that it's just silly to believe.

As for how to prove that the Earth is round, just type in "evidence that the Earth is round" into google and you'll get nearly 5 million hits. The first page of results should hold a wealth of good information for you. I only send you to google because I have no better source bookmarked or saved at the moment.

 

[Slade]

I'm still stuck on the thought: Who changes the light bulb? And how?

Well he is religious so that might be an explanation.

The best advice I can give you is to simply avoid debates like this. You are almost certainly never going to convince a flat-earther that they are incorrect.

Beyond that, you don't really need to know that much about science to accept that the Earth is round. You merely need to trust that thousands upon thousands of scientists (and some non-scientists) are not lying when they say that the Earth is round. And that all those pictures of a round Earth are not fakes. And the curved horizon, which can be seen from an airliner, is evidence that the Earth is round. And our space probes that have been sent to other planets and bodies in the solar system are also not fakes. And a thousand other small things that make no sense unless the Earth is round.

And remember that each individual piece of evidence is mostly worthless if you try to evaluate it alone. It's only when you combine it with thousands of other observations along with the known laws of nature and try to create a working, coherent model of the Earth that all of these small observations make sense. Sure, you could try to say that ships disappearing over the horizon is just an optical illusion. Or that the Sun and Moon behave differently than we think. But you can't create a fully functional model of the Earth and the heavens, one that explains all observed phenomenon using the fewest and simplest laws of nature, without making the Earth round.

Really this comes down to whether you trust that the scientific community isn't so horribly corrupt and evil that it boggles the mind as to how it could ever exist. How could such a community function with so many selfish liars and morally bankrupt individuals? How could so many people motivated purely by self-interest ever come to a common agreement on what to present to the public? This isn't a few dozen people running a Ponzi scheme or on a board trustees, we're talking about tens of thousands of people from different countries, religions, and classes. People that graduated from the most expensive schools working with people who graduated from community colleges and schools of much lesser pedigree. What could possibly motivate so many people of so different backgrounds to do such a thing? Greed? Criminals aren't generally known to be trustworthy. Such an institution would be so filled with backstabbing crooks, each one scrambling to get that golden funding, that the entire thing would fall apart.

To believe that the explanations by the scientific community are so horribly wrong requires that one believe that they are either united and actively working to feed misinformation to the public, or that they are absolutely and utterly incompetent. The former requires explaining the above, while the latter has so much overwhelming evidence against it in the form of modern technology and medicine that it's just silly to believe.

As for how to prove that the Earth is round, just type in "evidence that the Earth is round" into google and you'll get nearly 5 million hits. The first page of results should hold a wealth of good information for you. I only send you to google because I have no better source bookmarked or saved at the moment.

I appreciate this, thanks dude. Also nice Doom picture.

 

[OmCheeto]

The best advice I can give you...

Well, you're no fun, "Mr. Science"!

You may also find Wikipedia's counterpart Conservapedia to be an interesting read.
...

hmmm... Being a tried and true liberal(Capital "L"!), I have problems with that website:

Liberal claptrap

Liberal claptrap is pretentious nonsense promoted by liberals. It has the wordy characteristics of liberal style, typically with a self-serving conclusion.​

"Self-serving conclusion"

There you go then.

ps. This topic reminds me of "mathematical recreations", that used to be posted in Sci-Am, way back when I was young.

 

[Asymptotic]

"Self-serving conclusion"

This definition demonstrates a remarkable deftness for self-circularity.
I was also a big Martin Gardner fan :)

 

[jack action]

Can I get some help to debate him.?

Winning such a debate is a hopeless mission as people who believe such a thing only refer to one book. Even if you think you could find the words to make your case in that book, they will distort the words in any way they please to prove their point. Let me show you a real life example that will demonstrate how hopeless it can be (and because it is so ridiculous, it is funny; and I need laughter!).

So there is this reverend who came up with 3 experiments to prove the Earth is flat. One of his experiment (that anyone can do at home) shows that gravity doesn't exist (don't laugh yet, it is not the funny part):

So, the scientists want you to think that because the Earth is so much more massive than people or things, that people will naturally "stick" to the bottom of the Earth because of gravity.

This can be disproved very simply. Get a balloon and inflate it as big as possible. It will be a spherical shape. Now, take a piece of paper and try to rip, tear, or cut the tiniest speck of paper possible. This paper represents a human being, much smaller in mass to the balloon, which represents the Earth. Now try and place the small piece of paper to the underside of the balloon. What happens? It falls off!

So many people commented this thread after trying the experiments and one guy responded this (don't laugh yet, it is not the funny part):

I actually tried this, Brother, but the speck of paper stuck on the bottom. I am a little confused now, could it be that it is because of "electrostatic force," which is something atheists babble about when something does anything that can't be explained by gravity, or is it Satan messing things up again?

Luckily, a third person can explain why the experience failed, based on the only reliable source he knows (this is the funny part):

Try using a beach ball instead of a balloon. This eliminates the problem.

It's definitely Satan messing things up again. God hates balloons, so any experiment you try to do usign them is bound to fail!

«And it shall come to pass in the day of the LORD's sacrifice, that I will punish the princes, and the king's children, and all such as are clothed with strange apparel» (Zephaniah 1:8)

God hates people who dress in strange apparel, so He hates clowns. And clowns blow up balloons, so He hates balloons. Simple as that.

«Simple as that», he says!

How can you argue with someone who goes - with such conviction - from «I will punish the princes, and the king's children, and all such as are clothed with strange apparel» to «God hates balloons» in 20 words or so?

Impossible task, I say.

 

[fresh_42]

O.k., the topic brought some fun, but before it slips into a religious discussion, it's time to close it.

For the record: http://www.landoverbaptist.net/ as source of the previous story is a parody website.