Obligs:
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I still remember my high school history teacher doing a unit of evolution where the explanations ended up being too creation-y (the giraffe’s neck got longer so that he could eat the tall leaves!) It wasn’t explicitly as bad as all that, but certainly not good enough to avoid this kind of magical thinking. He was a solid guy and wasn’t trying to muck it up, he just wasn’t staying in his lane. My biology teacher caught wind of his unit from us and she very quietly turned a specific shade of red and said “he said…what?” I’m sure there was an interesting staff meeting soon after.
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Flat-Earthers should get used to people being patronizing and dismissive of their ignorant bullshit. Willfully stupid people don’t deserve respect or consideration for their stupidity.
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Fundies of any stripe have a hard time distinguishing their fantasies from reality. That’s why we get things like the Satanic Panic and Xians supporting Donald Trump.
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Seconded. This was a chilling interview because the guy was likable, self-aware and sane-sounding. I tend to believe the caricatures are true of many of the Flat-Earthers out there, but Sargent was not one of them.
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Of course there were, but without far reaching platforms from which to spread their dickheadedness, at least they were somewhat contained/limited. Now they are “influencers”, “personalities”, and “Presidents”.
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I once did some work analyzing YouTube’s recommendation system, and discovered that if you clicked on the most popular videos in the list it would inevitably dump you in the pit of flat earth/creationism/chemtrails videos in pretty short order.
Like my bot was trying to suss out some other trends and I eventually had to start blacklisting conspiracy theory keywords because they were polluting the results every time.
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Wake up sheeple! Just don’t ask me how to set your alarm, since with a flat earth, the sun rises and sets for everyone all at the same time, even though we’re all in different time zones. I keep missing the meetings.
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This short video debunks something I hadn’t known needed debunking (one cannot, in fact, see past the horizon with a telescope or a long camera lens), and in the process (read the comments!) illustrates the level of discourse that circulates in these circles. Education is important, but I’m skeptical that any degree of educational quality, any number of educational opportunities are going to reach all of these people. They are motivated reasoners.
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The sad part is China is now in on the NWO globed earth conspiracy. They put out this faked photo earlier this month.
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Sometimes people act like dickheads worked alone and in isolation before the internet.
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Funny thing; if the earth were actually flat, we’d hear about people, animals and inanimate objects ‘falling off’ of it all the time… especially in this day & age where there are cameras everywhere.
And yet some people still willfully believe this stuff…
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This is all the proof needed.
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Word.
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I feel inclined to agree very much - but I have had some truly haunting experiences in the past with people who don’t fit that bill. And I came to believe that education does not prevent that you become an idiot in one, some, or many fields.
My peer group basically consists of academics. Most of them are scientists, or are working in science-related fields. However, most of them spend money on homeopathy, acupuncture and other placebos.
I had a colleague working in West Africa who told me that she would be taking a homeopathic prophylaxis against malaria. (I lost it at that point, BTW, and our relationship is a bit tense since then.) This person holds a PhD, and their graduate education contained statistics, chemistry, physics, majored in biology. Ecotoxicology, to be precise. PhD in vegetation ecology.
I could go on for pages about people who, IMO, must know better, but obviously don’t. And this extends to at least one person with a masters degree in biology who told me she really understand the appeal of the flat earth theory (sic.), and has a close friend who likes to preach about it.
Education, including scientific education, does not automatically make someone immune against bullshit.
ETA: I really would like to invite you to a drink and discuss a) those textbooks and b) your experience growing up with two botanists as parents.
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I feel like “education” (as defined by me) helps, but no amount of advanced “training” will, and since “training” is how you get a job these days, “education” has been kicked to the curb.
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I want to do this kind of stuff but the flat earthers won’t believe me because I’m Jewish.
All of these anti-beliefs converge now: anti-vax, chem trails, flat earth, faked moon landing, and everything that comes under the 9/11 Alex Jones umbrella including beliefs that the California wildfires are a hoax or made by some secret advanced technology (as opposed to old neglected, poorly maintained technology) and Soros/The Jews.
A guy I went to high school with in a leftist community now posts about White Power, his insensitive Jewish landlord, the secret control of the world outlined in The Talmud, the way the shadows fall in moon photos prove it was faked etc. His feed is full of flat earth stuff. I suspect I’m dealing with unstable minds. As risky as it is to leave it unanswered, it also feels risky to invite that into my life so I disengaged.
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