our
knowledge
of the
inner
world

How fast are you moving when standing still? The first thing to consider is the earth’s rotation. The earth is 24,900 miles in circumference at the equator. The earth takes 24 hours to make one rotation. So: 24,900 / 24 = 1,037 MPH. As you move toward the poles that number decreases. At the north pole the speed is zero and you are simply rotating in place at one rotation every 24 hours. So let’s assume you are sitting somewhere in South Florida moving at about 1,000 miles per hour. The Earth orbits around the sun every year. The Earth is roughly 93 million miles (150 million km) away from the sun, giving its orbit a circumference of 584 million miles. That works out to 66,666 MPH. Our solar system itself is also moving in an orbit around the galactic core. The solar system is something like 25,000 light years away from the center of the galaxy, and the galaxy makes one rotation every 250 million years or so. That gives the solar system a speed of something like 420,000 MPH . So there is speculation that the galaxy is moving through the universe at a speed of 1,000 km/s, which means 2,237,000 MPH.

Adding it all up, you get: 1000 + 66,666 + 420,000 + 2,237,000 = 2,724,666 MPH

In other words, you are hurling through space at 2.7 million MPH even though it feels like you are sitting still while you read this text accompanying some pictures.