Yeah, Graham, the Flat Earth Society is a spectacular demonstration of "common sense" and personal observation gone amuck! There was an elderly professor at the University of Toronto in '69 when I was there who was a lifetime member of the Flat Earth Society. He had all kinds of articles pinned up on his door, "proving" that the Earth is flat. Amazing stuff to read. He looked like John Brown, with the full beard...and was probably equally wacky.

It's always a good idea to consult as many available sources as possible on any contentious issue, since one person's common sense may be another person's nonsense.

Most sailors even in ancient times were well aware that the Earth was round, since they could plainly see the curvature of the Earth from the deck or mast of their ship in calm, clear weather.

Even Columbus and his crew were well aware of it...despite Washington Irving's fictional nonsense to the contrary in his book about Columbus...after all, he was sailing west in order to reach China, wasn't he? That indicates a round Earth, obviously. He was however, mistaken in assuming that it was a considerably smaller Earth than it actually is.

The reason his sailors grew fractious was not because they were afraid of "falling off the edge" but because they were afraid of running out of fresh water and food before reaching land! (A reasonable fear. If the Americas had not conveniently lain in their path, and there had been nothing but water between them and China, they would have died of thirst before ever getting there.)

So, direct experience helps...but yes, it can be misinterpreted sometimes.

I think what really scares people about planes is that the passenger has no control over the situation whatsoever...and the crashes frequently kill everyone on board. You're surrendering yourself to fate when you step on an airplane, and people don't like to do that. I'm surprised how few air crashes there are, considering how many planes are in the air every day. They must be very well trained and organized indeed.

- LH