I'm not sure what the fascination and resurrection of the flat earth theory is all about. To me it is amusing and I don't mind talking to "flat earthers". I haven't seen anything from them that convinces me. I still look. Some of the things are often pretty amusing.

I was chatting with some people on steemit.chat today about flat earth. They were wondering why people were even talking about it. I mentioned I debate with flat earthers sometimes. They wondered why I debated. They even expressed there is nothing to debate.

There is ALWAYS something to debate. Asking questions is part of the scientific method. It might even be the most important part. We never stop asking questions. There is no stopping point in true science. There is only what makes the most sense at the moment. Yet we should welcome questions. This implies there is ALWAYS room for debate.

If there is nothing to debate then we are talking dogma, or religion most of the time. That can be worse than a person who is wrong, but still willing to respond to questions.

We as humans can often get very hung up on NOT BEING WRONG. In fact the more intelligent (ego at work) we perceive ourselves the more at risk we seem to be in becoming the person who considers themselves never, or rarely wrong.

This comes into play on both sides of the flat earth debate.

From the flat earther side I'll see them do everything they can to poke a hole into any video or experiment someone does even when it is a simple experiment. They won't bother to try to reproduce the experiment which is the scientific method. They'll simply attack the experiment and talk about how it was fake and rigged without doing the experiment themselves.

This is sad. If the experiment requires resources you do not have, then that is one thing. If they are experiments that can be attempted yourself and you do have the means and you are simply being obstinate or stubborn that is another.

Foe example: This father and son made a space balloon with a camera. How ingenious was that?

Of course I read comments and saw the flat earthers attacking it. Yet why don't they simply do the experiment themselves?

Or how about this one? This is something people could do themselves. This guy wasn't even trying to prove the earth was a globe. He assumed it was and was just trying to find out how to measure it's curvature.

Or if they have the means why don't they try to circumnavigate the globe themselves. They then can surely make certain they are not in some long turn.

I've known a person that circumnavigated the globe via foot, and one via bicycle. Now when they reached large bodies of water they had to take a plane, or boat to continue the journey. Yet we can use Distance = Velocity x Time as a simple equation to determine they could not back track via the plane or boat at that time unless you think we have amazingly fast planes and boats that only kick into warp drive when they are trying to keep people from learning the world is flat. I don't buy into magical thinking. I prefer the math, observation, reason, and if possible experimentation.

I do not believe asking questions is a bad thing. I think it is one of the most important things we can do.

I do think "I'm never/rarely wrong" is a bad thing and is actually coming from a position of ignorance.

We are ALL (I intentionally use an absolute here) wrong about a great number of things. Many of these things we are wrong simply due to lacking all of the information necessary to fully understand what we are perceiving. Yet there are many among us that will do everything they can to make sure they can continue to believe themselves rarely wrong.

Being wrong is not a bad thing. It is an opportunity to grow and learn. If you are rarely wrong in truth then you are a sad person as that means you have very little chance of learning new things and growing. You are stagnant, static, and locked into place. You might as well have stared at Medusa and had your mind turned into stone.

Hollow Earth

Now I admit I also debate with flat earthers and read flat earther posts because I often find them very amusing. This means while I've yet to find one I actually agree with, I do get some enjoyment from reading the posts.

I've decided some day I want to inject the Hollow Earth theory into a debate with a flat earther. I'm curious what they will think of that as Flat Earth + Hollow Earth combined seems like it could be insanely amusing.

I found myself thinking of some questions...

"If I dig continuously in a straight line down, in the earth as a globe/ellipsoid shaped thing the idea is I'd eventually pop through the crust on the other side. The old joke of digging a hole and popping up in China. There were some great looney tunes cartoons that did that. If the world is flat what happens if I keep digging? Will I eventually fall out of the bottom? If so, where will I go?"

Minecraft

Then I started to wonder if perhaps minecraft and its procedurally generated block world which is indeed flat might not have been one factor to the recent rise of flat earth.

Probably not so much.

It is more likely to be that the education system has been focused on making people fall for appeal to authorities, virtue signal, and believe in safe spaces than in critical thinking. In higher education they seem more interested in making people focus on collectivism, socialism, and communism than critical or free thinking.

It is no surprise that "I'm right mentallity" wins out. That tends to be the result of such programs. History backs this. It has in a few times lead to a cultural revolution where those that were "right" made sure they remained right simply by killing off those that disagreed with them. In the process of claiming to be fighting hate.

In some places they even put those people into a cooking pot. (Chinese Cultural Revolution).

So am I surprised at the rise of the flat earth theory? No. Am I surprised people will simply say "you are wrong" and debunk anything they can without actually experimenting? No.

It's called the easy path. Why do the work, if all you have to do is say YOU'RE WRONG and stubbornly defend your mental safe space?

NOTE: In parting. This can happen on the other side as well. This is obvious by "What is there to debate?" type statements and immediately considering the other side as insane or ignorant without even listening. Why? They didn't agree with your mental safe space. This is WHY we debate, it is not a reason to avoid debating.