Here we go!!
We live on a sphere, that's what you guys say....
Not this....
But this....
I'm sure will you agree with that.
The earth is
24,901 miles in circumference.
This means the earth curves at
8" per mile.
So let's look at a clean sphere...no mountains, no obstructions, everything at sea-level.
According to this Earth Curve Calculator, , at a
height of 6ft , the horizon will be
2.9995471525609774 miles away, or we'll just round up to
3 miles.
Based on a sphere-earth model, I also assume you would all agree.
This illustration is from the EC calculator site I just posted. The flaw with this illustration is that if
h0 is a person and
h1 is a building, the person is leaning towards the horizon looking downward while the building is also leaning in the opposite direction towards the horizon. Looks like this.....
h0 (the person) is leaning forward and looking downward (dashed line).
If gravity keeps you stuck to a sphere, then no matter where you stand on the sphere, you are on top of the sphere from your perspective. From whatever point you’re standing, the ground will curve downwards in any direction.
@blackras9 said:
Yes, using this logic and as illustrated above,
h0 at
6ft would ALSO have to look
downward to keep from
looking into the stratosphere.
h0 = 6ft.
If you're
6ft tall looking straight ahead, you are indeed looking into the stratosphere as illustrated by the
horizontal red line above.
As stated before, the earth curves at 8" per mile. This means that if the distance to the horizon is 3 miles and the earth curves at 8" per mile, the horizon would be 2ft below the h0. This is what the slanted, dashed line represents.
Next, lets take a look at things from the building's perspective......
Okay, so that's the Leaning Tower of Pisa.....And that building is
486 feet tall, based off the EC calculator.
Remember, if gravity keeps the building stuck to a sphere, then no matter where the building stands on the sphere, it is on top of the sphere from it's perspective. From whatever point on the sphere it's standing, the ground will curve downwards in any direction.
Likewise, if I straighten up the building and stand on the roof, the horizon will be
27 miles away. At
8" per mile of curvature, the horizon would be
18ft below the ground level of the building.
So I
would use this hallway for my next point, especially in illustrating how the sun behaves, but I know y'all hate hallways.....
So I'll use railroad tracks.
This is what we
actually see when looking to a horizon at
6ft tall.
As above so below, the lines converge to a vanishing point which
SHOULD BE 3 miles away. The thickness of the atmosphere makes the mountains less visible, but the key is that the picture is
not looking down at a horizon. The horizon is
eye level.
As I've stated before, no matter how high you go,
the horizon stays at eye level.
At the
h0 (height) of
35,000 ft on a commercial flight, according to the EC calculator the distance to the horizon is
229 miles. At
8" per mile of curvature, the horizon would be
35,152ft below the air
plane and you would have to look down to see it because the higher you are on a round earth, the lower the horizon.
This is the math for the sphere model:
I do not yet have a formula to determine the distance to the horizon on a flat plane, because unlike the sphere model, there is no radius. So I'm working on that. It comes down to measuring it physically in my opinion, which you can do using railroad tracks in place that's really flat with no hills, valleys or mountains. (
http://www.theatlantic.com/technolo...by-florida-are-flatter-than-a-pancake/284348/) You have to measure the distance to the vanishing point at various heights to see how much the horizon extends, because it
definitely does extend the higher you go.
But what I do believe I've proven,
is that the earth is definitely NOT a sphere, it is flat.
I'm going to supplement this presentation with a video.
Alright!
I'm gonna give y'all a quiz on Friday. Be prepared, study in groups.