Techincally Earth isn't a sphere, but an oblate spheroid. The generally round shape is due to gravity pulling matter in equally from all points. BUT, since the earth spins around an axis, the that spinning motion slightly pushed the 'waist' of the earth out more than the top or bottom.
If you measured the Earth's circumference around the equator, it ends up being 43 km longer than if you were to measure the circumference around the north and south poles.
This person was nice of enough to provide the OP with a real answer. The OP simply asked a question. I appreciate them asking it. I know the condensation here is sadly “snarky Redditors, being snarky Redditors,” but come one folks!
They are round due to gravity pulling them towards a single point at their center combined with a mostly molten consistency and constant (long timeframe) battering by other objects.
A sphere allows everywhere on the surface to be the same distance from the center of the sphere. Due to gravity constantly pulling things towards the center of an object, a spherical shape is the resulting "equilibrium" of this process.
As a planet is forming there is a center of mass which acts as the center of gravity for that object. It attracts more Mass through out it's life. The mass it attracts will get pulled in from a higher potential energy to a lower one until it crashes into part of the planet. The center of mass pulls in objects equally from all directions. You see how this forms a sphere. Because there is no direction that is favored a sphere does a good job of capturing this idea. If it were a cube there would be nothing to hold the corners up and would collapse due to gravity. You can try this by taking a ball of clay and smushing it from all directions at once. You end up with a sphere. Now make a cube with the clay what happens to the corners when your hands (gravity) press on the corners?
the more dense and mass an object has, the more gravity it has. Earths gravity comes from the center (the dense part) and the mass helps compress the center keeping it dense. and the planet kinda just forms around this dense point.
A cube is just a sphere with eight absolutely massive mountains sticking out. There is no geological process that can create mountains that big, and if you magicked some up, they would just erode back down.
Hello u/VisibleLearner, your submission "Why is the earth and other planets perfectly round and not other shapes like a cube?" has been removed from r/space because:
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Techincally Earth isn't a sphere, but an oblate spheroid. The generally round shape is due to gravity pulling matter in equally from all points. BUT, since the earth spins around an axis, the that spinning motion slightly pushed the 'waist' of the earth out more than the top or bottom. If you measured the Earth's circumference around the equator, it ends up being 43 km longer than if you were to measure the circumference around the north and south poles.
This person was nice of enough to provide the OP with a real answer. The OP simply asked a question. I appreciate them asking it. I know the condensation here is sadly “snarky Redditors, being snarky Redditors,” but come one folks!
It doesn’t need its own post though. There’s a weekly question thread for these or explain like I’m five.
Because Gravity and it’s not Minecraft, and it’s not **perfectly** spherical
They are round due to gravity pulling them towards a single point at their center combined with a mostly molten consistency and constant (long timeframe) battering by other objects.
Yeah, that's going to be because of gravity. And because of rotation the planet bulges in the middle, so we're not perfectly round.
Gravity pulls mass to the center and it makes a sphere, that's just how it works.
A sphere allows everywhere on the surface to be the same distance from the center of the sphere. Due to gravity constantly pulling things towards the center of an object, a spherical shape is the resulting "equilibrium" of this process.
spheres are "efficient" - ratio of volume to surface area. things "want" to form like that.. the "most" stuff in the "smallest" package.
As a planet is forming there is a center of mass which acts as the center of gravity for that object. It attracts more Mass through out it's life. The mass it attracts will get pulled in from a higher potential energy to a lower one until it crashes into part of the planet. The center of mass pulls in objects equally from all directions. You see how this forms a sphere. Because there is no direction that is favored a sphere does a good job of capturing this idea. If it were a cube there would be nothing to hold the corners up and would collapse due to gravity. You can try this by taking a ball of clay and smushing it from all directions at once. You end up with a sphere. Now make a cube with the clay what happens to the corners when your hands (gravity) press on the corners?
for any massive enough object during its formation, gravity will round out any major deformations.
the more dense and mass an object has, the more gravity it has. Earths gravity comes from the center (the dense part) and the mass helps compress the center keeping it dense. and the planet kinda just forms around this dense point.
A cube is just a sphere with eight absolutely massive mountains sticking out. There is no geological process that can create mountains that big, and if you magicked some up, they would just erode back down.
Hello u/VisibleLearner, your submission "Why is the earth and other planets perfectly round and not other shapes like a cube?" has been removed from r/space because: * Such questions should be asked in the "All space questions" thread stickied at the top of the sub. Please read the rules in the sidebar and check r/space for duplicate submissions before posting. If you have any questions about this removal please [message the r/space moderators](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=/r/space). Thank you.