"And yet it turns!" - these words, according to legend, were spoken by Galileo Galilei, rising from his knees after the trial of the Inquisition, which forced him to renounce the belief that the Earth revolves around the Sun, and not vice versa. But the great Italian scientist faced a painful death at the stake.
And what would happen today if some clever guy at a meeting of the Academy of Sciences exclaimed: “And yet it is flat!”? In his worst case, he would become a patient in ward # 6.
It would seem that only a madman can dispute that our planet has the shape of a ball, or, more precisely, a geoid. Nevertheless, there is a flat earth society in the United States with hundreds of adherents around the world. They give a lot of convincing enough arguments in favor of the fact that we live not on a ball, but on a disk.
"Flat Earthers" and "Sharovers"
Many ancient peoples were convinced that the Earth was flat. Surrounded by the waters of the World Ocean, it stands on the backs of three whales (as an option - three elephants or a giant turtle). In Hinduism and Buddhism, Jambudwipa - the land of people - is a flat disc in the middle of the ocean. In the center is Mount Meru, the top of the world, and all continents are its slopes. The sun, moon and stars revolve around Mount Meru. And the ocean is surrounded by a ring of high impassable mountains that prevent water from flowing into the void.
The early ancient philosophers Leucippus and Democritus also argued that the earth was flat. But Aristotle in 330 BC gave evidence of the sphericity of our planet, based on a change in the horizon line and a shift in the position of the constellations at different latitudes. In addition, he noticed that the shadow of the Earth during a lunar eclipse is always round.
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In the 1st century, Pliny the Elder wrote about the sphericity of the Earth as a generally accepted fact. Nevertheless, the confrontation between "flat-earthers" and "sharovers" continued for many centuries with varying success. For example, in Western Europe and Muslim countries in the early Middle Ages (V-XI centuries), under the influence of leading religions, the idea of a flat earth prevailed.
But the development of astronomical and geographical knowledge led to the fact that already in the late Middle Ages (XIV-XV centuries) the sphericity of the Earth was not questioned by educated people and was not denied by religious authorities. However, in Russia the concept of a flat earth was considered on a par with the geocentric picture of the world up to the 17th century.
Flat Earth Society
And in 1816, the English inventor Samuel Rowbotham was born. Throughout his conscious life, he conducted various experiments and experiments. The inventor presented their results under the pseudonym Parallax in a small book "Zetetic Astronomy: Earth is not a ball". The author argued that the Earth has the shape of a flat disk.
This book was reprinted several times, and each time both the number of pages in it and the number of supporters of Rowbotham's theory grew. His followers founded the Ecumenical Zetetic Society in England. Then Rowbotham's ideas crossed the ocean and were adopted by the American John Alexander Dowie, who founded the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church in 1895.
In 1906 this church was headed by Wilbur Glenn Voliva. He was a passionate preacher who championed and promoted Parallax's views. After the death of Voliva in 1942, the activities of the Ecumenical Zetetic Society died out. It was revived in 1956 by Samuel Shenton under the name International Flat Earth Society. In 1971, Charles Johnson became the president of the society.
Over the three decades of his presidency, the number of flat earth advocates has grown significantly.
The Society distributed brochures, newsletters, and other literature promoting the flat earth model. Although Johnson died in 2001, the International Flat Earth Society continues to function.
How many people are in it, no one knows for sure, the numbers range from hundreds to several thousand. But, judging by the Internet, there are supporters of the flat earth theory in almost all countries of the world, including Russia.
Entertaining cosmology
"Flat-earthers" represent our planet as a disk with a diameter of slightly more than 40 thousand kilometers, in its center - the North Pole. Where, then, is Yuzhny? But he is not - and that's it! There is no Antarctica either. There is the edge of the world, an ice wall that encircles the world and prevents the oceans from spreading. And what is behind this insurmountable obstacle?
Someone claims that these ices are endless. Others believe that the icy desert still ends somewhere with a cliff into the bottomless abyss of emptiness.
The earth is covered with a transparent dome, over which the sun, moon and stars revolve, providing a change of day and night. Gravity doesn't exist. In fact, the Earth is flying upward at a constant acceleration of 9.81 meters per second. And therefore, any objects thrown upwards do not fall down, but are caught up by the ground.
Thus, if you jump, then the earth does not pull you, but rises up and hits you on the heels. But if this theory is correct, the skeptic arises a natural question: how insects, birds and even airplanes can fly? After all, since the disk rises all the time, a body that is in the air for a long time would inevitably collide with the surface or even flatten itself against it. And what is the force that pushes the Earth up?
"Flat-earthers" find it difficult to give a clear answer to these questions. But if you ask them what will happen if the planet picks up maximum speed, they will answer that thanks to the curvature of space-time, this can be accelerated indefinitely.
Irrefutable evidence
Flat-earthers provide strong evidence to support their theory. So, if the Earth is a ball, then nothing should be visible beyond the horizon. But, for example, the Needles Lighthouse, located near Hampshire in the UK, which is 33 meters high, is visible up to 60 kilometers away.
The curvature of the earth, according to the teachings of the "sharovers", at this distance is 282 meters. It turns out that the point where the lighthouse is located should be 282 meters below the horizon. That is, the lighthouse should not be visible from such a distance - and yet it is in full view!
Needles lighthouse.
Or, when a ship, moving away from the coast, hides behind the horizon, this seems to be an irrefutable proof of the sphericity of the Earth. However, the "flat-earther" will object that if you take good equipment and adjust the magnifying zoom, then the vessel disappeared beyond the horizon will reappear in the field of view.
That is, our vision is limited by the point of dispersion of perspective, and not by the horizon line. If you equip the eye with good optics, then there will be no horizon line limiting visibility due to the curvature of the Earth.
But what about the generally accepted statement that the Earth rotates on its axis, and even at a speed of more than 400 meters per second? The Flat Earther will disprove this with a simple and witty experience. He will take a stone and throw it vertically upwards. In a few seconds, the stone will fall to the same point from which it was thrown, although if the Earth turns, it should fall many meters away.
Proponents of classical knowledge will object to this that atmospheric pressure drags along with it everything that is in its field of action. That is, everything that enters the atmospheric layer flies along with the Earth's surface.
Once the Italian physicist Evangelista Torricelli conducted an experiment. He filled a tube sealed from one end with mercury, turned it over, and lowered the open end into a cup of mercury. The column of mercury in the tube has dropped to a certain level. Thus, the scientist proved the existence of a vacuum, as well as atmospheric pressure, which affects any body.
Supporters of the flat earth theory believe that in the case of the Torricelli experiment, no vacuum was formed in the tube, but mercury vapor simply accumulated there, which, at minimum pressure at the very top of the sealed tube, began to boil at room temperature. That is, there is no atmospheric pressure, and if a stone thrown vertically upwards returns to the same point, then the Earth is flat.
World conspiracy
The "flat-earthers" are also absolutely sure that there are no space flights and cannot be. All the magnificent photos and videos taken from satellites circling over our planet and astronauts from the orbital stations are shameless fakes. Roscosmos, NASA and space agencies of other countries have been using computer graphics since 1957, that is, for 60 years, misleading everyone.
Spaceships and other gadgets are made of cardboard and plywood, all travels into space are filmed according to fictional scenarios on earth. And the Americans were not on the moon: gullible earthlings were slipped shooting in the pavilions of Hollywood and the deserts of Nevada.
The prevailing point of view about the sphericity of the Earth is just a conspiracy sponsored by the Freemasons in order to hide the truth from the entire population of the planet. Everyone who knows the truth: scientists, NASA employees, astronauts, are funded by the Freemasons and are also participants in the conspiracy.
However, it may be that the "flat-earthers" are right. The earth is not quite a ball, after all. It is a geoid, as it is somewhat flattened at the poles. Flattened? But to what extent? What if it's still flat?
Nikolay VALENTINOV, magazine "Secrets of the XX century" No. 14, April 2017