Isn’t there a documentary flat earthers filmed in which they debunked their own beliefs?
this post was submitted on 18 Dec 2025
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Beyond the Curve! Great doc.
I would also highly recommend folding ideas "in search of a flat earth."
It covers the actual flat earth claims in depth, but is very much about the culture, and why that culture exists.
the only documentary i know that has a twist in it.
Disney's FastPass: A Complicated History has a twist that Defunctland fans are still talking about four years later.
i assume that "it's real" thing would have been more impactful if i knew anything about disney parks.
The documentary "Icarus (2017)" has a twist as well.
It’s a really good documentary because a lot of them actually want to be scientific about it.
But instead of following the scientific process of test->observe->draw a conclusion, they start with the conclusion and look for a way to prove it. And when the prof isn’t there, they simply say the test was flawed, and move on to the next test that will prove it.
It’s sad in a way. I don’t think, most of them anyway, are con man. They’re just misguided.
I will say, starting with a conclusion/theory is fine, but the next step is to do everything you can to disprove it. The more you and other fail, the stronger it becomes
Here's two different excitements where they did just that:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrGgxAK9Z5A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFqmDazwb6Y
They display the sentiment of "if we fail this test (show earth is round) something clearly went wrong and it doesn't mean anything and we need to try, try again, but if we get a different result just once then that conclusively beyond any doubt proves that earth is flat"
Gotta give him some respect for admitting he was wrong, and doing so several times. Everyone is wrong from time to time, but barely anyone can openly admit it.
99% of doing science is being wrong and being happy about it
99% of the time, I make up statistics
He's getting more views on the "I was wrong" videos so I have doubts about his real motivation. I know, I'm very cynical.
99% of flat earthers are just trolling, I refuse to believe anything else
99% of them are in it for the community. The other 1% is in it for the views and followers.
I don't know the percentage, but I've been to a flat earthers/variety conspiracy convention. Unless all of them are pretty good actors, they're all were very serious about their batshitery. It's scary, really.
That's not a given, and the human brain has very strong aversions to admitting fault.
You're right, I was wrong.
I wouldn't say you're wrong necessarily, just that prevailing indications suggest the opposite.
you can both be wrong
I wonder if I could become a big Antivax YouTuber but just leave in little oopsies to try and convince people subtly that I'm wrong.
And also add to that that this is more like escaping from a cult than it is merely admitting you were silly and wrong.
You can tell their intelligence rises over the course of the series because they go from portrait to landscape videos.
We need more people like that in the world
You know, I really like it when people think twice about the "current" state of science. Thinking "I don't think that's true. So I will check and verify" is a great thing and most people should do that. Thinking the earth is flat is fine - if you then go to verify.
The problem I have is if there is PLENTY of proof of things being a certain way that you just choose to ignore. Then you become an idiot.
"Current" science is a bit of a stretch, like a couple thousand years of stretching. Eratosthenes showed the earth was round and calculated its circumference to an astonishing precision using research and fairly simple trigonometry. He died 2,219 years ago.
"known by scientists for a long time" doesn't necessarily mean true. Medical science believed in the four humours and thought most disease was caused by an imbalance in bile, blood and phlegm for like 1200 years before being replaced by the idea that it was actually miasma and stinky air.
Germ theory's claim that tiny monsters are eating your insides, maybe like invisible poisonous insects or miniature demons and you need to wash them off your hands - Sounded Batshit crazy by comparison.
Questioning long-held assumptions and challenging scientific norms is a good thing, but every human has a grift that they're vulnerable to and for some people, even smart, sciencey people, that grift is conspiracy alt science anti vax flat earth hollow earth aliens built the pyramids and the government doesn't want you to know the truth.
Sure, but with "current" I mean the current understanding of science. We know the earth is round, but not because we discovered it, but because it's the general consensus that is taught, barely anyone doubts it. Trying to - let's call it "rediscover" - the scientific status quo is something I do like because it might always be the case that the people before were wrong. This is how new discoveries are made and I think that is a great thing. As an example, nobody believed that continents did actually move, and Wegener was ridiculed because he had no sure way to proof it, but at some point, people had the way to proof that he was actually right.
People like RFK confuse skepticism with going against conventional thinking. Flerfers and anti-vaxxers and other conspiracy theorists aren't skeptical, because then they'd be open-minded about evidence. But they think they're being skeptical because they're going against the status quo.
Unfortunately bucking the status quo becomes an identity issue, and not only does evidence not matter anymore, but grifters come out to prey on people who just want to be skeptical.
A conspiracy theorist with strong evidence is just a leftist.
As in, conspiracies are real, but it's the 1%.
Ah, ok. Didn't know much reading-between-the-lines I needed to do there lol
Yeah, that's the kind of conspiracy theorists I don't like lmao.
always nice to see a wholesome meme
i remember this guy, he is a pretty cool dude, actually, I think he went on Prof. Daves and they had a good conversation.
Imagine what the world would be like if the con artists pulling this stuff were pushing people to build libraries and educate kids.
What about the other, the subtle cons, like we don't have to take immediate action against global warming? (Not mentioning the more controversial ones.)
I think we're pretty fucked on that front... You can just look outside to see the climate changing at this point
And our leaders can't even bother to pretend we're going to try to fix it anymore
But the economy ......
Recently learned a delightful linguistic trick. Replace "economy" with "rich people's yacht money"
We COULD do something about climate change, but what about rich people's yacht money?
Universal health care would save lives, but what about rich people's yacht money?
Countless other examples.
Yes, exactly. Stock market and other rich people schemes are doing great. When there was talk of the federal minimum wage going up all the Republicans were screaming about shit getting more expensive.
My wife and I make close to 90 thou a year, and we are barely scraping by. Food has skyrocketed
Over just a few months makes me think it's fake. But who knows. Things actually do happen.
I wonder what Chinese flat earthers be like:
A: 地球是平的 (地球 is flat)
B: 但是你刚刚说了“地球” (but you just said “地球”) (地球 literally translates to: "ball of dirt" xD)
There are two kinds of reality: the first is in the human head, the second is what it really is.
In general, we're not taught early enough, if at all, to question both what we 'perceive' and the mental blabbering that makes up stories about it.
6 stages of denial.