A Question About Antipodes

[+Doubledareya]

I have a question about antipodes, or opposites as the case may be. Is there a program available where I can enter my waypoint and find out what is at the opposite point of the Earth's surface? I know that in most cases it will most likely be an ocean, but I think it would be fun to play around with. Like I said, I am a newbie so please forgive me for any fox pauses. Thanks.

[BRTango]

I have a question about antipodes, or opposites as the case may be. Is there a program available where I can enter my waypoint and find out what is at the opposite point of the Earth's surface? I know that in most cases it will most likely be an ocean, but I think it would be fun to play around with. Like I said, I am a newbie so please forgive me for any fox pauses. Thanks.

 

Here's a previous thread about this: Markwell

 

Here's a link to a website: dighole

[marnen]

The calculation should be pretty simple. Working it out in my head, I think it goes as follows (someone please correct me if I'm wrong):

 

1. Change the latitude to the other hemisphere, so that north becomes south and vice versa.

2. Add or subtract 180° to or from the longitude.

 

Voilà, you should have your antipodal coordinates.

[+trainlove]

The science fiction author Larry Niven once postulated that it would be possible to teleport from one point on the globe to the point that's due south, I.E. not an antipode but the spot where your latitude is S instead of North. For me that's somewhere in Peru I think. If you teleport anywhere else you would depart the teleport booth the instant you got there at high speed, up to about 1000MPH.

 

There are 2 antipodes that would have the maximum opposite momentum, one is the true antipode you ask about (for me about 1000 miles off Australia), the other is where the latitude is still N but the longitude is 180 degrees from here (for me that's somewhere in Mongolia).

 

P.S. It's interesting to know that the two points that are exactly half way to the antipode are right on the equator, just where you would end up if you started off due East and due West from where you are.

[+blindleader]

If you teleport anywhere else you would depart the teleport booth the instant you got there at high speed, up to about 1000MPH.

Since teleportation assumes a circumvention of some really fundamental physical laws, Larry is playing tennis without a net and I see no reason to assume that momentum can't be managed just as easily.

[+trainlove]

Well sure Larry is playing with physics a bit but his idea is based on Quantum effects and the conservation of momentum can't be overcome even when 'tunneling' from point A to point B.

Of course Captain Kirk and Scotty have bypassed that requirement but their method actually kills you then transfers a digital representation of you to the other spot where a duplicate of you is reconstited somehow. Now why they don't build an army of the same soldier never came up but then again Cloning as in Star Wars is perhaps easier.

Oh, and I think I meant to say up to 2000 MPH since a point on the equator is traveling towards Orion at 1000MPH but the antipode is traveling away at 1000MPH. I guess they shouldn't ask me to build their transporter.

Edited May 17, 2007 by trainlove

[+trainlove]

If you are not already aware of it.

Tomorrow 5/20/07, all over the country there are going to be simultaneous geocaching events at Noon EDT which is 9PDT I guess. They will last exactly 15 minutes and if you have not signed the log by that time you DID NOT attend the event. Everyone there for the event should not congregate, should appear inconspicuously like regular visitors to the sites, and then MOB the event location at exactly the correct time as shown on your GPS'r unit. Magellan users be warned that seldomly is the time displayed on your GPS'r the correct time, can be several minutes off.

 

These were inspired by Larry Niven's stories, or at least make mention of them in the event page writeups.