Comments by "LoneTech" (@0LoneTech) on "Howtown" channel.

  1. It goes a little deeper. Scientific tradition is now that you try to disprove your own hypotheses. That's what the null hypothesis is about; could we see the same result without our expectation?
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  2. As with Eratosthenes' results, we don't know the size of the distance units al-Biruni used all that well, and cannot be certain of the resulting precision. We do however know the method, and therefore that it would be affected by atmospheric refraction to a much more drastic degree than Eratosthenes' method (typically 1/6) - and that al-Biruni did not describe accounting for this. The popular claims of incredible accuracy and small margin of error are therefore cherry picking. There's also a tragic reason why this is known as the golden age of Islam. They suffered a collapse quite similar to "MAGA" afterwards.
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  3. It's not that noone in the past believed it was flat, it's that a lot of silly myths are built around it, usually in the "we know so much better now" form, giving an illusion that it was a widespread belief. For instance some claim Columbus was the only one to know the Earth was round (XKCD 1255) and set out to prove it, but the actual opposition to his expedition was because he was severely underestimating its size, and was not equipped to traverse the pacific ocean. The heightened lookout, obvious in the age of sail, is plain evidence of curvature. Eratosthenes measurement was determining the size based on already established shape and long distance to the sun.
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