Timeline for Which side of the Moon faces Earth, the heavy side or the lighter side?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
5 events
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| Oct 5, 2020 at 3:01 | comment | added | blanci | Thankyou for expert correction. That seems quite an intriguing and counterintuitive possibility of a heavier mass joined to an inner lighter mass in a stable equilibrium! Not wishing to sound stubborn, one might still wonder if that configuration is really as likely in real world situations. Perhaps other factors may swing the balance as it were and end with the heavier part inward usually. Point taken nevertheless. Thanks. | |
| Oct 5, 2020 at 1:43 | comment | added | Christopher James Huff | It only needs to vary from radial symmetry. If it was stretched into an ellipsoid, it would have two stable positions, and would stay in one of them unless disturbed enough to rotate it more than 90 degrees with respect to Earth. And even with such an off-center mass, it could be stable with the heavy side outward...to the first order, it doesn't matter which end is heavier, just that the tidal forces on the object have a local maximum in a given orientation. | |
| Oct 5, 2020 at 0:31 | review | Late answers | |||
| Oct 5, 2020 at 4:41 | |||||
| Oct 5, 2020 at 0:16 | review | First posts | |||
| Oct 5, 2020 at 0:31 | |||||
| Oct 5, 2020 at 0:12 | history | answered | blanci | CC BY-SA 4.0 |