YouTube To Blame For Rise in Flat Earth Believers, Says Study (cnet.com) 404
According to research, almost everyone who believes in flat Earth theory got started on YouTube. From a report: Asheley Landrum is an assistant professor of science communication at Texas Tech University. Her focus: how cultural values affect our understanding of science. Most recently she's been looking at the rise of flat Earth theory. Incredibly, more people than ever believe in a flat Earth. Google searches for "flat earth" have grown massively over the past five years and flat Earth conventions have begun popping up all over the globe. That's where Landrum focused her research. Landrum interviewed 30 people who attended one flat Earth convention and found that all but one became flat Earthers after watching videos on YouTube.
She presented her research at an event run by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. While Landrum didn't explicitly blame YouTube for the rise in flat Earth believers, she does believe that Google could be doing more to stop the spread of scientifically incorrect ideas. "There's a lot of helpful information on YouTube but also a lot of misinformation," she said, as reported by The Guardian. "Their algorithms make it easy to end up going down the rabbit hole, by presenting information to people who are going to be more susceptible to it."
She presented her research at an event run by the American Association for the Advancement of Science. While Landrum didn't explicitly blame YouTube for the rise in flat Earth believers, she does believe that Google could be doing more to stop the spread of scientifically incorrect ideas. "There's a lot of helpful information on YouTube but also a lot of misinformation," she said, as reported by The Guardian. "Their algorithms make it easy to end up going down the rabbit hole, by presenting information to people who are going to be more susceptible to it."
Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:4, Insightful)
A lot of the flat earthers I've met are really just trolling other people.
If the number of "believers" is going up then it might be that the number of critical thinkers is going up.
On the other hand it could also be that I don't hang round with the other end of the spectrum and it really is the number of idiots that's going online to confirm their beliefs that's going up.
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Insightful)
Doubt is just a version of belief, albeit a belief in the negative. As Henri Poincaré eloquently pointed out: believing everything and doubting everything are equally convenient ways to avoid the work of actual thinking.
A critical thinker has to be able to do both: list the pro- and the counter-arguments and weigh them against each other. A critical thinker has to be able to argue both sides, and to really understand the consequences of each hypothesis. And he has to be able to think of alternate third hypotheses to not fall into the false dilemma trap (e.g. there is not only Darwinism and Biblical Creationism, there is also the Flying Spaghetti Monster).
Re: Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Interesting)
Well said. The conspiracy nut I know claims he is a free thinker and everyone else is held back by what they were taught in school. In reality he just dismisses anything mainstream and believes whatever 'feels right'.
It's a common cry from conspiracy believers that they are the skeptics and everyone else is just blindly following.
Re:What exactly is "mainstream" ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually dissecting which parts of mainstream knowledge is true (for a workable version of true) and which are not, is tedious work, and no single person will manage it during their lifetime completely.
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Interesting)
I agree. A critical thinker will often change his mind, sometimes his whole outlook on life without falling into a deep crisis, or resisting the change out of a subconscious fear of that change.
That is a pretty rare kind of human being I've unfortunately come to realise. To equate this to not believing everything you're told cheapens the value of the character trait.
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Bang on.
Not so rare, I think. I've been encouraged recently by people who are wiling to open their minds. I'm old enough to remember when miscegenation was considered shameful and in some places, illegal. People's minds changed on that, and widely
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Insightful)
All of those people ultimately believe that they are being lied to in one way or another, which is not unreasonable.
There is no important difference between guessing the authorities are telling the truth and guessing the authorities are lying, if you are too mentally lazy to consider the topic in a non-superficial way. That is not "critical thinking".
Critical thinking means coming up with a coherent set of thoughts, supported by some amount of evidence, that is more likely to reveal the truth than pure guessing.
If you believe the people around you are sheep who are not thinking, dyeing your wool to be a more garish colored sheep who is also not thinking is not an improvement. In fact, it is sincere endorsement of sheep-thinking.
Re: Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:3)
"those people ultimately believe that they are being lied to in one way or another"
Those people _know_ they have been lied to many times by ostensibly trustworthy authorities. Therefore they quite reasonably distrust the pronouncements of credentialed "experts". Thinking, again quite reasonably, that many "experts" given voice in the semi-official media are charlatans, who peddle injurious lies for the narrow benefit of their own class or partisan interests.
I find the outage endlessly hilarious. A bunch of
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Funny)
Well, we all know that this third hypothesis is just complete nonsense. The only valid third hypothesis is, of course, the Invisible Pink Unicorn.
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And for those who don't believe me, here's a photo [wikimedia.org] of her.
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you need God to act morally, you're not acting morally. You're just acting out of fear or hope for reward. I have a lot more respect for the person who acts kindly out of love for his fellow man than I do the person who acts kindly because they think God is going to reward them for it.
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How many people genuinely believe God is a human-like decision maker, rather than merely a metaphor for their innate moral system?
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Informative)
That's Not Critical Thinking (Score:5, Insightful)
A critical thinker has to be able to do both: list the pro- and the counter-arguments and weigh them against each other.
That's all fine and dandy. But nothing in your post actually defines critical thinking. The keyword here is critical. Which is not about making up lists of arguments and explanations - anybody can do that. Its about judging the quality of those arguments. Which for most people means evaluating the source of the argument, the qualifications and trustworthiness of the people making the arguments as well as things like logical consistency (of both the argument and the people making the argument). The fact is, truth is NOT self-evident and anyone who tells you that probably doesn't want you to critically evaluate them.
99% of the time we are not experts in the topics being debated, so we are left with critical evaluations of arguments based on external factors. Understanding how and why we evaluate those factors is central to critical thinking.
Media literacy, in particular, is a key component of critical thinking in the internet era. The reason youtube is causing a rise in people believing in conspiracy theories like a flat-earth is because youtube is designed to maximize "engagement" and conspiracy theories are like crack for the unsophisticated - especially those who feel dis-empowered in their lives (and who doesn't feel that way at least some times?) So youtube's algorithms reward ($$$) people who make conspiracy theory videos, which induces the creation of even more conspiracy theory videos.
In other words, the people making videos for youtube have strong incentives to be manipulative and completely dishonest because that's what youtube's algorithm rewards. The people consuming those videos aren't thinking about how those rewards degrade the trustworthiness of the video makers. Fundamentally its all a grift. A billion dollar grift. Its also the same business model as talk radio which has been lucrative AF for grifters too.
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Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Insightful)
A lot of the flat earthers I've met are really just trolling other people.
How do you know?
There is very little difference between an idiot and someone who pretends to be an idiot.
To the extent where there is absolutely no reason for anyone to make the distinction and treat them differently.
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A lot of the flat earthers I've met are really just trolling other people.
How do you know?
Because they're not idiots. They're just trying to find out how many other people know how to prove that the earth isn't flat.
For contrast I also know somebody who genuinely doesn't believe The Earth is round (she's an old lady with not much education so I don't devote much energy to changing her mind).
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Because they're not idiots. They're just trying to find out how many other people know how to prove that the earth isn't flat.
Again, how do you know? I mean I like to think my fellow man is a brainiac, but the reality and statistics will often point to a considerable portion of them being true idiots.
The difference is with flat earthers identifying the trolling isn't as scientifically subjective as say for example the current increasing trend of malaria is indicative of anti-vaxxers.
The world is sadly quite full of very smart idiots, and the most perfect smart troll is a person completely indistinguishable from the dumbest idiot.
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Jesus H. Christ on a bicycle, believing in flat earth or other kinds of extreme nonsense has nothing to do with "critical thinking"!
Critical thinking is the cradle of science and technology the road out from the dark ages, feudalism and authoritarianism, do not credit these cretins with any such description. What they are doing is the exact opposite, they are placing themselves or someone else who they trust as a higher authority to blindly believe in rather than trusting in science. Their choice is to avoi
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Jesus H. Christ on a bicycle, believing in flat earth or other kinds of extreme nonsense has nothing to do with "critical thinking"!
No, but pretending to believe in it does.
Maybe you also believe that all those Satanist/nihilist metal bands also believe in Satan/suicide?
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A lot of the flat earthers I've met are really just trolling other people.
If the number of "believers" is going up then it might be that the number of critical thinkers is going up.
On the other hand it could also be that I don't hang round with the other end of the spectrum and it really is the number of idiots that's going online to confirm their beliefs that's going up.
Of course flat earthers are wrong. Flat is a two dimensional concept and we clearly do not live in Flatland. Flat Earthers need to change their name to Square Earthers.
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Flat is a two dimensional concept and we clearly do not live in Flatland.
Tell that to the believers in the holographic principle, aka leading cosmologists.
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Flat Earthers need to change their name to Square Earthers.
Flat Earthers do not believe the earth is square. They believe it is a circular disk.
It is obviously not square, since the earth casts a circular shadow during a lunar eclipse.
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It is obviously not square, since the earth casts a circular shadow during a lunar eclipse.
Nothing obvious about it. The mental gymnastics required to explain every day phenomena like sunsets and time zones can also explain a circular shadow from a square object.
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Of course flat earthers are wrong. Flat is a two dimensional concept and we clearly do not live in Flatland. Flat Earthers need to change their name to Square Earthers.
I KNEW IT! That TimeCube guy [youtube.com] was right!
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Interesting)
Defending flat earth is a hell of an discussion and debate exercise.
It's probably one of the hardest non-evil things to actually defend.
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Interesting)
Not at all, you just need to declare all evidence contrary to your beliefs as being "fake".
You cherry pick any conclusions that can be used to prove your claims while dismissing any conclusions that are contrary to your views and voila.
It may be hard to defend if you are debating honestly, but it's not that hard if you rely on deceptions and lies. As far as I know, most flat earthers fall into the latter category.
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Not at all, you just need to declare all evidence contrary to your beliefs as being "fake".
You have be very creative to explain a sunset as "fake" when you can witness it yourself.
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:4, Funny)
I can easily explain this photograph:
- the file format is JPEG, in 24-bit colours, which is the appropriate format considering the image
- the DPI is set at 72 pixels per inch
- its dimensions are 300 × 294 pixels
- the file size is 27628 bytes
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Does it matter what they really believe in their heart-of-hearts?
Someone might not believe that there are literal angels or that when they die they are literally tortured for eternity, but that doesn't really matter if the result is the same, e.g. they support religion based policies and morality stemming for those ideas.
Believing in a flat earth may seem somewhat benign, but if it results in more impressionable people being mislead (e.g. children) or people using it to enrich themselves by organizing profi
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, it matters.
I recommend watching the documentary "Behind The Curve" on Netflix. I watch it last night and it was a real eye-opener.
In the last few years, Flat Earthers have gone from being a joke to something that a lot of people take very, very seriously. These people go hand-in-hand with anti-vaxxers, climate change deniers and creationists as part of a new wave of "Anti-Intellectualism".
Flat Earthers want Flat Earth theory to be taught in schools. That statement alone should be enough to make you realize that this has now gone beyond a joke and is something that should be vehimintly denied. The problem is that Flat Earthers are impossible to reason with. They keep saying "there is no scientific proof for a round earth", but if you try to present any sort of proof they completely dismiss it. Some of them even tried to do their own experiments [youtube.com] to prove the earth was flat and (surprise, surprise) the experiments instead showed that the earth was round. This then just leads them to believe that their experiment is flawed in someway. They are completely unwilling to take on board any facts that disprove the flat earth theory.
The funny thing is, Mark Sargent (the "King" of the Flat Earthers) says that you should "question everything". Yet these people are completely unwilling to question their own theory.
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I was wondering if it was any good. Thank you.
Aren't all of these groups mostly a USA-only thing? Is it coming from a lack of education, or something else?
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One of the more famous experiments was done to disprove a bet against a flat earther in England. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]. The scientist was Alfred Russel Wallace, essentially the co-discoverer of evolution who was a bit naive in thinking that the flat earther would ever actually pay up when losing the bet.
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One it has to do with falsifiable predictions for the future (which currently they are not - or have been proved wildly inaccurate.)
Second it has a lot to do with bad science reporting - but still the scientists are not rebuking the nonsense. Example that CO2 is a leading indicator for rise in temperatures.
Third, it has to with solutions for the problem. Not one of them brings acknowledges that renewable energy production has been growi
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Therefore by 2040 we will be able to source all our current use of electricity by renewables plus a lot more.
Electricity generation only accounts for about a quarter of total energy use, and it's the easiest to replace by renewables.
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But I was understating my case. Projecting the same growth rate to 2040 would be a 1000x increase over current production. That would take care of all electric generation plus allow for electric cars to supplant petrol based cars.
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Right, but you also need to account for time required to upgrade grid and replace all existing transportation. Also keep in mind that wind/solar installations start with the best locations, and that subsequent expansions have to move to poorer places, limiting their growth rate.
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> it might be that the number of critical thinkers is going up.
Nope, trolls are just attention-whores that aren't smart enough to come up with anything that contributes to the discussion, so they try and subvert it into their own dumbed-down one.
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Interesting)
A lot of the flat earthers I've met are really just trolling other people.
Well Flat Earth Conventions [arstechnica.com] and even cruises [theguardian.com] are a thing, so it's not just trolling. And the folks who attend these things genuinely seem to believe they are doing actual science, while proper peer-reviewed science is considered to be part of some grand conspiracy.
The problem with Youtube, in my experience, is with the recommendation system. I regularly get fringe political, pseudo-science, and conspiracy theory videos showing up as "Recommended for you"; even though they are in no way relevant what I'm watching or searching for.
Re:Is this a good thing or a bad thing? (Score:5, Funny)
What would be funny is "around the world" cruises for flat-earthers.
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What, trolls can't take cruises? Or go to conventions with other trolls?
If not, why not?
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I have a brother that will gladly troll you on flat earth, global warming, etc... just bring up a subject and he will disagree with you no matter which side you take. I think he get's a kick out of it.
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Is it? I may be Canadian, but I'll still celebrate anyway. Today instead of my usual grape-flavoured vitamin C, I'll take an orange-flavoured vitamin C.
"Flat Earth conventions have begun popping up all (Score:5, Funny)
..over the globe"
We all saw what you did there.
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Enough is ENOUGH! I have had it with these motherfuckin' flattards on this motherfuckin' plane!
Re:"Flat Earth conventions have begun popping up a (Score:5, Funny)
All over the disc, that is. I wonder if their compasses have directions named H (Hubwards), T (Turnwise), R (Rimwards) and W (widdershins) as well.
Re:"Flat Earth conventions have begun popping up a (Score:5, Funny)
The Earth is flat from the point of view of the 4th spatial dimension. Flat-Earthers are actually cosmic horrors possessing the weak-minded.
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The Earth is not flat from the point of view of the 4th spatial dimension. It's still a mostly-sphere shape, without a 4th spatial dimension.
You live in three spatial dimensions. Do you call two-dimensional squares "flat, one-dimensional lines"?
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Nice.
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Do they take Planes across the Plane to attend the conference held on the Plains?
I've always been impressed that they believe the flat-earth exists in 3-D. Airplanes travel on this 2-D surface and that water-droplets form balls - but that earth itself is not a ball. When they look at other Planets -- are they all Flat too?
Sorry I'm a bit ignorant on their belief system. Are the Sun, Moon, Jupiter (and moons) all Discs as well? If not -- how come earth is the odd-ball? (get it... odd ball...)
Democracy was a nice dream (Score:3)
It relied on the assumption that most people are rational, which in fact they were not. It was able to support itself using media gatekeepers which prevented mass-hysteria of the population and managed to keep them educated and informed to some extent. The moment that freedom of speech became absolute, and any idea of "knowledgeable" or "respectable" was lost, the truth about the populous was revealed. It was then that many people began to realize that democracy is based on a lie - that every man is rational.
Re:Democracy was a nice dream (Score:5, Insightful)
A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals, and you know it!
--Agent K, MiB
Or, as I tend to put it, the collective IQ of a group can be determined by taking the IQ of the biggest idiot and dividing by the number of feet.
The only thing the internet changed was that no loonie is alone anymore. Before the internet, anyone who had some batshit crazy outlook on life got a pretty quick reality check when his tinfoil hattery hit the reality of the rest of the world around him. Now it's easier than ever to find others who believe the same bullshit.
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Or, as I tend to put it, the collective IQ of a group can be determined by taking the IQ of the biggest idiot and dividing by the number of feet.
Clearly, we need to use a group of legless amputees as our leaders.
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It relied on the assumption that most people are rational, which in fact they were not.
Democracy is far better than being ruled by a cadre of irrational tyrants.
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In a world of mass media, being ruled by the people ends up being ruled by a cadre of irrational tyrants (media tycoons and fringe movements that know how to get likes) whose words are constantly distorted further and further.
Flat Earther Here (Score:3)
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Evidence that we're not in a 'holographic universe' suggests that our universe wasn't optimized for data efficiency, which is a strike against the simulation hypothesis; a hologram would be flat though. A simulation computer would probably use solid-state 3d chips though (a la 3d NAND). A block of computronium would probably be programmed like an FPGA, so there'd be no circuit boards; traces would be replaced with vias and internal allocation of resources.
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A total lack of evidence?
Youtube is for illiterate people (Score:2)
Ones who start with Youtube, probably have trouble reading text, so they prefer video as source of information.
Of course, most of flatearthers are those who haven't read their textbooks in school.
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i can tell you how to fix that (Score:3)
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Actually, a tetrahedron.
Haven't you ever heard of the expression "the 4 corners of the earth"?
So What? (Score:2)
Can't keep the narratives straight (Score:2)
The media is complicit in so many narratives they can't keep them straight. Or, they just assume their readers will take them at their word and never fact check them.
If YouTube creates more flat earthers (as opposed to simply attracting existing ones), then can't the same be said for radical Islam? Which means we SHOULD be taking it far more seriously than they want us to currently?
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Don't worry... (Score:2)
The article headline is highly misleading (Score:3, Insightful)
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The real problem is not youtube, as a giant repository of video on all kinds of things. The real problem is the algorithm that suggests videos for watching. The algorithm is probably right as it is, if someone enjoys flat earth stuff they may very well enjoy more flat earth stuff. I guess that youtube could modify the suggestion algorithm to offer pro's and con's for subjects but that almost certainly would piss people off too. Imagine someone who watched a video named "Why X fails" seeing suggestions o
Slashdot Headlines (Score:5, Insightful)
YouTube To Blame For Rise in Flat Earth Believers, Says Study
While Landrum didn't explicitly blame YouTube for the rise in flat Earth believers
When your headline is so inaccurate that it is contradicted right in the summary...
I guess people forget about books and magazines (Score:2)
A prelude to censorship (Score:4, Interesting)
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That's my biggest issue and yes that's a slippery slope argument.
I do think that algorithms for videos should work to push scientifically backed counter videos. I know this is possible because this is already done with advertisements. The difference is they have to make this decision based on morality and not advertising dollars. That can be tough for a billion dollar corporation to do.
Nothing you can do. (Score:2)
The study is flawed then. (Score:2)
Simply because Google/YouTube returns something in a search doesn't mean it's responsible for the content in the search.
And if some potato heads choose to play "pretend" that the world is a dinner plate, that's fine.
We are NOT the friggin' Thought Police.
We simply correct for it elsewhere (such as if said potato heads gain some form of temporal authority).
Thought police? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm the last person to argue that the earth is flat since all evidence is to the contrary but I also think that there are concerns over free speech and that "she does believe that Google could be doing more to stop the spread of scientifically incorrect ideas" she thinks google should do something to suppress idea's or beliefs and that in and of itself should be cause for concern. There are a lot of conflicts between what some people believe and what science says, the anti-vax movement is such a instance with plenty of scientific study's saying vaccinations don't cause autism but there also appears to be plenty of anecdotal evidence saying the opposite. I find it very dangerous to even consider giving a company like google the power to suppress idea's or to try and silence people who have a opinion that's not supported by science since aside from free speech there are also censorship concerns.
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but there also appears to be plenty of anecdotal evidence saying the opposite.
Here's the thing: There isn't plenty of anecdotal evidence saying the opposite.
There's the appearance of this because there's a whole lot of people trying to extract money from gullible people. After all, the gullible are fantastic financial targets, since you can just say anything and they'll keep buying your expensive snake oil.
These money extraction efforts are served by YouTube's current algorithm because it plays grifter after grifter until viewers start to think there's plenty of anecdotal evidence.
How many... (Score:2)
Question (Score:2)
One question that I've never gotten a good answer to and simply don't understand: WHAT MEANS TO AN END?
Meaning -- a true flat earther believes that ALL the governments of the world along with scientists, media, etc ... and ALL trying to make us believe the world is round.
Ok ... what means to an end? WHY would they do this? HOW do they benefit from hiding the FLAT truth to you?
Makes so sense. Oh, and the world is round. Ish.
Where's the edge? (Score:3)
There's a song in there somewhere, and I mean a good one; not the one from Magnum [stlyrics.com].
Re: Trolls (Score:3)
It's pretty rare to see "critical thinker/debunker and academic types" even bother addressing flat earth claims, let alone get "pissed off" about it. Some things are just too stupid to be taken seriously. The response to things like 9/11 conspiracy theories or even moon hoax claims has been far stronger. If the goal is to annoy and get a rise out of people, you're far better off focusing on those topics.
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It's pretty rare to see "critical thinker/debunker and academic types" even bother addressing flat earth claims, let alone get "pissed off" about it. Some things are just too stupid to be taken seriously.
And as Ron White say's "you can fix a lot of things, but you can't fix stupid, so don't even try."
Re: Trolls (Score:2)
I find that responding with laughter usually works pretty well. The "you mad" types really don't like being laughed at. Makes them pretty mad.
Re:Trolls (Score:5, Interesting)
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They MUST believe in the flat earth, because no matter who you talked to or how byzantine and strained the rationalizations, it all came back to - in their minds - proof of God.
I find it hard to take a cosmological model seriously if it can be disproved by a shovel.
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You can have an ordained universe without geocentricism. If their God is so great, he can make a universe, and not just a planet. Their failure is one of imagination, and it is arguably blasphemous in the bargain as it limits their supposedly unlimited deity.
Re:Trolls (Score:5, Interesting)
There are definitely trolls in the flat-earth community and I am pretty convinced that the majority of the 'famous' flat-earthers on Youtube are only doing it for the money. They are scam artists and their target is the myriad of scientifically illiterate people who genuinely believe their crap. Look at all the people who believe in unscientific ideas such as astrology, homeopathy, spiritism, power of crystals, ancient hidden civilizations, ... Add to that the bronze age cosmologies described by the holy books of most religions and you have the perfect environment to bring people to the border of the rabbit hole. Once they are there, Youtube provides the final kick to fall in the hole.
An important factor is the recent resurgence of creationism in the US and in most areas of the world where religious fundamentalists are thriving. Initially, the creationist movement was only targeting the Evolution Theory but all sciences are connected:
- The old ages of Earth and of the Universe are confirmed by Geology, Astrophysics, and Nuclear Physics (i.e. via Radiometric dating) so those sciences MUST be wrong.
- The common ancestry of all life forms is confirmed by DNA analysis, Paleontology and Anatomy so those sciences MUST be wrong.
- The Noah Flood is disproved by History, Geology, Climatology, DNA analysis so those sciences MUST be wrong.
- etc
The end result is that a fundamentalist preacher has no other choices than to denigrate all modern sciences to justify his bronze age beliefs.
Youtube and other social networks are not the cause of irrational beliefs but they provide a good environment to amplify them.
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I don't think they're trolling. Most, if not all, flat earthers are religious. Science makes their believes less relevant, and therefore scientific thinking should be rejected.
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Do you also think the religious idiots out there are in it for trolling academics?
Re:Trolls (Score:4, Informative)
Re:You don't really know anything (Score:2)
Re:A question to more experienced folks here: (Score:4, Informative)
There is actually two kinds. Just like with religion. The ones that really, really, REALLY try hard to believe it and at least convinced themselves, and now want to convince someone else to strengthen their faith so they don't "fall". To them it's quite a bit of a religious thing, and more often than not you'll notice that they follow some other religion and think that their holy book kinda "demands" that the world is flat, so they have to believe in a flat earth or their holy book could maybe be wrong, and that MUST NOT be.
And then of course there's the snakeoil peddlers that noticed that the former group is a welcome source of income.
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They're not eliminating it, they just don't promote it anymore. I.e. you won't get it in your "recommended" list anymore.
Doesn't keep flattards from crying CENSORSHIP, of course.
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why is that in this era that we are living in, people can't believe in what they want?
For flat earthers, I don't mind if they believe what they believe, as long as they aren't put in charge of map-making, arranging routes for cargo ships, or setting orbits for satellites.
There are other varieties of "ignint" [tm Zappa] that are actively dangerous; vaxxers, for example (I can't see their problem, really - the Vax 11-780 was a cool machine for its time).
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people can't believe in what they want?
People are free to believe anything they want until their belief starts having an impact on others. Frankly we should form lists of people for the sake of the species. You believe the earth is flat? You're on the list. You're on the list? You don't get to vote or have your opinion heard on anything that has an impact on the life of someone else.
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I don't trust any of the fact given that I can't proved myself.
But you can easily prove yourself that the Earth is round, using nothing more than common household items.