# Expanding Planet Earth



## Harpo (Feb 26, 2007)

Swollen Earth may reach Sun’s temperatures and turn into gigantic H-bomb - Pravda.Ru

"Contrary to a popular misconception about Earth, the planet is going through constant changes. The radius of Earth expands by one mm per year; the water level in the ocean is on the increase.  Lake Baikal grows wider by two cm every year. The volume of Earth is increasing at an annual rate of 515 cubic kilometers. The rate seems to defy imagination. In other words, the planet is growing bigger at an appalling pace. It is getting increasingly harder for Earth to revolve around the Sun. According to estimates by Prof. Sergei Novikov, the day grows longer by 0.0023 seconds every one hundred years. As a result, the distance between Earth and Sun grows by 22.6 m per year. The estimates are based on data provided by high-precision lasers used for monitoring space satellites."http://english.pravda.ru/filing/space_satellites/


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## j d worthington (Feb 27, 2007)

Um, I'm sorry, but that one is nonsense, on soooo many levels. Where would the extra mass come from, for example? And why is it that no one has seen evidence of this, with all the geophysical studies that are going on, including using satellite technology. And so on. It's tabloid "news", basically. And I must admit that it's rather difficult to take anything seriously from a news source that has "Fishermen Catch Squealing Alien and Eat It" as one of its featured stories..... 

Um, you know, this thing reads more like something you'd see in _The Onion_ than anything else.....


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## Harpo (Feb 27, 2007)

Maybe Pravda saw it in The Onion and didn't get the joke.


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## Dave (Feb 27, 2007)

He did say 'Volume' and not 'Mass', though that is probably just as hard to explain, and anyway it still has a number of problems:


Harpo said:


> According to estimates by Prof. Sergei Novikov, the day grows longer by 0.0023 seconds every one hundred years. As a result, the distance between Earth and Sun grows by 22.6 m per year.


The length of the 'Day' has little influence on the length of a 'year'. The rising level of the oceans has more to do with global temperature rise than anything else. 

On a geological time scale, the Earth and Sun are not static, there are many changes going on. So, on that point it is correct, but I don't think there are any more we should get alarmed about; not more than 'global warming' or that a meteorite might strike the Earth.


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## Delvo (Feb 27, 2007)

This has, for quite a while, actually been one of the more widespread of the multiple various physics ideas out there that come from non-physicists and go against standard physics theories.


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## gcon (Mar 26, 2007)

I could be wrong but I get the impression that this article in Pravda 26th Feb 2007, may not be as Professor Sergei Novikov would like it, or any other scientist for that matter. I have tried to contact the gentleman by email to get the info., direct from him.

  The only part of it I agree with is that earth is migrating at 22.6 metres per year, which is almost what I said well over 20 years ago as being 25 metres per year. But also since earth orbits the sun and does not revolve around it, plus a number of other way-out statements, puts this report’s validity very much in doubt.

[FONT=&quot]The H-bomb suggestion in the heading seems more of a young reporter’s ploy to bring attention to his readership by blowing the matter up out of all proportion.  

I have been misquoted a number of times and I daresay many others who contribute to this forum have also. If anyone knows how to contact the professor so that we can get confirmation or otherwise, please let’s have it, because I feel that it is very unfair to condemn without examination. 

gcon
 [/FONT]


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## gcon (Mar 28, 2007)

j. d. worthington said:


> Um, I'm sorry, but that one is nonsense, on soooo many levels. Where would the extra mass come from, for example? And why is it that no one has seen evidence of this, with all the geophysical studies that are going on, including using satellite technology. And so on. It's tabloid "news", basically. And I must admit that it's rather difficult to take anything seriously from a news source that has "Fishermen Catch Squealing Alien and Eat It" as one of its featured stories.....
> 
> Um, you know, this thing reads more like something you'd see in _The Onion_ than anything else.....



I agree that there are many things wrong with it but earth is capturing dust and asteroid material constantly and old cemetries offer pretty good evidence for that. Old headstones are getting buried, not by sinking into the ground but by additional build up of material around them.

As for the squealing alien, I reckon someone spiked their vodka.


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## mosaix (Mar 28, 2007)

gcon said:


> I agree that there are many things wrong with it but earth is capturing dust and asteroid material constantly and old cemetries offer pretty good evidence for that. Old headstones are getting buried, not by sinking into the ground but by additional build up of material around them.
> 
> As for the squealing alien, I reckon someone spiked their vodka.



I was always of the opinion that the build up of material around gravestones, and stepping stones in my lawn, was due the rotting down of vegetation.


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## chrispenycate (Mar 28, 2007)

You couldn't measure a one mm change in the Earth's radius; a single marauding mole or a child's toy left carelessly lying around would completely distort your measurements. You _might_ be able to estimate a meter - so it would take you a thousand years of satellite observatios to be sure the results were general, not just local anomilies.
However, the results could well be true; if you measure the surface at sea level, and that rises a bit, or even expansion of the Earth's crust (no, I don't know the average coefficient of expansion for crust material, but it must have one; and parts per million is what we're talking about here) due to global warming.
Most of the dust burying graveyards will come from crumbling mountains or buildings, or eroded off local fields; not that there won't be any extraterrestrial component, but it will be minor. And enthusiastic volcanoes probably give enough matter escape velocity to balance the equation (no, I have no idea whether this is true, and don't even know where to look up the figures)
Which leaves us with the squealing alien; are we sure the translation is correct, and it shouldn't be "foreigner" (conceptually very close)?


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## Dave (Mar 28, 2007)

mosaix said:


> I was always of the opinion that the build up of material around gravestones, and stepping stones in my lawn, was due the rotting down of vegetation.


The bio-degradation of vegetation by bacteria and fungi, and the weathering of rocks by the wind, rain and freezing; but most importantly of all - *Worms!*

It is primarily due to worm casts that things get buried. Charles Darwin was one of the first people to investigate this:
Charles Darwin - The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms

I studied this at school in A level Biology. The figures were incredible, but I don't have them to hand. All I could find with Google was that, according to Wally Richards of the Southland Times: 





> In New Zealand an incredible 25-30 tonnes of soil per hectare per year has been measured by scientists as being deposited by earthworms on the soil surface in the form of casts.


That figure does not include the casts which are not deposited at the surface but underground! 

When you look at archaeological sites, there is usually also a considerable amount of rubbish - broken crockery and tools, ashes from fires - especially in city sites - but the soil is all from worm casts.

Worm activity is very important for soil fertility, structure and drainage, and from a science fiction point of view, it should be considered if you are thinking of designing a world without worms.


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## Dave (Mar 28, 2007)

chrispenycate said:


> You couldn't measure a one mm change in the Earth's radius; a single marauding mole or a child's toy left carelessly lying around would completely distort your measurements.


I think the tidal effect of the Moon on the Earth's land mass, which although very small, is of that order, (or it may even by larger.)


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## mosaix (Mar 28, 2007)

Dave said:


> The bio-degradation of vegetation by bacteria and fungi, and the weathering of rocks by the wind, rain and freezing; but most importantly of all - *Worms!*
> 
> It is primarily due to worm casts that things get buried. Charles Darwin was one of the first people to investigate this:
> Charles Darwin - The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms
> ...



Thanks for that Dave. Does this mean that for all this material brought to the surface by worms there is an equivalent network of tunnels beneath the surface?


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## Dave (Mar 28, 2007)

mosaix said:


> Thanks for that Dave. Does this mean that for all this material brought to the surface by worms there is an equivalent network of tunnels beneath the surface?


There is actually quite a bit of air in soil (about a third of the volume of an average agricultural loam, and then water is about another quarter.)

But no, the soil sinks down along with everything else, large stones gradually getting deeper and deeper. This is all complicated further by compaction by vehicle wheels and livestock, and by ploughing.

Which is all totally off topic, for which I apologise.


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## gcon (Mar 30, 2007)

mosaix said:


> I was always of the opinion that the build up of material around gravestones, and stepping stones in my lawn, was due the rotting down of vegetation.



And from where did the rotting down vegetation get its mass from?

Not from the decay of squealing aliens I hope. Sorry - just my sense of humus.


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## mosaix (Mar 30, 2007)

gcon said:


> And from where did the rotting down vegetation get its mass from?



Another interesting question! About 20 years ago I planted five silver birches in my garden. They're enormous now - where did they get mass from? Not to mention the roots and the leaves that they have shed for the past twenty years.


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## gcon (Mar 30, 2007)

Anyway, back to Prof. Novikov. I still feel that the journalist or reporter or whoever wrote that report, exagerated it, and I would dearly like to read an account written by the professor. Does anyone out there know how he can be contacted? -


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## gcon (Mar 30, 2007)

Anyway, back to Prof. Novikov. I still feel that the journalist or reporter or whoever wrote that report, exagerated it, and I would dearly like to read an account written by the professor. Does anyone out there know how he can be contacted? -


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## Delvo (Mar 30, 2007)

The vast majority of any plant's or animal's mass is made of atoms of four elements: C, H, O, and N. Water vapor and carbon dioxide from the air are the sources for the C, H, and O, and plants get nitrogen through their roots in the form of simple water-soluble nitrogen compounds, which are made from atmospheric nitrogen by bacteria in the soil. So all but a tiny fraction of the plant's mass is directly or indirectly from the air.

The remainder is small amounts of many other elements, primarily metals/minerals. These are found in the soil.


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## Dave (Mar 30, 2007)

Delvo said:


> The vast majority of any plant's or animal's mass is made of atoms of four elements: C, H, O, and N. Water vapor and carbon dioxide from the air are the sources for the C, H, and O, and plants get nitrogen through their roots in the form of simple water-soluble nitrogen compounds, which are made from atmospheric nitrogen by bacteria in the soil. So all but a tiny fraction of the plant's mass is directly or indirectly from the air.


I can't believe no one here has heard of Helmont's classic Willow tree Experiment before!

Jean Baptista van Helmont (1577-1644) performed one of the classic experiments in plant physiology. His research was published posthumously in Ortus Medicinae (in 1648) and is one of the first examples of the use of the "scientific method".  Interestingly, this work was not truly original (it was mentioned by the Greeks and Da Vinci did a similar unpublished experiment with pumpkins). 



gcon said:


> Anyway, back to Prof. Novikov. I still feel that the journalist or reporter or whoever wrote that report, exagerated it, and I would dearly like to read an account written by the professor. Does anyone out there know how he can be contacted? -



A Google search gives various different institutions:

The University of Maryland, USA.
The Steklov Institute, Moscow, Russia.
The Landau Institute for Theoretical Physics, Moscow, Russia.

Given that he is over 60, he certainly gets around the world to different conferences.


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## gcon (Mar 31, 2007)

Yep, he certainly does get around and we can add Chicago and Nottingham to that list. - But about the guy who wrote his report in 'Pravda' one

[SIZE=-1]*Guerman Grachev*, trans. Russia starts purchasing flying tanks[/SIZE][SIZE=-1].

Scientists may soon unravel the mystery of the “Uralian alien,” a tiny creature found near the town of Kyshtym in the Urals

[/SIZE][SIZE=-1]The creatures turn up in our dimension once in a while only to disappear without a trace in another dimension

[/SIZE]*Strange Egg-Shaped Skulls Uncovered All Over The World Mystify .*

[SIZE=-1]Stones are living creatures that breathe and move

[/SIZE][SIZE=-1][/SIZE] *HiddenMysteries - Judas helped Jesus implement crucifixion and ...*

And there are others - enough indeed, to provide enough accretion for our forums for years to come. I've lost count as to the number of these on Google.


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