There’s a disturbing trend in my Facebook feed. I’m seeing more and more posts from those who deny that the earth is spherical, that the sun is 93,000,000 miles away, and that stars exist. NASA, according to these people, is concealing the fact that there is no such thing as “space”, and that the flat disk-like earth, surrounded by an ice wall (which is why no one is apparently allowed to go to Antarctica), is covered by a transparent dome (the “firmament”) on which the local sun, moon, and planets all move.
Gravity does not exist for these people, and is often replaced by “density”, conveniently ignoring the idea that density needs to include gravity as part of its definition. Nor did we ever go to the moon – “it was all CGI” – ignoring the graphics capabilities of computers in the late 1960s. Nor is it really ever explained exactly why NASA (other space agencies may or may not be collaborating with the Americans) has done this and is continuing to produce fake videos of the ISS, etc.
Confused? So are these people. There seem to be as many models for this fictional universe as there are people describing it (I’m not even going to start describing the armed penguins guarding the ice wall that surrounds the flat earth). Like other conspiracy theorists, these beliefs are not based so much on written work, as on YouTube videos made by amateurs who appear to have slept through elementary physics lessons at school. Demands for proof are usually met with “don’t be a brainwashed sheeple – do your own research” (“research” in this case meaning fast-forwarding through YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram videos).
Even after the failure of their own “experiments” to prove their beliefs, these people still refuse to accept that they may possibly be mistaken.
Some of these anti-science claims are being made by obvious trolls – those putting out outrageous “theories” in order to laugh at the gullible fools who believe them. Some are actually outright hustles, taking money from the believers (and doing very well at it). And some may well be the work of foreign state actors, seeking to destabilise our society though the promotion of questioning authority.
Sadly, though, there do appear to be many who actually sincerely believe this nonsense, and these failures of logic and reason would be laughable if they were not so pathetic and disturbing. I’ve been trying to work out some of the motivations and reasons for belief in this system (not all of these apply to all believers in this anti-science nonsense):
- Desire to be different: Claiming that you have secrets which eluded Newton, Kepler, Einstein, and Hawking makes you special. Like all keepers of secrets from alchemists onwards, these secrets are not for the common herd. Those who have these secrets are a special breed – part of the hermetic elite.
- Religion – specifically Christian fundamentalism: By reading and misinterpreting the first verses of Genesis, and various other isolated fragments of the Bible, it is possible to derive a cosmology which has a limited correspondence with reality. Many flat-earthers are also creationists. As a PS, I would add that I am a regularly worshipping Christian – I am no atheist or Satanist arguing against religion.
- Mental illness: Some of these believers, when faced with facts that go against their pet theory, simply resort to personal abuse, insisting that those who believe in scientific methods have been brainwashed and that the flat-earth believers are being continually lied to. They also, through their writing, may exhibit what seem to be further symptoms of persecution mania (I’m not qualified to make psychiatric diagnoses, so take this with a pinch of salt).
- Ignorance: Especially in the USA, lack of general knowledge and reasoning ability seems to be disturbingly common. Simple arithmetic seems to be outside many people’s skillset, as do elementary logical thought processes, or the ability to consider others’ observations as evidence (“I’ve never seen the curvature of the earth from a high-flying plane, or seen a SpaceX rocket land, so no-one has”). Homeschooling and the lack of exposure to contrary viewpoints may also play a role here.
As I wrote at the start, I find this disturbing. This move towards a distrust in science also reflects a breakdown in trust in authority. I know people who find any three-letter organisation (WHO, IMF, WEF, CIA, FBI, FDA, etc.) to be an agent of “Them”. The identity of “Them” is vague, but currently seems to be the ultra-rich who are aiming to reduce the earth’s population to about 10% of its current size (“the Great Reset”) through chemtrails, Covid vaccines, food monopolies, 5G, etc. The more people who believe in this and associated paranoid theories, the faster our society will disintegrate.
I’ll leave it there. I’m depressing myself.