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My question about this answer was tangential, but I'm very curious to know where the idea comes from that people believed in a flat Earth. For example, were there Greek philosophers that held this view, and made arguments for it? Or is this an idea that began showing up later, as in, "oh, yeah, people used to believe that"?

Don Branson
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  • Are you asking whether the concept of a flat earth was based on research or assumptions? And if it was research, if there is any source still available? – Joachim Jul 14 '19 at 20:02
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    Some of these sources can be found through the Wikipedia page. – Joachim Jul 14 '19 at 20:09
  • I see the comment from time to time that people used to believe in a flat earth. I'd like to know if there are documents from history where someone claimed the Earth was indeed flat, and argued for it. From say, 2000 years ago. Or 300. If there's research showing they believed in a flat Earth based on their actions rather than their documents, that would be good info, too. – Don Branson Jul 14 '19 at 20:10
  • @Joachim, if you want to turn that into an answer, I'd upvote it. – Don Branson Jul 14 '19 at 20:34
  • Better to ask this at [history.se]. – curiousdannii Jul 14 '19 at 20:54
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spherical_Earth – Ted Wrigley Jul 14 '19 at 22:39
  • @DavidBlomstrom Many features in Nature are indicative of a round Earth: objects sinking below the horizon, the path shadows take, the way scattered bank of clouds seem to bend down toward the horizon while still still seeming to stay at the same height... Here's Some more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_circumference - Point is whether someone, modern or ancient, believes in flat or round, is a matter of choice more than technology. – christo183 Jul 15 '19 at 06:18
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    See Dirk Couprie, When the Earth Was Flat : Studies in Ancient Greek and Chinese Cosmology (Springer, 2018). – Mauro ALLEGRANZA Jul 15 '19 at 06:57
  • @DavidBlomstrom I'm saying that if one is inclined to notice, there are many phenomena that calls to question a flat Earth model. On an flat plain the horizon is about 3 miles away, so the average person could experiment with nothing more than objects from nature... Technology doesn't really come into it, only the time and predilection to wonder. – christo183 Jul 15 '19 at 15:01
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    @DavidBlomstrom Bringing us back to OP question... – christo183 Jul 15 '19 at 15:24
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    It's interesting that nobody has answered the question by quoting any philosophical documents. I alse wonder how many humans ever believed in a flat Earth, outside of a Terry Pratchett novel. It's not an idea that makes even the slightest sense and even a few thousand years ago humans beings were quite clever. –  Jul 16 '19 at 17:29
  • @PeterJ - Something like that would qualify as an actual answer to this question, but none of the "answers" so far have done this. An actual answer would be formed like "Here's a quote from Tertullion's Musing of a Sumac, "The Earth is clearly flat because yada yada." All I see are repetitions of the unsupported assertions, that is, that people thought the Earth was flat in the middle ages, or they thought that 2K years ago. But so far, there are no logical defenses of those claims. – Don Branson Jul 16 '19 at 19:05
  • @PeterJ - However, I think I have seen arguments dating back 6K years or so, and I'm not really interested to contest that (yet!). So far, I haven't heard anyone actually be able to back up what they say, they just say it. – Don Branson Jul 16 '19 at 19:13

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Many ancient models of cosmology had a flat earth, but not in the sort of uninformed way that people imagine when they say things like, "Well, they used to think the Earth was flat!" Well, yes and no. From the earliest Greek cosmology that I know of, the shape of the earth was a topic of debate and one that great thinkers understood was an open question. Anaximander famously held a flat earth, but, again, his model was extremely sophisticated and modeled the Earth after a cylinder to accommodate a plethora of other keen observations. His model can also be extended to a spherical earth without significant loss. Even though Anaximander held a flat earth (of a sort), his model was a radical breakthrough for cosmology, since it explained how the Earth could remain steady without needing to rest on anything below it (like a turtle). It's hard to overstate how profound an effect this has on the picture of the universe that we have today, perhaps more significant than a spherical earth. Features such as this would pave the way for overcoming the great limitation of Aristotle's physics, which was that his physical laws were not uniform in all parts of the universe. Moreover, there is evidence that Plato, in the Phaedo, held the earth to be spherical in response to Anaximander's model. In short, ancients did not simply assume the earth was flat because it looked flat, but understood this as an important question that needed to be settled by scientific means. Their thoughts on the topic were informed---as ours are---by the best science of their day.

There is a great deal more to be said, but even from this small and insufficient survey I think you can get a general answer to your question. There's a lot of information out there on the cosmology of pre-Socratic philosophers. These models were being created by thinkers on busy port cities where ideas flowed as freely as material goods, many of whom themselves traveled abroad. In particular they were quite influenced by ideas coming from Egypt (they liked Egyptian ideas as much as their textiles). I'm not sure whether Egyptian cosmologies had a flat earth or not.

transitionsynthesis
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The flat earth movement is very recent: it started in the 1840s, around the same time Kierkegaard was writing his Postscript, when an amateur cosmologist named Samuel Rowbotham, writing under the pen name “Parallax,” began self-publishing anguished screeds on the Satanic science of astrology and the evil deception of a globular earth.

From Village Atheists, Village Idiots, by Sam Kriss. Brilliant and insightful essay, well worth your time to read, on the folly of those who so loudly proclaim that the earth is round. As Kierkegaard observed, this is no evidence of sanity.

Soren Kierkegaard, the great enemy of all pedants, offers a story that might shed considerable light. In his Concluding Unscientific Postscript, he describes a psychiatric patient who escapes from the asylum, climbing out a window and running through the gardens to rejoin the world at large. But the madman worries: out in the world, if anyone discovers that he is insane, he will instantly be sent back. So he has to watch what he says, and make sure none of it betrays his inner imbalance—in short, as the not-altogether unmad Danish genius put it, to “convince everyone by the objective truth of what he says that all is in order as far as his sanity is concerned.” Finding a skittle-bowl on the ground and popping it in his pocket, he has an ingenious idea: who could possibly deny that the world is round? So he goes into town and starts endlessly repeating that fact, proffering it over and over again as he wanders about with his small furious paces, the skittle-bowl in his coat clanking, in strict conformity with Newton’s laws, against what Kierkegaard euphemistically refers to as his “a–.” Of course, the poor insistent soul is then sent right back to the asylum.

https://thebaffler.com/salvos/degrasse-tyson-kriss-atheists

Samuel Birley Rowbotham (/ˈroʊbɒtəm/;[1] 1816 – 23 December 1884, in London) was an English inventor and writer who wrote Zetetic Astronomy: Earth Not a Globe under the pseudonym Parallax. His work was originally published as a 16-page pamphlet (1849), and later expanded into a book (1865). He dropped out of school at the age of 9.

Rowbotham's method, which he called zetetic astronomy, models the Earth as an enclosed plane centered at the North Pole and bounded along its perimeter by a wall of ice, with the Sun, Moon, planets, and stars moving only several hundred miles above the surface of Earth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Rowbotham

user4894
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    This isn't accurate - belief in a flat earth goes back way further than that. For example, Anaximander. Also re: "the folly of those who so loudly proclaim that the earth is round," what? How is that relevant to the question? – Noah Schweber Jul 14 '19 at 21:33
  • @NoahSchweber Terrific essay I linked. Worth reading. And the ideas of the modern flat-earthers seem totally in accord with Rowbotham's ideas. Not that you're wrong, but ... well, I stand by what I wrote. I hope you feel better after downvoting me. Your comment and downvote remind me of the exact point Kierkegaard and Kriss are making. – user4894 Jul 14 '19 at 21:35
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    Directly from the question: "For example, were there Greek philosophers that held this view, and made arguments for it?" The question isn't asking about the specific history of its modern formation, and I've downvoted because this doesn't actually address the question well. And as to Kriss' essay, in the interests of politeness I'm going to limit myself to saying that we're going to have to disagree about it's quality. – Noah Schweber Jul 14 '19 at 21:41
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    Also from the question: "I'm very curious to know where the idea comes from that people believed in a flat Earth" (emphasis mine). That is, not the origin of the idea in current times, but the origin of the notion that this was an idea held in the past (and whether that notion is accurate). – Noah Schweber Jul 14 '19 at 21:42
  • @NoahSchweber You're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. – user4894 Jul 14 '19 at 22:46
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    For all intents and purposes, the earth appears flat from the perspective of a human (just as the sun appears to rise and set). There is no reason to believe it would be other than flat without the application of some fairly sophisticated geometry and astronomy, and in fact the idea of a spherical earth seems not to have gained traction in the West until somewhere between the 6th and 3rd centuries BC. The modern 'flat earth' movement is unrelated: a fairly petulant reaction to modern scientific hegemony. – Ted Wrigley Jul 14 '19 at 22:47
  • @TedWrigley "reaction to modern scientific hegemony," yes. Petulant, I don't know. I appreciate your engaging with my point. – user4894 Jul 14 '19 at 23:01
  • @TedWrigley - "The modern 'flat earth' movement is unrelated." Agreed. That whole thing blows my mind. As far as the ancients are concerned, it seems to me that the observation of ships disappearing gradually and not suddenly over the horizon would be sufficient for one person to consider that the Earth is not flat, but we all see things that don't trigger curiosity, until there's that one person who does. – Don Branson Jul 14 '19 at 23:11
  • @Don Branson: I'm not certain what point you're trying to make. Are you suggesting that genus Homo always knew that the earth was a sphere, even back past prehistory, to their first dispersion out of Africa? I mean sure, it would be interesting to know when we came up with that idea, just like it would be interesting to know when we came up with the wheel. But not knowing when we learned it doesn't imply it is innate knowledge. – Ted Wrigley Jul 14 '19 at 23:54
  • @TedWrigley - I'm not making a point, just seeking understanding. – Don Branson Jul 15 '19 at 00:02
  • Ah, ok, that's good. :-) – Ted Wrigley Jul 15 '19 at 00:42
  • @TedWrigley - are you making the point that it's good I'm not making a point? Dang, now I'm going to be up all night... – Don Branson Jul 15 '19 at 00:56
  • +1 for the Kris's article. It's easy to forget how much more sensorial fidelity a geocentric model has – we see the sun rising. No one has ever seen elliptical orbits in the same obvious manner – Rushi Jul 15 '19 at 03:13
  • @Don Branson: no, I just like it when people seek understanding. – Ted Wrigley Jul 15 '19 at 03:38
  • Maybe of interest : Yajnavalkya circa 10th century BC proposed heliocentric model – Rushi Jul 15 '19 at 14:36
  • @Rusi Thank you. I thought the Kriss article and the Kierkegaard passage described therein were interesting, even if not literally the answer to the OP's historical question. Glad someone understood. – user4894 Jul 21 '19 at 05:20
  • @NoahSchweber After a week I'm still mightily annoyed that all your erudition was put in the service of mere facts. Of course belief in flat earth is ancient. But it's interesting that the modern flat earth movement is not a continuation of an ancient belief, but goes back only 150 years. It's also interesting that Kierkegaard wrote so insightfully on the insanity of a slavish devotion to facts at the expense of context or understanding. You perfectly exemplified Kierkegaard's point. Using facts as a means of control and power, not wisdom or enlightenment. – user4894 Jul 21 '19 at 05:25
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    I think it was Paul Valery who called the 20th century as the century of fact. And that's a strong pejorative: the synonymization of truth with fact. "Alternative facts" follows next – Rushi Jul 21 '19 at 05:38
  • @Rusi Thanks, I'm glad there's at least one person who understood my post. – user4894 Jul 21 '19 at 05:54
  • You're welcome. However @noahschweber has a point in implying that it's probably not very pertinent to the question. Perhaps the real issue is that the question itself is a bit short on context. And the larger issue: SE "to the point only" format is as inappropriate for philosophy as its appropriate for "Why does my windows become unhappy coexisting with linux?" – Rushi Jul 21 '19 at 06:20
  • @Rusi Yes, I agree that I can never get into the proper spirit of the "Just the facts, ma'am" ethos of this site. I feel that the interesting can be more valuable than the correct. Clearly not the right way of thinking around here. Perhaps I need a reeducation camp. – user4894 Jul 21 '19 at 07:31
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All documents are technically historical documents, and people still believe the Earth is flat, based on documents that exist today. There's even a whole wiki: https://wiki.tfes.org/Flat_Earth_-_Frequently_Asked_Questions

As for the origin of Flat Earth Theory, no one can truly know, and it in fact may have sprouted from multiple different locations. It makes sense empirically. You see a flat stretch of land, you think the land is flat until you have better evidence that it isn't.

AngelIntegrity
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