Mine is better than E=MC^2's...

[SunnyD]

Two possible scenarios... the classic "if everybody on Earth collectively jumps at the same time, can we affect it's orbit" question.

And a second, which I am more interested in, "if everybody on Earth collectively sprints (forward momentum) in the same direction for an arbitrary amount of time, and abruptly stops at the same time, can the Earth's rotation period be affected?"

Let's see Mythbusters that THAT on.

 

[Throckmorton]

The earth's motion is affected temporarily when someone jumps or moves in some direction, but it goes back to the way it was when they stop moving. The movements are always going to cancel out in the end.

 

[lyssword]

they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

 

[nakedfrog]

Originally posted by: lyssword
they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

I don't think all the morbidly obese people are pulling their weight here. We need to make sure they participate.

 

[SunnyD]

Originally posted by: nakedfrog

Originally posted by: lyssword
they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

I don't think all the morbidly obese people are pulling their weight here. We need to make sure they participate.

We may need to assist them though. Would cranes skew the results? Or should we just shove them off buildings?

 

[Throckmorton]

Originally posted by: nakedfrog

Originally posted by: lyssword
they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

I don't think all the morbidly obese people are pulling their weight here. We need to make sure they participate.

You're missing the point. When they jump, the earth gets pushed away from them, but then gravity pulls the two back together to exactly the same original locations relative to the earth's orbit.

 

[BlackTigers]

Originally posted by: Throckmorton

Originally posted by: nakedfrog

Originally posted by: lyssword
they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

I don't think all the morbidly obese people are pulling their weight here. We need to make sure they participate.

You're missing the point. When they jump, the earth gets pushed away from them, but then gravity pulls the two back together to exactly the same original locations relative to the earth's orbit.

morbidly obese people jump!?!

 

[hiromizu]

Originally posted by: nakedfrog

Originally posted by: lyssword
they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

I don't think all the morbidly obese people are pulling their weight here. We need to make sure they participate.

They're going be too busy sitting in a couch watching TV and eating rice n beans to care.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

You're also missing the point that the Earth is a sphere and people are not concentrated on one side of it; if everyone jumped simultaneously, it's going to compact the Earth ever so slightly. I guess if you got everyone to jump in the same basic geographic location (just put everyone in Wyoming for example), you would alter the path of the Earth's orbit ever so slightly, but I can't imagine it would be significant enough to measure in any meaningful way.

As for the sprinting thing, I think it would be fairly easy to prove that no, we wouldn't affect the Earth's rotation in any meaningful way. The Earth weighs a colossal amount (5.9736×10^24 kg according to wiki); that's 1,000,000,000,000,000 kg of matter per person on the planet. I'm no physicist, but I'm confident that regardless of how force is applied, the collective body of humans is not going to be able to generate enough force (without machines) to affect the Earth's rotation.

 

[silverpig]

The answer is no. It will not affect the earth's orbit.

Of course it will have an effect, but if you consider one tiny effect, you should consider them all, add in relativistic corrections etc, and you'll end up with some stupidly insanely small number.

Meanwhile the rest of us will be out enjoying our lives.

 

[NanoStuff]

More importantly, we have to slow the earth's rotation for a 26 hour day so I won't always be late to work. With enough ion/plasma thrusters pointing west, we could make it happen.

 

[Evadman]

The amount of water in dams has changed the axis of the earth very slightly since the vast majority of dams are in the northern hemisphere.

As for the question, we have launched things into space, like probes and such. Those altered the orbital velocity of the earth.

 

[FleshLight]

Learn action/reaction.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: Throckmorton
The earth's motion is affected temporarily when someone jumps or moves in some direction, but it goes back to the way it was when they stop moving. The movements are always going to cancel out in the end.

I think there is theoretically motion, except that the distance that Earth will move is something like the width of a proton. You should be more concerned about the Moon's receding orbit.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Originally posted by: Jeff7

Originally posted by: Throckmorton
The earth's motion is affected temporarily when someone jumps or moves in some direction, but it goes back to the way it was when they stop moving. The movements are always going to cancel out in the end.

I think there is theoretically motion, except that the distance that Earth will move is something like the width of a proton. You should be more concerned about the Moon's receding orbit.

Get the moon some Propecia.

 

[Eeezee]

No to both

The momentum and angular momentum of the whole system are both conserved quantities. You are part of that system. QED

 

[destrekor]

Originally posted by: BlackTigers91

Originally posted by: Throckmorton

Originally posted by: nakedfrog

Originally posted by: lyssword
they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

I don't think all the morbidly obese people are pulling their weight here. We need to make sure they participate.

You're missing the point. When they jump, the earth gets pushed away from them, but then gravity pulls the two back together to exactly the same original locations relative to the earth's orbit.

morbidly obese people jump!?!

we call it that. they mostly just fall though. 1g is far to great for them.

Originally posted by: Jeff7

Originally posted by: Throckmorton
The earth's motion is affected temporarily when someone jumps or moves in some direction, but it goes back to the way it was when they stop moving. The movements are always going to cancel out in the end.

I think there is theoretically motion, except that the distance that Earth will move is something like the width of a proton. You should be more concerned about the Moon's receding orbit.

wait... sooo what if we got everyone to jump on the moon? hmmm?

 

[SunnyD]

Originally posted by: Eeezee
No to both

The momentum and angular momentum of the whole system are both conserved quantities. You are part of that system. QED

Right, but those are only contrained to the gravitational constants of the surrounding universe, and thus can be affected.

 

[FoBoT]

you guys are going to make me regret that jamie/adam did the plane on a conveyor belt myth

 

[2Xtreme21]

Originally posted by: hiromizu

Originally posted by: nakedfrog

Originally posted by: lyssword
they already tested the jumping thing. No it will not move orbit, it will move it just a tiny bit and it will adjust right back to its natural orbit.

I don't think all the morbidly obese people are pulling their weight here. We need to make sure they participate.

They're going be too busy sitting on a couch watching Mythbusters bust such a myth to care.

Fixed for you.