How would the earth look if it the poles shifted and the earth turned upside down?

Question

Im serious about this so please no smart remarks. It happens every thousand years or so and I was wondering what its gonna look like. I was thinking about making a model of the earth and seeing what it would literaly look like. There will probibly be lots of earth quakes to if the earth turned upside down.

Answer 1

You seem to be confusing the spin poles of the Earth and the magnetic poles. The magnetic poles reverse on the order of 10s to 100s of thousands of years; the spin pole precesses (wobbles like a top, over a 25,000 year period), but does not reverse; doing so would imply that the Earth's spin should stop and then reverse, something that is physically impossible.



The Earth going through a magnetic pole reversal shouldn't be overly noticeable to anyone who doesn't have the instruments to measure it. This is known because studies around known reversals have detected no noticeable changes in plant or animal life as a result.

Answer 2

You are confused between the Earth's geomagnetic poles and the geographical poles.



The geographical poles are the axes of rotation, and they have never reversed.



The geomagnetic poles are not coincident with the geographical poles, and they have reversed countless times. Look up "magnetic pole reversal" using the magic little search box on top of this page for more information.



When the magnetic poles reverse, there is no change in the way that the Earth "looks like." The difference is that a compass would point in the opposite direction, the remnant magnetic orientation of magnetic minerals cooling through their curie point would be reversed, radio communications will be affected, and possibly the cosmic radiation shielding effects of the Earth's magnetic field would be affected.

Answer 3

If you are talking about the geomagnetic poles, those shifts happen every million years or so. And the magnetic poles don't affect how the Earth looks.



If you are talking about the rotational poles, they DON'T shift - not every 1000 years, not ever.



Being serious is fine, but you need to do your research before asking a question that begins with an inaccurate premise.

Answer 4

>> It happens every thousand years or so



No, it doesnt.

There are hypothesis that claim the poles undergo some sort of rapid polarity shift, but its not a theory which is widely accepted, and indeed there is no solid evidence of it occurring

Answer 5

the artic and Antartica would thaw out and the equator would freeze and become the new arctics