How as an individual can I know if the Earth is a sphere or a flat disc? What experiment can I do that doesn't involve trusting information from a 3rd party that would prove what the geometry really is?
You can prove yourself that the earth is a sphere with some facts:
-You can't see the star Polaris from the Southern hemisphere because is at a declination of a bit over 89 degrees, if the earth was flat we should be able to see it anywhere.
Convergence, perspective and refraction limits your field of view, you can't see the entire sky from any one point on the Earth's surface. Also atmosphereic refraction causes celestial objects to have an apprent position. You're debunking a strawman model.-You can see the International Space Station and even predict where and when will passover of your city doing by yourself the calculations using the spherical earth model or use a website like (
https://www.heavens-above.com/PassSummary) I know this is 3rd party information but you will be able to see the ISS with your own eyes (I have done it many times).
The object you're viewing in the sky could be anything from a high altitude aircraft to some kind of balloon riding the jetstream. I've seen telescopic video of an object with a blinking light that looks like a high altitude aircraft, the object was exactly where the iPhone ISS tracking app said the ISS would be.-Buy a decent telescope, watch others planets and you will see how they are round, that is not a direct evidence but if you think like Flath Earth Society (
https://twitter.com/FlatEarthOrg/status/935644892721762305), you can also with the telescope watch the ISS and see that is not a airplane, a ball, a missile, Chuck Norris or whatever as some people says.
Video and photographs of stars and plants taken by Nikon Coolpix P900/1000 owners all show twinkling lights that are not round at all. Again images of an object in the sky are not definitive proof NASA isn't just flying a kite up there to trick you.-Which ever hemisphere you live, watch the sky in the night and watch the direction of the rotation of the stars and call a friend of the opposite hemisphere and ask for the the direction there, you will see that they are opposite. I know is not just like that but that is the essence of the experiment
The stars say nothing of surface below them, you're making assumptions about the lights in sky then trying to validate your globe model with those assumptions. If the stars are projections off of a curved mirror (firmament) then you'll get distortions like a change in rotation direction and 24 hour light in Antarctica (summertime) from the light wrapping around. If anybody want to believe that the earth is flat its ok to have different opinions, personally I think that is a sphere or whatever is the name that scientist use
No you don't have a different opinion, you've just been brainwashed and are regurgitating the shit you've been fed by TPTB like an absolute cuck.