earth moon system.earth not rotating,but revolving instead?

Question

i have been reading that the earth is not actually rotating,but actually revolving around the earth-moon center of mass and thus undergoing more of a hellical motion,considering both around the sun as well as the earth-moon center of mass..so can anyone please explain me this..and dont bother telling me im wrong..cause i know im not :)

Answer 1

Please reread your source... I think you might be confusing the words "revolve" and "rotate" by equating them and using the interchangeably.

The Earth certainly does rotate (spin) on it's own axis at a rate which causes our 24 hour day - approximately 1,000 MPH at the equator.

The earth / moon center of mass, however, (and this is where I believe you are in error) is revolving (circling) the sun as a unit; therefore, the earth would not be tracing a perfect circular path around the sun, but rather, it would be slightly pulled off of its circular path by the moon's gravitational influence and thus it would be forced into following the helical tracing that your reading source was speaking of.

You can think of it as unrolling a dispenser of Scotch Tape around a Hula Hoop; the hoop being the true circular path around the sun and the tape dispenser being the earth / moon system. Perhaps you can see that the tape-dispenser-Earth would be going around the sun while at the same time it would be twisting itself around the hoop, i.e., creating a helical path.

Also picture the tape-dispenser-Earth in rotation (spinning on it's own axis) with the moon in revolution (making a circle around the earth, or orbiting the Earth, if you'd like to call it that.)

This ought to give you a pretty good idea of the concept. Did it help???

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Answer 2

You're wrong. Rotation is the earth spinning once a day, and has nothing to do with the moon. The trip the earth takes around the earth/moon center of mass every month is revolving.

Answer 3

It is true that the Earth-Moon system revolves around a center that is not the same as Earth's center. But, think about this for a minute: it takes Earth 24 hours to complete a rotation (1 Day), but it takes the Earth-Moon system about 28 days to complete a revolution about their common center of mass. Obviously, the two motions are not the same thing.

Answer 4

Gravitational forces from all directions pull any type of mass towards another mass,regardless of the distance,resulting in the masses configuring themselves upon a gravitational plane....Tom Science