“Antarctica is not a unified continent, but a gigantic wall of ice, as they say in Game of Thrones, that surrounds the continents of the Earth.” From this phrase a few years ago. It was Mark Sargent, youtuber and flat earther, at the beginning of the Netflix documentary Behind the Curve about this “curious” group that believes that the planet is covered by a gigantic dome, with the sun and the moon rotating in circles above our heads. Years later, a group of “intrepid” people decided go straight to the center of the core to prove once and for all that humanity is wrong. It hasn’t turned out as they expected.

Resolve an unfounded debate. A group of 24 flat earthers and 24 defenders of the spherical Earth undertook a trip to Antarctica, led by pastor Will Duffy, with the aim of confirm that the Earth was indeed flat. Nicknamed as “The Final Experiment”the expedition focused on verifying the existence of the midnight sun, a phenomenon known caused by the axial tilt of the Earth.

According to flat earthers, the presence of this phenomenon would put an end to the debate about the shape of the planet. However, upon reaching Antarctica, they found what is now widely accepted: the 24-hour sun is real, reinforcing the evidence that the Earth is round.

Reactions and contradictions. There is no doubt, it was a bucket of cold water. Jeran Campanella, a flat earth influencer (there are some), he admitted in a later video to the trip that he had been wrong, by initially stating that the midnight sun did not exist.

The result contradicts again the central arguments of the flat earth theory, which already faces all kinds of criticism for its resistance to science and his extreme literal interpretation of religious texts. In this regard, the theory has been promoted by conservative political figures in the United States such as Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson, who have used their platform to appeal to religious and science-skeptic audiences.

There was no need to go that far. The truth is that finding out if the Earth is spherical does not require a trip of thousands of kilometers. In reality, all you need is a stick, and we have known this for more than 2,220 years, when Eratosthenes, a Greek mathematician, astronomer and geographer, performed one of the most fascinating and simple experiments in history demonstrating the curvature of the Earth. .

While director of the Library of Alexandria, he discovered in a papyrus that in Syena (present-day Aswan) the sun’s rays fell perpendicularly on June 21 at noon, so that a vertical stick did not cast a shadow, something that could also be observed in the reflection of the sun in a well. This gave him an idea.

The Alexandria Experiment. Intrigued by the phenomenon, Eratosthenes decided to make a similar observation in Alexandria, located about 800 kilometers north of Siena. There, on the same day and at the same time, he noticed that a vertical stick did cast a definite shadow. The discrepancy led him to a fundamental question: how was it possible that in one place there was no shadow and in another there was, at the same time?

Eratosthenes deduced that the only explanation was that the earth’s surface was curved. He calculated that the angle of the shadow in Alexandria was 7 degrees and, using this data together with the known distance between the two cities, he estimated the circumference of the Earth with astonishing precision for his time. Furthermore, the experiment not only disproved the idea of ​​a flat Earth, but also allowed him to deduce the inclination of the Earth’s axis and establish key concepts in geography such as parallels and meridians.

And then Sagan arrived. Finally, many centuries later, Carl Sagan revived this experiment in his iconic program Cosmosshowing how a simple stick and careful observation were enough to prove that the Earth is spherical. With his unmatched style, Sagan illustrated how this discovery changed our understanding of the world and, without a doubt, we would say that it remains an elegant and forceful refutation of any of the flat earth theories.

By the way, in addition to the famous experiment, Eratosthenes left a notable legacy: calculated the distance between the Earth and the Sunproposed the leap year for correct calendar mismatches and created the first map of the world with parallels and meridians. His work not only marked a milestone in ancient science, but demonstrated the power of critical thinking and scientific observation, putting an end to unfounded speculation more than two millennia ago. What a genius.

Image | Roderick Eime

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