A Flat Earther will try to fly a rocket to prove his theory right (or wrong). (source) All jokes aside, we should all respect any man (or woman) who is bold enough to try and prove (or disprove) the theory he believes in. This is something we don’t see every day, not even in science.

And this gives me the opportunity to speak about something much more important: the nature of science itself.

People laugh at the Flat Earth theory.
And rightfully so.

It is an absurd theory which wants us to be living on a flat planet, instead of the sphere Earth we all know and love.

And yet, there is something really interesting to see and observe regarding the Flat Earth theory.
And this is what is true for all theories: that it is formulated in such a way that it totally aggrees with all the empirical (observational) data!

If you pay closer attention to that crazy theory you will be astounded to notice that the people defending it do not disagree with “us” (the rest) on the facts but on their interpretation! Yes, Flat Earthers do agree that we travel from China to America on a plane, yet they explain this travel as taking place on a different world than we know! (and no, we don’t travel from North to South) Yes, Flat Earthers do agree that we have pictures of Earth from space, yet they interpret them in a different way (from a different lens to be exact) than we do.

And when you tell them to go to space and see for themselves or to go to Antarctica to believe for themselves that there is no great Wall there, they simply answer that (a) they cannot, which is for most part true and that most importantly (b) we haven’t been there personally either! Meaning that our argument to ask for evidence is answered by a similar argument which claims that we personally do not have such evidence either! (By the way it is true that one cannot easily do to Antarctica, due to a very strict treaty which – surprisingly – has been signed by almost all countries on the sake of the environment)

I don’t believe we live in a flat planet.
But yet again, I don’t believe in modern atheistic dogmatic science neither…

One man one said that modern physics can prove anything given the right theory and circumstances. And nothing could be a better testament to that than the Flat Earth theory! A theory that – all jokes aside – proves the most important thing to know about science and scientific theories: that they can be complete and consistent and yet have no relation to reality whatsoever!

It is true.

From the Flat Earth to the theory of multiverses, science history is full of crazy ideas. (And to be honest, the theory of multiverses is much more crazy)

The only question to ask is: do you believe hard enough (in scientism) to give them credit?

Related articles: Search Harmonia Philosophica for “Limits of science”, “Scientific theories” or “Scientific models”.