The Earth is oblong (but that could be absurd)
Reflecting on the nature of nature, given we are subject to attacks on understanding
What shape is the Earth? On the one hand, I have friends who buy into the conventional heliocentric model of a lonely blue marble hanging in space. On the other hand, I have colleagues who are absolutely convinced it cannot be round, and must be dead flat in all directions. Of course, being the contrarian, I am going to claim they are all wrong, and it is oblong.
To support my case, I am going to appeal to the unquestionable authority of Sir Peter Rhomboid, the Chairman of the Royal Society for Cosmic Confusion: “It is well-known since ancient times that we live on a blocky thing that has edges and is a bit longer one way than the other. Hence we go to the edge of the known world, because other worlds are always just around the corner. So the Earth is veritably oblong.”
What do you mean it makes no sense, and you are not convinced?!? He is one of the top authorities on the subject! Ah well… I think you get the idea: I made it up, so it’s definitely false. I am deliberately constructing an obviously wrong narrative, a nanoscale psyop, not because I want to persuade you that Earth is oblong, but to allow is to briefly connect with our feeling of something being absurd.
This article most emphatically is not about the controversy about the shape of the Earth, about which I have little to say as I have done no real research, so lack an informed opinion. It is one about how we emotionally and practically relate to the “nature of nature” — and any uncertainty therein. In recent times I have seen all of the following models offered as the true geometry of the place we inhabit, and the real structure of that which surrounds it:
We live in a closed system, covered by an impenetrable dome, not an open one.
The Earth is hollow, with entrances at both poles, and another habitable realm exists on the inside surface, lit by an interior sun.
Earth is a flat ring, a-la Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels, and a dark sun sits beneath, and the light one above.
A huge mountain, the Rupes Nigra, sits at the north pole, but its existence is kept secret.
We live in a concave crater on a much larger round planet.
Antarctica is not a continent, but is an ice wall, with lands beyond it, and many inhabitable realms.
The question of the shape of the Earth depends on the consciousness of the viewer, being an inter-dimensional object.
Earth is round, but considerably bigger than we have been told.
Earth is flat-ish and sandwiched between concave and convex lenses.
We live on a torus, which channels energy around us.
The stars are the result of sonoluminescence through a watery firmament.
The moon is a disc, not a sphere, evidenced by the lack of spheroid conformity, shadow sharpness, reflectance during eclipses by Earth.
The moon is plasma, not solid, and we can see its translucence.
The moon is an artificial body, not natural, installed after an ancient war.
The moon has a projected surface, powered by nuclear reactors, that are failing.
The moon is a mirror, and if you look carefully it reflects the greater realm of Earth, inverted in shape and contrast.
The sun is local, relatively cool, and small — being the effect of concentrated energy from elsewhere, not nuclear fusion.
The sun is a conscious object, as everything is just vibration, and will respond to your sun gazing activities.
Everything is multi-dimensional and there is more than one Earth, depending on which timeline you access.
This Earth is just a simulation for learning purposes, and our true consciousness is of a higher order, and we return there when it is “game over” in this body.
I cannot begin to resolve these matters for you, other than to note that these statements will typically generate the same “feeling of being absurd” to those schooled (or indoctrinated) by modern society. But that something is not the conventional wisdom does not make it devoid of all truth, whether directly or indirectly. There is always something to learn by holding in mind an alternative hypothesis, even if it is only to reflect on the motives of those who might misdirect us.
A video online might offer me evidence of an Earth that is a flat plane by shining a laser across a salt flat. If I claim to be of a scientific mindset, I have to allow empirical evidence to refute the received globe hypothesis. But maybe salt flats dry in a concave shape, for all I know, nullifying the result, by countering the curvature of the planet. Or perhaps there is bending of the light through refraction over the dried lake bed. Or maybe, even, the whole thing is a psyop, designed to waste my time, and is all a lie. So at the end, I am left with the options of it being “true”, “true-ish”, and “false” — so may be little wiser until I replicate it and eliminate all confounding factors. It’s a lot of work!
Again, the purpose is not to engage in debate about the shape of Earth (it’s oblong, we have agreed), but instead to pay attention to one’s emotional state with respect to absurdity, and consequent ability to reason. Do I instantly reject the data, on the basis that it is “settled”, and there is nothing to learn? Well, we have seen governments coordinate over Covid to tell the most brazen deadly lies, supported by a corrupt scientific establishment, so “premature certainty” is definitely a thing. And NASA seem awfully good at offering inconsistent pictures of our planet, that raise reasonable doubt as to whether we’re told the full story. When do I doubt and question, versus just take what the textbook tells me?
As a “conspiracy theorist” that doubts official narratives by default, do I instantly accept the countervailing hypothesis, on the basis I am being “lied to about everything”? Well, that would also be unwise. I may be falling into a false dichotomy of “flat” versus “globe” as a distraction from where the real activity is at (say, “hollow”). I may be trapped into a knowing deception to discredit me, as I spout evidence that cannot be replicated, or has been structured to give a misleading answer. How we look at the matter is different in a “conventional science” paradigm of all honest actors versus a “philosophy of political power over truth” where deception is the norm and driving force.
The modern scientific and technical paradigm seems spectacularly dubious on so many matters of importance. We cannot isolate viruses, or prove transmission of disease via them. Consciousness is seen to arise from matter, and not the other way around, with scant evidence. Sacred geometry is neglected, astrology is laughed at (despite thousands of years of history across cultures), traditional healing with sound and light is ignored, extracting resonant energy from our environment forgotten, and heretics continue to be ostracised and ridiculed — as I found in telecoms for myself.
I see plenty of reasons to consider histories and models outside of the standard ones people have, if only to understand how beliefs are constructed, whether congruent with reality or not. After all, we seem to be surrounded with evidence of vast megaflora and megafauna from previous epochs, “lost” electromagnetic and sonic technology to levitate objects, doors on old buildings that are only fit for giants (whose skeletons are whisked away as soon as located), and old maps that show “impossible” knowledge of erased continents and advanced civilisations.
The wildest theory I have come across recently, and therefore the most aesthetically appealing, is that we are actually recovering from an alien invasion that took place in the late 18th to early 19th centuries, one that genocided much of humanity, enslaved the rest, and destroyed much of our environment. This is not without any evidence: we see melted buildings, orphan trains, asylums for survivors, clear historical meddling, crazy architecture we cannot replicate, and buildings all over buried in mud after some kind of cataclysm. Could this particular reset theory be true? The task is to keep an open mind without letting your brain fall out.
The “Great Reset” of Covid (via WEF and WHO) gives us an existence proof of resets, so perhaps there have been more. How many, and what is their nature, I cannot tell you. There are plenty of hints in science fiction that there is hidden knowledge of other advanced civilisations that mess around with us. As a boy, I used to read John Christopher novels like Empty World (wiped out by disease) and the Tripod Trilogy (with mind control skull caps), and they feel eerily close to reality now that I am an adult. It is painful to have to admit as I get older that I actually know very little indeed.
Maybe we are in a consciousness war, where the winner is the one with the most choice over which timelines they join. Maybe we are fighting an invading alien AI that has become disembodied and de-incarnated, and seeks to absorb not just us but our galactic neighbours. Maybe there is something in the theory that Orion, Sirius, the Pleiades, Arcturus, and Betelgeuse have a lot more going on than we have been told. Maybe we have been off-planet for quite some time in a parallel civilisation. Maybe we are prisoners in some kind of matrix that sucks out our life energy and turns us into batteries. Maybe there are far fewer humans that we imagine, and most of those around us are clones. Lots of maybes — and not all absurd.
Could secret societies conspire for hundreds of years to impose a false cosmology on us, in order to make us believe we are insignificant beings in a vast universe, rather than being potent creators in our own right, able to manifest our reality? In the past I would have mocked such a suggestion as being akin to the Earth is oblong — i.e. plain silly. Now I am not so sure. Yet I don’t feel like I have to research or resolve these matters for myself. If there is a collective awakening to a different understanding, then it will happen on its own timescale.
Maybe the dome on which the sky is projected cracks open, ending our Truman Show, to reveal the turquoise sky beyond! All I know for sure is that I still have important things to learn, and that my education was somewhere between incomplete and inverted. The real growth as an individual comes from feeling comfortable with the feeling of not knowing, and living with uncertainty, without fear of the crowd’s definition of absurdity limiting your possibilities. Whether my future growth is about the true nature of our cosmos, or the false tales told to keep us from our own power, I have yet to discover.
My sense is that science represents both a righteous quest for truth and a spiritual trap for those who believe they have arrived at the destination. The ultimate power of mind control is to make the obscured facts into a widely accepted absurdity. This means we have to keep a permanent eye on the absurd — a social construct — in order to relocate some lost truth. There is a fundamental reframing needed about the nature of knowledge: nothing is absolutely absurd and forever discounted, because that only gives enemies a place to hide what is important.
Like the Earth is oblong (or maybe not, as I made it up).
An excellent discussion of a timely subject, as we struggle to make sense of the continuous flow of alternative and disorienting "realities" that are being offered to us. The feeling of having been set adrift from our moorings is quite real, at the moment. One can only hope that we will be guided to eventually drop anchor in a safe harbor.
Isn't it amazing to consider all that we don't know? I for one intend to hang around long enough to find out as much as I can... great piece as always, thank you Martin! <3