ADOPT A PENGUIN _____________ HELP SAVE PENGUINS - Your Number 1 Source of Penguin News Stories Home    News Archives Flat Earth, Penguins and Ice Walls, Aden Investigates...  -- Feb 2007 By Dean Becker You may have heard of a fictitious novel called Discworld by Terry Pratchett. Some of you may have read it. This book has been such a huge influence on people’s lives that some people take some of it literally. Clinically insane? Possibly. Living in reality? Definitely not. There is one thing they are though; Flat-Earthers Yes, a tribe (well, about as in touch with the modern world as a tribe of Amazonian squirrel-eating Cannibals would be) which believe the Earth is flat. Not only do they believe that the Earth is flat, they also believe that Gravity doesn't exist for us, the Sun and the Moon are spotlights which cast hot light and cold light respectively, that the Earth rests on the back of 4 Elephants and a Turtle and, more relevantly, the existence of the "Ice Wall" which surrounds the Earth. More on this "Ice Wall" later; first, I feel compelled to tackle their animal weight-lifting hypothesis. Yes, to sum up their hypothesis; animals carry the Earth. Now who should get the slave-labour/sweatshop protesters attention? Working throughout time to carry our measly planet, I find this hard to believe; the union just wouldn't settle for it. Forgetting these minor facts for a moment, let's take a look at the physical dilemma. Surely these giant animals would be awfully disproportionate; for the turtle to take his (or her, for all you feminist Adopt A Penguin readers out there) fair share of the weight (which let's face it, in this communist society we live in - everyone should be carrying their equal share of the Earth), he would have to be the height of his elephant acquaintances. This obvious height difference would cause a huge tilt and the Earth would no longer be parallel to the bottom of the universe (as we all know that the universe is a mere cube); this would lead to Malteser's around the globe rolling into uncertainty and, quite possibly, into the mouths of undeserving chocolate fiends...         Continue to Page 2