NEWS

Proof That The Earth Is Round

Published

7 years ago

October 4, 2017

Not too long ago, that Olodo Rapper parading himself as a physicist came out to say that the Earth is Flat. he even started a GoFundMe account to prove his point.

However, because I am a nice person, I’ve decided to educate him (and anybody else who cares to learn) without collecting school fees.

Now in today’s lesson, I’ll be showing you proofs that the earth is indeed round. The first activity,

Go to the harbor

When a ship sails off toward the horizon, it doesn’t just get smaller and smaller until it’s not visible anymore. Instead, the hull seems to sink below the horizon first, then the mast. When ships return from sea, the sequence is reversed: First the mast, then the hull, seem to rise over the horizon.

The ship-and-horizon observation is so self-evident that 1881’s “Zetetic Astronomy,” the first modern flat-Earth text, devotes a chapter to “debunking” it. The explanation relies on assuming that the sequential disappearance is simply an illusion brought on by perspective. This debunking does not make much sense, however, as there’s nothing about perspective (which just says that things are smaller over longer distances) that should make the bottom of an object disappear before the top. If you’d like to prove to yourself that perspective isn’t the reason for boats disappearing hull-first and returning mast-first, bring a telescope or binoculars on your trip to the harbor. Even with vision enhancement, the ship will still dip below the curve of the Earth.

Look at the stars

Greek philosopher Aristotle figured out this one in 350 B.C., and nothing’s changed. Different constellations are visible from different latitudes. Probably the two most striking examples are the Big Dipper and the Southern Cross. The Big Dipper, a set of seven stars that looks like a ladle, is always visible at latitudes of 41 degrees North or higher. Below 25 degrees South, you can’t see it at all. And in northern Australia, just north of that latitude, the Big Dipper just barely squeaks above the horizon.Meanwhile, in the Southern Hemisphere, there’s the Southern Cross, a bright four-star arrangement. That constellation isn’t visible until you travel as far south as the Florida Keys in the Northern Hemisphere.

These different stellar views make sense if you imagine the Earth as a globe, so that looking “up” really means looking toward a different sliver of space from the Southern or Northern hemisphere.

Watch an eclipse

Aristotle also bolstered his belief in a round Earth with the observation that during lunar eclipses, the Earth’s shadow on the face of the sun is curved. Since this curved shape exists during all lunar eclipses, despite the fact that Earth is rotating, Aristotle correctly intuited from this curved shadow that the Earth is curvy all around — in other words, a sphere.For that matter, solar eclipses also tend to bolster the idea that the planets, moons and stars are a bunch of roundish objects orbiting each other. If the Earth is a disk and the stars and planets a bunch of small, nearby objects hovering in a dome above the surface, as many flat-Earthers believe, the total solar eclipse that crossed North America in August 2017 becomes very difficult to explain.

Take a round-the-world flight

This one should cost you considerably less than $1 million (B.o.B can use his GoFund Me money), though you will have to drop a few thousand dollars. Anyone can circumnavigate the globe nowadays; there are even travel firms, like AirTreks, that specialize in multi-stop, round-the-world routes. You won’t have to retrace your steps to land where you started.If you get lucky enough to get an unobscured view of the horizon and a high enough commercial flight, you might even be able to make out the curvature of the Earth with the naked eye. According to a 2008 paper in the journal Applied Optics, the Earth’s curve becomes subtly visible at an altitude of around 35,000 feet, as long as the observer has at least a 60 degree field of view (which may be difficult from a passenger plane window). The curvature becomes more readily apparent above 50,000 feet; passengers on the now-grounded supersonic Concorde jet were often treated to a view of the curved horizon while flying at 60,000 feet.

And that folks, is the end of the lesson today. do remember to share your notes with that B.o.B…or better still, direct him to this page to receive some education.

I know you want to say, “Thank You”, but Don’t mention!