OT Has the Earth gained more mass or has the gravitational constant altered?

As brexit gets closer you'll notice all sorts of things going wrong or being differnt, the world as we know it might end at the end of the month. Make sure you're wearing clean underwear.

With a meter. But the above is corect the KG or teh way to measure a KG has changed.

From then on it will be the standard 2.20462262185 lbs.

The problem with the lump of metal standard is that it is only accurate at one point on the earths surface. Acceleration due to gravity on the surface of the earth changes with location, the lowest being 9.7639 m/s2 on mount Nevado Huascarán in Peru and the highest being 9.8337 m/s2 at the surface of the arctic ocean. Gravity tends to be lowest towards the equator and higher at the poles as the earth is not a perfect sphere.

I don't understand?

You are referring to weight, I think. Whereas the definition of the kilogram is as a mass (whether a lump or otherwise) and is independent of gravity.

(My comment was tongue-in-cheek and not meant to be a serious discussion over definitions.)

Why would this be? The kg is a unit of mass, not weight. A kg on the moon is still a kg. You measure mass with a balance and weight with your bathroom scales.

Interesting but not germane to the issue.

Am happy to accept the earth gains - and loses - mass as described. But wait, weight needs a bit more thought. Isn't the only meaningful weight of the earth in respect of orbit - primarily round the sun? Does the sun gain or lose mass over time?

Every second, the Sun converts 600 million tons of hydrogen into 596 tons of helium. The difference is converted to energy as per Einstein's e = mc2 equation.

But even losing 4 millions tons of mass a second, over the 6 billyun years of its life it's only lost 4% of its mass.

So a ways to go yet.

Apparently the solar wind carries off about another 2 million tons/sec, also. The mass gain from stuff falling into the Sun appears to be negligible.

Not by much. But enough to notice.....

Apparently her clothes shrunk in the wash when I answered back and asked why her clothes were a bit tight.

I never thought about that before - the earth, being in orbit around the sun, is weightless...

Yes, you only have weight if you resist gravity. Want to lose weight? Jump out of a window. Mass, of course, you always have.

All that sunlight has to come from somewhere...

It must lose mass as the hydrogen atoms join to form helium and relase energy the mass must decrease.

Yep - but the loss from fusion is only about 4 Mt/s :)

It loses around 5.5M tons per second (1.5M solar wind and 4M nuclear fusion) and it's been on this weight loss programme ever since its birth some 4.7 Billion years ago. As a result of all this loss of mass, the Earth's orbit is currently expanding by around 1.5cm per year.

"Have you heard? It's in the stars Next July we collide with Mars. Well, did you evah? What a swell party, a swell party A swelligant, elegant party this is!"

my trouser length has always needed to be adjusted because I can't buy

Many years ago I discovered that Marks and Spencer St. Albans branch stocked jeans with even numbered leg length. I needed 31".

On holiday one year, I was pleased to discover that their Lowestoft branch stocked the odd numbered ones:-)