[VadeRetro]

Will the last person who knows the Earth isn't flat turn out the lights? placemarker.

[ml1954]

Continually clueless placemarker

[Fester Chugabrew]

"Perhaps the most revealing instance involves the "story" that in order to gain backing for his great voyage west, Columbus had to struggle against ignorant and superstitious churchmen who were certain that the earth was flat. Truth was that all educated Europeans, including bishops and cardinals, knew the earth was round. What produced church opposition to the Columbus voyage was that Columbus believed the circumference of the earth was only about one-fifth of its actual distance. Thus, the church scholars who opposed him did so because they knew that he and his sailors were bound to perish at sea. And they would have done so had the Western Hemisphere not been there to replenish their food and water." - Rodney Stark