A scientific controversy is resolved when one argument becomes widely accepted and other arguments begin to lose ground. Contrary to popular belief, it is not resolved by an authoritative body in science or by a complete consensus of all scientists involved. Commonly, when there is astounding evidence favoring one side of the debated topic, it eventually no longer becomes argued over. Generally, when the data from multiple research methods all converge, the scientific controversy becomes resolved. A non-scientific controversy cannot, on the other hand, be proven. For instance, religion cannot be necessarily falsified since it’s based on your opinion and point of view. When it comes to a non-scientific controversy, there is no right answer and it’s pretty much up for debate. The resolution is a much swifter process that just gets resolved when the person who argues better …show more content…
An example would be the past controversy on whether or not the Earth is flat or round. In the olden days, this was a huge scientific controversy with varying opinions. Some people claimed that the Earth was flat while others dismissed those claims and said that the Earth was round. Regardless of the varying opinions, there was only one true definitive answer. During the 6th century BCE, Greek philosophers regarded Earth as spherical based on their observation of the moon in which they said that the moon appeared to have a sphere-like shape. Afterward, some time later, Greek philosopher Aristotle observed the shadow of the moon during a lunar eclipse and realized that it was curved. In the 3rd century BCE, Eratosthenes observed the ancient city of Syene during the summer solstice at noon and noticed that the sun was directly overhead. He knew that during the summer solstice in Alexandria, Egypt, a tall tower would act as a shadow in the city. So, he took advantage of this occurrence and calculated the circumference of the planet and came to the conclusion that the Earth was possibly curved. In addition, the Greek geographer Strabo contributed and supported the claims that the Earth was round through his observation that sailors saw distant objects move downward on the horizon and that when they sailed away they disappeared because they were sailing around the planet. The idea that Earth was round was highly