Friday, April 1, 2011

Philosophy Wire: Earth spherical? Yes... Earth flat? Yes... Earth like a potato? Yes...


The mapping of Earth's gravity field from GOCE satellite of the European Space Agency (ESA), revives the interest in the discussion on how much we can trust our eyes. If some people previously (wrongly) ridiculed those who believed that the Earth is flat, now they can also (wrongly) ridicule those who believed that it is spherical. The mappings from GOCE show a potato-shaped Earth [source: ESA web portal] ! When we observed only a few meters away from where we were, we reached out to the scientific (for that time) conclusion that the Earth is flat. When we saw images of Earth by satellites we drawn the scientific (for that time) conclusion that it is spherical. This conclusion however is changing once more... And it is worth noting that recent scientific data show that the space in the universe is generally FLAT! [source]

Our senses are subjective and every time science draws conclusions based on "what we", one must always ask "what kind of glasses do you wear?"... And beyond any scientific detail, the most important thing will always be to remember that we actually wear "glasses"...

PS. You can see the relevant Greek Philosophy Wire for the video of the GOCE mappings.

(c) Philosophy WIRES - Commenting world news from philosophy's perspective...

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...