Flat Earthers and what to do with them

I'm reading this thread and getting the feeling that most people on here are spherical Earthers.

Bless.

I work for a landscape gardening firm levelling out the ground before we lay turf. As such I'm on a constant professional quest to literally flatten the earth, so this "flat earth" theory intrigues me. I'm very interested in receiving further promotional material by email, SMS and post.

Kind regards,

Fizzy

Coming from a background in physics I find it really hard to understand people's logic when I read these theories

It's not logic, it's emotion. If there were logic, honest investigation would lead to discovery of the truth. This is why most people who call themselves "skeptics" are not - they're not skeptical of everything, just anything "official".

Most conspiracy theorists are buying into it because it instantly makes them feel more intelligent than everybody else, particularly those with more "officially sanctioned" education/training than they have. It's very close to the reasoning that tempts people into religious cults (for which reason, I have little sympathy for cult members - they want to be told that the rest of the world is evil and they're in the tiny virtuous minority).

Interestingly, the review was quite benign on the topic, given that crystals don't actually do active harm

A couple of years ago, somebody who's on here posted on social media "My cat has a bad back. A friend left some 'healing' crystals here so I'm going to pass them over it's back. What's the worst it could do?"

To which my response was: "It could kill it."

My point being that anything which can genuinely have an effect could potentially have a negative effect. When people say "What's the worst it could do?" about so many 'alternative therapies', the best you can say is that they're implicitly accepting that the technique in question is hokum. But some of those therapies can poison and kill, which the alternative therapies people will never acknowldge.

But they are natural so can only have a positive effect. (Like all those naturally occurring poisonous things)

Don't you understand that it is only man made chemicals that kill. The same ones that occur in nature are natural and therefore good.

Have you thought about just not talking to them again? Life is too short

I had a Canadian friend who smoked too much crack in his teens and was always a bit unhinged.

He moved back to a small town in Canada and must have got bored, because he started on all the conspiracy stuff.

It kicked off a bit when a mutual friend's dad got cancer, and he started posting a load of stuff about how chemo was government control, and how apple seeds cure cancer but Big Pharma don't want you to know.

Idiocy is quite funny sometimes but it can also be infuriating.

Again, not to bang on about where my wife works, but they published a booklet entitled "I've got nothing to lose by trying it", you can download it here: http://senseaboutscience.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Ive-got-nothing-to-lose-by-trying-it.pdf

It details exactly what you've got to lose by trying crystals and other bullshit.

But some of those therapies can poison and kill, which the alternative therapies people will never acknowldge.

Yup, a lot of them have properties that can actively interfere with drugs with proven effectiveness, causing harm even if the person isn't actively shunning conventional treatment.

I have a feeling that most of these conspiracy theory lovers don't get on with Occam's razor as a concept.

FFS I've been drawn into an argument on FB. Turns out a friend is friends with a Flat Earther.

He's a fucking moron.

Is it better than gillette?

The world is dome shaped.

Mind.blown.

It's not logic, it's emotion.

You realise this argument is (ironically) nearly always motivated reasoning?

;-)

When Columbus lived, people thought that the earth was flat. They believed the Atlantic Ocean to be filled with monsters large enough to devour their ships, and with fearful waterfalls over which their frail vessels would plunge to destruction. Columbus had to fight these foolish beliefs in order to get men to sail with him. He felt sure the earth was round.”
–Emma Miler Bolenius, American Schoolbook Author, 1919

They believed the Atlantic Ocean to be filled with monsters large enough to devour their ships

Only because some joker drew a map with them on

He felt sure the earth was round.

See, it's all about feelings for the Round Earthers.

I'm not sure I would of have got in a boat with someone who just 'felt sure'.

And I don't care what the experts say ...

I can't be bothered to fact check this, but wasn't the spherical earth common knowledge by Columbus's time?

I thought the real story was that he was trying to sail to India* westwards, thus avoiding having to go around Africa. Everyone thought the crew would starve to death before they got there, which they would have, if they hadn't conveniently bumped into the Americas.

• Hence the "West Indies".
  

Pythagoras was the first Greek who called the Earth round; though Theophrastus attributes this to Parmenides, and Zeno to Hesiod." Early Greek philosophers alluded to a spherical Earth, though with some ambiguity.

see - bloody experts again.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_of_the_flat_Earth

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus

My bro science wasn't too far out.

saw this today

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Intellectual rigour is the thing. Motivation is inescapable but honesty is possible.

And if you can't apply rigour to motivation, you aren't reasoning.