Fact-check the claims of a flat earth before the 2024 solar eclipse
The total solar eclipse on April 8th is expected to exceed the US. That cannot stop some of the skeptics who believe that the Earth is flat.
Humans know that the Earth is round for over two thousand years, but the move to question that fact has reached the horns of American politics.
Those involved in politics in Alabama, Georgia and Minnesota have attracted attention for their connection to the flat Earth movement, although their beliefs and reasoning differ.
For some people, beliefs have a spiritual connection. Others say they have a healthy skepticism of scientific consensus.
Data from the 2021 University of New Hampshire Survey shows how widespread pseudo-scientific conspiracy theory is, with nearly 10% of Americans thinking that the Earth is flat, and how widespread theories of pseudo-scientific conspiracy are in the United States.
Meanwhile, political observers have come across the emergence of some flat earth beliefs in politics, a mixture of vigilance and indifference.
James Taylor, a professor of political science at the University of San Francisco, said the political candidate believes that the Earth is flat and that other similar beliefs are “consistent with current stupidity and anti-intellectualism.” Taylor said these theories thrive mostly because of the internet and social media compared to 20 years ago.
The existence of a flat earth in politics
Alabama has Dean Odol, a pastor who lost when he became governor in 2022 and is about to become lieutenant governor next year. Odol, who described himself as an “anti-established Republican,” spoke to USA Today, who became a “flatearth/biblical follower” in 2015 and even attended the first Flatearth International Conference in 2017.
He quotes a self-published book from 2019. The title “clay under the Seal” said that his belief that the earth is flat came initially as “a spiritual download from the Holy Spirit.” Odol said he is aware of the Flak he has gained for his beliefs, but he will not stop him from taking office to improve the state’s lower ranked education situation and stop the second revision from being attacked.
“I usually refer to Article 3, Article 3 of the U.S. Constitution, which states that no one should be subjected to religious tests as an qualification or disqualification to perform a duties,” Odol said. “What that means is that we all have different beliefs, but that doesn’t mean we are not worthy of protecting the God-given constitutional rights of all Americans and Alabama residents.”
In Minnesota, Army veteran Brett Basman, who became Minnesota’s 7th Congressional District Republican Chairman in March, reportedly has released a video on social media explaining why he believes the planet is flat. This includes a 2024 Facebook post entitled “Five Reasons to Believe in a Flat Earth (and You Should Do!)”.
When asked about his beliefs by Minnesota reformers in April, Basseman said, “Whatever you want can be printed. I spent over 20 years in the Army defending that right, but if you do, I don’t have the opportunity to talk to you in the future.”
(USA Today contacted Bussman for comment.)
In Georgia, Candy Taylor, a former Georgia Republican governor candidate and the state’s current District 1 GOP chairman, has announced he will run for Congress in 2026.
“There’s an Earth everywhere. It’s constant… that’s what they do to brainwash,” Taylor said. “For me, if it’s not a conspiracy, if it’s ‘real’, why you’re wherever I go, every store, you buy the earth, you’re anywhere, every movie, every TV show, news media. Why is that meaningless?”
Taylor has since said that she has not believed the earth is flat, but that she remains skeptical.
“I will clearly state that I don’t believe in anything I have never seen,” Taylor said in an emailed statement to USA Today. “That being said, I’ll be happy to take one of my 11-minute rocket flights into the stratosphere (as Katy Perry did) and report to people what I saw.”
What does Flatalin believe in?
In general, most flat Earths are flat, hockey puck-like objects with the Earth covered in domes, sometimes called the sky, with ice walls at the edge of the dome. Flatalin thinks this can be proven because the ocean appears to be at a non-curved level, and says that it cannot be seen from the plane.
They also challenge the photo evidence from space, saying it is unreliable and that NASA Moonlanding is a hoax.
Flat Earth in Politics: What does that mean?
While some flat earth followers were actively and aggressive in politics, there is no evidence of an organized flat airser movement in American politics, politics experts told USA Today.
“They’re making the most of the political sciences of the University of Massachusetts,” said John Cruberius, professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. “I hesitate to think of this as a conspiracy theory as much as an anti-scientific belief that can violate scientific evidence.”
When did people know that the Earth is a sphere?
There is a common flat Earth error that prevailed in the 19th century, suggesting that most people believed that the Earth was indeed flat before scientific research began in the 17th century.
However, the ancient Greeks thought that the Earth was round about 500 BC, and has since been generally accepted by scholars, navigators and cartographers.
The belief of the flat earth as a conspiracy theory rose again in the mid-1800s in Britain in the mid-1800s. The Flat Earth Society was founded in 1956.
Later, as San Francisco political scientist James Taylor put it, Flat Allin revived in the 2010s, as the rise of social media became a portal of conspiracy theorists.
Contributors: Elizabeth Wiese, Doyle Rice, USA Today
