Why does the planet earth not fall out of the galaxy?

Question

okay, i know this is a really stupid question, but i just wondered if anyone knew any theories

Answer 1

Gravity and gravitational pull..

Answer 2

The Earth moves relative to the Sun tracing an oscilliatory eliptical motion. However the Earth also moves with the Sun relative to the Milky Way barry center. The Motion of the Earth relative to our Galaxy traces a oscilliatory cycloidal motion. The Planet Earth and the Sun dont fall out of the Galaxy because the relative Gavitational Energy of the Solar system balances the Galaxy Gravitational Energy Just like a see saw.
NOte ;The Milky Way and Adromeda are slowly moving toward each other, predicting Galactical collison as per Atronomers' observation.
Whereas the other Galaxies are receeding relative to the Earth's motion also as per Astronomer's observation of the red shift of the Doppler effect and the Einstein Relativistic red shift effect.

Answer 3

Fall to where? There is no up or down in space, so what would the Earth be falling toward? The universe has no bottom or top as we understand it.

The Sun's gravity keeps the Earth in orbit around the Sun since the outward pull of the centripetal force caused by the Earth's movement balances the inward pull of the Sun's gravity.

Likewise, the Sun orbits the galactic center due to the gravity of the galaxy caused by the combined mass of all of the matter in the galaxy.

If the Earth was to fall anywhere, it woul fall toward the black hole in the center, because the center of the galaxy is the "bottom" where all objects in or near the galaxy are being pulled toward.

Answer 4

'Falling' is always INTO the galaxy.

Everything is falling. You fall towards the planet, the planet falls towards the sun, the sun falls 'centrewards'. All this falling is caused by gravity.

(Because all these things are moving, anything falling towards something else will always 'miss', and end up spinning around it.)

Looked at another way, the planet (and everything else) IS 'falling out of the galaxy'.

This is called 'expansion'. Edwin hubble is famous for noticing that everything we see in outer space, IS MOVING AWAY FROM US. This expansion could imply that there was once a 'big bang' (because everything used to be in one place, and is still exploding apart).

But it could be caused by all the spinning around. For example, the moon is getting about half-an-inch further away from the earth every year (kind of 'falling out of orbit').

Answer 5

Gravity is what makes matter attract each other, so since the sun is the one with most mass, it atracts all other planets

But what prevents the solar sistem from falling?

The Milky Way, wich is composed of lots of stars planets and black holes.

But what prevents the Milky way from falling?

Something invisible :)

Ninety-five percent of the universe is composed of "dark stuff" that we don’t know much about, 25 percent is dark matter, which is actually invisible, and 70 percent is dark energy, which is also invisible.

So we can only see 5% of the universe, that really isnt much to hold, is it?

Answer 6

It and everything else in the Universe is moving apart after the Big expansion - whether it will continue to expand , or eventually contract is largely tied up in the question of whether the mass of the universe is what is visible ( would expand indefinately) or largely tied up in dark matter we cant see (and should eventually contract back to a point) . As for falling - which way would you say is down - its the other way in the southern hemisphere after all! To be drawn out of our own Solar system or Galaxy would require a large mass to be drawn towards, but then everything else around us would be similarly affected so relative to us would appear static in that plane.

Hope that makes sense.

Answer 7

It's all to do with gravity. Each body (regarless of size) attracts other bodies. In the galaxy these bodies - such as the Earth and the Sun - eventually reach a state of equilibrium and things orbit around eachother.

Answer 8

The earth and all the planets and stars in the galaxy are held in their relative positions by gravity - just like you are held in place on the earth by gravity.

Answer 9

Because the "giver of life", our Sun, exerts a gravitational pull upon earth, keeping it in its orbit around the sun. Theories have been mentioned that as our sun grows weaker and cooler, the earth will pull farther away from the sun and grow cooler itself.

Answer 10

Why would it???
The Earth is held by a gravity 'string' in an orbit around the Sun which is in orbit around the galaxy, all held together by gravity.

Answer 11

Out of curiosity, why the Earth in particular? would not your question apply to the other planets? If you rephrased the question with some thought maybe the root of your enquiry would emerge.