50 Times People Had Such Perfect Comebacks, Someone Just Had To Share Them Online

Sorry, Foxxy, but some do use that as an argument. The mental gymnastics required to stick to their beliefs in the face of evidence that *sometimes they themselves generate on camera* is truly staggering

I honestly believe that 80% of flat earthers are just trolls messing with us all. There can't be any way that humanity can be regressing this badly. :S

Fascinating documentary on netflix called 'Behind the Curve' about the growing flat earth movement. Not sure whether I was amused, horrified, bemused or amusrifimused, it's certainly... something.

Nobody is so deaf as the person who doesn't want to hear.

Yep, flat earthers don't understand basic physics.

No they don't realise that. They're flat earthers, so their intellect is in question.

Yes they do. They say NASA is a big lie and they say the reason you can see the curve from an airplane is because the windows are curved. Or like a fish eye lens or whatever you call it. They say the bible says it is flat. It's insanity.

Just as them why they can't see the St. Louis arch from Chicago. They won't have an answer for you. They'll just scream about the earth being flat.

...you can't see anything at a greater distance than about 5 km, at which case it disappears over the horizon. These are all that can be used as thought experiments or easily proven with practical experiment - e.g. Eratosthenes' experiment is a simple experiment using shadows and distance and a calculation of the distance to the sun (also exerimentally testable); you can look from different observatories via the internet, or travel, and see the sky and prove different constellations; and you can pick a feature on a mountainside, or a particular buliding, calculate at what point it ought disappear behind the horizon on a spherical Earth, and travel that distance and use binoculars or telescopic aid to try and spot it. All accessible to anyone and not hidden behind any gates by any gate keepers. And none of it assumes that you're more clever than anyone despite the lack of proof and the demonstrated evidence to the contrary.

This comment is hidden. Click here to view.

Completely off topic but hi Foxxy! :D

Honestly, I didn't even know that we couldn't see the earth's curve because it was so large until 6th grade. I just had enough common sense to know that it was round

Some years ago I saw the earth's curvature for the first time sitting in the jump seat behind the Captain of a Qantas 747 on our way to New Zealand at 35,000 feet. It looked like a giant beach ball below us!

Yes, they really do use their limited senses as the basis for this. And they seem to genuinely believe all images of space, Earth from orbit, and the astronauts, are all made by a conspiracy to fool us all.

UPVOTES FOR EVERYONE! I'M GOING TO MAKE YOU ALL JUST A LITTLE BIT HAPPIER AND I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU SAY!

Now, in case you do need to explain it to someone one day, the proper explanation comes in many forms but this should suffice: look straight ahead and where is the horizon (elevation)? It is at about x°. Now, turn 90° and where is the horizion. It should still be at about x° (given flat terrain with no gradients). Continue. Pick any place in the 360°, and the horizon will be at x°. You can imagine this on a ball and see how all you can see is actually what appears to be a flat surface. To find curvature would mean that you are not on a ball, nor on a plane. You would be on an arc, perhaps a cylinder. Then you could direct them to Eratosthenes' proof. You could refer to people having traversed oceans for thousands of years using star maps, which necessitates knowledge of different constellations depending on hemisphere - which would not be the case on a flat Earth. And you could show them how you would see the edge (or ice wall) from any unimpeded place on a flat Earth, where in reality

You actually just demonstrated the flaw of rationality that allows things like Flat Earth. The reason is not that the world is so large. They think that the horizon should, basically, arc. That's the curvature they're looking for, and that you can't identify that - especially given the picture as demonstration - shows that you are also susceptible to falling prey to the same kind of logical fallacy. The difference: you stick to a crowd and don't explore outside of the defined boundaries. It's easy to get sucked in once you venture into less familiar territory.

just to clarify, we can't see at ground level with the naked eye. there's still curvature, there. And if they just take a plane ride... they can see it. But I guess they're too worried about flying over the edge...

oh, I've seen them use it even with pictures from a plane, where you CAN see the curve

Sorry Foxxy this is ture and it gets worse. Some of these people spent $20,000 on a laser gyroscope to prove the Earth doesn't rotate... only to have to the instrument tell them it does and they still disbelieve the results! Edit: Watch the documentary Behind the Curve, it's the famous Flat Earther's Jeran Campanella and Bob Knobel doing experiments trying to prove the Earth is flat and how they so terrifically fail.

yeah, thats one of their common arguments.

They do not realize that we can't see the curve because the earth is so large. They epitomize the idea that "logic" -- that is, the conclusions we draw based merely on experience -- is not a good substitute for expertise and an actual knowledge base.

Yes, Foxxy. They actually do use this argument. The fact we can see Earth is round from space is a "manipulated" image, according to them.

Around 350 BC, the great Aristotle declared that the Earth was a sphere (based on observations he made about which constellations you could see in the sky as you travelled further and further away from the equator) and during the next hundred years or so, Aristarchus and Eratosthenes actually measured the size of the Earth!

"Look at me!!! I'm smarter than ALL of you! Pay me attention!!". Sad people.