Earth stops spinning, we fly into space?

arthwollipot said:
Yeah, but as others have pointed out, this is divine magic we're talking about. God doesn't just stop the earth, He stops everyone and anything on it, including the atmosphere. God is omnipotent. He can do that ****.
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Why not just wipe out the pesky competing tribe himself? Seems like less trouble all round.
 
McCragge said:
The other day I was watching a video of an atheist and a christian going at each other on a beach front debate. One of them mentions god stopping the sun for a day and the atheist says that would mean the earth would stop spinning and therefore we would all float off into space if that happened. Therefore it didn't happen, even if god wanted it too or something similar to that.

In any case, I was thinking about it. Does the rotation of the earth create the gravity we feel? I don't think so, I am, of course, no physics professor or learned scholar by any means, but I was under the assumption that mass determines how much gravity is felt. And if we look at the merry-go-round when it spins it pushes things away from the center due to centrifugal force. So, if the earth were to stop spinning, wouldn't we then feel the full effect of the earths gravity due to lack of centrifugal force? (granted it probably wouldn't be crushing gravity, but more then we are used to perhaps).

Is this correct? Or do we actually float of into space if the earth stopped spinning?

McCragge
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You ask a good question, and since I have not really seen anyone answer in quite this way, I will give my answer.

First of all, if the Earth were to stop spinning, then people/animals/object/what-have-you would not fly off of the Earth because these things are held to the Earth by the force of gravity. And to put it simply (without getting into the full explanation) the magnitude of the Earth’s gravitational pull is dependent upon the mass of the Earth, and since the mass of the Earth would still be constant regardless of the amount of rotation, then the Earth’s gravitational pull does not have anything to do with the rotation of the Earth itself.

Second of all, if the Earth were to gradually stop rotating, then one would notice many things (such as the period between sun rise and sun set would be more like half a year instead of half a day), however things would not fly off into space. Because the Earth’s gravitation pull is determined by the mass of the Earth, not the rotation of the Earth.

Third of all, if the Earth were to suddenly stop rotating, then that would be quite bad. Much like being in a moving car at a steady speed, then suddenly stepping on the brakes can cause a most uncomfortable deceleration effect. But in this case, the effect would be quite widespread and it may even cause things such as a considerable seismic disturbance which would cause numerous earth quake and volcano problems. However, objects would not go flying off into space because the Earth’s gravitation pull would remain unchanged.

Fourth of all, even if some sort of super powerful supernatural being could suddenly stop the rotation of the Earth without all of the bad effects mentioned above, then objects would still not fly off of the Earth because again, the Earth’s gravitational pull would be unchanged. However, I expect that anything strong enough to do such a thing, could send Earth objects flying off into space if he/she/they/it wanted to do so.

I hope this helps!
 
I think it would be infinitely easier to kill a few people than stop the rotation of the Earth in such a way that no one else gets killed then start the whole thing back up again. It's extraordinarily hard for me to accept that people actually believe these kind of tales. Then you have people saying "such and such a program that tracks the movement of stars over millions of years simply won't work if you don't add an extra day in to account for the day god stopped the earth" which I've heard on a few occasions. Utter and complete nonsense.
 
Ah... the Bible vs. basic physics. I love it when fundies display their stupidity so openly for all to see. Fun times :popcorn1
 
MattusMaximus said:
Ah... the Bible vs. basic physics. I love it when fundies display their stupidity so openly for all to see. Fun times :popcorn1
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While I think there's probably been a bit of "Chinese whispers" misunderstanding along the way, in the OP it was the atheist who was purportedly arguing that people would float off if the Earth stopped spinning.
 
McCragge said:
The other day I was watching a video of an atheist and a christian going at each other on a beach front debate. One of them mentions god stopping the sun for a day and the atheist says that would mean the earth would stop spinning and therefore we would all float off into space if that happened. Therefore it didn't happen, even if god wanted it too or something similar to that.

In any case, I was thinking about it. Does the rotation of the earth create the gravity we feel? I don't think so, I am, of course, no physics professor or learned scholar by any means, but I was under the assumption that mass determines how much gravity is felt. And if we look at the merry-go-round when it spins it pushes things away from the center due to centrifugal force. So, if the earth were to stop spinning, wouldn't we then feel the full effect of the earths gravity due to lack of centrifugal force? (granted it probably wouldn't be crushing gravity, but more then we are used to perhaps).

Is this correct? Or do we actually float of into space if the earth stopped spinning?

McCragge
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Probably already answered, no we would not shoot into space, we would go in a straight line from the momentum of the earth's movement prior to it stopping, but that is not near escape velocity. So yes things would suddenly be moving relative to the stopped earth, but no they would not drift away after they crashed down again.
 
bokonon said:
The question is related to a story in the Bible, in which the sun supposedly stood still for a day so one tribe would have enough light to finish the job of slaughtering another tribe.
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OK, thanks, I understand the OP better now - clever idea of God's; thunderbolts are sooo 'minor deity'.

Yuri
 
McCragge said:
The other day I was watching a video of an atheist and a christian going at each other on a beach front debate. One of them mentions god stopping the sun for a day and the atheist says that would mean the earth would stop spinning and therefore we would all float off into space if that happened. Therefore it didn't happen, even if god wanted it too or something similar to that.
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I watched part of that video ("An Atheist and a Christian Debate at the Huntington Beach Pier") and, besides its obvious lack of spontaneity, it repeats a lot of stereotyped arguments -including "because if the Earth stopped we would be floating out in outer space..."-. The "fact" would be that an omnipotent being could perfectly modify properties of Physics, giving empty space some dynamic anisotropic refractive properties to make the sun look like it has stopped in the sky for a specific location -be it Jericho or Atlantic City-, as it seems there has been no recollection in Babylon, Egypt, China or wherever saying "gee! there was a time the sun stopped seven days and nobody understood what the hades was going on". Miracles have such elastic properties that you can't argue against them.

I mean, that omnipotent being wouldn't be so sloppy to let such loose ends. It is true that if Earth stopped spinning dead, everyone outside a building and in open and flat space would fly horizontally for -at most- a few seconds until the friction with the air and the friction of the air with the now-still surface make them fall like a collection of samples of all what is possible to happen in an airplane crash. This, as other explanations, require to say what the omnipotent being left unattended: It -with capital i, as i(humbled) don't want anybody to think i'm being disrespectful, least of all It- has to have forgotten the atmosphere and all the loose items in the planet -including us, Its servants- for that to happen. Even, if It should forgot to withdraw the energy in the spin we all be burnt instantly.

There are a lot of scenarios, but again, there is no thing that It, the master of entropy, can't do.
 
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aleCcowaN said:
The "fact" would be that an omnipotent being could perfectly modify properties of Physics, giving empty space some dynamic anisotropic refractive properties to make the sun look like it has stopped in the sky for a specific location -be it Jericho or Atlantic City-, as it seems there has been no recollection in Babylon, Egypt, China or wherever saying "gee! there was a time the sun stopped seven days and nobody understood what the hades was going on". Miracles have such elastic properties that you can't argue against them.
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Yeah, the easiest way to accomplish the effect wouldn't be to stop anything, but just to hang a light in the sky above the battle, and hide the real sun behind some clouds while it set.

I'll bet you could bring the whole project in for less than it cost to kill all the firstborn children...
 
bokonon said:
Yeah, the easiest way to accomplish the effect wouldn't be to stop anything, but just to hang a light in the sky above the battle, and hide the real sun behind some clouds while it set.
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That's very clever. But I'm not sure that an omnipotent being must feel budgetary restricted; a feeling shared by omnipotent beings and earthly politicians. The sole prospect of an "economy of omnipotence" make these beings -heavenly and earthly- look like they have something to shame about.

But accepted such "economy of omnipotence", I think that in the end the lowest energy solution for illiterate realms is writing a book telling in it that a miracle happened when in fact it didn't. In that case the miracle is in the eye of each believer, what is not the triumph of logic, but logistics'.
 
Of course, if the earth slowly came to a halt (so our momentum and kinetic energy could be turned into, say, heat[1]), then the sudden lack of centrifugal force around the equator would lower sea level in the tropics and raise it in the Arctic.

New world map: http://bigthink.com/ideas/21768

[1] No, I'm not calculating the temperature increase.

(I see Rimbaldi gave a better link. I'll shut up now.)
 
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Madalch said:
[1] No, I'm not calculating the temperature increase.
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Actually, that's not so hard. The drop in velocity (according to above posts) is 463 m/s. Kinetic energy is (1/2)mv2; if this energy is turned into heat, we get mc(delta)t. The masses cancel, and we get (delta)t = v2/2c.

Using the heat capacity of water (close enough for living tissue and oceans) of 4200 J/kgK, you get a temperature increase of 25 degrees for things at the equator. Ouch.

Anyone ever had a fever of 62 oC? That's 145 oF for the Americans.
 
bokonon said:
Yeah, the easiest way to accomplish the effect wouldn't be to stop anything, but just to hang a light in the sky above the battle, and hide the real sun behind some clouds while it set.

I'll bet you could bring the whole project in for less than it cost to kill all the firstborn children...
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I was thinking along the same lines, but why not just give the children of Israel super powers for one battle?
 
Madalch said:
Using the heat capacity of water (close enough for living tissue and oceans) of 4200 J/kgK, you get a temperature increase of 25 degrees for things at the equator. Ouch.
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And most of the Earth's mass is made of material with much less heat capacity. If you start from .5 x I x ω2 and use an average heat factor of 700 or 1000, you'd get the oceans boiling.
 
If God breaks the laws of physics he is a criminal!

I strongly believe that is the reason why we do not see miracles anymore. He is still in jail for breaking the law. To make the sun to appear to sit still requires to break many laws. He is also a repeat offender (according to his confession laid down in the bible). As is his son. Probably they got life without parole. So do not expect the second coming soon. :D Life for a god is a loooong, loooong time....
 
I remember this topic from my college days, and yes the year was in the AD's. The claim of "proof" that the Earth stood still was that a NASA computer analyzed all of the motions of the planets and realized there was a perturbation in the orbits. That perturbation was taken away if the Earth stopped for the time period, and the date of the story in the Bible. I Google searched this once and you can still find references to it. But NASA never did such a study of found such a perturbation. And a year or two later in a geophysics class I learned that gravitational solutions for materials under the Earth are not unique, and I assumed the same could be applied to orbits. It was a YEC roommate of mine who first introduced me to this story. Too bad we weren't still roommates when I found the counter to his claim.
 
Google "Harold Hill" and his role in spreading that NASA missing day canard.

Don't know what you're referring to about non unique solutions regarding Earth materials. The refutation of this story is far simpler in that there are simply no ancient astronomical records that could possibly allow NASA to do such a calculation.

And the Biblical story only requires that Earth's rotation, not it's revolution, stop. So there wouldn't even have to be a perturbation, since Earth's rotation doesn't affect it's gravitational effect on other planets.
 
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I remember reading in one of Sagan's books ("Broca's Brain" maybe), when he was discussing the theories of Immanuel Velikovsky, that the amount of energy required to stop the Earth's rotation would not be enough to melt it, but it would be enough to boil the oceans.
 
bokonon said:
While I think there's probably been a bit of "Chinese whispers" misunderstanding along the way, in the OP it was the atheist who was purportedly arguing that people would float off if the Earth stopped spinning.
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Yes, I did see that. And it made me grimace in annoyance.

My specific comment was in reference to those who hold the Bible up as infallible, which is laughable when you read the literal text regarding causing the Earth to stop spinning. Sorry that I didn't clarify.
 
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