Falling through the center of the earth

Fascinating thought experiment now has a more precise answer:

Suppose you dug a tunnel through the center of Earth, jumped in, and let gravity pull you through. How long would it take you to reach the other side of the planet? For decades, physics students have been asked to calculate that time and have been taught that the correct answer is 42 minutes. Now, a more realistic analysis has lopped 4 minutes off that estimate.

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Erich Vieth

Erich Vieth is an attorney focusing on civil rights (including First Amendment), consumer law litigation and appellate practice. At this website often writes about censorship, corporate news media corruption and cognitive science. He is also a working musician, artist and a writer, having founded Dangerous Intersection in 2006. Erich lives in St. Louis, Missouri with his two daughters.

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  1. Avatar of Edgar Montrose
    Edgar Montrose March 29, 2015 Reply

    The most interesting part of this story is in the comments, where many people start out by admitting that they know nothing about physics, and then offer their own (completely incorrect) theories about how things “work”. They then vehemently resist any and all attempts to correct their misunderstandings, often becoming quite vulgar in the process.

    Rather like Congress.

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