Which removeth the mountains, and they know not: which overturneth them in his anger. Which shaketh the earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble.
(Job 9:5-6) KJV
It will help to have an idea of the volume of material in the Earth’s mantle because it appears that Earth has shrunk since it was first created, a process known as radial shrinkage.
Using the information from seismic waves and our hypothesis about the pillars of the Earth we can do some simple calculations and deduce what the Earth’s radius was at the end of the third day of creation.
Volume of Mantle Material
- IF the volumetric radius of earth is currently 6,371 Km
- THEN it has a total volume of 1.08E+12 m³ ( p )
- IF we subtract the volume of a sphere of diameter 4,100 Km
(everything below the mantle = 2.89E+11 m³ ( g )) - THEN the volume of mantle material is 7.95E+11 m³ ( p-g )
Now that we have this information we can find the original radius of the Earth with this calculation:
Radius of 3rd Day Earth
- Take the total volume of the present day earth 1.08E+12 m³ ( p )
- Add to it the volume of mantle material 7.95E+11 m³ ( p-g )
- Then the total volume for the original earth is 1.88E+12 m³ ( t )
- This is a sphere of radius 7,653 Km
This means that the radius of the Earth has shrunk by 1,282 Km. This is the reason why there is so much evidence of circumferential shortening. We use the formula 2πr to calculate circumference. This gives us about 8,055 Km of circumferential shortening. This is accounted for by the tectonic plate material which has been subducted below other plates, as at the deep ocean trenches, and in upthrust mountain ranges such as the Andes, Alps, Himalayas and Rockies.
At the tectonic breakup of Pangaea the Earth underwent radial shrinkage and circumferential shortening. Earth lost 1,282 km of radius and 8,055 km of circumference.
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