The world is flat, no! But it’s not “perfectly round.” why is that?

Strange but true, the world is not round and the world is flat! But due to “certain forces of physics” the world has a strange shape than expected.

When different space organizations release images of the Earth taken from space it gives us an arc that looks completely round and beautiful. Not only that, images of the planets in the solar system make us feel that everything is perfectly round. But in reality those planets include Earth. It’s not quite like that.
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Aristotle and other ancient Greek scholars were among the first to suggest that the world was spherical by observing its surroundings like ships sailing the ocean not only appearing smaller. But it also seems to be sinking in on the horizon.

If the world were truly flat, all ships should travel at the same level. This created intense controversy on all sides. But humanity eventually realized that the Earth was indeed round, but was thought to be a perfect sphere.
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Why is the world round?
In short, the gravity of matter pulls everything as close to the center as possible. Points far from the center are pulled down as far as gravity will allow. Because of this, any sufficiently large object becomes spherical. This is because a sphere is a shape in which gravity is evenly distributed in all areas.
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“But the point is that gravity is surprisingly weak. The object would have to be very large first. Before a gravitational force strong enough to overcome the force of matter could be created,” University of Southern Queensland professor Jonty Horner said.
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The world itself is the same. It is large enough to create gravity that pulls matter into spheres. But it is weak enough to succumb to another force caused by the Earth’s rotation, and Jean Richter, a French astronomer, noticed this anomaly.
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In 1671, he traveled to Cayenne, French Guiana, in South America, taking with him a pendulum clock that kept normal time in Paris. But when he arrived in South America, the pendulum slowed. It cost him two and a half minutes every day. So cut it short. But when he returned to Paris, he found that the same clock ran at two and a half minutes every day.
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This greatly angered Richter. But it made mathematician Christian Huygens think about something. That is, this clock is evidence that the world revolves. This rotation gave the Earth its strange shape, and Isaac Newton later proved this mathematically in a book known as “Principles.”
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This suggests that the Earth is not perfectly round, but instead “bulges out” around the equator. “Most planets and moons are not really spherical. They are often compressed in some way,” said James Tuttle Kane, a planetary scientist at NASA.
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What puts pressure on the Earth and other planets is the “centrifugal force,” a force that everyone has probably experienced. When we sit on a spinning ride we will feel as if we have been thrown overboard, as our arms, legs or hair will fly around as if something is pulling them. This centrifugal force also occurs as the Earth rotates at a speed of about 1,675 kilometers per hour.
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This force causes the material inside the planet to swing outward around the equator. Where is the length of the diameter at the equator? (from left to right) is 12,756 km, but the pole-to-pole diameter (diameter from pole to pole, top to bottom) is 12,714 km, a difference of about 42 km, and the faster the star spins, the more it “bulges”.
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The most obvious example is Saturn, as its diameter at the equator is 120,500 km, but its diameter from pole to pole is 108,600 km, a difference of approximately 12,000 km.
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Dr Alastair Gunn, a radio astronomer from the University of Manchester, said: “The Earth’s rotation creates a maximum external force at the equator and zero at the poles.” Writing on the BBC Science Focus website, “Because the Earth is not perfectly solid in all areas, this force causes the Earth to ‘squeeze’ into a slightly flattened sphere.
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Scientists today track the shape of the Earth using a range of techniques to obtain the most accurate information. For example, there are thousands of GPS devices around the world that can measure changes in elevation down to a few millimeters. Including a method called “satellite laser” that uses ground stations to place laser beams at a satellite to measure changes.
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These technologies have enabled modern humans to have watches that are always running around the clock, no matter where they are in the world. It also helps to determine location or navigation more accurately.

Researched and edited by Witit Borompichaichartkul

Origin

https://www.iflscience.com/the-earth-isnt-perfectly-round-heres-why-71838

https://www.livescience.com/why-earth-not-round

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-is-not-round/

https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/earth-round.html#:~:text=The%20Earth%20is%20an%20irregularly%20 Shape%20ellipsoid.&text=While%20the%20Earth%20appears%20to, unique %20 and %20ever%2Dchange%20shape.

https://www.sciencefocus.com/planet-earth/why-isnt-the-earth-a-perfect-sphere

https://www.abccolumbia.com/2022/04/18/the-earth-is-not-a-perfect-sphere-heres-why/

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20160603-the-earth-is-definitely-not-round-but-its-not-flat-either

https://www.universetoday.com/26782/why-is-the-earth-round/


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