The Plane Truth: Noted Skeptic’s Newly Published (Posthumous) Book About Flat Earth Theories (2015)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Insight blog, Posts March 24, 2025Bob Schadewald, creationism, flat earth, history of skepticism, Lois Schadewald, memorial, NCSE, pseudoscience, Robert J Shadewald, skepticism, zetetic astronomy 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Insight blog at Skeptic.com on Nov 19, 2015. An archived version is available here.

Explore Bob Schadewald’s final project, a book on the topic of his most specialized area of skeptical expertise: Flat Earth theories.

I’m very pleased to learn that The Plane Truth, the unfinished final work of skeptical scholarship by the late Robert J. Schadewald (1943–2000), has now been prepared for publication and released online for free. You can read the book in its web version here, where you also find the EPUB ebook version available for download.

During his life, Bob Schadewald was the world’s leading skeptical expert on the history of flat-Earth advocacy. The pseudoscientific notion that the Earth is a flat disk may seem as quaint as it is preposterous, but so-called “Zetetic Astronomy” enjoyed a surprisingly strong period of public prominence in the UK and US during the 19th century—attracting attention from debunkers of the period such as Alfred Russel Wallace¹ (see Skeptic Vol. 20, No. 3) and Richard Anthony Proctor, and prompting reflections from later thinkers including George Bernard Shaw and George Orwell. During the 20th century the relative sophistication of Zetetic Astronomy collapsed into muddled conspiracy theories, parody, and ultra-fundamentalist Biblical literalism; nevertheless, flat-Earth advocacy continues to this day. Read more

A Rope of Sand (2015)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Insight blog, Posts March 23, 2025astronomy, debunking, flat earth, Great Moon Hoax, pseudoscience, Richard Anthony Proctor, skeptical history, skepticism, zetetic astronomy 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Insight blog at Skeptic.com on Sept 8, 2015. An archived version is available here.

Astronomer Richard Anthony Proctor. For general details about Proctor’s life and career, read this brief biographical sketch published in 1874.

If my explorations of skeptical history have revealed an overall theme, it is that things don’t change that much. Always there are scoundrels, scams, and misapprehensions; always there are those who probe mysteries and push back against paranormal fraud. Throughout history, those skeptics have repeatedly reached for the same tactics, claimed the same (scant few) rewards, and faced the same challenges of burnout and cynicism.

English astronomer and science popularizer Richard Anthony Proctor (1837–1888) makes an interesting case study. He weighed in as a skeptic against (surprisingly popular) Flat Earth advocates (see Junior Skeptic 53), quackery, and a range of pseudoscientific ideas connected to astronomy. His debunking book Myths and Marvels of Astronomy was a 19th century version of Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy. Originally published in 1877 (my copy dates to 1880), Myths and Marvels of Astronomy is available to read for free in several editions online. Read more

George Orwell Versus the Flat Earth (2015)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Insight blog, Posts March 12, 2025flat earth, George Bernard Shaw, George Orwell, Junior Skeptic 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Insight blog at Skeptic.com on March 3, 2015. An archived version is available here.

In recent months I’ve been hard at work on a three-part series of Junior Skeptic articles exploring fringe theories regarding the shape of the Earth. The issue on newsstands now [archive link] considers the peculiar history of claims that our world is as flat as a pancake. Our upcoming issue considers the (surprisingly) much more reputable history of hollow-Earth thinking through to the end of the 19th century. To complete the series, I am working now on an issue about 20th century hollow-Earth beliefs with their frankly creepy intersections with conspiracy theories, flying saucers, Nazis, and madness. Read more

Skeptic Investigates: Is the Earth Flat? (2018)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Insight blog, Posts March 12, 2025flat earth, pseudoscience, skepticism, zetetic astronomy 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Insight blog at Skeptic.com on March 20, 2018. An archived version is available here. Portions of this article appeared previously in Junior Skeptic #53, bound within Skeptic magazine 19.4 (2014).

Recent news stories,¹ celebrity endorsements, and Google search trends² have highlighted an apparently growing conspiracy theory belief that the Earth is not a globe, but instead a flat disc. According to believers, government forces promote a completely fictitious model of the cosmos in order to conceal the true nature of the Earth. Are these claims true?

No. The Earth is Round

The evidence for a spherical Earth is overwhelming.³ Most obviously, there are many thousands of images and videos of the Earth from space, including a continually changing live stream view of the globe from the International Space Station—not to mention all the astronauts who have personally seen the Earth from orbit. Flat Earthers claim that all images of the globe are fraudulent inventions, and all testimony from astronauts is false. It is unreasonable to dismiss all of the evidence from the entire history of space exploration, especially when there is zero evidence for a decades-long “globularist” conspiracy. However, we do not need to rely on evidence from modern space agencies to confirm the roundness of the Earth for ourselves. Read more