Ani, Araf ENGL 11000-5BC2 LEC (66236)
9/21/2021
Debunking the Flat Earth Myth:
Throughout the history of man, people tried their best to find the truths of the world. From the creation and usage of fire to the discovery of the atom. Mankind has always been searching for the truth. This also factors into the discovery of the shape of our own planet, Mother Earth. For a large part of human history, people assumed the earth was flat. The earliest known record for a globe earth theory was around the 3rd century BC. However, back then people did not really believe in science. This was a little before and during the dark ages of Europe. Where science was outlawed, and people did not believe in science. Either because of fear or religion, people were very anti-science. One scientific theory that was disregarded during this time was the theory of the round earth. More specifically, the globe earth theory. The globe earth theory discusses how the shape of the earth is a sphere and how this sphere effects things, like weather patterns, climate, even the positions of our stars. Things like these natural phenomena cannot be proven with the flat earth theory. Thus, scientists adopted the globe earth theory and rejected the flat earth theory. It may be mind boggling to understand today, but in the past, the flat earth theory was commonplace and was thought to be common sense. As time passed and people began to be more educated, we moved away from the flat earth conspiracy and as a society, adopted the global theory for our planet. Ironically enough, there are some crazy people that exist today that believe in the flat earth theory. With the advent of the internet, they can connect with each other all around the globe. Ironic, if you think about it. Either way, this essay is going to explain some basic functions of the earth and how the flat earth diagram just falls flat when trying to answer these questions.
If you really think about it, there really should be no reason for gravity to exist on a flat earth. Why would things fall to begin with? What forces objects to fall to the ground? On a globe earth model, we can name this force gravity. We can even discuss the significance of gravity and how it works. Gravity is a natural force that exists in our universe and causes objects to move closer together. Gravity is linked to the mass of an object, the high mass an object has, the greater gravitational force it exerts. All objects exert a gravitational force, even me and you. It’s just, our mass is so small, that our gravitational force is immensely small. The mass of the earth is so much greater than our own, and all that mass is concentrated at its core. Thus, the earth tries to pull everything to its core with the same constant gravitational force of 9.18 meters per second squared. Therefore, when you jump up, you come back falling. Also, this explains why things fall to the ground to begin with. How does the flat earth theory explain the phenomenon of gravity? Well, it doesn’t. The flat earth model completely ignores gravity and even says that gravity is fake. How would you explain gravity on a disk? It just doesn’t make any sense, on a disk, if gravity is moving to one specific point, then the gravity would be displaced the farther you get away from the center of the earth. Obviously, this doesn’t happen in real life, so flat earthers just pretend that gravity does not exist. They try to find excuses for why stuff fall to the ground that don’t equate to gravity. Honestly it is quite sad since none of the answers they give make any sense. The most common answers flat earthers give is, “electromagnetism”. Why? They don’t seem to know either. They just bring up big words and expect you to be so astonished that you won’t notice that garbage flowing from their mouth. Gravity alone debunks the flat earth conspiracy; they have no answer to this. If you want to see something funny, then just try to see how a flat earther explains why when things go up, they must come down.
How do seasons work? Can you explain how seasons work on a globe earth? On the globe earth model, the tilt of the earth causes seasons. The earth is tilted when revolving around the sun and that tilt causes seasons. Let’s take New York for example, during the winter seasons, the north hemisphere of the earth is tilted away, while the south hemisphere is tilted towards the earth. The north hemisphere gets less sunrays, thus we get shorter days and less heat per square meter hitting the north hemisphere. This causes it to get cold during winter. The same logic can be applied in reverse for summer. During the summer, the northern hemisphere is tilted towards the sun, thus we get longer days and, we get more heat per square meter. The more heat we get, the hotter it becomes. The hotter days of summer are a result of this. Now how does a flat earther explain seasons? Well, they say that on the disk-shaped earth, the sun circles in and out of the tropics. This causes the season and makes it cold in the winter and hot in the summer. This obviously makes no sense. If the sun goes into the trophics to make summer, it will have a smaller rotation and this it would have to move at a different speed. This just makes no sense, what causes the sudden change in speed? Do they have answers to these questions? No, of course they did not think this through. The problem with the flat earth proof is that flat earthers start with a conclusion and then cherry pick data to support their ideas. Therefore, they have these “explanations” and big words, but really, they can explain nothing.
Day and night are a critical part of our everyday life. How does day and night work? On the globe model, the day and night and night cycle are caused by the rotation of the earth. The rotation of the earth causes the earth to spin away from the sun. The side of the earth not facing the sun is night and the side of the earth facing the sun is day. This causes the day and night cycle. Quite simple right? How do the flat earthers explain this? They say that the moon and the sun spin around the earth’s atmosphere. This causes night on the moon side and day on the sun side. This makes no sense whatsoever. If this diagram was accurate, which it isn’t, it would contradict their season diagram. If the sun is spinning with the moon, then why is it going in and out of the tropics. Once again, these people think of a conclusions and then cherry pick data that contradicts itself to support their faulty claims.
I have rambled on for a while about these anti-intellectual ideas and how they just don’t work in the real world. However, who is this for? The people who are usually prone to fall for this anti-intellectual dogma usually fall on the republican side of the political spectrum. According to the article, “GOP takes flat earth view, shuns science”, it states, “Donald Trump’s conquest of the Republican Party is the culmination of the preceding stages: an authoritarian leader, so dishonest and careless about the distinction between truth and falsity, that he brings the party to full “flat earth” mode. Whether you admit it or not, you can’t put your faith in him without adopting the corruption of truth.” This basically means, that the republican party is more prone to the flat earth conspiracy because they are the party of misinformation. They will take misinformation that proves their world view, over actual real science. From the antivaxxers, to the flat earthers, they mostly come from the republican party because it is given a platform over there. They are given a stage to talk, and conspiracy theories are very open about being anti science. This can be seen from the mass amount of misinformation spread about COVID-19 from the republican party, from masks to vaccines. It’s obvious where all the conspiracy theories come from. However, that is a different topic for another day,
Back to debunking the flat earth, how does the moon work in relation to the earth? If people were to look up at the moon, what would they see? Would everyone see the same moon, or do we all see different moons? On a round earth, the moon circles around the earth, so whatever face the moon has, everyone will see that face as it cycles. Since the earth is also rotating, people will see the moon at night. Everyone will see the same moon at night. Now how would this work in a flat earth model? On a flat earth model, this is physically impossible. If there is a spherical moon rotating on a flat earth, people would see different sides of the moon. For example, let’s say you and 2 other people preform an experiment. You stand in the middle and your friends stand 1 in front of you and one behind you respectively. Would both your friends be able to see your front face? No of course not, that’s not how objects work. It would be physically impossible to see the same side of the moon from all parts of the world during their respective nights on a flat earth.
Another huge flaw of the flat earth theory is that the earth is the center of the universe. The earth is the canter and the moon and sun orbit on top of the earth. The problem with this is how do solar eclipses happen? How do lunar eclipses happen? A solar eclipse happens when the Moon moves between the Sun and Earth, and a lunar eclipse happens Earth comes between the Sun and the Moon. How would you ever explain this on a flat earth diagram? You can’t, once again, it is literally impossible to explain this. Most flat earthers don’t believe in lunar or solar eclipse and say that they are fake. They don’t even try to argue against it. Also, how would you explain the solar system? The solar system is full of spherical objects and planets, yet the earth is the only disk like object? Why is that? Does that make any sense to you? What is so special about the earth’s formation that makes it take this shape? Once again, flat earthers have no answer to this.
In conclusion, the earth is in fact a globe. This is a universally accepted fact. People from all over the world, whether it be scientists, or average day citizens, know the earth is a globe. So I have a challenge for you flat earthers. At least come up with one diagram to prove your points about how our planet works. Try to figure out one way that the earth is flat and not a globe. This will likely be impossible because you can’t even explain 2 phenomena with the same diagram. I would love to see you try your hand at this.
Sources:
https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/seasons/en/
This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.
