The earth is flat as a table top, who said. Flat Earth Theory

On October 4, 2017, planet Earth celebrated the 60th anniversary of the beginning of the space age of mankind - the launch of the first artificial Earth satellite into orbit.

Satellite for exposing the conspiracy of scientists

But, as it turns out, there are still skeptics who believe that all space research is a complete hoax. In particular, scientists allegedly lie about what shape our planet actually has.

At the end of September American hip-hop artist Bobby Ray Simons, performing under the pseudonym B.o.B, began raising funds for the construction of satellites. With their help, he plans to expose the NASA conspiracy and prove that the Earth is actually flat.

This could be regarded as a curiosity, but, as it turns out, a not very large, but quite active brotherhood of flat Earth supporters operates throughout the planet.

Mr Rowbotham and his followers

In 1992, the Vatican was perhaps the most conservative world organization- officially rehabilitated Galileo Galilei, recognizing that the Earth is not a stationary body and does indeed revolve around the Sun. This would seem to be the end of the flat Earth story. But it turned out completely differently.

In the 19th century English inventor and writer Samuel Rowbotham wrote a book in which, based on his own experience, he proved that the Earth is flat. He popularized his theory through lectures and attracted many supporters. In the United States, Rowbotham's supporters founded the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church, which preached the idea of a flat Earth.

In 1956, the International Flat Earth Society was created. Oddly enough, the ranks of this organization were replenished even after Gagarin’s flight and the landing of American astronauts on the Moon. By the way, it was flat Earth supporters who actively promoted the version that the moon landing was a hoax filmed in Hollywood.

The Earth is a disk, the North Pole is the center, Antarctica does not exist

So what is the Earth according to the supporters of this theory?

Our planet is a disk 40,000 kilometers in diameter, with the North Pole at the center. In fact, Antarctica and the South Pole do not exist - the wall of ice encircling the edges of the planet is mistaken for the southernmost continent. The Sun, Moon and stars revolve over the Earth's surface.

Flat Earth supporters do not consider images from space as an argument. In their opinion, the planet's scientists are in a conspiracy, and everything that is published is a well-thought-out lie.

“I'm going down. At the same place!"

In May 2017 American Darryl Marble I took a construction level with me on the plane and put it on the table in the back of the front seat. According to the man’s calculations, in 23 minutes of the experiment the plane must cover 326 kilometers. According to Marble, if the Earth has a curved surface, then the plane's trajectory will deviate from the horizontal by 8 kilometers. To compensate, the pilot would have to lower the nose of the plane. But this did not happen, which means, they say, the Earth is flat. The experimenter called the existence of gravity “just a theory.”

Blogger jeranism drove 144 kilometers along the highway in his car and recorded the entire journey on video. According to his calculations, if the Earth were a ball, then during the journey he would rise 1.6 kilometers. Since the road remained smooth and there were no bends, it means that no spherical Earth exists.

In July 2017, the fighter for a flat Earth became famous in Russia. Schoolboy Maxim Ozherelev on his video channel on the Internet he fiercely defended the version about the plane of his native planet: “So I jumped. The earth rotates at a speed of 400 meters per second. I'm going down. At the same place! I think why didn’t the Earth do this... movement, and I didn’t fly 400 meters somewhere?”

Maxim became famous throughout the Runet, but turned out to be not a very persistent person. After users ridiculed him, he chose to delete his videos and is no longer performing today.

“Who are we with? With God and the Bible, or with the Freemasons and their pseudoscience?

However, there are people in Russia who are stronger in faith. IN social network On VKontakte there is a “Flat Earth Society”, whose members are more than 28 thousand people.

“This group was created to counter pseudoscience that encroaches on the foundations of the biblical world order,” say the project organizers. — Why do we defend the truth about a Flat Earth? It's not that we're like everyone else honest people, we fight for the Truth. And not even that the plane of the Earth is obvious to anyone who has eyes and the ability to look with them. It's all about the question of trust in God... The Bible gives us a clear and clear picture of the world order. Modern science, financed by Masonic circles, denies this picture and instead puts in its own, designed to confuse minds. We have a choice - who are we with? With God and the Bible, or with the Freemasons and their pseudoscience?

Agree, this no longer sounds like a funny joke. One more step, and adherents of this society will begin to interpret the defense of the sphericity of the Earth as an insult to the feelings of believers with all the ensuing consequences.

Flat Earth on TV

On September 25, 2017, flat Earth supporters in Russia had a real holiday. The REN TV channel showed an episode of the TV show “The Most Shocking Hypotheses” with Igor Prokopenko, in which the floor was given to those who believe the Earth is flat.

Among the heroes of the program were former NASA employee Matthew Boylan, who claimed that he was forced to edit real satellite images to make the Earth appear spherical, and Pavel Sviridov, one of the most famous “flat earthers” in Russia. The latter announced his performance in the program on the Internet: “I am involved in the creation of this film. As you know, success on television is measured by ratings. Therefore, I appeal to you with a request - spread the information about this film as much as possible, let as many people as possible watch it, be active, write reviews, discuss, including on the channel’s forum, and then we will break through this dam of lies and silence.” In the program, Sviridov states that NASA, showing footage of astronauts from orbit, actually uses chroma key and other technologies, falsifying reality. The floor was also given to other flat Earth supporters from among bloggers and amateur scientists who debunked all evidence of the planet’s sphericity.

At the same time, real scientists were not given a chance to speak in the program, and it turned out that they had nothing to object to Sviridov and company.

“Anyone who wants to know information that is recognized by official science should go to a natural history textbook”

But a real scandal erupted after it became known that the author of the program, Igor Prokopenko, became a TEFI-2017 laureate in the nomination... “Educational program.” True, he received the award not for “The Most Shocking Hypotheses,” but for his other project, “Military Secret.”

The presentation of the award to Prokopenko immediately after the program about the “flat Earth” caused indignation among many. The journalist himself answered the critics this way: “I have no goal that a number of data that appear in my program are recognized by official science, for one simple reason: the program is called “The Most Shocking Hypotheses.” Anyone who wants to know information that is recognized by official science should read a fourth-grade natural history textbook. Those who want to know all the versions and hypotheses that exist today - from classic to the most ridiculous and fantastic - come to us. There is no contradiction in this."

Indeed, there is no contradiction. In essence, the TEFI laureate said the following: I have the right to present any theories, and if someone not burdened with the burden of knowledge falls under their influence, then this is not the problem of the creators of the program.

“I don’t believe people can be such idiots.”

The cosmonauts currently in orbit also joined in the discussion of the topic, which became unusually sensitive during the 60th anniversary of the launch of the first satellite.

During the presentation of the SPACEWALK 360 project, dedicated to the first ever panoramic video made in outer space, the Russian Sergey Ryazansky remarked: “In my opinion, flat Earthers are such cool professional space trolling. I don't believe people can be such idiots."

Still, one can argue with space heroes. People can be extraordinary idiots. Even in the 61st year of the space age.

In the middle of the last century, these people united in the Flat Earth Society and have now generated so much evidence for their theory that they have even appeared on the pages of respected publications like the BBC and The Guardian. We talk about the strangest conspiracy theory of our time.

What kind of people are these?

If we do not take into account the ancient ideas about the structure of the world and all the “scientific” calculations of those times, the first person who made a major contribution to the emergence of the Flat Earth Society was Samuel Rowbotham. This is an English inventor who lived in the 19th century. In addition to inventions, Samuel spent his life disproving the heliocentric theory of the structure of the Universe and proving that our planet is actually a flat pancake.

During his life, Samuel developed several important “evidences” and gained fans who, after the death of the inventor, continued his brave work. Fans founded their own communities (among them the Ecumenical Zetetic Society and churches), and somehow nurtured Rowbotham's "flat" ideas until the middle of the 20th century. In 1956, the Universal Zetetic Society was reborn as the International Flat Earth Society under the patronage and presidency of the American Samuel Shenton.

In those days, the community's ideas were spread through leaflets, newsletters, magazines (the first dated 1931, and the rest were published after 1977) and word of mouth, but the society's audience grew steadily. The Internet has made tools for disseminating the ideas of society accessible - websites, forums, publications in online publications, our own encyclopedias and Wikipedia pages.

As science developed, the discovery of space programs and the first extraterrestrial successes of mankind, the Society had to deny more and more things and find flaws in the material evidence. According to followers of the flat Earth idea, NASA is lying, there was no landing on the Moon, all photographs of the Earth from space are fabricated (by the location of some details in the photographs, in particular shadows, this can be easily proven, members of the society believe), airplane pilots are in cahoots with physicists, and the idea of an ellipsoidal Earth exists only to fool people and waste taxpayers' money on other dubious things.

What's the point?

The main ideas of society are:

The earth is flat as a pancake and has a diameter of 40,000 kilometers.
The diameter of the Sun is 50 kilometers, it is located at an altitude of several hundred kilometers (and not 150 million) above the Earth and moves along a complex trajectory (the trajectory can be seen in last video in this article) over the planet.
The stars also move above the Earth, somewhere behind the Sun, along their own complex trajectories.
There are no two turtles and three whales, no one holds the Earth in space. There is no gravity either, the disk simply flies upward at a speed of 9.8 m/s. The sun and stars, presumably, do this with her.
At the center of the flat Earth is the North Pole, with continents and oceans around it. All this is surrounded by a dense wall of ice (alas, without flame). Therefore, it is impossible to fall over the edge of the earth and therefore water does not flow over it. And the South Pole does not exist at all. Airplane pilots lie by spending more time in the air than required when they can fly a short route between continents of different hemispheres. By the way, this picture of the world is the logo of the community.

Flat Earth Society

Logo

The society sees its mission as promoting and initiating discussion about the flat Earth theory, and offers its forums as a platform for encouraging free thinking and discussion, where “free thinkers” could “bravely and intelligently” confront supporters of the globe.

The ideas of the Flat Earth Society are accepted with a bang by some religious people, since, unlike the classical theory, they do not contradict the scriptures and do not require deep knowledge physics. More precisely, rather the opposite - they require serious ignorance in scientific matters.

The society already has its own official website and pages on social networks ( Facebook And Twitter ), as well as a gallery at Flickr. Judging by the site, the guys who run the organization have an excellent sense of humor, style and proportion, and they are great at bringing out all the inner demons of the followers of this “free-thinking”, because on the thorny path of proof, the followers of the society famously cross divine theories with naked physics Baba Mani's level and god-level mathematics.

A caravan of delightful arguments

Over the years of the society's existence, plenty of “evidence” has accumulated. Some of the society activists even produced a two-hour proof film in which as many as 200 arguments are presented. Those who are strong in spirit and know English can learn it completely.

Conventionally, they can be divided into two groups: funny and similar to the truth, and those that make the hair on end not only of physicists. The official website of the society and unofficial forums of followers in English, Russian and other languages are teeming with evidence. We've selected a few of the most egregious ones, but we're not sure if everyone on this list is part of the official theory and not just fan speculation.

If the Earth were not flat, then taking off along a certain trajectory, planes would rise higher and higher above the Earth and eventually fall into space. The most amazing thing about this theory is that, according to society, all pilots are in cahoots with NASA and the company. However, that is not why conspiracy theories exist to provide logical arguments.
If the Earth were round, bridges would be built to adjust for bending (in fact, long bridges are built to adjust for it, but most bridges, due to their small size, simply do not need this).
The earth cannot be round because the horizon is always level and at eye level. On a round planet it should always be below eye level (presumably due to the rounding).
There are places on the planet, for example, the city of Genoa in Italy, from which good weather islands are visible at a distance of 80–125 miles (130–200 km), which, according to society, is impossible in a round Earth.
On routes between southern Africa and South America or the southern countries of Oceania and Africa, planes usually fly strongly to the north, to large cities and from them to the south again, which is completely illogical from the point of view of the globe, but fits perfectly into the theory of a flat Earth (and to hell with economic considerations and features of the relief and climate).
If the Sun were as far from the Earth as astronomers say, then hot climatic conditions, which contains most of the African continent, and the extremely cold Antarctica next door would be impossible. After all, from the Sahara to Antarctica is a stone’s throw by planetary standards, and the temperatures there are completely different.
If the Earth were an ellipsoid, then the North and South Poles would have similar temperature conditions, the seasons would change in the same way, there would be a similar solar cycle, the flora and fauna would be more similar to each other. In fact, the average annual temperature at the South Pole is -50 degrees Celsius, at the North Pole - -15 degrees Celsius. In summer it’s even relatively “warm” by the standards of one of the coldest places on Earth. According to society, this is all because the North Pole is in the center of the planet and receives much more sun. And the ice and permafrost encircling our flat planet, according to a conspiracy of scientists, are passed off as the South Pole.
There is no fixed most “western,” “eastern,” or “southern” point on the planet. There is only the northern one - at the pole. This is all because there is no west, east and south, and “north” is located strictly in the center of the planet.
Magellan did not prove that the Earth is round, because, according to his description of the route, according to round earth it is very difficult to travel, moving straight all the time, and return to one point. But on a flat plane it’s easy. It's just a circle around the North Pole!
It's not just because of the blocks of ice that you can't fall off the edge of the Earth. Between the earth and the sky lies the event horizon, so to someone watching a person on the edge of the flat earth, it will seem as if he has been standing there forever. In general, this place is a space-time anomaly where physical laws do not work or work differently.

How to join the community

If you are impressed by these arguments and would like to take part in a lively discussion about the shape of the Earth, this can easily be done on the Internet. Dozens of forums are returned by search engines for the query “Flat Earth Society.”

On the official website of the society in this moment there are 555 associated members (for comparison: the organization’s Facebook page has more than 50,000 followers, and 4,000 on Twitter). To become one of them, you need to leave a request on the website (by this link), it's free. The second option is to become a friend of the society, and "friendship" will cost $12. After successful registration and payment of the “friendly” commission, you will be sent by regular mail an identification card, a certificate signed personally by the president of the organization, and a bag of all sorts of branded joy - stickers, refrigerator magnets, etc.

So is it really flat?

Video blogger Vsauce, who regularly dives into such depths of science that not every video of his can be understood at first viewing, wondered what would happen if our planet really were flat. What would happen to gravity, to objects that fell on the edge of the Earth or were close to it, and why, in the end, from the point of view of physics, the existence of a flat planet is impossible - look in his video.

However, for the average member of the Flat Earth Society, the phrase that in space conditions not a single physical object large size cannot help but be a ball - an empty phrase, since society denies all cosmic theories and gravity. If we take as a basis the idea that the Earth is a big pancake that moves upward at a speed of 9.8 m/s, then we can assume that our entire existence will end at the moment when our giant pancake crashes into another one at full speed pancake, which may well move at a different speed. And then our whole wonderful, cloudless life will end in one big “wake.” Between us lie tiny stars and the hot ball of the Sun. No giant meteorites and Bruce Willis on a rescue mission, no romance. Burns, suffocation and crushing. It seems that fans of the flat Earth theory should show themselves in cinema.

If someone seriously says to a normal person accustomed to living in the modern news paradigm that space does not exist, planet Earth is flat, and the sun is actually much smaller than we used to think, most likely this citizen will twirl his finger at his temple. Especially if the speaker supplements his conclusions with the opinion that NASA is financed by a secret Masonic organization, and no one has ever landed on the Moon.

The statements seem absolutely crazy, and it is all the more surprising that all these theories have many supporters around the world. These people are convinced of the correctness of the flat Earth theory: for them it is an immutable truth, and not the anti-scientific fabrications of ignoramuses.

Adherents of the theory conduct experiments, publish research papers, providing evidence that humanity does not live on a rotating ball flying through space at enormous speed (30 km/s). According to these people, the earth is a flat disk covered with a transparent dome.

Despite the seeming madness of this theory, it continues to excite minds. Flat Earth theorists can immediately ask the following questions: why doesn’t water from the oceans overflow from the “disk” where the Sun hides at night, where tens of thousands of photographs of the spherical planet come from? We have dedicated this article to the answers to these and other questions.

History of the Flat Earth Theory

School education provides a clear guideline: - this is a fairy tale invented by our ancestors, who did not have the opportunity to carry out serious scientific work. The ancient Egyptians, Babylonians, Greeks, and Chinese agreed that the Earth was flat. The Sumerians and Scandinavians “agreed” with them in absentia. In mythological cosmogenesis, the ancient Vedas and the Bible, our planet is clearly called flat. The same can be said about Buddhist and Hindu practices.

If we talk about an earlier time in relation to us, then there were plenty of flat Earth theorists in the Middle Ages. A categorical breakdown occurred during the Renaissance, and in our time everyone knows that our planet is round. The scientific research of our ancient ancestors was ostracized and thrown to the margins of history.

But this does not mean that everyone agrees with the ideological dictates of modern science. There were people who did not believe the textbooks and began to study ancient treatises in all seriousness.

In the 19th century. in England, the British scientist and inventor S. Rowbotham organized the Flat Earth Society. Rowbotham spent hundreds scientific research which, in his opinion, proved that the Earth is flat.

Hiding under the fictitious name "Parallax", Rowbotham published the brochure "Zetetic Astronomy", which contained descriptions of his experiments and presented evidence of the impossibility of the existence of a spherical earth. Samuel argued that the planet was flat and the ocean was completely flat.

The brochure went through many reprints during Rowbotham's lifetime, and each time it became thicker: Parallax added more and more chapters to it. The number of supporters of the flat Earth theory also grew rapidly.

Samuel Rowbotham was not without marketing talent; he always took money for lectures. The researcher was so confident in his theory that he could attack with his fists those who expressed doubts about his conclusions.

Very soon, adherents of the flat Earth theory appeared all over the world. There were especially many of them in Europe and the United States. Among the followers of this trend there are also very unexpected personalities, for example, Adolf Hitler.

Surprisingly, the number of followers of the flat earth theory is growing every year. In some countries, this idea even caused some semblance of a social split. Adherents of the Earth-disk theory categorically reject the arguments of modern scientists and provide their own evidence, which seems to them the only correct one.

To understand how serious the dispute with flat Earth supporters is, just open the Yandex search engine. At the very first request, an abyss of articles, photographs, videos, forums and heated debates dedicated to Rowbotham’s theory will open in front of you.

Before we begin to familiarize ourselves with the most popular evidence of flat Earth adherents, we will study their key postulates.

Parallaxists imagine the Earth as a disk with the North Pole at the center. The diameter of the planet coincides with official scientific data - 40 thousand km. The disk is covered with a dome, behind which the Sun and Moon are visible. Thanks to these heavenly bodies, there is day and night on the planet. Gravity is something fundamentally different from the phenomenon that modern science studies.

According to Rowbotham and his followers, the South Pole does not exist in principle. There is no Antarctica either. The entire circumference of the earth's disk is surrounded by a wall of ice.

Photographs from space have been declared a clever photoshop and a fake. In general, astronautics is a complete deception and scam. Rockets, devices for transporting and lifting ships are skillfully executed props. Space travel and videos from the ISS are filmed on Earth by professional filmmakers.

The spherical nature of the planet was declared by Rowbotham's supporters to be a lie spread by conspiratorial Freemasons. Scientists, NASA specialists and astronauts know the truth, but they receive money from the Masons and therefore remain silent.

Flat Earth

What is the Solar System?

The idea of flat Earth adherents about the structure of the solar system is also interesting. At school they teach that several planets revolve around the sun; the Earth occupies the third orbit from the Sun, located between Venus and Mars. Is it possible for such a system to exist? Rowbotham's followers answer unequivocally: no.

In their opinion, a model with a stationary Sun is impossible, if only because there is constant movement in the Universe. If the generally accepted version of the solar system were correct, the star would fly through space at incredible speed, carrying the planets with it. In this case, oval orbits of the planets would be impossible, only spiral ones.

Another interesting argument concerns the forces of repulsion and attraction, thanks to which balance is achieved in the solar system: the planets do not fly away from the star and do not collide in space. Proponents of the flat Earth theory point out that all planets have different masses. If the solar system were as described in textbooks, major planets would be located closer to the sun, and small ones would be further from the luminary. After all, an object with a smaller mass simply does not have enough repulsive force to “escape” from the sun. According to the calculations of Rowbotham's adherents, in the paradigm accepted by official science, the Earth would be in the sixth orbit. This is determined by its mass. Such a distance from the Sun would make life on the planet impossible: eternal cold would reign here.

Evidence base

Of course, the most interesting thing about the flat Earth theory is the evidence collected by Parallax supporters. With a planet diameter of 40 thousand km, the planet rotates in 24 hours. These data allow you to calculate the rotation speed: more than 400 m/s. That is, according to official science, the Earth rotates at a speed of 0.5 km/sec.

Rowbotham's adherents ask the question: how can planes land exactly on the runway under such conditions? The earth is round and constantly rotating! According to the calculations of supporters of the theory, the runway will shift due to the rotation of the planet, and the plane will not be able to land.

Another proof: if we agree that the Earth is spherical, a cannonball fired from the muzzle of a cannon in the direction from West to East will be in the air 2 times less than it actually is. If you shoot from a cannon from East to West, the cannonball will travel twice as far due to the rotation of the Earth in the opposite direction.

However, neither the first nor the second phenomenon is observed, which, according to Rowbotham's adherents, exposes the generally accepted opinion that the Earth is a spherical rotating body.

Proponents of the theory also point out: if you shoot upward, the flight of the cannonball will continue certain time, during which the location of the gun will shift relative to the projectile by 5-6 kilometers, but this is not observed.

These simple conclusions evoke a feeling of triumph among Rowbotham's supporters. Traditional Science Answers: Don't Forget About atmospheric column, which rotates with the planet and “drags” everything that gets into it. Adherents of the earth-disk put forward a counterargument that is striking in its boldness: in their opinion, atmospheric pressure simply does not exist.

Official film about the real shape of the Earth from Terra Convexa

At the end of the film, experts from official science summarize the experiments carried out and give an authoritative conclusion regarding the tests performed.

Terra Convexa provides answers to many questions.

Criticism of the theory of atmospheric pressure

The inventor of the mercury barometer, E. Torricelli, suggested that the entire atmosphere of the Earth uniformly and constantly presses on the planet. The Italian proved his idea through experiments with water and mercury. Torricelli refuted Aristotle's postulate that there is no absolute emptiness (vacuum) in the Universe. An Italian scientist created a vacuum in which there was completely no atmospheric pressure.

Torricelli’s experiment worked perfectly with mercury and alcohol, but the trick did not work with water: the Italian was never able to create a water barometer. Modern science has proven that barometers on water are possible, but their size will be much larger than mercury or alcohol ones. You can read more about Torricelli’s experiments in his own works. For example, there you can find out where the scientist got a bucket of mercury, a radioactive liquid metal.

Flat Earth adherents could not help but pay attention to Torricelli’s experiments and try to expose them. In their opinion, a false vacuum was formed in the Italian’s test tubes. In fact, the space was filled with mercury vapor. On this basis, Rowbotham's supporters concluded that atmospheric pressure is a myth, like gravity. The vast space above the planet remains motionless. Adherents of the Earth-disk point to freely flying birds, to clouds that “travel” across the sky at the will of the wind. The pilot of a helicopter hovering above the earth, according to the logic of a spherical rotating planet, must see a gradually changing landscape beneath him. But this is not observed.

Why does a stone thrown strongly into the air land in almost the same place, and not many meters from the person who made the throw? Parallax adherents give an unequivocal answer - this happens because the earth is a flat, stationary surface.

Horizon and curvature of the earth

Rowbotham began making the first experiments about the curvature of the earth; his modern followers are conducting hundreds of similar studies. If our planet is a sphere, then, taking into account the curvature of the surface, the horizon line should be a solid line, behind which nothing is visible. However, in practice, mountains, giant sculptures or Egyptian pyramids are perfectly visible on the horizon.

The Needles Lighthouse in the British county of Hampshire (height - 54 meters) can be seen from a distance of 60 km, with the curvature of the earth being 282 m. If the Earth is a sphere, the lighthouse should be 282 m below the horizon. The situation is similar with ocean-going ships. Gradually moving away from the shore, the ships disappear behind the horizon. This would seem to confirm that the planet's surface is curved. However, supporters of the flat Earth theory armed themselves with high-quality optical instruments - and saw ships that supposedly “disappear” beyond the horizon...

With the naked eye, a person cannot see a ship that has moved away to such a considerable distance; in addition, vision is limited by a scattering perspective. With good optics, the horizon line disappears, and the stronger the optics, the greater the distance you can see.

Thus, according to flat Earthers, there is no horizon line. Photos from the International space station– fake, since the sky is a dome. When flying in an airplane, a person sees the rounding of the earth - but this is only an illusion. Even the UN coat of arms seems to Rowbotham's adherents to be a model of a disk-earth.

Round and at the same time flat Earth: video

Watch a video online about the round flat Earth

Moon landing: NASA hoax

Members of the Flat Earth Society pay special attention to the story of the American landing on the Moon. Of course, they are confident and furiously prove that man has never set foot on the only satellite of our planet. Rowbotham supporters point to photograph spaceship Apollo 11, which is widely believed to have once taken earthlings to the Moon.

With a strong magnification of the photograph, it is clear that the lunar shuttle is made of materials sold in a hardware store: plastic and cardboard shields, foil and polyethylene. Of course, it is impossible to fly anywhere on a device built from such materials.

Proponents of the flat Earth theory carefully studied photographs of astronauts, discovering rings with Masonic signs on their hands. For Parallax adherents, Freemasons are the world's main conspirators who have penetrated all international structures and governments of all countries of the world.

Where do photographs of Mars come from?

The situation is similar with photographs of Mars. For followers of the theory, photographs of the Red Planet are a skillful fake, Photoshopped. Photographers hired by the conspirators take pictures of deserts and mountainous terrain on Earth, then, after processing the pictures, pass them off as photos from Mars.

Photos of the lifeless Martian desert covered with stones have spread all over the world. If we reverse filter these images in Photoshop, we will get an ordinary earthly landscape with a blue sky. There are many such places on Earth.

Weird air travel

Many aircraft routes seem extremely illogical. For example, the Sydney-Santiago flight would seem to be much more convenient to travel through New Zealand. It will be a straight and simple route with one refueling.

In reality, a plane from Australia to Latin America flies through Mexico and the USA. If we consider the Earth to be spherical, this looks extremely strange: the plane makes a large detour, consuming fuel and increasing the distance. If the same route is drawn on a flat Earth map, it becomes clear that the airline has chosen the most reliable and direct route.

Rowbotham's followers suggest checking in this way any air route that seems illogical and strange. When transferred to flat earth, the trajectory begins to look quite adequate.

Video: How do planes fly over a rotating earth?

Why do all planes fly on maps of a flat Earth and not a spherical one?

Picture of the universe

To better understand the logic of flat earth theorists, you need to know what they think about the universe - the Moon, the Sun, the stars. In general, they adhere to the same statements that Rowbotham used two centuries ago. The only thing is that they constantly have to “fight off” new scientific discoveries.

For example, lunar photographs were claimed to have been taken on Earth. Followers of the theory regularly conduct research expeditions, the main goal of which is to search for areas where “false” images from space were taken.

In the summer of 2015, the Society published photographs from the Icelandic expedition, which depicted landscapes that were exactly like the photographs presented by the Americans as lunar. Earlier, journalists suggested that the astronauts of the first Apollo expedition put their hands on the Bible and say: “I swear that I was on the moon.” All astronauts refused. A video of the flat-Earther experiment can be found on the World Wide Web. One astronaut began to rudely swear at the journalist, another tried to laugh it off, and the third simply sent the TV reporter.

The Flat Earth Society analyzed all the data from alternative researchers, superimposed it on its own theory and came to a stunning conclusion: it turned out that the Moon is not a satellite of our planet at all. The moon doesn't exist at all.

But what then do we see in the sky? According to Parallax adherents, this is a constantly updated hologram. They control the hologram from Earth.

But what do Rowbotham's followers think about the stars? People began to study astrology many centuries ago; this science is one of the first in the world. People discovered the same Ursa Major several thousand years ago.

How can it be, flat Earth adherents ask, that during this time the constellations have not undergone any changes? After all, all celestial bodies, including stars and galaxies, move in the Universe at colossal speed. The Earth rotates around its own axis, flies around the Sun in its orbit, but people different countries do they always see the same “set” of stars above them? Why is that? Why do the stars stand still above the Earth, rotating and rushing through space, like soldiers on guard? Members of the Society consider this situation absurd.

In this regard, supporters of the “flat theory” declared the stars to be holograms. They don't exist either.

Sun

If the Moon and stars are holograms, then what about the Sun? Does the universal luminary really not exist? But what then warms the planet and brings life to all its inhabitants?

Flat Earthers claim that there are actually seventeen Suns. They all hover over different regions of the planet, shining and heating with different intensities. The Society's brochures list the characteristics of different suns: Californian, Russian, Chinese, etc.

Any scientist will call these statements sheer nonsense. However, the explanations of Rowbotham's adherents are by no means devoid of a certain logic. The color of the Sun we observe varies from pale yellow to bright red and burgundy, depending on the natural conditions or time of day. According to prevailing scientific ideas, a person sees the sky as blue or dark blue because the sun's rays, breaking through the planet's atmosphere, are divided into corresponding spectra.

But why, then, do we see a yellow sun? If we observe a star through the prism of the atmosphere, then it should be blue. Followers of the flat earth theory give a clear answer: the fact is that the Sun is located not above the atmosphere, but below it.

As a result, the Society paints the following picture of the universe: the Earth-disk is covered with a dome, under which there are artificially made holograms - the Moon, stars and the Sun. Those who wish to learn more about the ideas of Parallax adherents can find a lot of videos and articles on the Internet.

The closer to the light source, the warmer it is

The nature of misconceptions is based on people’s inability to give answers to the simplest questions. At the same time, we like to provide a lot of pseudoscientific evidence for the craziest theories.

For example, try to answer the following question: it is obvious to everyone that the closer an object is to a source of light and heat, the hotter it is. Try touching a light bulb or getting close to a fire – does it get hotter? Certainly!

But why then, when rising up in a hot air balloon, do we find ourselves in a zone of severe cold? And the higher we rise, the lower the temperature becomes.

When answering this question, most people will talk about layers of the atmosphere that have different temperature characteristics. All this evidence is taken from books and has not been tested in practice.

Let's focus on the obvious - the closer a person is to a heat source, the warmer he is. This should also be true for the Sun. The closer to the luminary, the higher the temperature. However, in practice this is not observed. Followers of the flat Earth theory conclude that the Sun is not a source of heat, since in space in this case it would be much hotter than on our planet.

Counter-arguments of official science

Straight horizon

People only think that they see a straight line of the horizon. Already from an airplane or from the roof of a skyscraper you can notice the curvature earth's surface.

Fake photos from space. NASA conspiracy

In the paradigm of NASA's flat-Earthers - almost criminal organization. One gets the feeling that the American space agency is led by Professor Moriarty, and all of his employees are masons-conspirators, hiding the truth from people because of the desire for personal enrichment.

However, there is not only NASA in the world. Russia has its own space agency, Roscosmos, which broadcasts from the ISS and launches manned spacecraft into space. Russian cosmonauts, like their American colleagues, confirm that the Earth is a ball. Is it really true that Roscosmos is also ruled by the Masons?

There is no gravity

Another popular claim of the Flat Earth Society is that there is no gravity and the planet is constantly moving upward. If this statement is true and the Earth does not attract anything, then how can birds and airplanes fly?

The sun is located 5 thousand kilometers from the surface of the Earth, its diameter is 51 km

Why, in this case, do seasons change on the planet, day follows night, are there climatic zones. If the Sun were positioned in the manner described by Parallax adherents, the entire surface of the Earth would have the same temperature.

How do planes land on a round and rotating Earth?

Airplanes “rotate” in the atmospheric column along with the Earth.

Atmospheric pressure is a myth

Anyone who makes such a statement should visit the mountains and experience the effects of atmospheric pressure first-hand.

Books on Flat Earth Theory

The idea of the Earth as a disk is very stable and has been very popular for two centuries. Various authors and researchers paid attention to this theory and presented evidence of the correctness of the Parallax teachings in their books.

One of the most popular books of this kind is “Ancient Cosmology” by W. Warren. This large work tells about the cosmogonic ideas of the Egyptians, Sumerians, Babylonians, ancient Chinese, and Buddhists. Readers will learn how our ancestors imagined the Universe. The book contains more interesting illustrations.

“The Earth is not a ball: 100 proofs” by M. Carpenter. The book contains the most convincing, from the author’s point of view, evidence of the correctness of the flat Earth theory.

“The Earth is not a Globe” by S. Rowbotham. A book by the founder of the Earth-Disc Supporters Society. Rowbotham did a lot of work to confirm the theses he put forward.

“Vasechkin, prove to us that the Earth is round.” - “But I didn’t say that.”
Today we find it easy to laugh at dialogue from a popular children's film. And once upon a time, the shape of planet Earth was the subject of fierce discussions between scientists and was even a bargaining chip in human destinies. For every piece of evidence from supporters of the “round” theory, there were many refutations. Today this issue has been removed from the agenda. Photographs taken from space confirm: the Earth resembles a ball, an orange, a tennis ball, although not perfectly smooth in contour. If Vasechkin had been a diligent student, he would have easily proven this...

How ideas about the shape of the Earth have changed

In the days before our era, science, if it could be considered such, was based on myths, legends and simple observations. The huge starry sky above our heads gave rise to many different fantasies about the structure of the Universe, the astronomical objects inhabiting it, their appearance and forms of interaction.

Later, religion made its contribution to ideas about what our planet looks like, what it rests on and why it rotates. The Creator has his own laws of the universe, so the arguments given by scientists were often questioned or refuted, and the authors of the hypotheses themselves were persecuted.

Versions about whales, elephants and a giant turtle holding a large flat disk called planet Earth seem naive today. However they for a long time were considered the only true ones.

The Greeks had a rather original theory about the shape of the Earth. The flat cosmic body is supposedly located under the cap of the celestial hemisphere and is connected to the stars by invisible threads. And the moon and the sun are not objects of the Universe, but divine creations.

Modern hypotheses regarding the flat configuration of the planet were also very peculiar. In order to defend this version, even the so-called Flat Earth Society appeared. Assumptions about round shape were completely rejected, and the theory itself was presented in the eyes of its opponents as a conspiracy and a set of pseudoscientific fabrications.

Proponents of the flat earth form argued that:

The Earth is a flattened disk with a diameter of 40 thousand kilometers centered near the North Pole.
The sun, moon and stars do not move around the planet, but seem to hang above its surface.
The South Pole does not exist. Antarctica is an ice wall located along the contour of the planetary disk.
The sun, with a diameter of 51 kilometers, is located above the Earth at a distance of about 5 thousand kilometers and illuminates it like a powerful spotlight.

But the main arguments for the inconsistency of the “round” theory were the statements that man did not fly into space, did not land on the Moon, all space photographs of the Earth are falsifications, scientific institutions are in collusion with the governments of pseudo-space powers, and all inhabitants of the planet are part of a big secret experiment.

It is clear that such statements cannot be taken seriously, because such “evidence” has nothing to do with science.

	Rating of the TOP 10 best online schools
	International school foreign languages, including Japanese, Chinese, Arabic. Computer courses, art and design, finance and accounting, marketing, advertising, PR are also available.
	Individual lessons with a tutor to prepare for the Unified State Examination, Unified State Examination, Olympiads, school subjects. Classes with the best teachers in Russia, more than 23,000 interactive tasks.
	An educational IT portal that helps you become a programmer from scratch and start a career in your specialty. Training with guaranteed internship and free master classes.
	The largest online school in English, which gives you the opportunity to learn English individually with a Russian-speaking teacher or native speaker.
	English language school via Skype. Strong Russian-speaking teachers and native speakers from the UK and USA. Maximum conversation practice.
	Online school English language of the new generation. The teacher communicates with the student via Skype, and the lesson takes place in a digital textbook. Personal training program.
	Distance online school. School curriculum lessons from grades 1 to 11: videos, notes, tests, simulators. For those who often miss school or live outside of Russia.
	Online university of modern professions (web design, internet marketing, programming, management, business). After training, students can undergo a guaranteed internship with partners.
	The largest online education platform. Allows you to obtain a sought-after Internet profession. All exercises are posted online, access to them is unlimited.
	An interactive online service for learning and practicing English in a fun way. Effective training, word translation, crosswords, listening, vocabulary cards.

The most famous theories that the Earth is round

Let's go back to the history of early times. Doubts regarding the fact that the Earth has a flat surface did not leave scientists. If this is so, they reasoned, the celestial bodies should be in the same visibility zone, and the time of day should be the same in all corners of the planet.

However, the sun at different zones and latitudes continued to rise and set at different periods, and the stars that shone brightly at one point were invisible at another. All this proved that the Earth has any surface shape except flat.

In the 5th-6th century BC, Pythagoras recounted in detail in his work the impressions of one sailor from traveling around Mediterranean Sea. It was a real diary of observations, which the scientist carefully analyzed. It was on the basis of these stories that the scientist suggested that the earth might resemble a large ball.

In the 4th century BC, Aristotle spoke in favor of a spherical shape. He cited three, now classic, proofs:

When an eclipse occurs on the Moon, which is located next to the Earth, the shadow cast from our planet has an arc-shaped outline. This can only happen if the object the light hits is a ball.
Ships leaving for the sea do not “dissolve” gradually as they move away, but seem to fall into the water, approaching the horizon.
The stars that people love to look at can be admired in one part of the Earth, but remain invisible in another.

The fact that our planet is a ball was among the first to be proven by the ancient Greek scientist Eratosthenes. He made his conclusions using a specially designed pole, which cast a shadow in sunlight.

The method of observing the position of the luminary simultaneously in different populated areas the scientist was able to measure the height of the sun at its zenith and compare the indicators with each other.

It turned out that the points of the sun's position relative to the earth's surface are at an angle to each other. This proved that the planet has a round shape. Eratosthenes even managed to measure half the diameter of the globe. Surprisingly, modern calculations practically coincided with the indicators of the ancient scientist. The size of the Earth in radius today is almost 6400 kilometers.

There are versions of researchers that the shape of the planet is not perfectly round, but uneven, sometimes flattened on the sides. It even more closely resembles an ellipse, although this is not noticeable from photographs from space.

It is worth remembering that Newton also argued that the circumference of the earth’s sphere is not a figure that a modern schoolchild can draw with a compass. Modern space discoveries and measurements have shown that the diameter of the Earth is indeed not the same everywhere.

In the 19th century, the German mathematician and astronomer Friedrich Bessel was able to calculate the radii in places where the planet is compressed. Researchers used these data until the 20th century.

Already in our time, the Soviet scientist Theodosius Krasovsky presented more accurate measurements to the academic community. According to these data, the difference between the equatorial and polar radii is 21 kilometers.

And finally, according to the latest scientific hypotheses, the planet has the shape of a so-called geoid. It is different everywhere and depends on the height of the hills located on it, the depth of the depressions, as well as the intensity of water movements in the world's oceans.

However, the fact that our planet has the shape of a three-dimensional circle has long been beyond doubt. And the presence of many existing versions on this issue proves: the Earth is a unique space object, the mysteries of which scientists are still trying to unravel.

Top 10 evidence that the Earth is round

So, if schoolboy Petya Vasechkin learned his lesson and presented the ten most common (and now generally accepted by humanity) evidence of the sphericity of our planet, this is what he would list.

During lunar eclipse, when the Earth's satellite enters the shadow cast by our planet, it is clear that the reflection has the shape of a circle, a circular segment or an arc from it, depending on the degree of darkness. This is why when the Moon darkens, it turns into a crescent rather than half a triangle or a square.
Ships moving away from the shore do not dissolve, going beyond the horizon, but seem to fall beyond it. This means that the planet is changing its curve. So the worm, moving along the surface of the apple, changes the trajectory of its movement. The fact that ships do not fall from top to bottom, as one might assume, is explained by the fact that the earth is constantly turning, aligning the guides for further rectilinear motion. And of course, a spherical figure is characterized by a shift in gravity towards the center.
In different hemispheres of the globe you can see different constellations. If you imagine a flat table with a lampshade hanging above it, it is equally visible from every point of the table. If you place a ball under the lampshade, the lamp at the bottom will not be visible. Constellations that are clearly visible in the northern hemisphere of the Earth should not be looked for in the sky Southern Hemisphere and vice versa.
The length of shadows that fall on a flat surface has the same indicators. Two shadows from a round object have different lengths and form an angle.
The view of a flat surface is the same from any height. If you rise above something spherical, then you have the opportunity to observe more distantly. The prospect in this case increases.
Photographs taken from an airplane at various altitudes show that the Earth has curves. If the earth were flat, it would look level from any height. If you take a trip around the world, you can do it without stopping because the Earth has no “edges.”

TOP 10 evidence that the Earth is round

We live in amazing times. Most of the celestial bodies of the Solar System have been explored by NASA probes, GPS satellites are circling above the Earth, ISS crews are steadily flying into orbit, and returning rockets are landing on barges in the Atlantic Ocean.

Nevertheless, there is still a whole community of people who are sure that the Earth is flat. Reading their statements and comments, you sincerely hope that they are all just trolls.

Here are some simple proofs that our planet is round.

Ships and horizon

If you visit any port, look at the horizon and watch the ships. As the ship moves away, it doesn't just get smaller and smaller. It gradually disappears over the horizon: first the hull disappears, then the mast. Conversely, approaching ships do not appear on the horizon (as they would if the world were flat), but rather emerge from the sea.

But the ships do not emerge from the waves (with the exception of the “Flying Dutchman” from “”). The reason approaching ships look like they are slowly rising over the horizon is because the Earth is not flat, but round.

Varying Constellations

Paranal Observatory in Chile

Different constellations are visible from different latitudes. This was noticed by the Greek philosopher Aristotle back in 350 BC. e. Returning from a trip to Egypt, Aristotle wrote that “in Egypt and<…>there are stars in Cyprus that are not visible in the northern regions.”

The most striking examples are the constellations Ursa Major and the Southern Cross. Ursa Major, a bucket-shaped constellation of seven stars, is always visible at latitudes above 41° north latitude. Below 25° south latitude you will not see it.

Meanwhile, you will discover the Southern Cross, a small constellation of five stars, only when you reach 20° north latitude. And the further south you move, the higher above the horizon the Southern Cross will be.

If the world were flat, we could see the same constellations from anywhere on the planet. But that's not true.

You can repeat Aristotle's experiment when you go on a trip. These for Android and iOS will help you discover constellations in the sky.

Lunar eclipses

Stages of a lunar eclipse / wikimedia.org

Another proof of the sphericity of the Earth, found by Aristotle, is the shape of the Earth's shadow on the Moon during an eclipse. During an eclipse, the Earth comes between the Moon and the Sun, blocking the Moon from sunlight.

The shape of the Earth's shadow that falls on the Moon during eclipses is completely round. This is why the Moon becomes a crescent.

Shadow length

The first person to calculate the circumference of the earth was a Greek mathematician named Eratosthenes, who was born in 276 BC. e. He compared the length of the shadows on the day of the summer solstice in Siena (this Egyptian city is today called Aswan) and Alexandria located to the north.

At noon, when the sun was directly above Siena, there were no shadows. In Alexandria, a stick placed on the ground cast a shadow. Eratosthenes realized that if he knew the angle of the shadow and the distance between cities, he could calculate the circumference of the globe.

On a flat Earth there would be no difference between the lengths of shadows. The position of the Sun would be the same everywhere. Only the sphericity of the planet explains why the position of the Sun is different in two cities at a distance of several hundred kilometers from each other.

Observations from above

Another obvious proof of the spherical shape of the Earth: the higher you go, the further you can see. If the earth were flat you would have same review no matter your elevation. The curvature of the Earth limits our viewing range to about five kilometers.

Traveling around the world

View from the Concorde cockpit / manchestereveningnews.co.uk

The first trip around the world was made by the Spaniard Ferdinand Magellan. The voyage lasted three years, from 1519 to 1522. To go around Earth, Magellan required five ships (of which two returned) and 260 crew (of which 18 returned). Fortunately, nowadays, in order to make sure that the Earth is round, you just need to buy a plane ticket.

If you've ever traveled by plane, you may have noticed the curvature of the Earth's horizon. It is best seen when flying over the oceans.

According to the article Visually discerning the curvature of the Earth, published in the journal Applied Optics, the curve of the Earth becomes visible at an altitude of about 10 kilometers, provided that the observer has a field of view of at least 60°. From the window of a passenger airliner the view is still less.

The curvature of the horizon is more clearly visible if you fly above 15 kilometers. It is best seen in photographs from Concorde, but, unfortunately, this supersonic aircraft has not made flights for a long time. However, high-altitude aviation is being revived in the passenger rocket plane from Virgin Galactic - Space Ship Two. So in the near future we will see new photographs of the Earth taken in suborbital flight.

An airplane can easily fly around the globe without stopping. Traveling around the world have been performed on airplanes many times. At the same time, the planes did not detect any “edges” of the Earth.

Weather balloon observations

Image from weather balloon / le.ac.uk

Regular passenger airliners do not fly that high: at an altitude of 8–10 kilometers. Weather balloons rise much higher.

In January 2017, students at the University of Leicester strapped several cameras to a hot air balloon and launched it into the sky. It rose to an altitude of 23.6 kilometers above the surface, significantly higher than passenger airliners fly. In the photographs taken by the cameras, the curve of the horizon is clearly visible.

Shape of other planets

Photo of Mars / nasa.gov

Our planet is pretty ordinary. Of course, there is life on it, but otherwise it is no different from many other planets.

All our observations show that the planets are spherical. Since we have no compelling reason to believe otherwise, our planet is also spherical.

A flat planet (ours or any other) would be an incredible discovery that would contradict everything we know about planet formation and orbital mechanics.

Time Zones

When it is seven in the evening in Moscow, it is noon in New York, and midnight in Beijing. In Australia at the same time it is 1:30 am. You can tell what time it is anywhere in the world, and make sure that the time of day is different everywhere.

There is only one explanation for this: the Earth is round and rotates around its axis. On the side of the planet where the Sun shines, it is currently day. The opposite side of the Earth is dark and night there. This forces us to use time zones.

Even if we imagine that the Sun is a directional searchlight that runs over a flat Earth, we would not have a clear day and night. We would still observe the Sun, even if we were in the shadow, just as we can see spotlights shining on the stage in a theater, while being in a dark hall. The only explanation for the change in time of day is the sphericity of the Earth.

Center of gravity

It is known that gravity always pulls everything towards the center of mass.

Our Earth is spherical in shape. The center of mass of the sphere is, logically, at its center. Gravity pulls all objects on the surface towards the Earth's core (that is, straight down) regardless of their location, which is what we always see.

If we imagine that the Earth is flat, then gravity should attract everything on the surface to the center of the plane. That is, if you find yourself at the edge of a flat Earth, gravity will not pull you down, but towards the center of the disk. It is hardly possible to find a place on the planet where things fall not down, but sideways.

Images from space

Photo from ISS / nasa.gov

The first photograph of the Earth from space was taken in 1946. Since then, we have launched many satellites, probes and astronauts (or astronauts, or taikonauts - depending on the country) there. Some satellites and probes have returned, some remain in Earth's orbit or fly through solar system. And in all photographs and videos transmitted by spacecraft, the Earth is round.

The curvature of the Earth is clearly visible in photographs from the ISS. In addition, you can see photographs of the Earth taken every 10 minutes by the Japan Meteorological Agency's Himawari-8 satellite. It is constantly in geostationary orbit. Or here are real-time photos from the DSCOVR satellite, NASA.

Now, if you suddenly find yourself in the company of flat earthers, you will have several arguments to argue with them.