Talk:Flat Earth

Biased article

A little issue that has irritated me with this article: Of course flat Earth is scientifically disproven. This does not mean that it should be stated in the first sentence. Flat Earth being a hoax is a given by all means, so it should instead only be noted in a further sentence such as: "Despite the overwhelming evidence against flat Earth..." --Apmh 21:13, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Describing utter nonsense as nonsense is the opposite of bias. This encylopedia is not in the business of lending tiny bits of credibility to hooey with the implication of "on the other hand." Acroterion (talk) 23:28, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

but its right. if its been proven false, its not bias to say that its false. Babysharkboss2 (talk) 19:07, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

failed verification of lead statement

for the record, i am *not* defending flat earth

"Strangely, the youngest generation, raised with the internet, is the most skeptical of a spherical earth, with only 82% firmly believing the Earth is round."

1. The question asked in the study where the 82% number came from is“I have always believed the world is round.", but its reported here as a present tense belief. This is also, to be fair, and we're allowed to say this, one of those questions engineered to get a "surprising" result by playing with some wording in a report, which is exactly what they did.
2. The source says that only 2% of people across all age groups firmly believe the earth is flat. Though this is followed up on immediately, it casts doubt on whether or not the prior sentence should be there in the first place.
4. The source says the responses could be "ironic"
5. Taken directly from the article, verbatum,

But further survey research will be necessary to winnow the possible explanations. There is a critical lesson to be learned here: the results of a single public opinion survey are by no means authoritative. Differences in the phrasing of questions, variance in the methods of polling, randomness and error and (rarely but sadly) misconduct: all of these guarantee that a single survey should never be taken as the last word.

The statement as written does not reflect what the source says, I'm going to remove it and link this diff. Feel free to discuss it with me if you disagree, or think it should be changed. DarmaniLink (talk) 17:29, 18 February 2024 (UTC)

Decided not to remove it and to instead reword it DarmaniLink (talk) 17:36, 18 February 2024 (UTC)

References

Clarity of assertion

There is a sentence which, for me, is confusing - "For young children who have not yet received information from their social environment, their own perception of their surroundings often leads to a false concept about the shape of the underground on the horizon" I feel like it could be edited for clarity. Perhaps it is more concise to say the shape of the planet beyond the horizon" or even "the shape of the ground as it appears at the horizon"? Chardok (talk) 02:59, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing that out. I made copy edits. Do they address your concern? Strebe (talk) 18:41, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Thomas Aquinas does not mention a spherical earth

The article says:

St. Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), the most widely taught theologian of the Middle Ages, believed in a spherical Earth and took for granted that his readers also knew the Earth is round.

But the source which is given does not mention a spherical earth. Aquinas says that both the physicist and the astronomer prove the earth to be round, which is not necessarily spherical. Why does the text then say Aquinas believed in a spherical earth? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Retonom (talk • contribs) 15:55, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Article full of globe bias

This article should be about the flat earth but in fact is serves more to make assertions that the flat earth theory is pseudoscience, silly, unscientific or whatever is brought up to discredit the flat earth. This is not how it should work. The article should give an objective account of the flat earth theory and history and not state in every second paragraph that the heliocentric model or the spinning ball are the only true valid models etc. From what I perceive the people that are in charge here do not want an objective view of the flat earth to be available to the general public, since they delete even comments on this talk page that point out flaws in the article. Let's see if this comment is deleted again, which would prove my point... Have a nice day