[WyldKard]

Interesting Map.... Does anyone know if you weigh less on top of MT. Everest compared at sea level?

If I understand my Physics 103 class correctly, then answer is technically yes. We measure gravitic pull from the center of the particular mass, outwards. The further you are from the center of the Earth, the less of an effect Earth's gravity has on you. So technically, yes, you would weigh a teeny, tiny, itty-bit less on top of Mt. Everest than at sea level. Also, time would move somewhat faster at the top, than at sea level.

[Chemist_Geek]

If I understand my Physics 103 class correctly, then answer is technically yes. We measure gravitic pull from the center of the particular mass, outwards. The further you are from the center of the Earth, the less of an effect Earth's gravity has on you. So technically, yes, you would weigh a teeny, tiny, itty-bit less on top of Mt. Everest than at sea level. Also, time would move somewhat faster at the top, than at sea level.

Remember Newton's Law of Gravitation? F=G.M.m.(r^-2). The force between two bodies is inverse-square proportional to the distance between them. At the top of Mt. Everest, one's center-of-mass is several thousand feet further away from the center-of-mass of the Earth than at sea level.

[Physicist]

You will weigh more on top of Mt. Everest. You would be right about the inverse square law if the Earth were smooth, but that is more than compensated by the gravity from Everest itself. Look at the big blue-and-white blob over the Himalayas!

Furthermore, you will have an additional weight gain from the loss of buoyancy caused by the relative thinness of the air. I'm not sure whether this will be greater or less than the change in gravity. Both effects are small.

[Physicist]

I'm wrong.

Everest is about 10,000 meters high. Its volume is about a trillion cubic meters. If we assume a density of 4 grams per cubic centimeter, we get a mass of about 4x10¹⁵ kilograms. If the center of gravity is a little more than 6 kilometers away from Mr. Hillary, the acceleration due to gravity from Everest itself is somewhat more than 6x10^-3 meters per second squared.

The radius of the Earth is 6400 kilometers. The gravity of a sphere of that size will be reduced by a factor of about 3x10^-3. The acceleration due to gravity at sea level is 10 meters per second squared, so the change in acceleration is about 3x10^-2, or about 5 times the change caused by Everest itself.

When in doubt, work it out.

[Physicist]

I've worked out the loss of buoyancy. The density of a human being is about 1 gram per cubic centimeter. The density of air at sea level is .00129 g/cc. The pressure at 10,000 feet is 0.24 times the pressure at sea level, so your effective density increases by about one part in a thousand. So the increase in weight due to loss of buoyancy is about a third as big as the weight lost to the change in radius.

You really do weigh less on Everest.