Question

Respond to the following in a minimum of 175 words:

• The world's population grows each year. Does this mean that the mass of Earth increases each year? How old are atoms? Explain your answer with an example.

PLEASE TYPE RESPONSE DO NOT HAND WRITE!!

Answer 1

The worlds population grows each year but the mass of the Earth remains constant. It follows the law of conservation of mass. Humans get the mass from the food they eat. If the total mass of the humans is increasing, mass of some other elements is decreasing, in our case consider this element as food. This happens as the atoms do not die and move from one form to another. Let us consider a human. Food is consumed to sustain life. This increases the mass. When the human dies, this mass accumulated is buried,burnt etc.. and finally reaches the ground in form of humus/ash which is again absorbed by the plants and the humans that have not died yet consume these plants directly or indirectly in order to put on the mass. This cycle goes on and on and maintains a balance of mass on the Earth. Mass of Earth does not increase until another extraterrestrial object enters into Earth.

Atoms are as old as the Universe itself. As explained above the atoms in the form of elements morph from one form to another and there is a high chance that many of the atoms that make us were once a part of a dinosaurs body.