Flat Earther’s £15k Experiment Backfires, Revealing Shocking Truth About Earth’s Shape
So, here’s a question that might rattle your brain a bit: What do you get when a guy spends twenty grand trying to prove the Earth is flat — only to end up confirming it’s not? Yep, our pal Bob Knodel did exactly that. Now, keep in mind, over 2,000 years ago some clever bloke named Eratosthenes used nothing but a stick (and probably some serious patience) to figure out the Earth was round and even sized up its circumference pretty close. But hey, some folks apparently have extra room up top and just can’t let go of the idea that we’re living on a perfect pancake instead of a globe. Bob Knodel, featured in Netflix’s 2019 documentary Behind the Curve, went all in with an expensive laser gyroscope to debunk centuries of science. Spoiler alert: his experiment didn’t quite pan out the way he hoped — in fact, it backfired in a spectacular fashion. Intrigued by how science can smash conspiracy theories right into the stratosphere? Dive into the curious case of Knodel’s costly quest to prove the world flat, only to be floored by undeniable evidence of its curve.
There are Flat Earthers all around the world and one of them spent an awful lot of money trying to prove his theory correct, only to be shown proof he was dead wrong.
Over 2,000 years ago some bloke called Eratosthenes managed to prove the world was round with a stick, and get pretty close to working out the planet’s circumference as well.
Unfortunately that hasn’t stopped some people with a bit more extra space between the ears than the rest of us from insisting that there is no sphere here.
One of them who tried to prove his theory was Bob Knodel, who spent $20k (£15,150) in the search for evidence of his idea.
Bob spent his money trying to prove the Earth was flat, but instead demonstrated the opposite and his failed experiment ended up on a Netflix documentary for all to see.
Released on Netflix back in February 2019, Behind the Curve followed prominent Flat Earthers such as Mark Sargent who outlined their beliefs in the documentary.
Several scientists and astrophysicists also appeared in the film to give their views on the Flat Earth movement and its longevity.
During his segment in the documentary, Knodel decided to go beyond arguing his case and prove once and for all that scientific consensus from the last couple of centuries was wrong.
What was Bob Knodel’s Flat Earth experiment?
In order to prove his theory that the Earth was in fact flat, Knodel created an extravagant experiment which set him back tens of thousands of dollars.
To conduct his experiment, Knodel created a laser gyroscope which he believed would debunk the idea that our planet is round.
To put it plainly, Knodel used a camera to film through two holes – which were both the same distance from the ground – while a person stood on the other side was shining a torch at the camera.
Below is a diagram of the YouTuber’s set up for the experiment:
Knodel believed this would prove the Earth is flat. (Netflix)
Knodel claimed that if light could be seen with the camera, and that all of the holes in the fence and his torch were at the same height, then we had definitive proof the world was flat.
However the experiment didn’t go entirely to plan, with Knodel left muttering ‘interesting’ to himself after no light was able to be seen.
He would later attempt to explain the findings in Youtube video, saying: “What we found is, is when we turned on that gyroscope we found that we were picking up a drift. A 15 degree per hour drift.
Bob Knodel spent a lot of money on the failed experiment. (Netflix)
“Now, obviously we were taken aback by that.”
Admitting the results were ‘kind of a problem’, he continued: “We obviously were not willing to accept that, and so we started looking for ways to disprove it was actually registering the motion of the Earth.”
Knodel passed away on 6 April, 2023, aged 62.
Additional words by Brenna Cooper.
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