Earthquakes

If Newton’s laws of motion hold true, and if for every reaction there is an equal, but opposite reaction, then something as simple as blowing one’s nose will affect the orbit of the Earth.  This may seem silly, at first blush, but it is, in fact, true.  That is the nature of truth sometimes – when we are confronted with the reality of the way things really are, it seems too incredulous to be believed, and we dismiss it as falsehood, when in actuality, we are dismissing the truth.  In all fairness, while the first statement here is, indeed, a reality, the greater reality is that the effect of such a small force acting on something as large as an entire planet is virtually negligible; not to mention, that the effect is likely cancelled by a similar force on the exact opposite side of the earth (and with the balance of probability, that would likely be a wave on the ocean’s surface).   However, there are some rather earth-shattering forces that may not be negated entirely and whose force, however small a fraction of a percentage, is not entirely negligible when it comes to the Earth’s orbit around the sun.  These would be earthquakes, especially those that register an 8.0, or greater, on the Richter scale (the Richter scale is, after all, a logarithmic one, meaning that an 9.0 is actually ten times stronger, or more forceful, than an 8.0…also, this means a 9.0 is 10,000 times stronger than a 5.0 on the Richter scale).  When earthquakes move the earth, they also move the Earth – and that is not a tautology!  Earthquakes can also move massive amounts of water, if the epicenter occurs under the ocean floor…remember the day after Christmas of 2005?  Sometimes earthquakes, and their subsequent aftershocks, are just above the threshold of perceptibility and feel like a bulldozer is driving by a few streets over (this is what I perceived the 2011 Virginia earthquake, with its epicenter near Mineral, VA, as) and sometimes they are destructive enough to bring an entire nation or region to its knees economically and concerning infrastructure (Nepal in 2015, or here again, Indonesia in 2005 or Japan in 2011).  Seismologists are working on how to detect the warning signs for earthquakes farther in advanced, more for warning than preparation purposes, so when the ‘big one’ hits, the body count will be less.  For now, triangulation after the fact is an interesting diversion – of course, at least with this, we can make maps of ‘accident-prone’ areas and warn people not to live in places like Los Angeles (so far, not much luck with this one).  One other intriguing aspect of earthquakes, and their fault lines, is that they are occasionally used as an instrument of divine judgment as well:  “As soon as he finished saying all this, the ground under them split apart and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them and their households, and all those associated with Korah, together with their possessions. They went down alive into the realm of the dead, with everything they owned; the earth closed over them, and they perished and were gone from the community.” (Numb. 16:31-33)