THE FLAT EARTH CRUISE: SERIOUSLY, PEOPLE?
Organizers of an annual conference that brings together people who believe that our planet is not
round are planning a cruise to the supposed edge of the Earth. They’re looking for the ice wall that
holds back the oceans.
The journey will take place in 2020, the Flat Earth International Conference (FEIC) recently
[5] announced on its website. The goal? To test so-called flat-Earthers’ assertion that the Earth is a
flattened disk surrounded at its edge by a towering wall of ice.
Details about the event, including the dates, are forthcoming, according to the FEIC, which calls
the cruise “the biggest, boldest adventure yet”. However, it’s worth noting that nautical maps and
navigation technologies such as global positioning systems (GPS) work as they do because the
[10] Earth is … a globe.
Believers in a flat Earth argue that images showing a curved horizon are fake and that photos of a
round Earth from space are part of a vast conspiracy perpetrated by NASA and other space agencies
to hide Earth’s flatness. “This likely began during the cold war”, the Flat Earth Society (FES) says.
“The U.S.S.R. and U.S.A. were obsessed with beating each other into space to the point that each
[15] faked their accomplishments in an attempt to keep pace with the other’s supposed achievements.”
These and other flat-Earth assertions appear on the website of the FES, allegedly the world’s oldest
official flat Earth organization, dating to the early 1800s.
However, the ancient Greeks demonstrated that Earth was a sphere more than 2.000 years ago,
and the gravity that keeps everything on the planet from flying off into space could exist only on a
[20] spherical world.
But in diagrams shared on the FES website, the planet appears as a pancake-like disk with the
North Pole smacked in the center and an edge “surrounded on all sides by an ice wall that holds
the oceans back”. This ice wall – thought by some flat-Earthers to be Antarctica – is the destination
of the promised FEIC cruise.
[25] There’s just one catch: navigational charts and systems that guide cruise ships and other vessels
around the Earth’s oceans are all based on the principle of a round Earth, says Henk Keijer, a
former cruise ship captain with 23 years of experience.
GPS relies on a network of dozens of satellites orbiting thousands of miles above Earth; signals
from the satellites beam down to the receiver inside of a GPS device, and at least three satellites are
[30] required to pinpoint a precise position because of Earth’s curvature, Keijer explained. “Had the
Earth been flat, a total of three satellites would have been enough to provide this information to
everyone on Earth”. He adds: “But it is not enough, because the Earth is round”.
Whether or not, the FEIC cruise will rely on GPS or deploy an entirely new flat-Earth-based
navigation system for finding the end of the world remains to be seen.
Adaptado de livescience.com, 30/05/2017.
people who believe that our planet is not round (l. 1-2)
The expression from the text which refers to this same group of people is:
¿FLETAR UN CRUCERO HASTA EL BORDE DE LA TIERRA?
La Conferencia Internacional de Flat Earth (FEIC) ha anunciado que fletará un crucero el año que
viene con el absurdo fin de llegar hasta los confines de la Tierra. Según una parte de los seguidores
de esta corriente, que defiende que la Tierra no es redonda, el planeta acaba en un muro de hielo
que nos separa del espacio exterior, al que pretenden llegar en el crucero. Será “la aventura más
[5] grande, más audaz y mejor hasta la fecha”, según la publicitan en la web.
La organización Flat Earth anunció el proyecto en su conferencia anual y así lo ha confirmado el
periódico The Guardian. El excapitán de barco Henk Keijer cuenta en este periódico que el crucero
lo tiene crudo para navegar porque todas las cartas náuticas y los sistemas de navegación están
diseñados bajo la premisa de que la Tierra es redonda. Si la tripulación opina que el planeta no es
[10] esférico, la navegación podría convertirse en una tarea “muy complicada”.
“Los barcos navegan basándose en el principio de que la Tierra es redonda. Las cartas náuticas
se diseñan con eso en mente: que la Tierra es redonda”, recuerda el excapitán, que añade que los
barcos usan “un moderno sistema de navegación que se llama ECDIS, que proporciona una gran
mejora en la seguridad de la navegación”.
[15] Existen varias teorías dentro de las que creen que la Tierra es plana, aunque la principal afirma que,
después de “una extensa experimentación, análisis e investigación”, la Tierra es un disco gigante
con el polo norte en el centro y rodeado de “una barrera de pared de hielo: la Antártida”, según la
sociedad terraplanista.
“Hasta donde sabemos, nadie ha logrado ir mucho más allá del muro de hielo y ha regresado
[20] para contarlo. Lo que sabemos es que rodea la Tierra, sirve para contener a los océanos y ayuda a
protegernos de lo que pueda haber más allá”, asegura la Flatpedia, la Wikipedia de los terraplanistas.
Los organizadores del crucero advierten, por tanto, de que no garantizan llegar al muro, pero
aseguran que los viajeros encontrarán “evidencias” suficientes para dar el viaje por bueno. Además
de navegar al borde del precipicio, los terraplanistas podrán disfrutar de restaurantes y piscinas de
[25] olas para poder hacer surf.
En los foros terraplanistas han colgado fotos que “demuestran la existencia de dicho muro”. En
realidad son grandes láminas de hielo ártico que, al desprenderse de forma cada vez más frecuente
debido al calentamiento global, dejan grandes cortes verticales que se asemejan a murallas.
La Flat Earth Society asegura que “las agencias espaciales del mundo” han conspirado para falsificar
[30] “el viaje espacial y la exploración”. “Probablemente empezó durante la Guerra Fría. La U.R.S.S.
y los Estados Unidos estaban obsesionados con ser los mejores en cuanto a llegar al espacio se
refiere, hasta el punto de que cada uno fingía sus logros en un intento por seguir el ritmo de los
supuestos logros del rival”, aseguran.
Adaptado de elpais.com, 12/01/2019.
SOBREVIVEREMOS NA TERRA?
Tenho interesse pessoal no tempo. Primeiro, meu best-seller chama-se Uma breve história do
tempo. Segundo, por ser alguém que, aos 21 anos, foi informado pelos médicos de que teria apenas
mais cinco anos de vida e que completou 76 anos em 2018. Tenho uma aguda e desconfortável
consciência da passagem do tempo. Durante a maior parte da minha vida, convivi com a sensação
[5] de que estava fazendo hora extra.
Parece que nosso mundo enfrenta uma instabilidade política maior do que em qualquer outro
momento. Uma grande quantidade de pessoas sente ter ficado para trás. Como resultado, temos
nos voltado para políticos populistas, com experiência de governo limitada e cuja capacidade para
tomar decisões ponderadas em uma crise ainda está para ser testada. A Terra sofre ameaças em
[10] tantas frentes que é difícil permanecer otimista. Os perigos são grandes e numerosos demais. O
planeta está ficando pequeno para nós. Nossos recursos físicos estão se esgotando a uma velocidade
alarmante. A mudança climática foi uma trágica dádiva humana ao planeta. Temperaturas cada vez
mais elevadas, redução da calota polar, desmatamento, superpopulação, doenças, guerras, fome,
escassez de água e extermínio de espécies; todos esses problemas poderiam ser resolvidos, mas
[15] até hoje não foram. O aquecimento global está sendo causado por todos nós. Queremos andar de
carro, viajar e desfrutar um padrão de vida melhor. Mas quando as pessoas se derem conta do que
está acontecendo, pode ser tarde demais.
Estamos no limiar de um período de mudança climática sem precedentes. No entanto, muitos políticos
negam a mudança climática provocada pelo homem, ou a capacidade do homem de revertê-la.
[20] O derretimento das calotas polares ártica e antártica reduz a fração de energia solar refletida de volta
no espaço e aumenta ainda mais a temperatura. A mudança climática pode destruir a Amazônia e
outras florestas tropicais, eliminando uma das principais ferramentas para a remoção do dióxido
de carbono da atmosfera. A elevação da temperatura dos oceanos pode provocar a liberação de
grandes quantidades de dióxido de carbono. Ambos os fenômenos aumentariam o efeito estufa e
[25] exacerbariam o aquecimento global, tornando o clima em nosso planeta parecido com o de Vênus:
atmosfera escaldante e chuva ácida a uma temperatura de 250 ºC. A vida humana seria impossível.
Precisamos ir além do Protocolo de Kyoto – o acordo internacional adotado em 1997 – e cortar
imediatamente as emissões de carbono. Temos a tecnologia. Só precisamos de vontade política.
Quando enfrentamos crises parecidas no passado, havia algum outro lugar para colonizar. Estamos
[30] ficando sem espaço, e o único lugar para ir são outros mundos. Tenho esperança e fé de que nossa
engenhosa raça encontrará uma maneira de escapar dos sombrios grilhões do planeta e, deste
modo, sobreviver ao desastre. A mesma providência talvez não seja possível para os milhões de
outras espécies que vivem na Terra, e isso pesará em nossa consciência.
Mas somos, por natureza, exploradores. Somos motivados pela curiosidade, essa qualidade
[35] humana única. Foi a curiosidade obstinada que levou os exploradores a provar que a Terra não era
plana, e é esse mesmo impulso que nos leva a viajar para as estrelas na velocidade do pensamento,
instigando-nos a realmente chegar lá. E sempre que realizamos um grande salto, como nos pousos
lunares, exaltamos a humanidade, unimos povos e nações, introduzimos novas descobertas e novas
tecnologias. Deixar a Terra exige uma abordagem global combinada – todos devem participar.
STEPHEN HAWKING (1942-2018)
Adaptado de Breves respostas para grandes questões. Rio de Janeiro: Intrínseca, 2018.
The texts Sobreviveremos na Terra? and The flat Earth cruise: seriously, people? share one issue.
The issue mentioned in both texts is the following one:
THE FLAT EARTH CRUISE: SERIOUSLY, PEOPLE?
Organizers of an annual conference that brings together people who believe that our planet is not
round are planning a cruise to the supposed edge of the Earth. They’re looking for the ice wall that
holds back the oceans.
The journey will take place in 2020, the Flat Earth International Conference (FEIC) recently
[5] announced on its website. The goal? To test so-called flat-Earthers’ assertion that the Earth is a
flattened disk surrounded at its edge by a towering wall of ice.
Details about the event, including the dates, are forthcoming, according to the FEIC, which calls
the cruise “the biggest, boldest adventure yet”. However, it’s worth noting that nautical maps and
navigation technologies such as global positioning systems (GPS) work as they do because the
[10] Earth is … a globe.
Believers in a flat Earth argue that images showing a curved horizon are fake and that photos of a
round Earth from space are part of a vast conspiracy perpetrated by NASA and other space agencies
to hide Earth’s flatness. “This likely began during the cold war”, the Flat Earth Society (FES) says.
“The U.S.S.R. and U.S.A. were obsessed with beating each other into space to the point that each
[15] faked their accomplishments in an attempt to keep pace with the other’s supposed achievements.”
These and other flat-Earth assertions appear on the website of the FES, allegedly the world’s oldest
official flat Earth organization, dating to the early 1800s.
However, the ancient Greeks demonstrated that Earth was a sphere more than 2.000 years ago,
and the gravity that keeps everything on the planet from flying off into space could exist only on a
[20] spherical world.
But in diagrams shared on the FES website, the planet appears as a pancake-like disk with the
North Pole smacked in the center and an edge “surrounded on all sides by an ice wall that holds
the oceans back”. This ice wall – thought by some flat-Earthers to be Antarctica – is the destination
of the promised FEIC cruise.
[25] There’s just one catch: navigational charts and systems that guide cruise ships and other vessels
around the Earth’s oceans are all based on the principle of a round Earth, says Henk Keijer, a
former cruise ship captain with 23 years of experience.
GPS relies on a network of dozens of satellites orbiting thousands of miles above Earth; signals
from the satellites beam down to the receiver inside of a GPS device, and at least three satellites are
[30] required to pinpoint a precise position because of Earth’s curvature, Keijer explained. “Had the
Earth been flat, a total of three satellites would have been enough to provide this information to
everyone on Earth”. He adds: “But it is not enough, because the Earth is round”.
Whether or not, the FEIC cruise will rely on GPS or deploy an entirely new flat-Earth-based
navigation system for finding the end of the world remains to be seen.
Adaptado de livescience.com, 30/05/2017.
In order to support his point of view, the writer of the text quotes an authoritative source in the fragment below:
THE FLAT EARTH CRUISE: SERIOUSLY, PEOPLE?
Organizers of an annual conference that brings together people who believe that our planet is not
round are planning a cruise to the supposed edge of the Earth. They’re looking for the ice wall that
holds back the oceans.
The journey will take place in 2020, the Flat Earth International Conference (FEIC) recently
[5] announced on its website. The goal? To test so-called flat-Earthers’ assertion that the Earth is a
flattened disk surrounded at its edge by a towering wall of ice.
Details about the event, including the dates, are forthcoming, according to the FEIC, which calls
the cruise “the biggest, boldest adventure yet”. However, it’s worth noting that nautical maps and
navigation technologies such as global positioning systems (GPS) work as they do because the
[10] Earth is … a globe.
Believers in a flat Earth argue that images showing a curved horizon are fake and that photos of a
round Earth from space are part of a vast conspiracy perpetrated by NASA and other space agencies
to hide Earth’s flatness. “This likely began during the cold war”, the Flat Earth Society (FES) says.
“The U.S.S.R. and U.S.A. were obsessed with beating each other into space to the point that each
[15] faked their accomplishments in an attempt to keep pace with the other’s supposed achievements.”
These and other flat-Earth assertions appear on the website of the FES, allegedly the world’s oldest
official flat Earth organization, dating to the early 1800s.
However, the ancient Greeks demonstrated that Earth was a sphere more than 2.000 years ago,
and the gravity that keeps everything on the planet from flying off into space could exist only on a
[20] spherical world.
But in diagrams shared on the FES website, the planet appears as a pancake-like disk with the
North Pole smacked in the center and an edge “surrounded on all sides by an ice wall that holds
the oceans back”. This ice wall – thought by some flat-Earthers to be Antarctica – is the destination
of the promised FEIC cruise.
[25] There’s just one catch: navigational charts and systems that guide cruise ships and other vessels
around the Earth’s oceans are all based on the principle of a round Earth, says Henk Keijer, a
former cruise ship captain with 23 years of experience.
GPS relies on a network of dozens of satellites orbiting thousands of miles above Earth; signals
from the satellites beam down to the receiver inside of a GPS device, and at least three satellites are
[30] required to pinpoint a precise position because of Earth’s curvature, Keijer explained. “Had the
Earth been flat, a total of three satellites would have been enough to provide this information to
everyone on Earth”. He adds: “But it is not enough, because the Earth is round”.
Whether or not, the FEIC cruise will rely on GPS or deploy an entirely new flat-Earth-based
navigation system for finding the end of the world remains to be seen.
Adaptado de livescience.com, 30/05/2017.
These and other flat-Earth assertions appear on the website of the FES, allegedly the world’s oldest official flat Earth organization, dating to the early 1800s. (l. 16-17)
In relation to the fragment above, the pieces of information introduced in the fifth paragraph (l. 18-20) serve the following purpose:
THE FLAT EARTH CRUISE: SERIOUSLY, PEOPLE?
Organizers of an annual conference that brings together people who believe that our planet is not
round are planning a cruise to the supposed edge of the Earth. They’re looking for the ice wall that
holds back the oceans.
The journey will take place in 2020, the Flat Earth International Conference (FEIC) recently
[5] announced on its website. The goal? To test so-called flat-Earthers’ assertion that the Earth is a
flattened disk surrounded at its edge by a towering wall of ice.
Details about the event, including the dates, are forthcoming, according to the FEIC, which calls
the cruise “the biggest, boldest adventure yet”. However, it’s worth noting that nautical maps and
navigation technologies such as global positioning systems (GPS) work as they do because the
[10] Earth is … a globe.
Believers in a flat Earth argue that images showing a curved horizon are fake and that photos of a
round Earth from space are part of a vast conspiracy perpetrated by NASA and other space agencies
to hide Earth’s flatness. “This likely began during the cold war”, the Flat Earth Society (FES) says.
“The U.S.S.R. and U.S.A. were obsessed with beating each other into space to the point that each
[15] faked their accomplishments in an attempt to keep pace with the other’s supposed achievements.”
These and other flat-Earth assertions appear on the website of the FES, allegedly the world’s oldest
official flat Earth organization, dating to the early 1800s.
However, the ancient Greeks demonstrated that Earth was a sphere more than 2.000 years ago,
and the gravity that keeps everything on the planet from flying off into space could exist only on a
[20] spherical world.
But in diagrams shared on the FES website, the planet appears as a pancake-like disk with the
North Pole smacked in the center and an edge “surrounded on all sides by an ice wall that holds
the oceans back”. This ice wall – thought by some flat-Earthers to be Antarctica – is the destination
of the promised FEIC cruise.
[25] There’s just one catch: navigational charts and systems that guide cruise ships and other vessels
around the Earth’s oceans are all based on the principle of a round Earth, says Henk Keijer, a
former cruise ship captain with 23 years of experience.
GPS relies on a network of dozens of satellites orbiting thousands of miles above Earth; signals
from the satellites beam down to the receiver inside of a GPS device, and at least three satellites are
[30] required to pinpoint a precise position because of Earth’s curvature, Keijer explained. “Had the
Earth been flat, a total of three satellites would have been enough to provide this information to
everyone on Earth”. He adds: “But it is not enough, because the Earth is round”.
Whether or not, the FEIC cruise will rely on GPS or deploy an entirely new flat-Earth-based
navigation system for finding the end of the world remains to be seen.
Adaptado de livescience.com, 30/05/2017.
Had the Earth been flat, a total of three satellites would have been enough to provide this information (l. 30-31)
In relation to the rest of the statement, the underlined fragment has the objective of: