2007-10-26 06:32:24 · 24 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
LOL
2007-10-26 06:46:30 · answer #1 · answered by Kaynos 5 · 1⤊ 1⤋
There are a few different reasons why this can't be possible.
1) You are assuming that "everyone" lives in just one part of the world. However, if everyone really lost 5 pounds, that would include people from all over the globe, right? So on an average, the Earth's "axis deviation" from all weight losses should cancel out.
2) But more seriously, The Law of Conservation of Mass ensures that the sum total of mass in a closed system remains the same. So if people lose 5 pounds, think of what happens to it. They probably sweat it out, which means that it is given back to Earth in the form of water and salts. Again, this means that even if everyone loses 5 pounds simultaneously, the total mass of the earth still remains the same, hence there is no deviation in earth's rotation.
An allied question is that if everyone on Earth jumps at exactly the same time, would that throw the earth off its axis? The same logic applies to this question too.
2007-10-26 13:45:32 · answer #2 · answered by al 2 · 6⤊ 1⤋
As an exercise in thinking, do the math (forgetting for a moment pesky little things like physics, like that the 5 lbs per person would actually be re-absorbed by the Earth, that the loss would be roughly equally distributed, etc).
There's about 6 billion people on the earth, times 5 lbs = 30,000,000,000 pounds
Convert that to kilograms = 13,607,771,100 kg (about 14 billion kg).
Mass of earth = 5.972 x 10^24 kg = 5 972 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 kg (i had to remove the commas because Yahoo was truncating the number)
Lost weight as a fraction of earth's mass = 2.28 x 10^-15, or .00000000000000228%, or 2.28 quadrillionths* of a percent. (*In the USA, large numbers are named in this order: million, billion, trillion, quadrillion)
2.28 quadrillionths of a percent is not likely to have an effect on the rotation of the Earth.
To put the 30,000,000,000 pounds (13,607,771,100 kg) into perspective, the mass of the Space Shuttle at launch is 2,029,000 kg give or take a few thousand kg. So the weight lost by 6 billion people would equal about 6707 space shuttles. A lot to be sure, but not even enough to cover the total land area of a small city. (I'm having trouble finding data for the Space Shuttle's vertical (i.e. takeoff) footprint, but its wingspan is 79.06 feet. Let's round that up to 100 and say that a shuttle takes up a 100ft by 100ft square, for a 10000 sqft footprint. 10000 * 6706 = 67,060,000 sqft = approx. 2.41 square miles, which is only slightly larger than Cape Canaveral itself (2.33 square miles).
2007-10-26 14:52:19 · answer #3 · answered by Ryan H 6 · 4⤊ 0⤋
EVEN IF, you could take 5 pounds from everyone, put it on a rocket and blast it off the Earth, the Earth still gains mass every day from incoming cosmic debris, space dust, meteorites, etc. The difference in mass, if it was even negative, would be negligible.
2007-10-26 15:34:48 · answer #4 · answered by SteveA8 6 · 2⤊ 0⤋
I'm going to buck the trend and say yes. To lose 5 pounds all at once means instantaneous conversion into energy. Doesn't it. I have a four function calculator so I'm not going to do the math, but 6 billion people at 5 pounds per person factored into e=MC ^2 ( I hate my keyboard for not having a squared function) is going to be one very serious bang. AnyTrue scientific types out there? Please do the math and put it in terms of trillions of tons of TNT. Because I'm pretty sure thats the sort of number we're talking about here.
2007-10-26 16:55:37 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
No. There is no way to throw the earth off its axis.
2007-10-26 14:51:24 · answer #6 · answered by Renaissance Man 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
It wouldn;t throw Earth off its axis, but it would change the orbit path, but the amount of mass we're talking about is negligible - it wouldn't make a noticeable difference at all.
2007-10-26 17:39:21 · answer #7 · answered by vEngful.Gibb0n 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
No.
First, that is too little weight to make any measurable difference.
Second, the weight would not leave Earth. It would leave the bodies of people and be added to the weight of sewage or whatever. The weight would still be on Earth.
2007-10-26 14:22:18 · answer #8 · answered by campbelp2002 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
No, it would have no effect on the Earth Axis.
2007-10-26 20:53:10 · answer #9 · answered by Norskeyenta 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Matter is neither created nor destroyed. The net mass of the earth would not change. People would be lighter but that weight would be transfered into different matteriels
2007-10-26 14:51:09 · answer #10 · answered by willmiller82 2 · 1⤊ 1⤋
You've got to be kidding? If everybody on the earth suddenly disappeared the total mass of the earth would barely be affected.
Not to mention those pesky laws of physics:
conservation of energy
conservation of mass
2007-10-26 13:44:19 · answer #11 · answered by Brian K² 6 · 6⤊ 1⤋