Our spherical home is Earth, the blue marble. What if Earth was flat? This retrograde idea is believed by some people. What would the daily life be like? It would function, if at all. We examine how oddball or "oddslice", Earth would look if it was flat. Also, we explore whether there are any benefits to living on a strange disc with the sun and moon rotating overhead as a cosmic carousel.1. Gravitation, at least as it is now, goneGravitropism refers to the gravitational process which directs a plant’s roots to grow down and its shoots upward. We could observe strange behavior in plants if gravity was altered to point toward the North Pole. Image credit: Tim Graham via GettyGravitation tugs on all objects, no matter their location in the universe, on spherical Earth. Gravity must not be acting in any way that Earth would assume the flat disk shape. If gravity did, it would quickly pull the planet into a spheroid.A flat-Earth might not have any gravity, since a solid-disk-like Earth is impossible under current gravity conditions, according calculations by James Clerk Maxwell, mathematician, and physicist.Perhaps gravity pulls everything toward the North Pole on a flat Earth. According to James Davis, a geophysicist from Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, this scenario would mean that the gravity pull toward the center of the disk is more horizontal the further you are away from the North Pole. The world's longest jump record would be broken, although this would cause havoc around the globe. As long as you were able to orient yourself northward before taking off, that is.2. It would definitely clear the atmosphereView of Earth's atmosphere taken from the International Space Station. Image credit: ESA/NASA/Tim PeakeFlat-Earth without gravity would lose the layer of gases known as the atmosphere. This protective veil is held in place by the force of gravity. Without this protective shield, Earth's skies could turn black as the light from the sun wouldn't scatter into Earth's atmosphere. Instead, it would cause the sky to become the familiar blue color we see today. Luis Villazon, a zoologist, educator and writer, stated that the loss of atmospheric pressure would cause plants and animals to become exposed to the vacuum of space. This could lead to asphyxiation within seconds.Water would boil in space if there was no atmosphere around the planet. Water boils when it has a vapor pressure equal to that of the atmosphere. A lower atmospheric pressure will result in a lower boiling point. Without an atmosphere to warm the planet, the temperature at the surface would plummet and any water that remains would freeze. It's not all bad news. Deep-ocean organisms like chemosynthetic bacteria, which don't need oxygen, might still survive. These bacteria survived long space missions and have lived to tell the story.3. It's cloudy with the possibility of some sideways rainBulging oceans would gather at the center of the globe if flat-Earth gravity pulled water towards the North Pole. (Image credit: Joel Sharpe via GettyGravitation pulling toward the center of the planet disk (in this case the North Pole), would cause precipitation to gravitate towards that spot. Because precipitation falls to Earth because of gravity, and therefore will fall towards the spot with the strongest gravitational pull.Weather would behave the same way on Earth as it does at the centre of the disk. Horizontal precipitation would be more intense the further you go. According to Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, water from rivers and seas would flow towards the North Pole. This would mean that huge bulging oceans would accumulate at the center of Earth, leaving virtually no water at its edges.4. We'd all be lost.It's difficult to imagine a world with GPS. (Image credit: Blend Images - Diego Cervo via Getty)Satellites wouldn't exist if the Earth was flat because they would have difficulty orbiting a flat plane. "There are many satellite missions that society relies on that just wouldn’t work," James Davis of Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory stated in a statement, "I cannot imagine how GPS would function on a flat Earth."Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), which is used by many people for everything, including GPS services on their phones, travel information and just-in time stock management at supermarkets to ensure fresh produce arrives as soon as possible, are all dependent on Global Navigation Satellite Systems. Critically, emergency services can use GPS to locate callers using their phone signal. Satellite communications could save your life.It is difficult to imagine a world where GPS was not available. We would be lost. The upside is that humans on flat-Earth would have horizontal rain to guide us in the right direction, north.5. Some journeys could take forever(Image credit: Rebel Design Project / Alamy)You can expect longer travel times, not only because there are no GPS navigation problems, but also because we have to travel further. Flat-Earth beliefs hold that the Arctic is located in the middle of the Earth and Antarctica forms an ice wall around its edge. This wall prevents people from falling off the surface of the Earth. Travel times will increase if you can't fly around the globe but are instead forced to fly across it. To fly from Australia, which is on one side of the globe, to McMurdo station Antarctica, on the other, you'd need to fly across North and South America. It is also possible to forget about Antarctica trips (though this has been accomplished many times on a flat-Earth map). However, you would need to fly across the entire Arctic as well as North and South America.6. We'd all be roasted if there were no more aurorasNASA astronaut Jack Fischer captured Aurora aboard the International Space Station. NASA Image Credit: AuroraNASA reports that the protective magnetic field curves around Earth's poles from one to the other because of the swirling molten iron surrounding the core. The magnetosphere wouldn't exist on a flat Earth if there was no solid core that generates a magnetic field. The auroras would also cease to exist. These are also known as the Northern Lights. They occur when charged particles from sun hit oxygen and nitrogen molecules in magnetosphere. This causes them to release energy, releasing incredible aurora light shows.Even so, Earth's inability to see auroras will be a concern as it would not be protected from the sun's radiation. NASA states that Earth and all of its surface would be exposed to harmful solar radiation. This would leave a barren world similar to Mars.7. 7.Flat-Earth would give us all the same night sky view. (Image credit: Alan Dyer/VWPics/Universal Images Group via Getty Images))Flat-Earth wouldn't split into hemispheres as it is on the current orb. Night and day would not be divided depending on where you are in the Northern or Southern parts of the hemisphere. The night sky would be visible no matter where you are on the planetary disc. Stargazing would be easier if you didn't need to travel to another hemisphere in order to complete your astronomy bucket lists. Isn't that part?We'd all miss out on many ground-based discoveries if we shared a single view of the night sky. To see the cosmos more clearly, we would have to rely solely on space-based telescopes.8. Hurricanes will be gone foreverPhotograph of Hurricane Florence taken from the International Space Station NASA image creditEach year, hurricanes (also known as cyclones or typhoons depending on where they form) inflict unprecedented damage. According to NOAA, Hurricane Harvey caused $125 billion (90 Billion) of damage in the United States alone in 2017.These storms are characterized by their destructive rotating nature due to Earth's coriolis Effect. This causes storms in Northern Hemispheres to rotate clockwise, while those in Southern Hemispheres rotate counterclockwise. But, a stationary, flat-Earth would not produce the coriolis effect. There is no coriolis, which means there are no hurricanes or typhoons. NASA says that the magnitude of the coriolis effect at the equator is zero, which is why we don’t see these kinds of storms in the five-degree north or south hemispheres.Additional resources:Our Changing Views on Earth: 90 YearsWhy some people think the Earth is flat
