The Earth Is Flat
You probably weren’t paying attention when the news came to light but we’re currently living in an era of truth and enlightenment and, latest news says the Earth is one giant, flat plane where it’s estimated up to 20 billion people live and we’re just one small piece of a much — bigger piece.
OK. I’m just pulling your leg…or am I? The truth is — well, the truth is what science currently tells us it is and we’re in this giant, cosmic universe surrounded by spherical objects that all rely on each other to keep us placed on a specific axis in our galaxy.
Truth is a fairly simple concept: “The quality or state of being true…” It’s from that point on that things can get complicated. While the quality or state of points to a singularity of acceptance — the idea itself is ambiguous by its very nature.
Personally, I believe there are two truths in our world: Universal truth and popular opinion truth. Universal truth is fairly straight forward and is obvious — the sky is blue. We would all agree, unless colorblind, that the sky is indeed blue. But imagine you are colorblind and through your eyes, the sky is yellow. You’re one person and that becomes your opinion. Is it no less truth?
Now, imagine as one person you were able to convince a friend with a valid and well thought out argument that it was they who were misinterpreting the color and you changed their mind. The sky for two people is now yellow. Over time, two people can become an army of yellow sky believers. This is popular opinion truth based on a well thought out thesis on the idea of how we interpret color.
The Earth isn’t flat. I came to that conclusion based on my schooling, the books, the science, the teachings and everything in modern literature that compels me to believe the Earth is a giant, moving orb that is suspended in space via gravitational forces. This doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate the flat Earth argument. In fact, I have really enjoyed the writings, the youtube videos and the passion that “flatearthers” extol. While they take some rather large leaps to convince their audience that this planet we live on is a large, flat plane surrounding by wall of ice, suspended in a sky of water — it’s still really interesting.
Interesting enough that it’s actually gained traction via the big, wonderful web.
I used to believe that the web would set us free. The idealist in me believed that an open forum for discussion would create some of the most open conversation mankind has ever seen. I thought that we would make massive leaps in technology, medicine and all of the sciences because there would be this amazing ability for great minds to share great ideas.
Sadly, this isn’t how it played out. The internet has forced us to take hard lines on everything and shame that which we don’t agree with. It’s not enough to bring an idea to the world. You better make sure that that idea is backed up with the “popular opinion” truth — meaning; someone who has been vetted and already put that idea forth. Without this, you are a fool worthy of all the abuse web trolls can dish out.
Truth. At one point in our history, somewhere in the 15th century, populist belief was that our Earth was flat and you would fall of the edge if you got too close. In the 18th century, doctors would cut you open to release your blood with the idea that this was a way to cure many illnesses. In the 50’s, people believed smoking could enhance your life because doctors told you so. These days, chemotherapy is the chosen medicine to cure cancer. They have known since 1974 that cannabis can cure cancer(s) but, this truth wasn’t based on “popular opinion” truth and became fodder for those internet trolls that shame anyone that believes in a holistic approach to medicine and prevention.
Today’s piece has nothing to do with flatearthers, marijuana or conspiracies. Today’s piece has to do with you. I see the memes and inspirational quotes from famous people whose truth is qualified by their celebrity. Their truth becomes your truth because you can relate to their message. Meanwhile, you’ll completely ignore a friend’s message because they haven’t earned your respect by gaining notoriety as a celebrity. Friends are easy to dismiss because we secretly yearn for them to fall on their proverbial faces rather than give them merit.
I always say — I don’t put my arguments forth to change anyone’s mind. My arguments are put forth to create dialogue and perhaps, a yearning to dig deeper, even if it confirms your position.
You’re still with me so first off, I want to say thank you. Of all the people I know, a 100 people will click on this link (based on the metrics) and about 8 people will take the time to read this(Medium actually tracks time spent on the page to come up with that number). I want to say that the 8 of you who have taken the time for me are the most important and amazing people in my life. I am blessed.
Moving on — the purpose of this little blog today is to talk about truth and how history repeats and how we are destined to forget. Google, in their infinite wisdom has just erased Palestine from the map. Sure, it may seem insignificant now because, Palestine is still there — physically. But here’s the thing: Google is attempting, through some rather powerful allies, to rewrite history by creating a yellow sky. It may not matter today or tomorrow or next week or next year but, in 50 years, a new generation may have no knowledge of this place called Palestine.
The truth will become — “popular” and the ramifications are frightening. As a social experiment, we are now moving into an era where government can destroy a whole group of people in plain sight and if the news is following the guidelines of “popular opinion” it becomes truth and those who contradict that truth…nothing more than the futile rantings of “flatearthers” and are easily dismissed.
Conversation. Dialogue. Argument. These are critical for our society to move forward. My best friends in the world argue with me all the time. We don’t always agree and I learn more from our interactions than I could from any book. Arguments are ideas. When you shut someone down for contradicting your position, you are effectively shutting down their ideas.
There’s nothing worse (for me) than witnessing the ugliness that comes from someone who feels an opinion is an attack on them personally or a threat against mankind. When we shut down discourse, we effectively close the door to improvement and innovation. We allow the status quo to take over and chemotherapy becomes the only treatment we will ever know.
Sobering, in this day of the internet. Don’t you think?
