Confirmation Without the Bias
Confirmation bias is a funny thing. It happens to everyone at some point, but the best thing to do with our deeply held beliefs is to test them to the truth.
This week, the Final Experiment happened, where a select few people, such as a freelance photographer I watch sometimes on YouTube, and a select few flat earthers, went to Antarctica to figure out if the sun stays for 24 hours in the sky.
If the sun stays above the horizon, then the Earth is a massive sphere. If the sun sets at any point during this time of year, then the Earth isn’t a massive sphere.
Simple experiment, right?
It turns out the Earth is a sphere.
Much like preparing for a season of singleness after a long relationship, the entire flat-earth community will have to undergo massive shifts in how they view things and see the world and make drastic changes that ultimately lead to the right views.
I’ve heard mostly radio silence, with some strange reasoning why the 24-hour sun does not mean we live on a globe.
The Final Experiment has been conducted in such a way that tampering is impossible, to satisfy the universal concerns of all those who believe we live in a flat world reality.
I’ve heard from fellow believers and from people who have been close to me the Earth can’t be a sphere, and if I don’t believe we live on a flat plane, then I’m not saved and will go to hell, or some variation of, “You’re demonic!”
The all-powerful God we serve can apparently do anything except create a sphere that pulls things to its center.
Just because we don’t understand something, it does not mean it isn’t true. I don’t understand the intricacies of how a smartphone works at the nano-level, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t operate the way the manufacturer intended it to.
A massive sphere spinning in a vast universe is a testament to the creative power of our God.
Whether or not there is life out there on other worlds, it is clear the way the Earth was made is specifically to support life. Gravity pulling toward the center of the Earth’s mass is one example of how this can’t be random. For living beings to survive on a sphere, and all over the sphere at that, a force would need to exist to keep them from falling out from the center of the Earth. Thus, gravity.
Leading back to confirmation bias, I find some believers have this in spades. The Earth looks flat; therefore, it must be flat. They specifically search for information or misinformation, which adds to this viewpoint.
However, the truth is we live on a sphere. We’ve known this for thousands of years.
Reading into the Bible what we already believe is a form of confirmation bias.
If you come to the Bible with the idea, the notion the Earth is flat already, you’re only going to fit things together that don’t belong together in that viewpoint.
The wrong puzzle pieces don’t fit the truth, but the correct puzzle pieces fit together perfectly, like two halves of one whole. There’s the confirmation you need. You’ve got to be aware of the truth.
To seek specific information to build up an already-held conclusion is not the way of our King.
There are many mysteries in this world, but like this recent experiment proves once more, the shape of the Earth is not one of them.
If you were in a room set ablaze and you closed your eyes, would that make the fire disappear?
No.
So why do people who believe the Earth is flat do this regarding centuries of science, science that has only built up from its initial foundation?
We can confirm the facts and leave the bias behind like gloves that don’t quite fit our hands.
In that way, we can seize the truth and find gloves that truly fit our hands.
As believers, we shouldn’t seek to establish interpretations from dogmatically held truth before we investigate the Scriptures, but rather find the truth based on the evidence we’re given, using the Scriptures in the proper way.
Confirmation comes from truth, not bias.
