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User:Deacon Vorbis prefers the text In early Egyptian and Mesopotamian thinking, the world was portrayed as a flat disk floating in the ocean, over In early Egyptian and Mesopotamian thought, the world was portrayed as a flat disk floating in the ocean, by reason of, “According to multiple dictionaries, yes, they're synonyms, and it's definitely less awkward with "thinking"”. This is wrong on both accounts. First, awkwardness is, apparently, in the mind of the reader, and in this reader’s mind, “thinking” is definitely more awkward. So let us discard that reason. The first reason, that “thinking” is synonymous with “thought”, is a fallacy. It is true that there are several definitions by which the two are synonymous. However, the specific definition in play here for “thought” has no parallel in thinking: “The formation of opinions, especially as a philosophy or system of ideas, or the opinions so formed: the traditions of Western thought”, (New Oxford American Dictionary, and any other dictionary that ever existed). The example provided in the dictionary is exactly the usage we have in the article. It means the deep, collective intellectual zeitgeist of a group, in a way that thinking does not, particularly. Apparently User:Deacon Vorbis is unaware of this usage. I have reverted the change. Strebe ( talk) 23:34, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
Do the readers need to be told that the consensus of experts today is that the Earth is not flat? (Even the flat-Earthers must agree that the scientists call it pseudoscience.) But I will not complain about saying so. But is there any point of repeating that? It is in the lede. Is that not enough? But I will not make an edit war about the redundant statements about what is perhaps paradigmatic of the obvious in the first place. TomS TDotO ( talk) 10:22, 10 January 2017 (UTC)
Shaquille O´Neal being a big proponent... http://www.newser.com/story/240022/shaquille-oneal-is-a-flat-earther.html Is that worthy of an update to the page. (I admit, I had to throw up) 148.188.1.60 ( talk) 09:40, 23 March 2017 (UTC)Matthias
@ Deacon Vorbis: Why are you removing sources and sourced content? If you wish to reword a part, you may. But deleting WP:RS and content is inappropriate. Have you checked Pingree? The old version misrepresents what he states. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 22:36, 1 April 2017 (UTC)
Why is the article entitled Flat Earth, and not Flat Earth model, or something similar, as in the first sentence? The article isn't about an Earth that is actually flat, but rather the belief that it is flat. — Sangdeboeuf ( talk) 12:53, 3 April 2017 (UTC)
See [1]. Dreadful that this has gotten as far as it did, and that it was approved by senior academics. However, it's now been rejected. [2] Doug Weller talk 11:16, 20 April 2017 (UTC)
Concerning this change, I don't strongly disagree with ‡ Єl Cid, Єl Caɱ̩peador's most recent edit. I agree the current text (the later edit in the diff) is a little abrupt, but I don't think abruptness is relevant in the lede, where each paragraph is expected to encapsulate a different aspect of the subject. My concern with ‡ Єl Cid, Єl Caɱ̩peador's edit is that it implies continuity in flat-earth belief into modern times. There is no such continuity. These modern flat-earthers are largely isolated individuals who start up a "movement", collect a few adherents if they are lucky, and then fade back into obscurity. Hence I prefer the text as reverted to by User:Deacon Vorbis. Strebe ( talk) 20:05, 21 July 2017 (UTC)
In my oppinion, this edit violates WP:Fringe. I won't revert it, as this would violate WP:3RR for me, therefor I put it up for discussion if this should stay. 78.94.53.130 ( talk) 11:59, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
1 The horizon always appears completely flat 360 degrees to the observer, regardless of how high you go up. Any curvature you think you see is from curved airplane windows or Go Pro cameras and fisheye lenses (which NASA loves to use). The reality is that the horizon never curves because we are on an endless plane. On a globe with 25,000 miles in circumference you would see a noticeable disappearance of objects the further they are as they would be leaning away from you and dropping below the constantly curving horizon. Completely flat horizon from the stratosphere:
2 The horizon always rises to meet your eye level never no matter how high in altitude you go. Even at 20 miles up the horizon rises to meet the observer/camera. This is only physically possible if the earth is a huge "endless" flat plane. If Earth were a globe, no matter how large, as you ascended the horizon would stay fixed and the observer/camera would have to tilt downward, looking down further and further to see it
3 The natural physics of water is to find and maintain its level. If Earth were a giant spinning sphere tilting and hurling through space then truly flat, consistently level surfaces would not exist here. There would be a massive bulge of water in the oceans because of the curvature of the earth. If earth was curved and spinning the oceans of water would be flowing down to level and covering land. Some rivers would be impossibly flowing uphill. There would massive water chaos and flooding! What we would see and experience would be vastly different! But since Earth is in fact an extended flat plane, this fundamental physical property of fluids finding and remaining level is consistent with experience and common sense. The water remains flat because the earth is flat!
4 If Earth were a ball 25,000 miles in circumference as NASA and modern astronomy claim, spherical trigonometry dictates the surface of all standing water must curve downward an easily measurable 8 inches per mile multiplied by the square of the distance. This means along a 6 mile channel of standing water, the Earth would dip 6 feet on either end from the central peak. Every time such experiments have been conducted, however, standing water has proven to be perfectly level.
5 The sun is much closer than we have been told. It is, in fact, in our atmosphere. You can clearly see that it is not 93 million miles away. Many times you can see the sun's rays shooting out of a cloud forming a triangle. If you follow the rays to their source it will always lead to a place above the clouds. If the sun was truly millions of miles away, all the rays would come in at a straight angle. Also the sun can be seen directly above clouds in some balloon photos, creating a hot spot on the clouds below it and in other photos you can clearly see the clouds dispersing directly underneath the close small sun.
6 If we were living on a spinning globe airplane's would constantly have to dip their noses down every few minutes to compensate for the curvature of the earth (with a circumference of 25,000 miles the earth would be constantly curving at the speed of an airplane). In reality however, they never do this! They learn how to fly based on a level flat plane. Also if the earth was spinning the airplane's going west would get to their destination much faster since the earth is spinning in the opposite direction. If the atmosphere is spinning with the earth then airplane's flying west would have to fly faster than the earth's spin to reach its destination. In reality, the earth is flat and airplane's just fly level and reach their destination easily because the earth is not moving. Planes Could Not Land if Earth was Moving or Spinning
7 The experiment known as “Airy’s Failure” proved that the stars move relative to a stationary Earth and not the other way around. By first filling a telescope with water to slow down the speed of light inside, then calculating the tilt necessary to get the starlight directly down the tube, Airy failed to prove the heliocentric theory since the starlight was already coming in the correct angle with no change necessary, and instead proved the geocentric model correct
8 The Michelson-Morley and Sagnac experiments attempted to measure the change in speed of light due to Earth’s assumed motion through space. After measuring in every possible different direction in various locations they failed to detect any significant change whatsoever, again proving the stationary geocentric model
9 If “gravity” is credited with being a force strong enough to hold the world’s oceans, buildings, people and atmosphere stuck to the surface of a rapidly spinning ball, then it is impossible for “gravity” to also simultaneously be weak enough to allow little birds, bugs, and planes to take-off and travel freely unabated in any direction. If “gravity” is credited with being a force strong enough to curve the massive expanse of oceans around a globular Earth, it would be impossible for fish and other creatures to swim through such forcefully held water.
10 Ship captains in navigating great distances at sea never need to factor the supposed curvature of the Earth into their calculations. Both Plane Sailing and Great Circle Sailing, the most popular navigation methods, use plane, not spherical trigonometry, making all mathematical calculations on the assumption that the Earth is perfectly flat. If the Earth were in fact a sphere, such an errant assumption would lead to constant glaring inaccuracies. Plane Sailing has worked perfectly fine in both theory and practice for thousands of years, however, and plane trigonometry has time and again proven more accurate than spherical trigonometry in determining distances across the oceans. If the Earth were truly a globe, then every line of latitude south of the equator would have to measure a gradually smaller and smaller circumference the farther South travelled. If, however, the Earth is an extended plane, then every line of latitude south of the equator should measure a gradually larger and larger circumference the farther South travelled. The fact that many captains navigating south of the equator assuming the globular theory have found themselves drastically out of reckoning, more so the farther South travelled, testifies to the fact that the Earth is not a ball.
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I proposed that we include the ten "evidence" and their debunking into the article for Flat Earth. 110.22.20.252 ( talk) 09:02, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
Why would you hide this persons response and put it as "apologia"? This is censorship. This is an entry about the flat earth or round earth? If you want to censor it, then do so under the wikipedia entry "the earth is round". This page should be sourcing flat earth sources and books as there are many. Wikipedia isn't a place to push POV it is an unbiased place to source content.( talk) 09:02, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
"Indians believed earth is flat till Gupta period." Well, it was just a portion of the population. In that period most of the people believed earth is sphere. The lead should be updated reflecting that there was both the views present. —usernamekiran (talk) 20:06, 12 October 2017 (UTC)
Who believed it was a sphere? Where is your source? Vedic astronomy was flat earth cosmology!! Did you live in India 1000 years ago? 20:25 25 October 2017 (UTC)
Wiqi55: Websites, blogs and personal translations are questionable sources and not acceptable. Instead of stating in edit comment "Ibn Hazm's statement is well known and can be supported with sources" but not providing those sources, please find and cite those "can be supported with sources" with page numbers. Please do not add websites/blogs back to this article. I would welcome the same content if it is supported by RS. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 11:04, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
I think we need to do something about this term. It is strewn all over the section titles without regard to the periods under discussion.
Beyond just that, the discussions themselves freely mix vast spans of time. Presently in South India we have material from the Rigveda, the origins of which are truly ancient, juxtaposed with material from Aryabhata, from India’s Classical period, some from even later Indian Medieval, and everything in between. Cultural exchanges that were very unlikely in earlier periods were, conversely, highly likely in later periods; likewise indigenous developments. A reader would be mightily confused by this narrative.
I understand that the South Asia section, in particular, is under considerable flux (and usually is), but it is not the only mess. Temporal compression and mixing is rife. Cultures exist in parallel. Cultures exchange ideas. Coherently representing the modern understanding of what really happened is going to be hard in a single, linear text. Can we please brainstorm on solving this problem? I don't think that haphazardly pulling in references is working. A cohesive narrative is, itself, a scholarly matter. That suggests we resort to scholars who address the whole narrative, rather than just factoids. I don't know who those scholars are. I do think we should be looking harder. Strebe ( talk) 17:39, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
It's best to avoid edit warring. Sarah, please explain here why you think your edit is better. PiCo ( talk) 01:36, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
Ms Sarah Welch: It's not the same topic, Sarah, we're talking here about avoiding an edit war over a specific edit.
I'm sorry I was pressed for time earlier and didn't set out the topic. This is what we're talking about:
Sarah, on another matter, I think you need to consider whether you might be too emotionally involved with this article - you're showing a distinct "ownership" of it, which is not good. Take a step back and approach it as if you'd never seen it before. PiCo ( talk) 02:29, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
@ PiCo:: I am surprised with your strange declaration that Herman Wayne Tull, David Pingree etc are unreliable scholars or what they wrote is non-RS. Please discuss your concerns. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 01:45, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: Please avoid this strange "The fact is that ancient....", or "I have doubts....". It just comes across as your personal wisdom / prejudice / POV being pushed without sources. Let us stick with the sources, and strive for NPOV. You state Sanskritist+cited by others. But then go on and link Williams and Knudsen, plus doubt K.V. Sarma! Have you really checked their background? Reread Williams and Knudsen... fwiw, on page 465, they cite K.V. Sarma. So K.V. Sarma source is fine, according to a source you recommend. An encyclopedia is a tertiary RS, and one published by a reputable publisher is good enough for wikipedia purposes (far better than the unsourced, or personal translations, or the sources in other sections which I hope you or someone would also check). Kim Plofker is a fine source, thank you. I have a copy on my shelf. Again, please read that chapter around page 52, where she is discussing the calendar system in the context of the earliest Indian texts of the Purana genre. Now read the summary we have, it says the same thing in the early Purana's context. We shouldn't interpret what Plofker writes outside of the context of her discussion. Context matters. On Pingree, please see his context and the ideas that medieval Indians did adopt, in his view. Does he say, ancient Indian texts demonstrate that no one ever speculated on spherical earth there, in addition to other shapes? Which page numbers? Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 14:44, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: That is tendentious misrepresentation of the sources and refusal to respect NPOV policy, given what is in Plofker and given the other cited and quoted scholarly sources published by reputable university presses! Please note that voting would not allow you to exempt this or any other wikipedia article from core content policies and guidelines. We can take this all the way to ARB, through the due dispute resolution boards etc process, if you wish. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 11:04, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: No. We already went over this source. See my comments above. The Glick et al edited book is on Routledge Revivals: Medieval Science..., in which Williams and Knudsen discuss theories in medieval South Asia. For the period earlier than what they cover, there are other sources. Williams and Knudsen cite KV Sarma on page 465. KV Sarma does summarize the multiple theories in pre-Greek era in South Asia. We already summarize KV Sarma side in this article and others, please see this section. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 00:13, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: I am open to suggestions that would summarize the multiple sources fairly, without bias and better. On Plofker, please note that page 52 starts a section titled, "Cosmology and time in the Puranas." That is what Plofker is discussing there, and it is inappropriate to interpret more than or less than what she is stating in that section. The subject of this article is Flat Earth, and just like Pythagoras' speculations about earth as sphere is relevant to this article, the Vedic speculations are too. Further, on page Plofker on page 120 states, "the divergence of the above two hypotheses about the foundations of siddhanta spherical astronomy, together with the vast number of details left unexplained by both of them, indicates how much work still needs to be done before the issue can be confidently resolved, if it ever can." I urge you to study Plofker for what "the two hypotheses" are that she is mentioning there. Further, I note for those not fluent with ancient and early medieval Indian texts, that Purana texts =/= Siddhanta texts. It would be a gross misrepresentation of multiple RS, including Plofker, to state or imply either [1] ancient South Asians did not speculate on earth's shape before the 5th century / Greek influence; or [2] ancient or early medieval South Asian texts only mention flat earth / flat disc. Whether you or I are persuaded or not by each other's arguments is not really relevant, what is relevant is that we cite, embed quotes given our content dispute and summarize the high quality sources to the best our abilities and per NPOV etc guidelines. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 02:53, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
I object to this inclusion: One finds in the Rigveda intelligent speculations about the genesis of the universe from non-existence, the configuration of the universe, the spherical self supporting universe [...]. That passage isn't about a spherical earth (let alone a flat earth). One gets the impression that the egg-shaped universe within which "the earth" as a disk or wheel is embedded frequently gets conflated with a spherical earth. What's really going on is this:
...There is a common theory that the world is shaped like an egg, the outermost shell of which is undifferentiated matter; within this is a layer of intelligence and within this egoicity; and within this again in due order are layers of ether, wind, fire, and water. Each layer is ten times as thick as the next one in. The outermost layer of undifferentiated matter is sometimes omitted, but to include it gives the satisfactory number of seven layers. These layers envelop the entire universe; the water thus merges in cosmographic tradition with the water which in Vedic times was believed to be above the heavens and below and around the earth. The earth, the element which comes into being last, does not encircle the universe, but forms a mass in the centre. Its basic shape might be described as a huge flat disc, as it was in the Vedas, but this disc is now broken up into a system of concentric oceans and continents...
From Blacker & Loewe, which gives a comprehensive description of the Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist cosmologies of South Asia all the way up to the medieval period. Despite the myriad convolutions of these cosmologies, nowhere does a spherical earth show up except within the circles of astronomers starting around the 5th century AD from Greek influence. Strebe ( talk) 20:12, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
The Rg Veda, our earliest Indian document, dates from the second half of the second millennium BC.... When sky and earth are spoken of as the complementary pair they are called Dyaus and Prthivi respectively, Dyavaprthivi (in the dual) together.... Dyaus and Prthivi are compared to the two wheels at the ends of an axle, in which case the earth must be conceived as flat, but also to two bowls, and to two leather bags, in which case the earth is presumably concave. (pp 112-113) The cosmography of the Brahmanas is no more consistent than that of the Rg Veda. There are still allusions to the world as bipartite: the world is a tortoise, its arched shell the heaven, its flat underside the earth. (p 116) How do the Hindus conceive of the construction of the universe? ...The earth, the element which comes into being last does not encircle the universe, but forms a mass in the centre. Its basic shape might be described as a huge flat disc, as it was in the Vedas, but this disc is now broken up into a system of concentric oceans and continents. (p124-125)(if you google "Ancient Indian Cosmologies" you can find ELNEVER copies of this chapter online)
There exists in a number of puranas, as Kirfel has demonstrated, two descriptions of the universe having a common source. In this common source the earth, prthivi, with its seven concentric pairs of continents and oceans, is a horizontal disk in the center of a vertical universe enclosed in the brahmanda.
-- Jytdog ( talk) 23:59, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
This article is full of lies and a lot of it is unsourced or has weak sources. The SCIENTIFIC BASIS for a Flat Earth is overwhelming. There is more scientific proof for electrostatics than gravity as the reason for why things fall for example, Sunsets and things going "over the horizon" are scientifically shown to happen due to the atmosphere magnifying the horizon (due to the amount of refraction and water and elements in it) and also refracting the water line up. This is show by timelapse from weather stations such as skunkbayweather for example. Things are visible for tremendous distances without any horizontal bow or curve based on calculations for the distance and height of the occurrence sometimes things are visible that should be a mile under the curve such as corsica, elba and other adjacent islands from across the sea. It doesn't mention the atmosphere and it's effects on light, it doesn't mention that people navigate using a compass and the flat earth model shows magnetic north as the center, it doesn't cover all of the research (a lot of it can be easily sourced to books including Rowbotham). The lack of parralax forces modern scientists to justify a ball model by saying we live in a flat galaxy and flat universe and flat solar system when it is painfully obvious the stars go around us.
Instead the sources are for round earth proponents and bias. Things like calling the theory itself disinformation, calling it fringe and other insults which violate Wikipedias terms of introducing personal opinion of the writer. And if this talk gets removed that is simply more proof that this article is censored.
Wikipedia is not about censorship and not about monopoly of ideas. It is about sourcing information for the topic at hand. This article only sources the counter-thesis, the ideas opposition. The people who have contributed to this are traitors to humanity and to science. Even if they don't realize it.
Scientific research is not about trusting authority or consensus. There is things you can source here that support the thesis of the entry. Proof that NASA makes composites and passes them off as full photos (Blue Marble for example) by their own admission. Lack of footage of the earth in the background while on the surface of the moon during the so-called "moon landing". Of course they had time to play "golf" on the moon and of course nobody died in an environment which in theory would have been more dangerous than jumping into a volcano.
There is volumes and volumes of research into the flat earth and this article is a total betrayal of those who poured blood sweat and tears into researching it. Also for 1000s of years the theory dominated all over the world. The exception was Europe, not the rule. Only when Greek and Spanish and British conquerors pushed the idea did it catch on in their regions. Yet they were a small minority of the world. Now within a few years, history changes and is written by the winners. Do the right thing and open this article up to the public. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.166.110.183 ( talk • contribs) 26 October 2017 (UTC)
EXACTLY MY POINT! None of you have NPOV! All of you who edit this do so thinking the Flat Earth is a fringe theory. It is not and there are reliable sources. There are thousands of books on the subject and news articles. There is also things you can cite directly from NASAs site including their admission that they make composite images of earth. If this is a government conspiracy it would make sense for them to discredit scientists that don't adhere to the school taught propaganda. YOU should read WP:NPOV — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.166.110.183 ( talk • contribs)
The round earth theory is pseudoscience. You are taught you live in a flat solar system in a flat galaxy in a flat universe (look it up if you don't believe me). You are taught that gravity is not due to electrostatics but instead due to mass which has never been proven in a lab experiment on a micro-level. The moon landing is clearly fake. It's not even a conspiracy theory. The flat earth theory shows the moon as only being a light. It's an intelligent design system (not specifically biblical, all religions knew it) and the motive to destroy the theory was to destroy all religions and all notions that we were designed. To say NASA only uses composites is not "original research" it's a fact. https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/BlueMarble/ Read that link, it shows by their own admission it's a composite of multiple images. They fed us those for years and years before they decided to shill this further. If your wikipedia policy is against anything that is not "dogmatic" and "mainstream" then how is this (not) evidence of censorship? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.166.110.183 ( talk • contribs)
“You are taught that gravity is not due to electrostatics but instead due to mass which has never been proven in a lab experiment on a micro-level.”The work of Loránd Eötvös shows otherwise. In addition, the Eötvös effect and the Coriolis force are consistent with a rotating round Earth. The direction of cyclonic air flow in the northern and southern hemispheres is convincing, and observable with instrumentation that was available in the age of sail. Bringing sociological arguments (
“motive to destroy the theory“) to a scientfic discussion, as you have done, is ineffective, and a mistake. Just plain Bill ( talk) 14:31, 26 October 2017 (UTC)
@ Strebe: Jytdog is rightly concerned about some copyvio, which seems to have entered in this article sometime last week. In this edit by you, the sentence " Dyaus (heaven) and Prithvi (earth) are compared to the two wheels at the end of the axle, in which case the earth must be conceived as flat, but also to two bowls, and to two leather bags, in which case the earth is presumably concave" from the Gombrich source was added (may be it was there long ago, I haven't checked). Jytdog is right! that is not okay. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 07:53, 27 October 2017 (UTC)
I have removed the citation to Samuel Warren Carey's book, Theories of the Earth and Universe: A History of Dogma in the Earth Sciences, from the article, along with the quotation allegedly taken from it, for two reasons:
In relation to the first point, the citation gives p.17, Chapter 10, of Carey's book as the location where the quoted text supposedly appears. However, page 17 is in Chapter 2 of the book, not Chapter 10, Chapter 10 spans pages 120–33 ,and the text, as quoted, appears nowhere on any of those pages. The editor who added the citation clearly cannot have consulted the cited source itself—as both proper scholarly practice and Wikipedia guidelines dictate—and should have been alerted to the dubiousness of the citation by the fact that Chapters 1 to 9 of the work being cited are very likely to have occupied rather more than 17 pages—as, in fact, they do.
The text, as it was quoted in the article, reads:
- But, two millennia B.C. Aryan Indo-Iranians had recognized heliocentricity, and the role of the Sun in holding the Earth by its attraction. I quote from J. Arunchalan's translation of Sanskrit psalms from the Rig Veda: In the prescribed daily prayers to the Sun (sandya vandanum) we find ... Soura manrlala madhyastham. (The Sun is at the center of the solar system). The word mandala means curved, referring perhaps to the curved path of the planets at the centre of which the Sun is located. ... The students ask, "What is the nature of the entity that holds the Earth?" The teacher answers, "Risha Vatsa holds the view that the Earth is held in space by the Sun". In the sandhya vandhana we find the phrase: Mitro dadhara privliti. (The Sun holds the Earth.)
As it happens, a passage very similar to this does appear on pages 16–17 of the cited work of Carey's:
- Philosophers of northern India, some 2000 years before Pythagoras, had taught that the sun was at the center and that it holds the earth in its power, and that the earth also has a similar power of attraction. From Science Age (New Delhi), I quote from J. Arunachalan's translation from the Sanskrit of the Rig-Veda (the earliest literary work in any Indo-Aryan language):
- In the prescribed daily prayers to the Sun (sandhya vandanum) we find ... Soura mandala madhyastham Sambam (The Sun is at the centre of the solar system.) The word mandala means curved, referring perhaps to the curved path of the planets at the centre of which the Sun is located ... The students ask, "What is the nature ot the entity that holds the Earth?" The teacher answers, "Risha Vatsa holds the view that the Earth is held in space by the Sun." In the sandhya vadhana we find the phrase: Mitro dadhara pritivi. (The Sun holds the Earth.)
The differences between these two passages, highlighted in red and green, are obviously far too great to have been the result of mere transcription errors. In fact, the quotation I have removed from the article is identical—except for its paragraphing and fonts—to a passage of text on this web page (note the chapter number, 10, appearing at the top of the page). The fact that the text quoted in the citation is identical, right down to the transcription and OCR errors—"Arunchalan" for "Arunachalan", "manrlala" for "mandala", and "prvliti" for "pritivi"—to that on the web page linked to above, shows unequivocally that either the latter was the ultimate source of the former—possibly via several intermediate copypastings—or that both have been derived from the same original source.
I initially thought that the text on the web page I have linked to above was just a blatant plagiarisation of Carey's book. However, on looking more carefully over the page, and other similar pages—which appear to be remnants of pages on a site originally hosted by Yahoo!'s now defunct geocities web hosting service—, I'm more inclined to think that it's part of another book—or perhaps the draft of another book—by Carey himself.See update below
Dealing fully with the second point will take more time than I have available to devote to it right now. For the time being, suffice it to say that both Carey himself and his own source, J. Arunachalam (this is the correct spelling of his name—the spelling "Arunachalan", which appears on p.16 of Carey's book, is a typo), were scientists who appear to have been dabbling outside their fields of expertise. Neither of them, as far as I have been able to determine, had any qualifications, expertise or standing as scholars in Sanskrit or any other field of Indic studies. Moreover, comparison of the interpretation Arunachalam gives for the transliterated Sanskrit passage "Sourya mandala madhyastham Sambam" with one given by another source seems to indicate that his is total hogwash.
David Wilson (
talk ·
cont)
15:09, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
References
References
Due and undue weight[edit] Main page: WP:WEIGHT
Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight mean that articles should not give minority views or aspects as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views or widely supported aspects.
Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all, except perhaps in a "see also" to an article about those specific views.
In articles specifically relating to a minority viewpoint, such views may receive more attention and space. However, these pages should still make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint wherever relevant and must not represent content strictly from the perspective of the minority view. Specifically, it should always be clear which parts of the text describe the minority view. In addition, the majority view should be explained in sufficient detail that the reader can understand how the minority view differs from it, and controversies regarding aspects of the minority view should be clearly identified and explained.
Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserves as much attention overall as the majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views (such as Flat Earth).
AGAIN it is mentioned HERE: /info/en/?search=Wikipedia:Reliable_sources_and_undue_weight
It's the first thing discussed. This theory is a serious threat to governments who have enslaved us. True your job as a moderator is to follow rules. But your job as a human being is to follow your heart. Research flat earth. See why they try to hard to hide it.
By stating this they are deliberately creating policy that moderators must follow to enforce the conspiracy Thus a minority opinion EVEN IF CORRECT will not be even given fair representation even in the entry devoted to it! The scientific method is about skepticism and testing ideas. It is not about dogmatic consensus. The flat earth has re-surged on the internet because people have been questioning the current consensus. If we are correct, this means moderators are unwittingly enforcing a deliberate deception. The policy of wikipedia is not to cover contrarian points of view equally even if the article itself is about that specific viewpoint.
Thus you will find no information about Flat Earth under "Flat Earth"... censorship.
Wikipedia states "Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserves as much attention overall as the majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views (such as Flat Earth)." THEREFORE the person who posted this should not have been blocked. He is correct. Because this article is devoted to Flat Earth thus the belief should be represented by the article. But the belief is not represented this article only talks about round earth theory. That is wrong and it is censorship. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.204.175.103 ( talk) 11:10, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
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Every time the word "false" is added to the intro to the article, it is reverted. Are there actually editors that believe the Earth is flat? If so, I fear for the future of this site. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.12.220.125 ( talk) 21:29, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
In the Section Resurgence in the era of celebrity and social media it states...
"In the modern era, the availability of communications technology and social media like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter have made it easy for individuals, famous and not, to spread disinformation and attract others to their erroneous ideas. One of the topics that has flourished in this environment is that of the Flat-Earth."
Although this subject, IMO, is very dumb. This statement is not a NPOV and should be reworded. DrkBlueXG ( talk) 16:51, 16 October 2017 (UTC)
Misinformation is not the appropriate word, this is a very nasty abuse of WP:NPOV... just because you don't like the theory doesn't mean you should call it a lie. It could very well be the truth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.204.175.103 ( talk) 04:51, 22 November 2017 (UTC)
For the record, I think the
current version as I'm writing this is a very good way of phrasing it. I posted a comment in that section leading here for future editors.
Double Plus Ungood (
talk)
00:44, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedia users, You should be aware of the fact that most people find the politically correct expressions Common Era (CE) and Before Common Era (BCE) highly offensive. You should instead use Anno Domini (AD) and Before Christ (BC). Other was of marking passing era's by other religions such as those used by Islam, Judaism, Hinduism , Buddhism and the Sikh faith are also acceptable. ScottieRoadPatriot ( talk) 12:05, 15 February 2018 (UTC)
"Do not change the established era style in an article unless there are reasons specific to its content."Your gripe is fairly general and not related to the content here. Personally, I think we should change (almost) all instances to CE/BCE, as this is the more neutral, encyclopedic version. However, others disagree – enough that I have about no chance of getting the policy changed. Likewise, those who prefer BC/AD probably have no real chance of changing the policy to favor that. We live with the compromise. – Deacon Vorbis ( carbon • videos) 15:19, 15 February 2018 (UTC)
Should we have articles like this at all? Drawing attention to proof that the earth is round gives attention to the lies. However much attention this false theory receives, don't we have a moral responsibility not to expose readers to this idea in case they begin to believe it?
It doesn't really matter if all we do is dispute it and show evidence it's a false idea, because we're still giving it attention and spreading the lie in the course of dissecting it. @ InedibleHulk: what do you think about this? ScratchMarshall ( talk) 02:58, 19 March 2018 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | ← | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | Archive 7 | Archive 8 | Archive 9 |
User:Deacon Vorbis prefers the text In early Egyptian and Mesopotamian thinking, the world was portrayed as a flat disk floating in the ocean, over In early Egyptian and Mesopotamian thought, the world was portrayed as a flat disk floating in the ocean, by reason of, “According to multiple dictionaries, yes, they're synonyms, and it's definitely less awkward with "thinking"”. This is wrong on both accounts. First, awkwardness is, apparently, in the mind of the reader, and in this reader’s mind, “thinking” is definitely more awkward. So let us discard that reason. The first reason, that “thinking” is synonymous with “thought”, is a fallacy. It is true that there are several definitions by which the two are synonymous. However, the specific definition in play here for “thought” has no parallel in thinking: “The formation of opinions, especially as a philosophy or system of ideas, or the opinions so formed: the traditions of Western thought”, (New Oxford American Dictionary, and any other dictionary that ever existed). The example provided in the dictionary is exactly the usage we have in the article. It means the deep, collective intellectual zeitgeist of a group, in a way that thinking does not, particularly. Apparently User:Deacon Vorbis is unaware of this usage. I have reverted the change. Strebe ( talk) 23:34, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
Do the readers need to be told that the consensus of experts today is that the Earth is not flat? (Even the flat-Earthers must agree that the scientists call it pseudoscience.) But I will not complain about saying so. But is there any point of repeating that? It is in the lede. Is that not enough? But I will not make an edit war about the redundant statements about what is perhaps paradigmatic of the obvious in the first place. TomS TDotO ( talk) 10:22, 10 January 2017 (UTC)
Shaquille O´Neal being a big proponent... http://www.newser.com/story/240022/shaquille-oneal-is-a-flat-earther.html Is that worthy of an update to the page. (I admit, I had to throw up) 148.188.1.60 ( talk) 09:40, 23 March 2017 (UTC)Matthias
@ Deacon Vorbis: Why are you removing sources and sourced content? If you wish to reword a part, you may. But deleting WP:RS and content is inappropriate. Have you checked Pingree? The old version misrepresents what he states. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 22:36, 1 April 2017 (UTC)
Why is the article entitled Flat Earth, and not Flat Earth model, or something similar, as in the first sentence? The article isn't about an Earth that is actually flat, but rather the belief that it is flat. — Sangdeboeuf ( talk) 12:53, 3 April 2017 (UTC)
See [1]. Dreadful that this has gotten as far as it did, and that it was approved by senior academics. However, it's now been rejected. [2] Doug Weller talk 11:16, 20 April 2017 (UTC)
Concerning this change, I don't strongly disagree with ‡ Єl Cid, Єl Caɱ̩peador's most recent edit. I agree the current text (the later edit in the diff) is a little abrupt, but I don't think abruptness is relevant in the lede, where each paragraph is expected to encapsulate a different aspect of the subject. My concern with ‡ Єl Cid, Єl Caɱ̩peador's edit is that it implies continuity in flat-earth belief into modern times. There is no such continuity. These modern flat-earthers are largely isolated individuals who start up a "movement", collect a few adherents if they are lucky, and then fade back into obscurity. Hence I prefer the text as reverted to by User:Deacon Vorbis. Strebe ( talk) 20:05, 21 July 2017 (UTC)
In my oppinion, this edit violates WP:Fringe. I won't revert it, as this would violate WP:3RR for me, therefor I put it up for discussion if this should stay. 78.94.53.130 ( talk) 11:59, 12 September 2017 (UTC)
1 The horizon always appears completely flat 360 degrees to the observer, regardless of how high you go up. Any curvature you think you see is from curved airplane windows or Go Pro cameras and fisheye lenses (which NASA loves to use). The reality is that the horizon never curves because we are on an endless plane. On a globe with 25,000 miles in circumference you would see a noticeable disappearance of objects the further they are as they would be leaning away from you and dropping below the constantly curving horizon. Completely flat horizon from the stratosphere:
2 The horizon always rises to meet your eye level never no matter how high in altitude you go. Even at 20 miles up the horizon rises to meet the observer/camera. This is only physically possible if the earth is a huge "endless" flat plane. If Earth were a globe, no matter how large, as you ascended the horizon would stay fixed and the observer/camera would have to tilt downward, looking down further and further to see it
3 The natural physics of water is to find and maintain its level. If Earth were a giant spinning sphere tilting and hurling through space then truly flat, consistently level surfaces would not exist here. There would be a massive bulge of water in the oceans because of the curvature of the earth. If earth was curved and spinning the oceans of water would be flowing down to level and covering land. Some rivers would be impossibly flowing uphill. There would massive water chaos and flooding! What we would see and experience would be vastly different! But since Earth is in fact an extended flat plane, this fundamental physical property of fluids finding and remaining level is consistent with experience and common sense. The water remains flat because the earth is flat!
4 If Earth were a ball 25,000 miles in circumference as NASA and modern astronomy claim, spherical trigonometry dictates the surface of all standing water must curve downward an easily measurable 8 inches per mile multiplied by the square of the distance. This means along a 6 mile channel of standing water, the Earth would dip 6 feet on either end from the central peak. Every time such experiments have been conducted, however, standing water has proven to be perfectly level.
5 The sun is much closer than we have been told. It is, in fact, in our atmosphere. You can clearly see that it is not 93 million miles away. Many times you can see the sun's rays shooting out of a cloud forming a triangle. If you follow the rays to their source it will always lead to a place above the clouds. If the sun was truly millions of miles away, all the rays would come in at a straight angle. Also the sun can be seen directly above clouds in some balloon photos, creating a hot spot on the clouds below it and in other photos you can clearly see the clouds dispersing directly underneath the close small sun.
6 If we were living on a spinning globe airplane's would constantly have to dip their noses down every few minutes to compensate for the curvature of the earth (with a circumference of 25,000 miles the earth would be constantly curving at the speed of an airplane). In reality however, they never do this! They learn how to fly based on a level flat plane. Also if the earth was spinning the airplane's going west would get to their destination much faster since the earth is spinning in the opposite direction. If the atmosphere is spinning with the earth then airplane's flying west would have to fly faster than the earth's spin to reach its destination. In reality, the earth is flat and airplane's just fly level and reach their destination easily because the earth is not moving. Planes Could Not Land if Earth was Moving or Spinning
7 The experiment known as “Airy’s Failure” proved that the stars move relative to a stationary Earth and not the other way around. By first filling a telescope with water to slow down the speed of light inside, then calculating the tilt necessary to get the starlight directly down the tube, Airy failed to prove the heliocentric theory since the starlight was already coming in the correct angle with no change necessary, and instead proved the geocentric model correct
8 The Michelson-Morley and Sagnac experiments attempted to measure the change in speed of light due to Earth’s assumed motion through space. After measuring in every possible different direction in various locations they failed to detect any significant change whatsoever, again proving the stationary geocentric model
9 If “gravity” is credited with being a force strong enough to hold the world’s oceans, buildings, people and atmosphere stuck to the surface of a rapidly spinning ball, then it is impossible for “gravity” to also simultaneously be weak enough to allow little birds, bugs, and planes to take-off and travel freely unabated in any direction. If “gravity” is credited with being a force strong enough to curve the massive expanse of oceans around a globular Earth, it would be impossible for fish and other creatures to swim through such forcefully held water.
10 Ship captains in navigating great distances at sea never need to factor the supposed curvature of the Earth into their calculations. Both Plane Sailing and Great Circle Sailing, the most popular navigation methods, use plane, not spherical trigonometry, making all mathematical calculations on the assumption that the Earth is perfectly flat. If the Earth were in fact a sphere, such an errant assumption would lead to constant glaring inaccuracies. Plane Sailing has worked perfectly fine in both theory and practice for thousands of years, however, and plane trigonometry has time and again proven more accurate than spherical trigonometry in determining distances across the oceans. If the Earth were truly a globe, then every line of latitude south of the equator would have to measure a gradually smaller and smaller circumference the farther South travelled. If, however, the Earth is an extended plane, then every line of latitude south of the equator should measure a gradually larger and larger circumference the farther South travelled. The fact that many captains navigating south of the equator assuming the globular theory have found themselves drastically out of reckoning, more so the farther South travelled, testifies to the fact that the Earth is not a ball.
|}
I proposed that we include the ten "evidence" and their debunking into the article for Flat Earth. 110.22.20.252 ( talk) 09:02, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
Why would you hide this persons response and put it as "apologia"? This is censorship. This is an entry about the flat earth or round earth? If you want to censor it, then do so under the wikipedia entry "the earth is round". This page should be sourcing flat earth sources and books as there are many. Wikipedia isn't a place to push POV it is an unbiased place to source content.( talk) 09:02, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
"Indians believed earth is flat till Gupta period." Well, it was just a portion of the population. In that period most of the people believed earth is sphere. The lead should be updated reflecting that there was both the views present. —usernamekiran (talk) 20:06, 12 October 2017 (UTC)
Who believed it was a sphere? Where is your source? Vedic astronomy was flat earth cosmology!! Did you live in India 1000 years ago? 20:25 25 October 2017 (UTC)
Wiqi55: Websites, blogs and personal translations are questionable sources and not acceptable. Instead of stating in edit comment "Ibn Hazm's statement is well known and can be supported with sources" but not providing those sources, please find and cite those "can be supported with sources" with page numbers. Please do not add websites/blogs back to this article. I would welcome the same content if it is supported by RS. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 11:04, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
I think we need to do something about this term. It is strewn all over the section titles without regard to the periods under discussion.
Beyond just that, the discussions themselves freely mix vast spans of time. Presently in South India we have material from the Rigveda, the origins of which are truly ancient, juxtaposed with material from Aryabhata, from India’s Classical period, some from even later Indian Medieval, and everything in between. Cultural exchanges that were very unlikely in earlier periods were, conversely, highly likely in later periods; likewise indigenous developments. A reader would be mightily confused by this narrative.
I understand that the South Asia section, in particular, is under considerable flux (and usually is), but it is not the only mess. Temporal compression and mixing is rife. Cultures exist in parallel. Cultures exchange ideas. Coherently representing the modern understanding of what really happened is going to be hard in a single, linear text. Can we please brainstorm on solving this problem? I don't think that haphazardly pulling in references is working. A cohesive narrative is, itself, a scholarly matter. That suggests we resort to scholars who address the whole narrative, rather than just factoids. I don't know who those scholars are. I do think we should be looking harder. Strebe ( talk) 17:39, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
It's best to avoid edit warring. Sarah, please explain here why you think your edit is better. PiCo ( talk) 01:36, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
Ms Sarah Welch: It's not the same topic, Sarah, we're talking here about avoiding an edit war over a specific edit.
I'm sorry I was pressed for time earlier and didn't set out the topic. This is what we're talking about:
Sarah, on another matter, I think you need to consider whether you might be too emotionally involved with this article - you're showing a distinct "ownership" of it, which is not good. Take a step back and approach it as if you'd never seen it before. PiCo ( talk) 02:29, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
@ PiCo:: I am surprised with your strange declaration that Herman Wayne Tull, David Pingree etc are unreliable scholars or what they wrote is non-RS. Please discuss your concerns. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 01:45, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: Please avoid this strange "The fact is that ancient....", or "I have doubts....". It just comes across as your personal wisdom / prejudice / POV being pushed without sources. Let us stick with the sources, and strive for NPOV. You state Sanskritist+cited by others. But then go on and link Williams and Knudsen, plus doubt K.V. Sarma! Have you really checked their background? Reread Williams and Knudsen... fwiw, on page 465, they cite K.V. Sarma. So K.V. Sarma source is fine, according to a source you recommend. An encyclopedia is a tertiary RS, and one published by a reputable publisher is good enough for wikipedia purposes (far better than the unsourced, or personal translations, or the sources in other sections which I hope you or someone would also check). Kim Plofker is a fine source, thank you. I have a copy on my shelf. Again, please read that chapter around page 52, where she is discussing the calendar system in the context of the earliest Indian texts of the Purana genre. Now read the summary we have, it says the same thing in the early Purana's context. We shouldn't interpret what Plofker writes outside of the context of her discussion. Context matters. On Pingree, please see his context and the ideas that medieval Indians did adopt, in his view. Does he say, ancient Indian texts demonstrate that no one ever speculated on spherical earth there, in addition to other shapes? Which page numbers? Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 14:44, 17 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: That is tendentious misrepresentation of the sources and refusal to respect NPOV policy, given what is in Plofker and given the other cited and quoted scholarly sources published by reputable university presses! Please note that voting would not allow you to exempt this or any other wikipedia article from core content policies and guidelines. We can take this all the way to ARB, through the due dispute resolution boards etc process, if you wish. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 11:04, 18 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: No. We already went over this source. See my comments above. The Glick et al edited book is on Routledge Revivals: Medieval Science..., in which Williams and Knudsen discuss theories in medieval South Asia. For the period earlier than what they cover, there are other sources. Williams and Knudsen cite KV Sarma on page 465. KV Sarma does summarize the multiple theories in pre-Greek era in South Asia. We already summarize KV Sarma side in this article and others, please see this section. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 00:13, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
PiCo: I am open to suggestions that would summarize the multiple sources fairly, without bias and better. On Plofker, please note that page 52 starts a section titled, "Cosmology and time in the Puranas." That is what Plofker is discussing there, and it is inappropriate to interpret more than or less than what she is stating in that section. The subject of this article is Flat Earth, and just like Pythagoras' speculations about earth as sphere is relevant to this article, the Vedic speculations are too. Further, on page Plofker on page 120 states, "the divergence of the above two hypotheses about the foundations of siddhanta spherical astronomy, together with the vast number of details left unexplained by both of them, indicates how much work still needs to be done before the issue can be confidently resolved, if it ever can." I urge you to study Plofker for what "the two hypotheses" are that she is mentioning there. Further, I note for those not fluent with ancient and early medieval Indian texts, that Purana texts =/= Siddhanta texts. It would be a gross misrepresentation of multiple RS, including Plofker, to state or imply either [1] ancient South Asians did not speculate on earth's shape before the 5th century / Greek influence; or [2] ancient or early medieval South Asian texts only mention flat earth / flat disc. Whether you or I are persuaded or not by each other's arguments is not really relevant, what is relevant is that we cite, embed quotes given our content dispute and summarize the high quality sources to the best our abilities and per NPOV etc guidelines. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 02:53, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
I object to this inclusion: One finds in the Rigveda intelligent speculations about the genesis of the universe from non-existence, the configuration of the universe, the spherical self supporting universe [...]. That passage isn't about a spherical earth (let alone a flat earth). One gets the impression that the egg-shaped universe within which "the earth" as a disk or wheel is embedded frequently gets conflated with a spherical earth. What's really going on is this:
...There is a common theory that the world is shaped like an egg, the outermost shell of which is undifferentiated matter; within this is a layer of intelligence and within this egoicity; and within this again in due order are layers of ether, wind, fire, and water. Each layer is ten times as thick as the next one in. The outermost layer of undifferentiated matter is sometimes omitted, but to include it gives the satisfactory number of seven layers. These layers envelop the entire universe; the water thus merges in cosmographic tradition with the water which in Vedic times was believed to be above the heavens and below and around the earth. The earth, the element which comes into being last, does not encircle the universe, but forms a mass in the centre. Its basic shape might be described as a huge flat disc, as it was in the Vedas, but this disc is now broken up into a system of concentric oceans and continents...
From Blacker & Loewe, which gives a comprehensive description of the Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist cosmologies of South Asia all the way up to the medieval period. Despite the myriad convolutions of these cosmologies, nowhere does a spherical earth show up except within the circles of astronomers starting around the 5th century AD from Greek influence. Strebe ( talk) 20:12, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
The Rg Veda, our earliest Indian document, dates from the second half of the second millennium BC.... When sky and earth are spoken of as the complementary pair they are called Dyaus and Prthivi respectively, Dyavaprthivi (in the dual) together.... Dyaus and Prthivi are compared to the two wheels at the ends of an axle, in which case the earth must be conceived as flat, but also to two bowls, and to two leather bags, in which case the earth is presumably concave. (pp 112-113) The cosmography of the Brahmanas is no more consistent than that of the Rg Veda. There are still allusions to the world as bipartite: the world is a tortoise, its arched shell the heaven, its flat underside the earth. (p 116) How do the Hindus conceive of the construction of the universe? ...The earth, the element which comes into being last does not encircle the universe, but forms a mass in the centre. Its basic shape might be described as a huge flat disc, as it was in the Vedas, but this disc is now broken up into a system of concentric oceans and continents. (p124-125)(if you google "Ancient Indian Cosmologies" you can find ELNEVER copies of this chapter online)
There exists in a number of puranas, as Kirfel has demonstrated, two descriptions of the universe having a common source. In this common source the earth, prthivi, with its seven concentric pairs of continents and oceans, is a horizontal disk in the center of a vertical universe enclosed in the brahmanda.
-- Jytdog ( talk) 23:59, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
This article is full of lies and a lot of it is unsourced or has weak sources. The SCIENTIFIC BASIS for a Flat Earth is overwhelming. There is more scientific proof for electrostatics than gravity as the reason for why things fall for example, Sunsets and things going "over the horizon" are scientifically shown to happen due to the atmosphere magnifying the horizon (due to the amount of refraction and water and elements in it) and also refracting the water line up. This is show by timelapse from weather stations such as skunkbayweather for example. Things are visible for tremendous distances without any horizontal bow or curve based on calculations for the distance and height of the occurrence sometimes things are visible that should be a mile under the curve such as corsica, elba and other adjacent islands from across the sea. It doesn't mention the atmosphere and it's effects on light, it doesn't mention that people navigate using a compass and the flat earth model shows magnetic north as the center, it doesn't cover all of the research (a lot of it can be easily sourced to books including Rowbotham). The lack of parralax forces modern scientists to justify a ball model by saying we live in a flat galaxy and flat universe and flat solar system when it is painfully obvious the stars go around us.
Instead the sources are for round earth proponents and bias. Things like calling the theory itself disinformation, calling it fringe and other insults which violate Wikipedias terms of introducing personal opinion of the writer. And if this talk gets removed that is simply more proof that this article is censored.
Wikipedia is not about censorship and not about monopoly of ideas. It is about sourcing information for the topic at hand. This article only sources the counter-thesis, the ideas opposition. The people who have contributed to this are traitors to humanity and to science. Even if they don't realize it.
Scientific research is not about trusting authority or consensus. There is things you can source here that support the thesis of the entry. Proof that NASA makes composites and passes them off as full photos (Blue Marble for example) by their own admission. Lack of footage of the earth in the background while on the surface of the moon during the so-called "moon landing". Of course they had time to play "golf" on the moon and of course nobody died in an environment which in theory would have been more dangerous than jumping into a volcano.
There is volumes and volumes of research into the flat earth and this article is a total betrayal of those who poured blood sweat and tears into researching it. Also for 1000s of years the theory dominated all over the world. The exception was Europe, not the rule. Only when Greek and Spanish and British conquerors pushed the idea did it catch on in their regions. Yet they were a small minority of the world. Now within a few years, history changes and is written by the winners. Do the right thing and open this article up to the public. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.166.110.183 ( talk • contribs) 26 October 2017 (UTC)
EXACTLY MY POINT! None of you have NPOV! All of you who edit this do so thinking the Flat Earth is a fringe theory. It is not and there are reliable sources. There are thousands of books on the subject and news articles. There is also things you can cite directly from NASAs site including their admission that they make composite images of earth. If this is a government conspiracy it would make sense for them to discredit scientists that don't adhere to the school taught propaganda. YOU should read WP:NPOV — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.166.110.183 ( talk • contribs)
The round earth theory is pseudoscience. You are taught you live in a flat solar system in a flat galaxy in a flat universe (look it up if you don't believe me). You are taught that gravity is not due to electrostatics but instead due to mass which has never been proven in a lab experiment on a micro-level. The moon landing is clearly fake. It's not even a conspiracy theory. The flat earth theory shows the moon as only being a light. It's an intelligent design system (not specifically biblical, all religions knew it) and the motive to destroy the theory was to destroy all religions and all notions that we were designed. To say NASA only uses composites is not "original research" it's a fact. https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/BlueMarble/ Read that link, it shows by their own admission it's a composite of multiple images. They fed us those for years and years before they decided to shill this further. If your wikipedia policy is against anything that is not "dogmatic" and "mainstream" then how is this (not) evidence of censorship? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.166.110.183 ( talk • contribs)
“You are taught that gravity is not due to electrostatics but instead due to mass which has never been proven in a lab experiment on a micro-level.”The work of Loránd Eötvös shows otherwise. In addition, the Eötvös effect and the Coriolis force are consistent with a rotating round Earth. The direction of cyclonic air flow in the northern and southern hemispheres is convincing, and observable with instrumentation that was available in the age of sail. Bringing sociological arguments (
“motive to destroy the theory“) to a scientfic discussion, as you have done, is ineffective, and a mistake. Just plain Bill ( talk) 14:31, 26 October 2017 (UTC)
@ Strebe: Jytdog is rightly concerned about some copyvio, which seems to have entered in this article sometime last week. In this edit by you, the sentence " Dyaus (heaven) and Prithvi (earth) are compared to the two wheels at the end of the axle, in which case the earth must be conceived as flat, but also to two bowls, and to two leather bags, in which case the earth is presumably concave" from the Gombrich source was added (may be it was there long ago, I haven't checked). Jytdog is right! that is not okay. Ms Sarah Welch ( talk) 07:53, 27 October 2017 (UTC)
I have removed the citation to Samuel Warren Carey's book, Theories of the Earth and Universe: A History of Dogma in the Earth Sciences, from the article, along with the quotation allegedly taken from it, for two reasons:
In relation to the first point, the citation gives p.17, Chapter 10, of Carey's book as the location where the quoted text supposedly appears. However, page 17 is in Chapter 2 of the book, not Chapter 10, Chapter 10 spans pages 120–33 ,and the text, as quoted, appears nowhere on any of those pages. The editor who added the citation clearly cannot have consulted the cited source itself—as both proper scholarly practice and Wikipedia guidelines dictate—and should have been alerted to the dubiousness of the citation by the fact that Chapters 1 to 9 of the work being cited are very likely to have occupied rather more than 17 pages—as, in fact, they do.
The text, as it was quoted in the article, reads:
- But, two millennia B.C. Aryan Indo-Iranians had recognized heliocentricity, and the role of the Sun in holding the Earth by its attraction. I quote from J. Arunchalan's translation of Sanskrit psalms from the Rig Veda: In the prescribed daily prayers to the Sun (sandya vandanum) we find ... Soura manrlala madhyastham. (The Sun is at the center of the solar system). The word mandala means curved, referring perhaps to the curved path of the planets at the centre of which the Sun is located. ... The students ask, "What is the nature of the entity that holds the Earth?" The teacher answers, "Risha Vatsa holds the view that the Earth is held in space by the Sun". In the sandhya vandhana we find the phrase: Mitro dadhara privliti. (The Sun holds the Earth.)
As it happens, a passage very similar to this does appear on pages 16–17 of the cited work of Carey's:
- Philosophers of northern India, some 2000 years before Pythagoras, had taught that the sun was at the center and that it holds the earth in its power, and that the earth also has a similar power of attraction. From Science Age (New Delhi), I quote from J. Arunachalan's translation from the Sanskrit of the Rig-Veda (the earliest literary work in any Indo-Aryan language):
- In the prescribed daily prayers to the Sun (sandhya vandanum) we find ... Soura mandala madhyastham Sambam (The Sun is at the centre of the solar system.) The word mandala means curved, referring perhaps to the curved path of the planets at the centre of which the Sun is located ... The students ask, "What is the nature ot the entity that holds the Earth?" The teacher answers, "Risha Vatsa holds the view that the Earth is held in space by the Sun." In the sandhya vadhana we find the phrase: Mitro dadhara pritivi. (The Sun holds the Earth.)
The differences between these two passages, highlighted in red and green, are obviously far too great to have been the result of mere transcription errors. In fact, the quotation I have removed from the article is identical—except for its paragraphing and fonts—to a passage of text on this web page (note the chapter number, 10, appearing at the top of the page). The fact that the text quoted in the citation is identical, right down to the transcription and OCR errors—"Arunchalan" for "Arunachalan", "manrlala" for "mandala", and "prvliti" for "pritivi"—to that on the web page linked to above, shows unequivocally that either the latter was the ultimate source of the former—possibly via several intermediate copypastings—or that both have been derived from the same original source.
I initially thought that the text on the web page I have linked to above was just a blatant plagiarisation of Carey's book. However, on looking more carefully over the page, and other similar pages—which appear to be remnants of pages on a site originally hosted by Yahoo!'s now defunct geocities web hosting service—, I'm more inclined to think that it's part of another book—or perhaps the draft of another book—by Carey himself.See update below
Dealing fully with the second point will take more time than I have available to devote to it right now. For the time being, suffice it to say that both Carey himself and his own source, J. Arunachalam (this is the correct spelling of his name—the spelling "Arunachalan", which appears on p.16 of Carey's book, is a typo), were scientists who appear to have been dabbling outside their fields of expertise. Neither of them, as far as I have been able to determine, had any qualifications, expertise or standing as scholars in Sanskrit or any other field of Indic studies. Moreover, comparison of the interpretation Arunachalam gives for the transliterated Sanskrit passage "Sourya mandala madhyastham Sambam" with one given by another source seems to indicate that his is total hogwash.
David Wilson (
talk ·
cont)
15:09, 19 October 2017 (UTC)
References
References
Due and undue weight[edit] Main page: WP:WEIGHT
Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight mean that articles should not give minority views or aspects as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views or widely supported aspects.
Generally, the views of tiny minorities should not be included at all, except perhaps in a "see also" to an article about those specific views.
In articles specifically relating to a minority viewpoint, such views may receive more attention and space. However, these pages should still make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint wherever relevant and must not represent content strictly from the perspective of the minority view. Specifically, it should always be clear which parts of the text describe the minority view. In addition, the majority view should be explained in sufficient detail that the reader can understand how the minority view differs from it, and controversies regarding aspects of the minority view should be clearly identified and explained.
Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserves as much attention overall as the majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views (such as Flat Earth).
AGAIN it is mentioned HERE: /info/en/?search=Wikipedia:Reliable_sources_and_undue_weight
It's the first thing discussed. This theory is a serious threat to governments who have enslaved us. True your job as a moderator is to follow rules. But your job as a human being is to follow your heart. Research flat earth. See why they try to hard to hide it.
By stating this they are deliberately creating policy that moderators must follow to enforce the conspiracy Thus a minority opinion EVEN IF CORRECT will not be even given fair representation even in the entry devoted to it! The scientific method is about skepticism and testing ideas. It is not about dogmatic consensus. The flat earth has re-surged on the internet because people have been questioning the current consensus. If we are correct, this means moderators are unwittingly enforcing a deliberate deception. The policy of wikipedia is not to cover contrarian points of view equally even if the article itself is about that specific viewpoint.
Thus you will find no information about Flat Earth under "Flat Earth"... censorship.
Wikipedia states "Wikipedia should not present a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserves as much attention overall as the majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views (such as Flat Earth)." THEREFORE the person who posted this should not have been blocked. He is correct. Because this article is devoted to Flat Earth thus the belief should be represented by the article. But the belief is not represented this article only talks about round earth theory. That is wrong and it is censorship. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.204.175.103 ( talk) 11:10, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
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Every time the word "false" is added to the intro to the article, it is reverted. Are there actually editors that believe the Earth is flat? If so, I fear for the future of this site. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.12.220.125 ( talk) 21:29, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
In the Section Resurgence in the era of celebrity and social media it states...
"In the modern era, the availability of communications technology and social media like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter have made it easy for individuals, famous and not, to spread disinformation and attract others to their erroneous ideas. One of the topics that has flourished in this environment is that of the Flat-Earth."
Although this subject, IMO, is very dumb. This statement is not a NPOV and should be reworded. DrkBlueXG ( talk) 16:51, 16 October 2017 (UTC)
Misinformation is not the appropriate word, this is a very nasty abuse of WP:NPOV... just because you don't like the theory doesn't mean you should call it a lie. It could very well be the truth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.204.175.103 ( talk) 04:51, 22 November 2017 (UTC)
For the record, I think the
current version as I'm writing this is a very good way of phrasing it. I posted a comment in that section leading here for future editors.
Double Plus Ungood (
talk)
00:44, 17 March 2018 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedia users, You should be aware of the fact that most people find the politically correct expressions Common Era (CE) and Before Common Era (BCE) highly offensive. You should instead use Anno Domini (AD) and Before Christ (BC). Other was of marking passing era's by other religions such as those used by Islam, Judaism, Hinduism , Buddhism and the Sikh faith are also acceptable. ScottieRoadPatriot ( talk) 12:05, 15 February 2018 (UTC)
"Do not change the established era style in an article unless there are reasons specific to its content."Your gripe is fairly general and not related to the content here. Personally, I think we should change (almost) all instances to CE/BCE, as this is the more neutral, encyclopedic version. However, others disagree – enough that I have about no chance of getting the policy changed. Likewise, those who prefer BC/AD probably have no real chance of changing the policy to favor that. We live with the compromise. – Deacon Vorbis ( carbon • videos) 15:19, 15 February 2018 (UTC)
Should we have articles like this at all? Drawing attention to proof that the earth is round gives attention to the lies. However much attention this false theory receives, don't we have a moral responsibility not to expose readers to this idea in case they begin to believe it?
It doesn't really matter if all we do is dispute it and show evidence it's a false idea, because we're still giving it attention and spreading the lie in the course of dissecting it. @ InedibleHulk: what do you think about this? ScratchMarshall ( talk) 02:58, 19 March 2018 (UTC)