this post was submitted on 30 Nov 2023
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Science Memes

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[–] [email protected] 79 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Lol this heightmap is so exaggerated

[–] DeusHircus 38 points 1 year ago

Lol wildly exaggerated. Largest height difference on Earth's surface is 13 miles (including underwater) vs. the 8,000 mile diameter. To quote NDGT, "The Earth is smoother than a cue ball"

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago

If it wasn't, there will be no atlantic (or even pacific) for us to see

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Might just be the angle of the light.

[–] [email protected] 51 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's not to scale, right?

[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

It's the Instagram filter.

https://ourplnt.com/earth-without-water/

The original is a exaggerated estimate (projection) based on a assumed sphere, probably WGS84, because a lot of the global satellite data is formatted as such.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_map_projections?wprov=sfla1

[–] [email protected] 84 points 1 year ago (4 children)

"reality" as in extremely exaggerated deviations from the ellipsoid. Otherwise it would just look like a smooth sphere. Earth has 12'700 km diameter. From the shallowest point to mount everest are just about 20 km. That is a 0.15 % change. You would see nothing.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago

To put in perspective how shallow a 0.15% change is, a dimple on a golf ball is roughly 4 times deeper than that (0.60% of a difference in depth).

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago

Bang on, the Pacific is not 250 miles deep…

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

"Smoother and rounder than a bowling ball" is my usual comparison

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I think that would be too much. A bowling ball is really smooth. It would not roll as well with such deviations all over the place.

At a diameter of 22 cm, the roughness would have to be in the order of 0.3 mm, which would not just be visible due to the distorted reflections, it would even be audible while rolling.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago (1 children)

In Finnish language we already have the kinda rare expression "rapakon takana" ("behind the mud puddle") about stuff that's happening in America.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 year ago

Both the UK and the USA refer to it as "the pond". As in "across the pond".

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago

You VS. the ocean she told you not to worry about.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

Isn't the Atlantic Ocean going to become larger than the Pacific in a relatively short geologic time scale? I ask because this is mander.xyz and I'm lazy, and also because I'm aware of the Mid-Atlantic ridge seafloor spreading and the fact that the Americas used to be attached to Europe and Africa. Meanwhile the Pacific plate is subducting under various continental plates.

Keep bullying the Atlantic and see what happens in 100 million years when it's bigger than you 🫣

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

Atlantic was surveyed in imperial units, Pacific in metric.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

Smooth as a shark, as they say

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

"Draining Earth's oceans, revealing the two-thirds of Earth's surface we don't get to see": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uOwv_Krqk8

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

In this you can see they're about the same depth.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

At a global scale, the Mariana Trench and the Everest are the same depth. It's less than 20 Km of difference against a mean diameter of 12742 Km.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Paddling pool vs. diving zone.