what happens to the displaced air when someone is born?

Question

My 9 year old son is always asking questions. Sometimes I can answer, sometimes I can't. Here is one that he asked several weeks ago. He wanted to know where the air goes when someone is born. He said "there are so many people and animals born all the time, what happens to all that air that their body takes up? I wasn't sure how to answer. If anyone has any intelligent answer that would be great. Please no smart a@# comments. Thanks

Answer 1

I would say the air was displaced slowly as your belly grew before he was even born

but for his answer,you could compare the air to water its still here it just moved out of the way like wen he gets it the bath tub,,except the air tops off at space

or you could say they breath it in there lungs with there first breath

Answer 2

The air gets pushed out of the way. But the combined volume is negligible. It seems like a lot of air would be pushed around, but think about ti this way: the baby is formed from chemicals ingested by the mother (i.e. food), which comes from the surface of the planet. So no extra substance is actually created when someone is born. Substance has just been moved around. The net volume is actually the same (admittedly the density may be different, but the effect is negligible).

Also, if the volume change was significant, the atmosphere would go up by a few centimetres. at most.

A similar thing would be "what about people who grow up- they get bigger"- the volume must coemf rom somewhere. The air goes into the empty space, if you get my drift.

Answer 3

This may be a bit over his head, but physics kind of dictates the answer:

The 'law of conservation of mass/matter', also known as law of mass/matter conservation states that the mass of a closed system will remain constant, regardless of the processes acting inside the system. An equivalent statement is that matter cannot be created/destroyed, although it may be rearranged. This implies that for any chemical process in a closed system, the mass of the reactants must equal the mass of the products. The law of mass/matter conservation may be considered as an approximate physical law that holds only in the classical sense before the advent of special relativity and quantum mechanics.

While the earth is not strictly a closed system (due to asteroids, sunlight, etc.) The cells that make up a person are created & grow through the processing & use of carbon based materials that are already here. In order to produce the baby, the parents had to consume extra food, water, vitamins, and minerals, which allow the baby to grow. So the volume of the baby is offset by the volume of the stuff that went into making the baby.

Answer 4

A very clever question for a 9-year-old, if true. No air is displaced when a baby is born, because there is not an airtight seal between the walls of the mother's vagina and the baby's body.

That is, there is no vacuum left inside mommy when the baby comes out, because the air in front of the baby just goes around the baby and ends up behind the baby.

That's the true answer. But you should read all the smart a@# answers I didn't write.

Good luck explaining all this female anatomy to a 9-year-old boy. Sounds like he keeps you hitting the books.

Answer 5

I like how your son thinks! First, if you measure the volume of the baby and amniotic fluid, it would match almost exactly the reduction in the volume of the mother's body. Second, all of the matter in the baby beyond the original egg and sperm comes from food. It doesn't just appear. Third, the atmosphere is extremely fluid and compressible. Its boundary at space is not distinct. You can put this in words appropriate for an obviously intelligent and curious 9-year-old.

Answer 6

Well, you must remember being pregnant 9 years ago. Remember how big your belly was? Taking up a lot of space, wasn't it? Then, when your son was born, it suddenly got smaller and took up less space, right? The space it used to take up is now occupied by your son. BTW, thanks for caring about your son's education, I wish more parents would.

Answer 7

There is no new matter in the universe. Babies are just composed of preexisting matter that the mother ingests as food and pops out later. :-)