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Interesting bit to be found at The Conversation:
Speakers recently flew in from around (or perhaps, across?) the earth for a three-day event held in Birmingham: the UK's first ever public Flat Earth Convention. It was well attended, and wasn't just three days of speeches and YouTube clips (though, granted, there was a lot of this). There was also a lot of team-building, networking, debating, workshops – and scientific experiments.
Yes, flat earthers do seem to place a lot of emphasis and priority on scientific methods and, in particular, on observable facts. The weekend in no small part revolved around discussing and debating science, with lots of time spent running, planning, and reporting on the latest set of flat earth experiments and models. Indeed, as one presenter noted early on, flat earthers try to "look for multiple, verifiable evidence" and advised attendees to "always do your own research and accept you might be wrong".
While flat earthers seem to trust and support scientific methods, what they don't trust is scientists, and the established relationships between "power" and "knowledge". This relationship between power and knowledge has long been theorised by sociologists. By exploring this relationship, we can begin to understand why there is a swelling resurgence of flat earthers.
Interestingly enough, the author delves into philosophy, particularly the work of Michel Foucault, who, for those not familiar with him, traced the relations between knowledge and power, especially in The Archaeology of Knowledge.
In the 21st century, we are witnessing another important shift in both power and knowledge due to factors that include the increased public platforms afforded by social media. Knowledge is no longer centrally controlled and – as has been pointed out in the wake of Brexit – the age of the expert may be passing. Now, everybody has the power to create and share content. When Michael Gove, a leading proponent of Brexit, proclaimed: "I think the people of this country have had enough of experts", it would seem that he, in many ways, meant it.
Ah, that explains so much beyond Brexit! Alternative Knowledge!
And for those who will never read the entire article, bit of the take-away:
In many ways, a public meeting of flat earthers is a product and sign of our time; a reflection of our increasing distrust in scientific institutions, and the moves by power-holding institutions towards populism and emotions. In much the same way that Foucault reflected on what social outcasts could reveal about our social systems, there is a lot flat earthers can reveal to us about the current changing relationship between power and knowledge. And judging by the success of this UK event – and the large conventions planned in Canada and America this year – it seems the flat earth is going to be around for a while yet.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Lester on Saturday May 05 2018, @07:24PM (4 children)
Heliocentrism is more counterintuitive, you need a lot of sky observation and a dramatic change of point of view. But spherical Earth is almost evident, you don't need a very advanced technology. It is known since ancient Greeks. They even calculated the radius with an error of 15%. Greeks, like many sea people (Chinese, Indian) , watched how ships in sea disappeared, first the hull, and then slowly the mast, And the same happened in every direction. Spherical Earth was the only logical explanations.
I can't believe that an educated person nowadays really believes that Earth is flat. I think it looks more like a debate competition, they have picked a side and know try to destroy opponent arguments and make their arguments. They know they are the underdog, Spherical Earth arguments are overwhelming, but that only makes for them fight more interesting. But deep inside I'm sure they know Earth is Spherical. Supporting flat Earth theory It is just an entertainment.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 05 2018, @07:55PM (3 children)
Heliocentrism isn't really a scientific truth but a stupid talking point anyway.
For example as far as we know the universe has no "magic special point", so you can put your reference wherever you want without the physics changing even one bit.
Also the sun isn't remotely the center because it also goes in a circle around the galactic core.
There isn't really a center anyway since the planets don't go in exact circles but slight ellipses even if you take the sun as reference point.
Now it is however correct that "if you take the sun as reference/fix point, the movement of the planets can be quite simply approximated as circles while their paths are very complex to describe even very approximately when taking the Earth as reference/fix point".
(Score: 3, Touché) by takyon on Saturday May 05 2018, @08:11PM
The Earth is the center of the (Earth's) observable universe.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday May 05 2018, @10:46PM (1 child)
Occam's Razor.
If you model the Earth, Sun, and nearby planets against the Earth as a reference point, the equations are horrendous (ever heard of epicycles?) and very inaccurate to boot, and there are no good physical theories that explain the model, again without huge amounts of complexity and demonstrable inaccuracy.
If you model the system using the Sun as a reference point, the equations are stupidly simple and stupidly accurate, and it can be easily explained by Newtonian physics.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 06 2018, @12:36PM
This is amazingly incorrect. The equations are extremely complex (actually too complex for anyone to solve directly) and must use corrections to Newtonian physics for general relativity:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jet_Propulsion_Laboratory_Development_Ephemeris [wikipedia.org]
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article-abstract/456/4/4015/1032033?redirectedFrom=PDF [oup.com]