(January 21, 2018 at 5:40 am)AFTT47 Wrote:(January 21, 2018 at 5:07 am)vulcanlogician Wrote: No, that's a win for me. He didn't research anything, did he? He didn't learn anything new, did he? In the aftermath of this discourse, he looks like the loser to me.
Engaging a flat-earther in an argument is like playing chess with a stalk of celery and then bragging about winning. You're not going to impress anybody with your "win" and you're going to give the false impression that the stalk of celery had any business playing the game to begin with.
I'm not talking about "bragging rights" so much as the fact that, going into the debate I wasn't exactly sure how astronomy followed the scientific method. Because I did some research and gleaned some insights from this thread (especially from Polymath's post) I emerged from the other side of the process with some new insights that I didn't have going in. It doesn't even matter if I won the debate by default or not. Had I not put the question to myself, I would have continued through life with only a vague understanding of what makes astronomy scientific. Now I am equipped with a clear answer, and I will have it at my disposal for as long as I can remember it. I win.
