FunWhat if the Earth were twice as big?

What if the Earth were twice as big?

Obviously enough. And for a very simple reason: the height and size of living beings is determined by the gravity of the planet. For example, could the giants of stories exist on Earth, a human being with the same proportions as ours but ten or a hundred times larger? No, and Galileo already knew that: Nature cannot make a tree grow or build an animal above a certain size while preserving its proportions and using the same materials.

The only way to solve the problem is to change the relative proportions because, as Archimedes discovered, if we increase the size of any solid, its surface will increase proportionally to the square of its dimensions (length, width, and height) and its volume, to the cube. In other words, if we multiply our size by two, the total surface of your skin will increase four times and its volume, eight.

To this problem we add another of no lesser significance: moving around the planet. The greater the gravity, the greater the sensation of weight. This implies that if human beings had appeared on a planet with twice the gravity of Earth, our bones would have to be thicker to support the weight of the body. But that plays against us, because if they are older, their mass will be greater and, therefore, we will be heavier. Therefore, our muscular system should be truly powerful to be able to move, which also implies more mass. Then, in places of high gravity , we have no choice but to reduce the size if we want to survive: we would be shorter and stockier.

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