When gravity's force reverses sometime in the unknown future, we are all doomed if we don't do something.
We must build a ceiling surrounding the entire planet in order to hold everything in - including the atmosphere. It needs to be made of very thick, very soft foam, because we will be hitting it pretty hard.
Also we need to find a way to stay warm and fed, with the planet slinging out into deep space. Oh, and we'll probably need protection from the planet itself falling apart and crashing into the ceiling.
We don't know when this will happen, but it's never too late to start thinking about it.-- globaltourniquet, Aug 24 2007 Drat, Pivoting_20Parental_20MisericordI'll have to redesign this now. [pertinax, Aug 27 2007] Wiki on gravity http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GravitationNote: no mention of spinning nor reversal [the great unknown, Aug 27 2007] ask: gravity and spinning http://www.newton.d.../phy99/phy99x82.htmScienctist gives answers on gravity and spin! [the great unknown, Aug 30 2007, last modified Sep 04 2007] I'm sure the answer to all our problems lies amongst the craters of the moon... Dark_20Side_20Of_20Our_20MoonUse its gravity to offset the reverse polarity in some way? [theleopard, Aug 30 2007] "Gravity Off" Switch on Ceiling "Gravity Off" Switch on CeilingJust in case, we ought to equip it with one of these... [zen_tom, Sep 06 2007] gravity experiment http://www.fourmila...gravitation/foobar/shows that gravity works without spinning [the great unknown, Sep 12 2007] Dude, you haven't slept in a week, have you?-- Galbinus_Caeli, Aug 24 2007 The baby is three weeks old Monday...-- globaltourniquet, Aug 24 2007 So you haven't slept in THREE weeks.-- Galbinus_Caeli, Aug 24 2007 A Dyson Ceiling? Far too expensive! - Instead, we should start digging handles and other holdy-on type things into pavements, and building small upside-down shelters in our houses from whence we can later emerge after these inverse-gravity periods have all died down.
On the plus-side, it would be amazing to be able to finally walk about on vaulted church ceilings.-- zen_tom, Aug 24 2007 Bolts in the floors and safety harnesses might be more cost effective.-- normzone, Aug 24 2007 //inevitable// reversal? Any proof/link? I've heard the Earth's magnetic poles has and will reverse and that may cause havoc, but unless there's a major shift of mass on our planet, I don't think we will have a loss of gravity.
If you were drunk and stood on your head, you may think you'll fall up to the sky, as well as blow chunks all in your hair.-- the great unknown, Aug 24 2007 It's going to get cold and dark down here...-- wagster, Aug 24 2007 [the great unknown] is a gravity reversal denier.-- globaltourniquet, Aug 24 2007 Need some mechanism to let airplanes out and back in.-- xipetotec, Aug 24 2007 Except, how will lift work when gravity is reversed? We need to do that experiment too. People, we have a lot of work to do.-- globaltourniquet, Aug 24 2007 I was referring to our current mode of intercontinental traveling. Once the gravity is reversed, we won't need any more planes, of course, because we'll just lay railroads on the Ceiling, for safer and intuitive travel.-- xipetotec, Aug 24 2007 You could just tie a long enough rope to the floor, and swing to your destination.
And [gta] I'm surprised you've not heard of the inevitable gravity reversion scenario. Unfortunately, it is quite inevitable, just a matter of time. (Which interestingly enough, may too be reversed, however, it's far more dificult to actually describe a time-reversal scenario as being strictly *inevitable*, because just as soon as it starts happening, it hasn't happened yet.)-- zen_tom, Aug 25 2007 You must be thinking of polar drifting. The north pole drifts about 10 to 40 km per year and eventually magnetic north will be geographic south. Gravity has nothing to do with it.-- Livingfishguy, Aug 25 2007 Polar drifting? Nonsense!
It's gravity drifting you're thinking of - as everyone knows, as the earth spins, it creates gravity. If it span the other way (as it inevitably will one day) the gravity would be reversed, like in a gyroscope, or hamster-wheel.-- zen_tom, Aug 25 2007 Yay, no more need for diets.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Aug 25 2007 Hey, [Treon], give [2 fries shy] his login back!-- globaltourniquet, Aug 25 2007 Wrong, Zen. spinning doesn't "make" gravity. If that was true, it would be simple to make anti gravity & have flying cars, etc. If you use the "force" of spinning, it pushes things away from the center, not towards it like the earth. If you reverse the spinning, this force still goes in the same direction.
The pull of gravity is dependant on the mass, not rotation. Some planets have faster/slower spin, but how much gravity depends on it's size instead of that. Also, has such a process of reverse gravity been observed?
The earth may stop spinning someday, and there can be many repracussions, but loss of gravity is not one.
[globaltourniquet] is a reverse chicken little: "We're falling to the sky!We're falling to the sky!"-- the great unknown, Aug 27 2007 Did you know you can cut glass underwater with scissors?
At least that's what I heard from a man in the pub (do you think it was the same one?)
Everyone knows that gravity is based on spinning effects. It's even called Grav-ity after Einstein successfully predicted that the speed of gravy is a constant except when under extreme rotation - at which point it flies out all over the place, due to a phenomena known as Brownian Motion. Similar experiments were being undertaken using other similarly non-Newtonian fluids, but they were never published in time. In fact, rather than being lauded as the scientific pioneers they undoubtedly were, the research team who had been exploring the rotational properties of a yellow, non-Newtonian liquid were swiftly reported to the police, and taken into Custardy.-- zen_tom, Aug 27 2007 Uh, yeah...and the theory of relativity was based on his aunts' moustache.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Aug 27 2007 It all depends on what axis you are spinning around Up/Down, Left/Right, and In/Out all just give regular gravity, but if a body spins around a FOURTH dimensional axis Past/Future, you get anti gravity.-- Galbinus_Caeli, Aug 27 2007 wahoo, I think zen-tom is on to something here, if you spin a non-neutonian substance around in a neutonian liquid, and add essences of various flavors,such as hamster or dead cat, you get gravy-ty.
I used to make that in a pub where I worked.-- dentworth, Aug 27 2007 Einstein was full of shit. This whole space-time is curved, time is relative thing is impossible because space-time is a mathematical plane and not a physical object that can be manipulated.
It all comes down to particles randomly bouncing off one another Space-time being an imaginary plane used to measure this bouncing.-- Livingfishguy, Aug 27 2007 OK, so there is a chance that gravity will reverse. Forget the fact there's never been anything like this happening in all of history of the universe. but I think there's a better chance for polar bear attacks in Miami. Maybe we should put more strain on our tax dollars and fund a Miami polar bear patrol?-- the great unknown, Aug 28 2007 I saw a presentation on the telly once by a Creation "scientist" demonstrating that the Earth once had such a ceiling, to hold the atmosphere in, or something. It was made of ineffable divine crystal, or something.-- BunsenHoneydew, Aug 29 2007 so assuming the ceiling will also have some gravity itself, it will repell us just as much as the earth(when gravitys flipped), so if we hollow out the mantle of the earth and put it on the crust so the core of the earth has just as much pull as the mantle/crust, the space between the core and crust will have -0- gravity whether gravity is on,off, or reversed, covering all bases. then we just use velcrow shoes. or build the ceiling with ceiling fans, to blow us back down, and keep us cool in the gravity offseason. the only other solution would be to drill holes to the core of the earth and let the liquid metals fill these holes, and harden into structural beams that hold the earth together.-- chickenninja, Aug 29 2007 //we could all just move to the opposite side of the planet//
I tried that. The weather improved, but the gravity seems much the same.-- pertinax, Aug 29 2007 [chickenninja] - now you're thinking. Originally I figured the reverse gravity of the planet would be far greater than the reverse gravity of the ceiling, but, as we like to say here on the half-bakery, you can never overthink something.-- globaltourniquet, Aug 29 2007 we could all just live underground and walk on the ceiling.-- Livingfishguy, Aug 31 2007 - wonders how the Poseidon Adventure would have turned out --- theleopard, Aug 31 2007 Z- Tom, I love this bit from the web site I linked: //I hazard that (people)are suffering from a peculiarly ...malady -- the tendency to confuse proximity to causation. The Earth does two interesting things as far as human beings are concerned: it spins, giving us day and night, and it exerts gravity, giving us up and down. (I suppose a case can be made for a third: it goes around the Sun tilted, which gives us summer and winter.) It is human,... to assume that because the two phenomena occur on the same object one must cause the other. Gravity is the more mysterious fact, more in need of explanation, so it is assigned to be the effect, and spin assigned to be the cause. The root cause is that {people), in particular, find it difficult to cope with the state of ``not knowing''. They need to feel they know, even if they can't possibly given the evidence available to them. They are happier feeling they know, and later finding themselves wrong, than in feeling ignorant, and later being enlightened. It's an unfortunate tendency, which tends to hamper their scientific abilities, since a good scientist needs to cherish the feeling of ``not knowing'' as long as possible. It is only in this mental silence, free of unjustifiable hypothesizing, that the truth, which always starts out as a tiny voice indeed, can be heard. Hence you might do them a favor if you explore with them first WHY they feel there is a connection between spin and gravity. If the answer is ``just because'' ,("as everyone knows") or ``it seems sensible'' or something equally data- and logic-free, then you can do them some good by discussing how very dangerous trusting that kind of unsupported evidence-free ``hunch'' can be, not only scientifically, but in other areas. The tendency to judge too hastily and on too little actual data is a particularly unfortunate ... vice. You can point out to them that the very best and most successful scientists and inventors are those who are the least inclined to think they know the answer before they are absolutely, positively, convinced-by-mountains-of-data sure they know. In science plausible hypotheses are a dime a dozen, but good, fact-supported theories are rare gems indeed. //-- the great unknown, Sep 04 2007 Dear great unknown, Stand up where you are right now and start spinning around really fast for a while. You will fall down and be unable to stand. This is because your spinning motion has upset gravity in your local area- which acts on the inner ear and renders your body incapable of judging which way is up. What more proof do you need?-- the dog's breakfast, Sep 04 2007 [thegreatknowitall] I was in such a nice mood and here you are with your anti-american rant. Thanks for the headache.-- dentworth, Sep 04 2007 DW, that was a quote from the link I provied, I do not share any anti-american views of this writer. I just edited out the references above. Dog, here is some more from the site: //...note that they have assumed that the gravitational attraction between a large body (the Earth) and a small body (a person or object on the Earth's surface) depends on the spin of the LARGE body. (Because if the Earth were not spinning, there would be no such force, according to them.) And ask them why, in that case, the gravitational force between the small body and the large body does NOT depend on the spin of the SMALL body. (You can easily demonstrate that the time it takes a spinning object to fall is identical to the time it takes a nonspinning object to fall.) You can also perform the thought experiment of considering two bodies near each other, one spinning planet, one nonspinning small object. Gradually you transfer mass from one to the other, keeping the angular momentum constant (which means the planet starts spinning faster and faster, incidentally, but perhaps irrelevantly). After a while the object will become as large as the planet was, and the planet as small as the object was. Is the gravitational attraction still due to the (very quickly) spinning ``micro''planet left over? If so, then we should see that two spinning objects -- if necessary very quickly spinning objects -- should attract each other more strongly then they do when not spinning. And this is not, of course, observed. If their arguments are vaguely based on centrifugal forces, ask them why gravity does not vary near the poles, where you are going around the Sun once a year, but not being flung around in a circle every 24 hours.// And try this: do your dizzy spinning on a scale. if your weight gets lighter, then that may be proof. I also don't count the force by any jumping nor your evential fall.-- the great unknown, Sep 05 2007 Did you perform the experiment Mr unknown? In answer to the theories that you put forward: Yes Gravity is mainly provided by the large spinning body, however it can be influenced by a smaller body within close proximity to it. The degree and direction of this influence is determined by the rotation of the smaller body, as evinced in the simple experiment that I have provided. Gravity does not vary at the poles because the earth does exactly the same number of revolutions per day as everywhere else on earth. So it is perfectly constant. You may still vary its effect locally by spinning around rapidly when you meet santa claus. (actually gravity does vary at the poles, but that fact is inconsistent with my argument!)-- the dog's breakfast, Sep 05 2007 Fine. I'm not going to spend my time teaching pigs to sing. Pay no mind any instance when spinning has nothing to do with gravity, like how Jupiter has a longer day thus spin slower but still has more gravity than any other planet. Forget hundred of years of scientific evidence and climb into your cave of ignorance.
I will concede that if the earth spins at a rapid rate, making each day last about 5 minutes, that the centrifugal force (actually the inertia) would be strong enough to negate gravity. But that's a very big if. the whole world would tear itself apart, so there will be nothing to put a ceiling over.-- the great unknown, Sep 06 2007 Now there's an idea. <serious for a mo>If Einstein's thing about an object's mass increasing towards infinity as it approaches light-speed is correct, then wouldn't we expect there to be a corresponding increase in gravitation? If that's the case, then spinning at a sufficiently rapid rate might actually cause an object's extremities to develop their own gravitational pull as they approached this velocity - </sfam> hence, gravity really is caused by spinning!-- zen_tom, Sep 06 2007 There's a map to be drawn of these annotations, showing layers of irony and shortfalls of comprehension.
Why?
Because some people seem to be taking some other people literally, and I'm just curious as to which of those instances represent genuine stupidity and which represent sarcastic double-bluff.
It reminds me of the joke where a Yankee visits Dixieland and meets two good ol' boys whittling sticks: Yankee: What are you boys doing? Good Ol' Boy #1 (innocently): We're making a piano. Yankee (sarcastically): Oh, so you're making a piano. [Exit Yankee] Good Ol' Boy #2: Pretty dumb, these Yankees!-- pertinax, Sep 07 2007 So what if we crash into the sun instead of just loosing gravity?-- krigre55, Dec 03 2007 You're so messy leaving all this loose gravity all over the place [krigre]. Pick it down immediately!-- theleopard, Dec 03 2007 random, halfbakery