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Some Flat Earthers believe that the Earth is shaped like a massive doughnut complete with a giant hole in the middle.
Although most of us understand the Earth is shaped like a sphere, Donut Earth Theory is the belief that our planet is ring-shaped, or torus-shaped to use the scientific term, and the conspiracy theory is becoming popular among Flat Earthers.
The theory was first coined in the Flat Earth Theory forum by Flat Earther Dr. Rosenpenis in 2008 as a joke, reports Indy100, yet somehow the idea grown legs.
In his post, Dr. Rosenpenis wrote: "I used advanced scaled astrophysical professional academic software to make a model of the geo-doughnut, the tastiest celestial body, our sugar-glazed planet Earth."
Despite the Flat Earther's post clearly being a joke, the idea has somehow now grown legs, with some people taking the idea seriously, claiming we can't see the hole in the middle due to the way light bends.
In the same forum, another Flat Earther called Varaug posted in 2012: "I have a theory that the Earth is in fact shaped like a torus (a donut-shape). However, light is curved so we cannot tell."
Varaug expanded on his idea, arguing that light follows the torus's curve, making the hole "unseeable".
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In an explanation as to why no one has ever fallen into Earth's hole, Varaug asks other forum members to think of the Earth as a "jam donut", with gravity working towards the jam.
Varaug also argues that day and night still occurs because the doughnut-shaped Earth completes a revolution every 24 hours, with the hole at a 90 degree angle to the sun.
The Flat Earther also speculates that the torus shape was formed by gravity pulling in rocks and dust and bits of space matter together into an orbit with no central focal point, effectively creating a ring-shaped planet spinning around nothing – the hole.
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Scientists have slammed the theory, explaining that the sun could not rise or set as it does if Earth had a gaping hole in the middle, nor would we experience day and night as we currently do.
VICE reports that Oxford professor Dr. Anders Sandberg points out that on a doughnut-shaped Earth, clouds could be up to three times taller and pushed around by stronger winds, and that people living near the hole would see "double seasons" where summer snaps back into winter and visa versa.
- Flat Earth
- Space
- Conspiracy theories
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