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#11
10-23-2007, 06:09 PM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
Yeah, but 'what if' scenarios puts knowledge to use and let's us play around with it, and potentially learn stuff in the process. I remember from my (brief) physics studies (a long time ago in the dark ages) that tossing out wild scenarios was awesome fun, and I'll claim it made us who did it much better students since it allowed us to 'see' the physics working, which is hard to do when you have nothing to compare it with. 
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#14
10-23-2007, 11:23 PM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
In a vacuum, the answer to your question is that we can have no gravity and be fine, as long as we exercise and make sure we don't atrophy, and on the other side, I think I heard it was like 6 G's or something, we're just too heavy and our bodies couldn't handle it indefinitely. That could be off a bit, I'm just going from memory. But I mean, there is some point where gravity is too much for our heart to pump blood around and our organs to work and stuff.
But like somebody pointed out, it's all interconnected. Different gravity would affect all the other things on the planet which would affect us. No gravity would mean no rain and we couldn't stop ourselves from drifting into space, and too much would crash the moon into us and god knows. It's not really possible to determine all the effects, but it wouldn't take being plus or minus 2 m/s^2 to notice the vast vast changes I wouldn't think.
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#15
10-24-2007, 12:53 AM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
[ QUOTE ]
let's assume we could make the earth have any mass we wanted. right now the gravitational acceleration at the surface of the earth is 9.81 m/s^2. what is the minimum and maximum g that would still allow humans to live indefinately? [/ QUOTE ] idiot
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#16
10-24-2007, 07:47 AM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
[ QUOTE ]
Forget the moon, how much extra mass would cause the Earth to slide out to an orbit that is too cold, or pulling away mass would push us into a killer hot orbit? Or do I have that backwards? [/ QUOTE ] changing the mass of the earth wouldn't affect the orbit
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#17
10-24-2007, 07:27 PM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
To all the guys calling the OP an idiot, I took his post as more a biology question - how much gravity can a human body endure? Is there a minimum gravity the body needs to function? When would changes in gravity cause problems with the things on earth that we need to survive? Rather than an "if there was more or less gravity, what would the effects have been on the formation of earth and life?" type question...
I know this forum (rightly) favours precise posting, but I think it was obvious what the OP meant. (Obviously, if Im mistaken about what the OP wanted to ask, forget everything I just said...)
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#18
10-24-2007, 07:33 PM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] Forget the moon, how much extra mass would cause the Earth to slide out to an orbit that is too cold, or pulling away mass would push us into a killer hot orbit? Or do I have that backwards? [/ QUOTE ] changing the mass of the earth wouldn't affect the orbit [/ QUOTE ] so if the mass of the earth were = to the mass of the sun our orbit would not change?
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#19
10-24-2007, 08:46 PM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] Forget the moon, how much extra mass would cause the Earth to slide out to an orbit that is too cold, or pulling away mass would push us into a killer hot orbit? Or do I have that backwards? [/ QUOTE ] changing the mass of the earth wouldn't affect the orbit [/ QUOTE ] so if the mass of the earth were = to the mass of the sun our orbit would not change? [/ QUOTE ] Things stay in orbit because they fall at the same acceleration as their velocity and orbital path allows. Changing the mass of an object does not affect the acceleration of its fall so would not affect the orbit. However, a change in the Earth's mass would affect the orbit of the moon. With a heavier Earth the moon would fall toward us faster. The question is, would the moon's orbit restabalize or would the moon crash relatively quickly into the earth? PairTheBoard
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#20
10-24-2007, 10:02 PM
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Re: earth\'s gravity
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] Forget the moon, how much extra mass would cause the Earth to slide out to an orbit that is too cold, or pulling away mass would push us into a killer hot orbit? Or do I have that backwards? [/ QUOTE ] changing the mass of the earth wouldn't affect the orbit [/ QUOTE ] so if the mass of the earth were = to the mass of the sun our orbit would not change? [/ QUOTE ] Things stay in orbit because they fall at the same acceleration as their velocity and orbital path allows. Changing the mass of an object does not affect the acceleration of its fall so would not affect the orbit. However, a change in the Earth's mass would affect the orbit of the moon. With a heavier Earth the moon would fall toward us faster. The question is, would the moon's orbit restabalize or would the moon crash relatively quickly into the earth? PairTheBoard [/ QUOTE ] It would also effect the orbit of the sun about the earth.
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