I’m pretty sure I love geophysics because we have the strangest problems.
Problems like “Huh, this ocean is... kinda light? Like... are we sure it’s ocean...? ...all the way down? Hm. Really? For sure? ...fuck.”
Problems like “Huh, this ocean is... kinda light? Like... are we sure it’s ocean...? ...all the way down? Hm. Really? For sure? ...fuck.”
The best bit? One possible solution is subducted crust & we’ve got a slab graveyard tucked under that ocean.
“Om nom nom, gonna eat the surface of the planet, yum! Oh noes, my mantle is full of floaty crust bits & now my gravity pulls less hard. 😭”
“Om nom nom, gonna eat the surface of the planet, yum! Oh noes, my mantle is full of floaty crust bits & now my gravity pulls less hard. 😭”
It’s weird enough our pretty little planet is smooshed into an oblate spheroid, but is downright freaky that the geoid is actually this lumpy potato. (.gif is 1000x vertical exaggeration)
Gravity is so much less constant than it feels to us oblivious clunky humans.
Gravity is so much less constant than it feels to us oblivious clunky humans.
Like... who even has these problems?! “Look, a mountain! Oh huh, turns out it’s a freaking iceberg of low-density rock bobbing in the mantle & is lower gravity than that big ol’ plain. Surprise!”
Freaking geophysics.
It’s so strange & I love it so hard.
Freaking geophysics.
It’s so strange & I love it so hard.
