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Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

willpatrick.co.uk

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Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#51

Post by Brendinooo »

cma wrote: post #30
lisper wrote: post #17

I've been spending quite a bit of time interacting with the young-earth creationist community on Reddit and YouTube. It is closely related to flat-earth, though there is one significant difference: YEC is overtly religious, and specifically Christian. Other than that many of the forms of argument are the same. From that experience I have made two observations: 1. These people are not idiots (at least the YECs aren't,…

Why would some point of existence or meaning lead specifically to Christianity?

It doesn't, necessarily. But it's a part of that overall argument.

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#52

Post by dsr_ »

BrianOnHN wrote: post #14
firebaze wrote: post #2

Depressing.

I'm sure this won't be a popular comment, but based on the descriptions in the article, the flat earthers seem very similar to the Trump supporters I know (family, not by choice). The clear distinction is the absolute unwillingness to listen logic without screaming what-a-about conspiracy A, or conspiracy B, or C. Or the classic "your just a socialist" inbetween talking about their social security and medicare benefi…

Specifically, the QAnon cultists are just like Flat Earthers.

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#53

Post by lm28469 »

toss1 wrote: post #5

Sadly, this is another topic of questions to add to job interview filters - ask about the moon landings & vaccines. Anyone subscribing to any of this conspiracy nonsense, especially as an identity is (pardon the language) too effin stupid to work in any serious technical endeavor - if they're deeply willing to ignore those facts & reason, what will they ignore on your project? Plus, their deeply ingrained ideas that…

Ah yes, the famous "I don't like them so they shouldn't be able to live"...

Since you're willing to deny people's basic rights such as "working", following your logic, someone could argue that you obviously lack empathy and shouldn't be in a managing position or anywhere above the very bottom of the hierarchy ladder

No matter how smart you think you are there will always be someone who think you're as dumb as a rock, hopefully they're not in a position to chose if you're allowed to get a job or not

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#54

Post by krapp »

corndoge wrote: post #31
toss1 wrote: post #5

Sadly, this is another topic of questions to add to job interview filters - ask about the moon landings & vaccines. Anyone subscribing to any of this conspiracy nonsense, especially as an identity is (pardon the language) too effin stupid to work in any serious technical endeavor - if they're deeply willing to ignore those facts & reason, what will they ignore on your project? Plus, their deeply ingrained ideas that…

> if they're deeply willing to ignore those facts & reason, what will they ignore on your project? And yet there are & have been brilliant engineers with uncommon beliefs, e.g. Terry Davis.

You could have picked any number of brilliant iconoclasts, but Terry Davis didn't have "uncommon beliefs," he had schizophrenia and it ruined his life and may have driven him to suicide.

And at the end of the day, his operating system is an interesting novelty and little more. Manic obsession and technical skill aren't equivalent to genius.

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#55

Post by Hoasi »

emteycz wrote: post #10
mcculley wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Stupid" is not a useful way to generally describe the people vulnerable to conspiracy theories. I have met people who are relatively intelligent who fall into these. See also: religion, politics.

I have met stupid intelligent people. Sometimes knowledge just doesn't seem to translate to actual behavior and decisions (it's mostly about the lack of decisions, IMHO).

> I have met stupid intelligent people.

The irony happens when it is education itself that compromises the critical faculties of someone, as the article mentions.

Intelligent people are sometimes loyal to an ideology built during their upbringing and belong to their circle. Sometimes the exact opposite happens and drives them to a complete rejection of said ideas. Religion, culture, and politics are prone to create blind spots, where otherwise critical, highly educated, and intelligent individuals don't question specific biases because they are too closely related to their identity.

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#56

Post by shadowgovt »

umvi wrote: post #22

I used to be a flat earther. No, I didn't actually believe the earth was flat, but I loved the outrage it provoked and the attention I got when I told people I was a flat earther. I also enjoyed trying to defend my position and call out (valid) logical fallacies round earthers were making. It really forces you to improve your debate skills when you have to defend an impossible position. Lastly, there was a social asp…

I wonder if you had a strategy for reconciling the theory of the flat moon with flat Earth?

Believing in both at the same time is extra-tricky, and that's what caused me to get banned from the Facebook flat-Earthers. If the moon is flat, perspective distortion should make it disk-like, and nobody's observed a disk-like moon. So either the moon is round (and the fact it only shows us one face is some extra-fancy trickery with mirrors or lenses or something), or the moon is a flat disk facing Earth, but the Earth is a ball rotating under the moon.

(Clarification: none of this is things I believe. I spent time debating flat-Earthers as an exercise in logical consistency and alignment with observational evidence).

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#57

Post by Brendinooo »

umvi wrote: post #22

I used to be a flat earther. No, I didn't actually believe the earth was flat, but I loved the outrage it provoked and the attention I got when I told people I was a flat earther. I also enjoyed trying to defend my position and call out (valid) logical fallacies round earthers were making. It really forces you to improve your debate skills when you have to defend an impossible position. Lastly, there was a social asp…

My headcanon is that most people that proclaim to be flat-earthers are like you - they don't actually believe it.

From the Ancient Greeks to the 19th century, people believed the world was round. That story you heard in history class about how people in the 1400s were afraid to sail west because they'd fall off? Not true. They were afraid to sail west because they didn't know that the Americas existed, and without those they knew there was no way they'd survive a trip to China.

Flat earth in modern discourse was a strawman from the start. There may be some true believers - there always are - but it hasn't been a serious worldview in 2000 years or more.

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#58

Post by eurekin »

BrianOnHN wrote: post #14
firebaze wrote: post #2

Depressing.

I'm sure this won't be a popular comment, but based on the descriptions in the article, the flat earthers seem very similar to the Trump supporters I know (family, not by choice). The clear distinction is the absolute unwillingness to listen logic without screaming what-a-about conspiracy A, or conspiracy B, or C. Or the classic "your just a socialist" inbetween talking about their social security and medicare benefi…

This actually would explain a lot from my environment as well. Different country, different parties and issues, but that triggered responses - same story

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#59

Post by erdos4d »

lisper wrote: post #17

I've been spending quite a bit of time interacting with the young-earth creationist community on Reddit and YouTube. It is closely related to flat-earth, though there is one significant difference: YEC is overtly religious, and specifically Christian. Other than that many of the forms of argument are the same. From that experience I have made two observations: 1. These people are not idiots (at least the YECs aren't,…

I just don't get this at all. Could you explain how they refute things like ISS camera footage showing a clearly round earth with the station going around it? Are you saying that they just refute science outright because it conflicts with their teleology beliefs? If that is the case, they actually are idiots, regardless of how erudite their arguments may be.

Re: Notes from a Flat Earth Conference

#60

Post by BrianOnHN »

dsr_ wrote: post #52
BrianOnHN wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure this won't be a popular comment, but based on the descriptions in the article, the flat earthers seem very similar to the Trump supporters I know (family, not by choice). The clear distinction is the absolute unwillingness to listen logic without screaming what-a-about conspiracy A, or conspiracy B, or C. Or the classic "your just a socialist" inbetween talking about their social security and medicare benefi…

Specifically, the QAnon cultists are just like Flat Earthers.

Thankfully, I haven't known one of those since he got run out of the state for committing loan fraud. He seemed like an intelligent guy. Was even interested in startups. Then he started asking me about the "intellectual dark web." I was like, I know quite a bit about computers and I think I would've heard if there really was any legitimate intellect only accessible on the dark web. That was the last I remember of him besides that he committed fraud and moved back to his parents house in Wisconsin.
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