If we were smaller.

[lAmebAdger]

Re: If we were smaller.

which is exactly why we thrive under a lot of air pressure... (compared to some sky-floating microorganisms, maybe)

i think we could even do with a mix of less cells and compressed-and-restructured-to-the-smallest-viable-version-cells to compensate for the shrinking...

 

[Dondrei]

Re: If we were smaller.

I'd be surprised if you could reduce overall volume by more than 15% though.

 

[krischan]

Re: If we were smaller.

A cell has a lot of "empty" space but I wouldn't be surprised if it dies if you remove a lot of it.

Human beings are compressible though, you're measurably taller outside of the earth's gravitational pull.

That's not a matter of compression, but of bending our spine. You will need an incredibly high pressure to compress fluids and solid bodies significantly. I'm just guessing but it might be 1000 times as much as in the deepest ocean. At that point, our atmosphere probably won't be gaseous anymore, so it's not really an option.

 

[lAmebAdger]

Re: If we were smaller.

means we'll also need to pee/puke blood/etc. a lot to compensate for shrinking (sarcasm only partially intended)

 

[Dondrei]

Re: If we were smaller.

That's not a matter of compression, but of bending our spine. You will need an incredibly high pressure to compress fluids and solid bodies significantly. I'm just guessing but it might be 1000 times as much as in the deepest ocean. At that point, our atmosphere probably won't be gaseous anymore, so it's not really an option.

I'm pretty sure it's not your spine, but your whole body.

 

[HegemonKhan]

Re: If we were smaller.

can u say, the BENDS (scuba/deep diving danger. if any of u don't know what the bends are) to the extreme ?

 

[krischan]

Re: If we were smaller.

Fluids and solid bodies are practically incompressible unless being subject to forces which will crush you to a pulp anyway. Water has a compressibility of k=2,000,000,000N/m² (k is the term in the equation dV/dp = -k*V). That means, you need a pressure of about 1000 atmospheres (1 atmosphere ~= 100,000N/m²) to reduce the volume of water (or the water in your body) by 5%. That's the pressure of the ocean at a depth of 10,000m (OK, I was wrong with the "1000 times as much" term). Solid matter has even higher compressibilities, e.g. 25,000,000,000N/m² for copper (metals aren't particularly good at that IIRC).

Only an entrapped gas or vacuum are significant issues.

 

[Dondrei]

Re: If we were smaller.

I guess I was wrong, I looked it up and it is your spine. Although it's being compressed, not bent.