[ELI5] If Earth is a sphere, which way would we be standing if we dug straight down?
Which way would you end up in? I wanna know because if you have ever looked at a ball, we know that if you went straight through it. We’d basically be upside down. So does that mean it applies if we do the same with Earth? If you don’t understand what I mean, there is a part from the game Plants vs Zombies where you can go to your achievements, when you scroll all the way to the bottom, you end up upside down but the zombies are standing up perfectly fine.
In: Earth Science
If you could put a magical tunnel through the middle of the earth and dive in without any risk from the heat or any air resistance you would accelerate until the middle and then start slowing down more and more until you popped up on the other side. If you dove in head first you would come out head first.
If you could go straight down through the core, you would be “upside down”. However you’d have to be climbing “up” once you get past the core of the Earth, to counteract the Earth pulling you towards it’s center of mass.
You could only feasibly dig “straight down” until you reached the Earth’s center of gravity. At thay point, to keep on digging in the same direction, you’re have to dig “straight up”.
At the center you wouldn’t be standing; you would float. You can’t stand anywhere as such. There is no upside down because there is no down or up. There is only in or out — from the center. Gravity is the pull from the center. Once you get to the center, the pull stops. It’s like the other post that mentions the north pole. Compases don’t work well at the poles for the same reason, that the pull is very low in the way the compass needs for it to be used properly. Gravity needs a mass to be attracted to. When you’re the biggest mass in the neighborhood, you float.
I think your question is “Since Earth is a sphere…”. If you were able to dig through it and not be crushed by pressure and heat, you would be digging “down” towards the center and then “up” away from the center. You would of course exit the hole head first; this is in no way affected by the shape of the earth.
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