The most kerbal flat-earther I have yet to see

[Mitchz95]

Yeah, apparently his original kickstarted failed. Then he started using flat-earth rhetoric, and the FES contributed $8,000 to the cause. It's sort of brilliant.

Of course, I can think of much better uses for $8,000...

[Zeiss Ikon]

What I find really amusing is that he's not using a solid booster -- that would require a Federal explosives license to store from construction to launch -- but rather a steam rocket virtually identical in operation to Evel Knievel's Skycycle (from 1973).  I wonder if he was encouraged by the successful flight of the Skycycle X-2 in the last year or two?  Any case, this launch also demonstrates his inability to learn from his own mistakes; the last time he tried this, he was significantly injured on landing/impact.

[cubinator]

I unmistakably saw Earth's curvature at a beach. Also the Moon is upside down in Brazil. 

[softweir]

Two threads on the topic merged.

[Helmetman]

2 hours ago, Mitchz95 said:

Of course, I can think of much better uses for $8,000...

• Fastest 4TB intel SSD.
• Fastest Z270 platform with i7 7700k intel CPU
• 64GB of ram.
• 2x GTX 1080 in SLI
• prettiest and likeliest desktop case mid/full tower casing you can find.
• Watercooling CPU and GPU's
• Asus Xonar soundcard
• gaming keyboard and mouse
• 24 inch 4k monitor
• Kerbal space program..................................................................?
• The rest on your savings account  

 

[James Kerman]

I think this man is a horrible individual.

It appears quite likely that he himself is not a flat earther.  I think he must have enough understanding of air and spaceflight to know the earth is round.

He has taken money from gullible or uneducated people, telling them he will prove their theory for the sole intention of furthering his own selfish goals.  I believe the $8,000 he raised would have been far better spent on groceries or the education of the (most likely underprivileged) people and families he has taken it from but instead it is being used to perpetuate these peoples delusions.  Mad Mike is a moral vacuum.

Edited November 24, 2017 by James Kerman
Striked the last sentence.

[Helmetman]

41 minutes ago, James Kerman said:

I think this man is a horrible individual.

It appears quite likely that he himself is not a flat earther.  I think he must have enough understanding of air and spaceflight to know the earth is round.

He has taken money from gullible or uneducated people, telling them he will prove their theory for the sole intention of furthering his own selfish goals.  I believe the $8,000 he raised would have been far better spent on groceries or the education of the (most likely underprivileged) people and families he has taken it from but instead it is being used to perpetuate these peoples delusions.  Mad Mike is a moral vacuum.

Words taken right of my mouth.

In Mikes case, out of his ass...

Nuff said,

[Nibb31]

4 hours ago, James Kerman said:

I think this man is a horrible individual.

It appears quite likely that he himself is not a flat earther.  I think he must have enough understanding of air and spaceflight to know the earth is round.

He has taken money from gullible or uneducated people, telling them he will prove their theory for the sole intention of furthering his own selfish goals.  I believe the $8,000 he raised would have been far better spent on groceries or the education of the (most likely underprivileged) people and families he has taken it from but instead it is being used to perpetuate these peoples delusions.  Mad Mike is a moral vacuum.

On the other hand, educating flat-earthers is a lost cause, so getting them to spit out $8000 is at least using them for something.

[MinimalMinmus]

2 hours ago, Nibb31 said:

On the other hand, educating flat-earthers is a lost cause, so getting them to spit out $8000 is at least using them for something.

Indeed, I'm pretty sure the hardcore flat-earthers wouldn't even be convinced if they were sent to space.

[kerbiloid]

7 hours ago, James Kerman said:

It appears quite likely that he himself is not a flat earther.

He is a flat-earthers' heretic.
Once he succeeds, he'll become the Flat Earth Heresiarch and found his own movement.

[James Kerman]

9 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

He is a flat-earthers' heretic.
Once he succeeds, he'll become the Flat Earth Heresiarch and found his own movement.

He's too late by a long shot.

[NSEP]

I hope that guy tells all the people he sucked his money from the Earth is round and curvy, and that you should think twice before wasting your money on this kinda junk.

[Hypercosmic]

Put those hardcore flat Earthers in a fake rocket that instantly blows up upon 'launch'. No need to keep those flatbrains around. I think somebody would reward the person who did this with the Darwin Award.

[KSK]

10 hours ago, James Kerman said:

I think this man is a horrible individual.

It appears quite likely that he himself is not a flat earther.  I think he must have enough understanding of air and spaceflight to know the earth is round.

He has taken money from gullible or uneducated people, telling them he will prove their theory for the sole intention of furthering his own selfish goals.  I believe the $8,000 he raised would have been far better spent on groceries or the education of the (most likely underprivileged) people and families he has taken it from but instead it is being used to perpetuate these peoples delusions.  Mad Mike is a moral vacuum.

I agree that a knowledge of air and spaceflight makes it more likely that you'll know the Earth isn't flat but I don't see why one guarantees the other. I also think it's a little dangerous to dismiss Flat-Earthers as gullible or uneducated. That way lies the slippery slope of similarly dismissing anyone who holds opinions that we disagree with. Indeed, Flat-Earthers seem to be quite capable of advancing rational arguments for their belief, even if they're less capable of accepting rational counter-arguments. (And they're hardly the only people in this world to have that particular blind spot.) Besides, holding to odd beliefs in one sphere shouldn't be taken as a lack of capacity in other spheres.

As to Mad Mike - he seems a bit crazy but I have no idea how he persuaded the Flat-Earthers to part with their money. If he told them his steam powered rocket would take him to the edge of space and he pinky-promised to get lots of lovely photos of Flat Earth, well yeah you might have a point. On the other hand, if he told them that his rocket would only get him 1 maybe 2 kilometres up at most -  you don't have to be a genius to figure that buying an airline ticket and staring out of the window during takeoff and landing, would probably give you more useful information for rather less than $8,000.

TL: DR, I don't know enough to judge either way. Until then, calling this guy a moral vacuum seems overly harsh.

Edited November 24, 2017 by KSK

[Green Baron]

Well, it does take a whole lot of ignorance not to realize the curvature on a clear day just from a mountain near the sea for example. You don't even need a mason's water bubble. The problem is that like with any belief it cannot be overcome with rationality. Rejecting reason isn't exactly a sign of advanced education, at least in the natural sciences ;-) I feel tempted to utter ...

[GoSlash27]

I don't believe that this guy is a flat-Earther, since flat-Earthers don't believe there is such a thing as "space". Nevertheless, it doesn't bother me at all if he's manipulating these people to fund his rocket and it doesn't bother me at all that these people believe that the Earth is flat. Maybe it's just me becoming more apathetic with age, but this ain't my circus and these ain't my monkeys.

 I wish him the best of luck. I hope he built this one more sturdily than his last attempt.

 Best,
-Slashy

Edited November 24, 2017 by GoSlash27

[KSK]

2 hours ago, Green Baron said:

Well, it does take a whole lot of ignorance not to realize the curvature on a clear day just from a mountain near the sea for example. You don't even need a mason's water bubble. The problem is that like with any belief it cannot be overcome with rationality. Rejecting reason isn't exactly a sign of advanced education, at least in the natural sciences ;-) I feel tempted to utter ...

Glad you added that qualifier.  Even then, I would argue that rejecting reason isn't necessarily the sign of being uneducated - in fact the better educated you are the better the reasons you can articulate for your apparent rejection of reason in a particular field. Plenty of eminent scientists have held to their incorrect views on a subject in the face of an ever increasing weight of evidence against them.

Sometimes a deeply held pet theory can trump any attempt at scientific objectivity. But I'm just arguing for arguments sake here.

Edited November 24, 2017 by KSK

[Green Baron]

Arguing between colleagues about a subject both are proficient in is a different thing. This regularly leads to new insights, for all of them. We are, if we come freshly from university and have had a natural science formation, able to critically deal with other's arguments. Or should be :-)

But, let's say, arguing with a child about something it rejects with stomping feet is fruitless. It either lacks the knowledge (= education/schooling ?) or is unwilling to accept it. A believer like a flat earther has similar deficits i think. Somebody with a firm belief can of course be a good scientist but if the belief is in conflict with a scientific finding than he/she regularly fails ("... the Old One does not roll dice.").

I argued with a computer scientist in a pub, young guy from my point of view, here on holiday. His belief forbid him to accept the notion that an island like La Palma, volcanic, relatively young, is 2-3 million years old. That's not much, but his calendar starts at 4500 years ago (or before christ ?), the only argument he could bring forward was "Human knowledge is nothing compared to God(*)". All education becomes irrelevant at that point. The work of thousands of geologists, generations of physicists ... wasted and in vain :-)

Yeah, well. This post may be irrelevant as well, no doubt.

 

(*) General operational device. Stanislaw Lem, "Fiasko" :-))

Edited November 24, 2017 by Green Baron

[DDE]

On 11/22/2017 at 9:22 PM, kerbiloid said:

Space Shuttle used one. Saturn and Energy, too. H₂+O₂ = water steam.

No. LITERAL compressed steam.

[TheKosanianMethod]

1 hour ago, DDE said:

No. LITERAL compressed steam.

So it's a really big water rocket. Like the ones I played with as a kid. You put water into a rocket-shaped container, pumped it up to pressure, and released. Is that what a "steam rocket" is?

[James Kerman]

@KSK You have convinced me that I was harsh with the moral vacuum comment and I withdraw it.  I don't know enough about the man to make that judgment. 

I reacted strongly because I feel that all people, regardless of belief, should not be lied to - particularly for financial gain and particularly about science.

[KSK]

31 minutes ago, James Kerman said:

@KSK You have convinced me that I was harsh with the moral vacuum comment and I withdraw it.  I don't know enough about the man to make that judgment. 

I reacted strongly because I feel that all people, regardless of belief, should not be lied to - particularly for financial gain and particularly about science.

Perfectly understandable and in turn, my respect for your withdrawn comment. Internet debates need more of that kind of thing.

[wumpus]

50 minutes ago, TheKosanianMethod said:

So it's a really big water rocket. Like the ones I played with as a kid. You put water into a rocket-shaped container, pumped it up to pressure, and released. Is that what a "steam rocket" is?

It certainly sounds like that.  Note that 3000K steam should have an Isp similar to kerolox, but I can't imagine maintaining 3000K steam nor what you do as the pressure steadily drops.  I can't imagine any steam-based design that can't be converted into a much more efficient pressure-based liquid rocket (although converting to bipropellant at least doubles the complexity but I'd hate to work with monopropellants).

There was a company called escape dynamics that claimed to be working on laser based orbital launch designs (I can't imagine they employed enough people to do more than write proposals and make powerpoint slides).  The idea was to heat up hydrogen (via an external laser) and push that way, considering the density of hydrogen it would likely make far more sense to launch with with a first fuel tank of water and then switch to hydrogen.  Even though the water would likely have an Isp of ~300 (and hydrogen ~800) the density of the water would be so much higher to make a much more compact STTO craft (I'm also sure they didn't want to talk about such complexity until they are ready to commit to real designs).

Another mention is that the *goal* is 1,800 feet, while simply flying to Pike's Peak and driving to the top will get you 5,500ft net elevation (Pike's Peak is 14,000 ft of elevation, but it starts nearly 9,000 ft up), although I'd expect you can see the "mile high" (~5,000 ft) plain.  The whole project sounds like Jeb Kerman pitching a mission.

 

[Tux1]

You know, I've always thought about taking a bunch of flat-earthers up with a rocket, getting them into orbit, then docking with the ISS to show them that everything is real. Too bad I don't have 500 million dollars.

[Scotius]

11 hours ago, Tux1 said:

You know, I've always thought about taking a bunch of flat-earthers up with a rocket, getting them into orbit, then docking with the ISS to show them that everything is real. Too bad I don't have 500 million dollars.

I think they wouldn't want to go anyway. First: space to them doesn't exist. Second: what if you'd want to kill them to cover the Big Conspiracy?