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Journey to the centre of the Earth.

Journey to the centre of the Earth.

Science

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Could it be done?

http://www.virginvolcanic.com/

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Originally posted by murphius
Could it be done?

http://www.virginvolcanic.com/
Only on April 1st.

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Originally posted by murphius
Could it be done?

http://www.virginvolcanic.com/
Its a big joke. It is a pure fantasy only in part ( there are several reasons ) because no known material can hold back the huge pressures and temperatures to stop a capsule imploding. Not even solid diamond would be sufficient. I have speculated that, with extreme difficulty, it might be possible to send an unmanned probe with no air-gaps in it to implode a short distance below the Earth's crust and briefly swim very slowly ( magma has high viscosity ) in the magma and send some meaningful data back to the surface. But a manned vehicle to the core of the Earth will always be pure fantasy.

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I love one of the comments made at that URL: "Brings new meaning to sacrificing a virgin to the volcano!"

Anyway, it seems like the goal of the project is far less ambitious than travelling to the core of the earth. Rather, just probing inside a volcano. It seems like that's a little more realistic.

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Originally posted by WoodPush
I love one of the comments made at that URL: "Brings new meaning to sacrificing a virgin to the volcano!"

Anyway, it seems like the goal of the project is far less ambitious than travelling to the core of the earth. Rather, just probing inside a volcano. It seems like that's a little more realistic.
Heh, funny comment.


Um... no the goal of the project is to be an April fools joke.

None of it is remotely realistic.

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And the joke lives on 🙂

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what if there was a hole right through the earth and you jump in it would you fall out of the hole?

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Originally posted by tim88
what if there was a hole right through the earth and you jump in it would you fall out of the hole?
If there was a tunnel straight through the centre of the earth.
And that tunnel contained a vacuum (so there was no air resistance).
Then if you jumped into it you would accelerate towards the centre of the earth until you
reached the very centre and then you would decelerate all the way back up the other side
until you reached the same hight above the geodesy as you started from.

At which point you would stop. (and then fall back again assuming you didn't grab hold of
anything.)

If there was air resistance then you would be slowed down and just get stuck in the core.

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INTERESTING!

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Originally posted by googlefudge
If there was a tunnel straight through the centre of the earth.
And that tunnel contained a vacuum (so there was no air resistance).
Then if you jumped into it you would accelerate towards the centre of the earth until you
reached the very centre and then you would decelerate all the way back up the other side
until you reached the same hight above .)

If there was air resistance then you would be slowed down and just get stuck in the core.
Even in a vacuum, you'd eventually settle in the core.

You'd keep smacking into the hole's walls, as the earth would keep rotating, and you of course wouldn't along with it. You'd eventually lose enough energy to end up in the core, regardless.

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More realistically, if there was such a hole it would get filled up quite rapidly.

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Originally posted by KazetNagorra
More realistically, if there was such a hole it would get filled up quite rapidly.
I almost made the same comment, but then again having a nice tunnel through the earth isn't so realistic to begin with, so I decided to forgo that 🙂

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Originally posted by WoodPush
as the earth would keep rotating, and you of course wouldn't along with it. [/b]
Why not?

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Originally posted by amolv06
Why not?
Newton's first and second laws.

The only force acting on you would be gravity, which would accelerate you to the center of the planet. So I'll ask back to you, what force, (remember you're in a vacuum) would propel you to keep you in pace with the earth's rotation?

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The centripetal force of gravity. Angular momentum would have to be conserved, right?