A Flat Earth Helicopter Experiment

[EarthIsNotFlat]

Hi,

There is a YouTube video that suppose to show a scientific experiment with a helicopter that proves that the earth is not flat. The experiment shows that the helicopter is vanish when it goes under the horizon which is something that cannot occur on the flat earth:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVa2UmgdTM4

It looks very impressive, but someone in another YouTube channel noticed something very strange... in two different parts of this video you see the helicopter once when it is under the horizon, and once when its above it, but the frame and the background is exactly the same! Including the birds that are flying there!

Now it's very hard for me to think that this video is fake, or that they cheated. Can you please look at the frames, and tell me if you can think of any reasonable explanation for that?

Check this out:

 

What do you think?

Is this cheating?

 

[Bufofrog]

That's not the horizon in those frames, so I am not sure what you are talking about.

[EarthIsNotFlat]

27 minutes ago, Bufofrog said:

That's not the horizon in those frames, so I am not sure what you are talking about.

Sorry my mistake, what I meant to say is that although the lake looks flat, it is curved because it's part of a round world. So when the helicopter is about to land on the other side of the lake the water are hiding it.

If the earth was flat, the lake was flat also and we would be able to see the helicopter landing on the other side.

But the main issue in my post is how can it be that two supposedly different times in the video has exactly the same background including the 3 birds that you see there? How do you explain this if this video is real?

 

Edited December 14, 2020 by EarthIsNotFlat

[joigus]

Irrefutable proof that there's virtually no limit to how expensive and silly a game can be at the same time.

[Bufofrog]

6 hours ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

How do you explain this if this video is real?

No idea.  Who cares, it is a silly you tube video. 

Who would waste the time to run a 'scientific' experiment like that to prove the earth is not flat?  It makes no sense.  It would be like running a 'scientific' experiment to prove water is wet.

[joigus]

7 hours ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

How do you explain this if this video is real?

 

As bufofrog said, 

7 hours ago, Bufofrog said:

That's not the horizon in those frames, so I am not sure what you are talking about.

So it's not about the Earth being flat, but about curvature in the proximity of the lake.

Explanations could range from:

The video was tampered with.

The light is known to bend over the terrain when there are intense gradients of temperature, because the refraction index varies with temperature. This is the reason why you see a piece of the sky under the horizon in the desert.

Edited December 14, 2020 by joigus

[EarthIsNotFlat]

5 hours ago, joigus said:

Irrefutable proof that there's virtually no limit to how expensive and silly a game can be at the same time.

So you think that this experiment is fake?

 

[joigus]

1 hour ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

So you think that this experiment is fake?

 

No. I think:

1) It has nothing to do with the Earth's curvature to start with

2) There is a possibility that the video has been manipulated. I don't know, and I don't think that's so important, because:

3) Even if it's an honest to goodness video, there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for that kind of effects that has to do with optics

[swansont]

9 hours ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

 But the main issue in my post is how can it be that two supposedly different times in the video has exactly the same background including the 3 birds that you see there? How do you explain this if this video is real?

What three birds? Do you mean the three black spots below the dark blue line? They are in a different location in your two images.

 

[Eise]

12 hours ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

It looks very impressive, but someone in another YouTube channel noticed something very strange... in two different parts of this video you see the helicopter once when it is under the horizon, and once when its above it, but the frame and the background is exactly the same! Including the birds that are flying there!

Well, you cannot say from such a distance that they are the same birds. I looked at the video. But at 6:44 the helicopter is going downwards, and at 7:41/7:42 it is going up again. And yes, a small group of birds is flying along, in both cases from left to right at about the same height. But there are a lot of birds that do that, e.g. cormorants. I see them a lot in front of my house, and if they just want to move from one location on the water to another, they always fly about 15 cm above the water surface.

That the landscape is the same is obvious: their telescope is standing on a tripod.

On the other side, Audio/video/photo material on itself is never proof of anything. You have to trust the people that they exactly did what they show you. And in times of deep fakes this is more true than ever.

What I missed was that they would do a simple calculation: with the distances and heights they measured, one could estimate the size of the earth (assuming it is a sphere).

[EarthIsNotFlat]

3 hours ago, Eise said:

Well, you cannot say from such a distance that they are the same birds. I looked at the video. But at 6:44 the helicopter is going downwards, and at 7:41/7:42 it is going up again. And yes, a small group of birds is flying along, in both cases from left to right at about the same height. But there are a lot of birds that do that, e.g. cormorants. I see them a lot in front of my house, and if they just want to move from one location on the water to another, they always fly about 15 cm above the water surface.

That the landscape is the same is obvious: their telescope is standing on a tripod.

On the other side, Audio/video/photo material on itself is never proof of anything. You have to trust the people that they exactly did what they show you. And in times of deep fakes this is more true than ever.

What I missed was that they would do a simple calculation: with the distances and heights they measured, one could estimate the size of the earth (assuming it is a sphere).

These are exactly the same birds, did you see the animation that I made? I'm toggling between 2 frames (one at 6:44 and the second at 7:42) and you can see that these are exactly the same birds, and also exactly the same waves pattern in the lake. Maybe you will see the animation better if you'll see it in it's original size, here:

https://i.ibb.co/Qm6C5q0/Helicopter2.gif

No way that two frames that were taken at different times has exactly the same waves pattern and 3 birds at exactly the same spot.

You can check it yourself if you will open the video in 2 separate tabs on your browser, pause it on the first tab at 6:44, and pause it on the second tab at about 7:42. Now you can watch it Frame By Frame using the following keys on your keyboard:

https://i.ibb.co/jbjhdMx/Frame-By-Frame.jpg

You will see that the birds have the exact same pattern during all their flight from left to right, and as I said also the waves in the lake are exactly the same. The only different is that one frame has a helicopter and the other one hasn't.

By the way I saw that Discovery Channel have deleted this video from their YouTube channel... maybe it says something.

 

6 hours ago, swansont said:

What three birds? Do you mean the three black spots below the dark blue line? They are in a different location in your two images.

 

See my response to Eise.

 

6 hours ago, joigus said:

No. I think:

1) It has nothing to do with the Earth's curvature to start with

2) There is a possibility that the video has been manipulated. I don't know, and I don't think that's so important, because:

3) Even if it's an honest to goodness video, there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for that kind of effects that has to do with optics

1. The experiment in this video is trying to prove that the lake is curved because the earth is round...

2.

3. It has nothing to do with optics, see my reply to Eise.

 

8 hours ago, Bufofrog said:

No idea.  Who cares, it is a silly you tube video. 

Who would waste the time to run a 'scientific' experiment like that to prove the earth is not flat?  It makes no sense.  It would be like running a 'scientific' experiment to prove water is wet.

I don't know if you aware of this but there is a large and very loud group of people especially in the US, who claim that the world is flat. Someone have to fight against stupid conspiracy theories like that.

 

Edited December 14, 2020 by EarthIsNotFlat

[Bufofrog]

1 hour ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

I don't know if you aware of this but there is a large and very loud group of people especially in the US, who claim that the world is flat. Someone have to fight against stupid conspiracy theories like that.

It's a waste of time.  Their belief is not based on logic and evidence, so logic and evidence won't change their beliefs.

[studiot]

Anyone remember this long thread by a flat earther, youtube videos and all ?

It took us ages to realise the promoter was not making a genuine scientific point .

Edited December 14, 2020 by studiot

[Bufofrog]

8 hours ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

So you think that this experiment is fake?

I don't think there was an experiment, I think somebody just made a silly video and called it an experiment.

[koti]

2 hours ago, studiot said:

Anyone remember this long thread by a flat earther, youtube videos and all ?

It took us ages to realise the promoter was not making a genuine scientific point .

Exactly my thought when I started to read this thread. It looks very much like either Sandor or one of his crackpots are the OP of this thread.

[EarthIsNotFlat]

4 hours ago, koti said:

Exactly my thought when I started to read this thread. It looks very much like either Sandor or one of his crackpots are the OP of this thread.

I'm not a flat earther, and what you are doing is called Ed Hominem (a strategy where the speaker attacks the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself).

Doesn't it bother you that people on a formal scientific channel have to use fakery in order to support their scientific claims?

 

6 hours ago, Bufofrog said:

I don't think there was an experiment, I think somebody just made a silly video and called it an experiment.

It's still important, check this:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2018/04/04/only-two-thirds-of-american-millennials-believe-the-earth-is-round/?sh=602deff27ec6

"Only Two-Thirds Of American Millennials Believe The Earth Is Round".

 

[md65536]

On 12/13/2020 at 10:26 PM, Bufofrog said:

That's not the horizon in those frames, so I am not sure what you are talking about.

I think the helicopter is below the "true horizon" in those videos (represented by the lake surface), and hills behind it make the visible horizon higher.

On 12/13/2020 at 9:35 PM, EarthIsNotFlat said:

Now it's very hard for me to think that this video is fake, or that they cheated. Can you please look at the frames, and tell me if you can think of any reasonable explanation for that?

The simplest explanation is the video producers fabricated the shot because they didn't have the footage that they wanted to illustrate the narrative. That's pervasive in modern media, and only increasing. They add, remove, combine, edit, recolor, enhance, and create the shots they want if they don't have them. They basically assemble the story they want to tell, from pieces of the story they shot. Scenes are not always in the right order or even in context, and here you have proof that they're edited.

Discovery Channel shows like this aren't video evidence of scientific experiments conducted by scientists, they're science-themed entertainment. Another common thing you'll see is footage of insects, or stop-motion of plants growing, and you'll hear loud, clear chewing noises, or the "sound of plants growing", but most of the time it's just a separate sound track added in post exactly like they would do for movie sound effects. Everything is edited and processed and repackaged these days. The raw footage would be boring and dry and not fit the exciting action film percussion soundtrack. I imagine that editing is such a common practice that the producers might not have even considered that people would treat it as scientific evidence.

I think the "target circle" was added in post as well.

13 hours ago, Eise said:

Well, you cannot say from such a distance that they are the same birds. I looked at the video. But at 6:44 the helicopter is going downwards, and at 7:41/7:42 it is going up again. And yes, a small group of birds is flying along, in both cases from left to right at about the same height. But there are a lot of birds that do that, e.g. cormorants.

I don't think you looked very closely, they're not just the same birds, they're the same pixels frame after frame. You can see it in OP's images. They're the same shot, and one is edited.

13 hours ago, Eise said:

What I missed was that they would do a simple calculation: with the distances and heights they measured, one could estimate the size of the earth (assuming it is a sphere).

That's not something I'd expect to see on Discovery. But maybe they could blow something up when they're talking about the laser, and say "Now that's what I call doing science!"

Edited December 15, 2020 by md65536

[Ghideon]

1 hour ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

Doesn't it bother you that people on a formal scientific channel have to use fakery in order to support their scientific claims?

I have not yet any opinion about a possible edit of the video material but I am curious how you traced a possible edit or fake to the the producer of the TV-show. The YouTube account linked in OP is not connected to the discovery network as far as I can tell, do you have a link to the original content delivered by the scientific channel? 

Edited December 15, 2020 by Ghideon

[studiot]

6 hours ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

I'm not a flat earther, and what you are doing is called Ed Hominem (a strategy where the speaker attacks the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself).

Doesn't it bother you that people on a formal scientific channel have to use fakery in order to support their scientific claims?

Youtube is not a formal scientific channel.

You should be barking at me, not Koti.

Especially as the thread I referred to started out the in same way as yours.

If all you want is commentary on the video then

It is a poor quality video that cannot be said to show anything in particular at all.

It is meaningless rubbish.

So my advice is to forget it.

However there are many good videos and presentations on Youtube offering material about Science and many other matters, often made by amateurs and/or enthusiasts on a particular topic.

 

 

5 hours ago, md65536 said:

The simplest explanation is the video producers fabricated the shot because they didn't have the footage that they wanted to illustrate the narrative. That's pervasive in modern media, and only increasing. They add, remove, combine, edit, recolor, enhance, and create the shots they want if they don't have them. They basically assemble the story they want to tell, from pieces of the story they shot. Scenes are not always in the right order or even in context, and here you have proof that they're edited.

Discovery Channel shows like this aren't video evidence of scientific experiments conducted by scientists, they're science-themed entertainment.

I totally agree. +1

But sometimes there are good and genuine attempts to demonstrate something scientific to the best of the producers' ability. For instance the Unilever series of videos in Physics and Chemistry.

 

Edited December 15, 2020 by studiot

[koti]

6 hours ago, EarthIsNotFlat said:

I'm not a flat earther, and what you are doing is called Ed Hominem (a strategy where the speaker attacks the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself).

 

It's Ad Hominem not "Ed Hominem" Also there is no merit in adressing the substance of this post as it's "not even wrong"

Plus you seem very tacky about defending a flat earth crackpot, especially for someone with a nickname like yours. Are you sure youre 100% frank with us Ed?
 

Edited December 15, 2020 by koti

[Sensei]

A small homemade space rocket can reach enough altitude to prove the Earth is not flat. Launch at 2:20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qY7W3EMfrgc

There is no need for all this bizarre discussion about the vanishing helicopter..

[joigus]

7 hours ago, md65536 said:

The simplest explanation is the video producers fabricated the shot because they didn't have the footage that they wanted to illustrate the narrative. That's pervasive in modern media, and only increasing. They add, remove, combine, edit, recolor, enhance, and create the shots they want if they don't have them. They basically assemble the story they want to tell, from pieces of the story they shot. Scenes are not always in the right order or even in context, and here you have proof that they're edited.

I totally agree. The narrative needs override everything else.

 

7 hours ago, md65536 said:

Discovery Channel shows like this aren't video evidence of scientific experiments conducted by scientists, they're science-themed entertainment. Another common thing you'll see is footage of insects, or stop-motion of plants growing, and you'll hear loud, clear chewing noises, or the "sound of plants growing", but most of the time it's just a separate sound track added in post exactly like they would do for movie sound effects.

I've thought about this same example many times. Sometimes you even hear the predator roar while still in stealth action. And I've thought, 'what's the point', you might as well walk in plain sight?

Edited December 15, 2020 by joigus

[md65536]

5 hours ago, koti said:

It's Ad Hominem not "Ed Hominem" Also there is no merit in adressing the substance of this post as it's "not even wrong"

Plus you seem very tacky about defending a flat earth crackpot, especially for someone with a nickname like yours. Are you sure youre 100% frank with us Ed?
 

Yes, it's definitely an ad hominem attack. I still see the same pattern of posts on this site over many years, where newer users must deal with people who like "crackpot bashing for sport". If one of the regulars posted a question about a suspicious video about science, would you treat their post the same way? Would you focus on their name while completely ignoring the content of the post? Did you even read the post, or did you conclude all you needed to know by the title, nickname, and some assumptions? What exactly is "not even wrong" about OP's post?

"you seem very tacky"??? Why do this?

[koti]

29 minutes ago, md65536 said:

Yes, it's definitely an ad hominem attack.

What is?
 

Quote

I still see the same pattern of posts on this site over many years, where newer users must deal with people who like "crackpot bashing for sport". If one of the regulars posted a question about a suspicious video about science, would you treat their post the same way? Would you focus on their name while completely ignoring the content of the post?

Ofcourse you do. That is because not everyone is disciplined (and gullible) enough to treat everyones comments equally. I have no problem with you taking your time to explain to someobody that a youtube video is a youtube video and/or that the earth is not flat, you have my full support.
 

Quote

Did you even read the post, or did you conclude all you needed to know by the title, nickname, and some assumptions? What exactly is "not even wrong" about OP's post?

Yes, I read the post, watched the youtube video, I even watched the original show months ago. Did you take the time to click on the not even wrong link I provided?
 

Quote

"you seem very tacky"??? Why do this?

Oh don't get me started...I'm sitting here with Covid both me and my wife for a week now with our 4 year old 24/7 locked in. But I'm like this all the time regardless of confinement - does that answer your question?

[EarthIsNotFlat]

On 12/15/2020 at 8:02 AM, md65536 said:

The simplest explanation is the video producers fabricated the shot because they didn't have the footage that they wanted to illustrate the narrative. That's pervasive in modern media, and only increasing. They add, remove, combine, edit, recolor, enhance, and create the shots they want if they don't have them. They basically assemble the story they want to tell, from pieces of the story they shot. Scenes are not always in the right order or even in context, and here you have proof that they're edited.

Discovery Channel shows like this aren't video evidence of scientific experiments conducted by scientists, they're science-themed entertainment. Another common thing you'll see is footage of insects, or stop-motion of plants growing, and you'll hear loud, clear chewing noises, or the "sound of plants growing", but most of the time it's just a separate sound track added in post exactly like they would do for movie sound effects. Everything is edited and processed and repackaged these days. The raw footage would be boring and dry and not fit the exciting action film percussion soundtrack. I imagine that editing is such a common practice that the producers might not have even considered that people would treat it as scientific evidence.

I think the "target circle" was added in post as well.

 

I'm 100% agree with you.

About the sound effects yes I'm familiar with that:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggIzq8JUK44

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UO3N_PRIgX0

 

On 12/15/2020 at 8:47 AM, Ghideon said:

I have not yet any opinion about a possible edit of the video material but I am curious how you traced a possible edit or fake to the the producer of the TV-show. The YouTube account linked in OP is not connected to the discovery network as far as I can tell, do you have a link to the original content delivered by the scientific channel? 

As I said in my opening post someone in another YouTube channel noticed that, someone else also noticed that when you see the helicopter from the telescope side you see it's Left side, but when they show the helicopter from close on the other side of the lake you see that it's Right side is pointing to the telescope...

There is a logo on the bottom left of the video says: "Discovery Channel", also the description of the video says:

"Discovery Channel full episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgZgoWfZb6c "

But when I click it I get: "Video unavailable".

 

21 hours ago, studiot said:

YouTube is not a formal scientific channel.

You should be barking at me, not Koti.

 

I'm not barking at anyone, try to be more polite.

YouTube is not a formal scientific channel but this clip was taken from Discovery Channel.

 

21 hours ago, koti said:

It's Ad Hominem not "Ed Hominem" Also there is no merit in adressing the substance of this post as it's "not even wrong"

Plus you seem very tacky about defending a flat earth crackpot, especially for someone with a nickname like yours. Are you sure youre 100% frank with us Ed?
 

Yes I know that it's "Ad hominem" it was a typing mistake.

For the last time I'm not a flat earther, if you don't believe me it's not my problem.

 

21 hours ago, Sensei said:

A small homemade space rocket can reach enough altitude to prove the Earth is not flat. Launch at 2:20

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qY7W3EMfrgc

There is no need for all this bizarre discussion about the vanishing helicopter..

 

The problem with this rocket videos is that usually (and I don't know why, anyone?) they use a fisheye camera so everything it picture looks round. Here are two print screens from your video, see how you see the same curvature when it's only a few meters from ground:

 

 

Edited December 16, 2020 by EarthIsNotFlat