Talk:Flat Earth

Scholarly interpretation

Scholars have noted substantial challenges when characterizing ancient cosmography as belief in a "flat Earth". For instance, Jeffrey Burton Russell observed that many ancient and medieval maps, such as the T and O maps, "were intended to represent only a portion of the sphere."^[1] The Greek concept of oikoumene, which influenced many ancient cosmographies, referred to known lands rather than all of Earth.^[2]

Additionally, Wayne Horowitz's study of Mesopotamian texts found "significant variety" in cosmological views across different time periods, concluding that ancient cosmographies are not monolithic.^[3] Other scholars distinguish between cosmographies that are literal versus everyday observation "phenomenological" accounts, such as the word "sunrise" which is not strictly scientific.^[4] Additionally, Historian James Hannam notes that debates in ancient China focused primarily on whether the earth was square or circular, as opposed to flatness.^[5]

Although ancient cultures may have held cosmographies which differ substantially from the modern spherical Earth model, they do challenge direct comparisons with modern flat Earth beliefs.

• Why it should be changed:

Per WP:NPOV, legitimate scholarly debates improve overall article neutrality. The article presents ancient cosmographies without acknowledging different interpretations discussed in academic literature. This subsection provides additional scholarly context from peer-reviewed sources. Russell's Inventing the Flat Earth is already a key source for this article; Horowitz is a standard academic reference in Assyriology; Hannam's book was reviewed in the British Journal for the History of Science (2024); and Greenwood is published by an academic press.

What this does not claim:

1. It does not claim ancient peoples knew the Earth was spherical

2. It does not claim ancient flat-Earth beliefs must be a "myth"

3. It does not remove or minimize any existing content

• References supporting the possible change:

1. Russell, Jeffrey Burton (1991). Inventing the Flat Earth: Columbus and Modern Historians. Praeger. pp. 17–18. ISBN 978-0-275-93956-4.
2. Horowitz, Wayne (1998). Mesopotamian Cosmic Geography. Eisenbrauns. ISBN 978-0-931464-99-7.
3. Greenwood, Kyle (2015). Scripture and Cosmology: Reading the Bible Between the Ancient World and Modern Science. IVP Academic. p. 69. ISBN 978-0-8308-2561-5.
4. Hannam, James (2023). The Globe: How the Earth Became Round. Reaktion Books. pp. 178–193. ISBN 978-1-78914-758-2.
5. Herodotus, Histories, 4.8, 4.36.

~2026-13532-4 (talk) 19:23, 14 January 2026 (UTC)

"In my own words"? Wikipedia is not a blog. Maybe start one instead? --Fama Clamosa (talk) 19:35, 14 January 2026 (UTC)

I meant it in a way that I did not use LLMs when writing this verison. Fixed the title to specify this. ~2026-13532-4 (talk) 19:56, 14 January 2026 (UTC)

I don’t see the relevance of much of the edit request. T-O maps are not presented in the article as evidence of belief in a flat earth and have no bearing on the matter. Oikoumene is not presented in the article as evidence of belief in a flat earth and has no bearing on the matter. Chinese debates about square versus circular are not about flat versus spherical, they are about what shape of flat. It would be fine to mention that Mesopotamian models were not exclusively flat, as long as it is clear that none of them were spherical.

If the intent is to help the reader understand that ancient models were not uniformly flat, that is fine, but we can’t establish that as editors through accreting various sources that discuss various things. We need a reliable source that clearly says so as a consequence of a scholarly survey of civilizations worldwide. Yes, I know there were many ancient models. No, I cannot just say that. If your intent for the scholarly interpretation section is to build up such an understanding in the reader without directly saying so, I’m not opposed, but as noted, the only relevant example was Mesopotamia. And there is also the problem that this article is about flat earth beliefs, not cosmological models that are neither flat nor spherical. Strebe (talk) 17:55, 15 January 2026 (UTC)