Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2024 March 5

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March 5

Dust buildup

If humans and animals produce dust in their dead skin, hair, body matter, etc., and dust isn't being removed from the world, but simply moved around and accumulated, will there come a time when there is too much dust, or a dust buildup on Earth? Will dust kill us, and if so, was Malthus right? What if we took all of the dust, packed it in a space capsule more densely concentrated than a Bangladeshi slum, and flung said capsule into the Sun? Would this be feasible and cost-effective? Any and all clarification is appreciated. Ευtγchεα 03:15, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Would you want all the poor little dust mites to starve to death? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:00, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

The organic dust isn't created out of nothing: it ultimately comes from the food humans and animals eat, which is formed from the existing soil and atmosphere, and it ultimately returns to the soil and becomes part of it (although it might hang around in the house for a while). There is thus no net increase of material from this source.

In any case, the amounts are trivial compared to the scale of the Earth. Consider that every year around 40,000 metric tons of meteoritic material, including 5,000 tons of cosmic dust, fall on to the Earth every year – this is new material, but even though it's been going on for a few billion years, it doesn't seem to have caused any problems: quite the reverse, as some scientists think it might have been the source of molecules that gave rise to life. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 176.24.44.161 (talk) 04:23, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Life has been the source of quite some problems.  --Lambiam 06:32, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

We come from dust and we return to dust. PiusImpavidus (talk) 10:31, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Dust simply goes to create earth, along with all the other rotting vegetable and animal matter. Incidentally, the idea that dust is made up largely of dead skin cells is a myth. Shantavira|^{feed me} 09:31, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Dead skin cells, hair, pollen, worn carpets and clothes, ash from fires, soot from internal combustion engines, dust mite corpses, sea salt, ... Most of it is simply recycled into the environment. Worn synthetic fibres can be a problem though, as they may not be biodegradable. And launching something into the sun is very hard; first get to circular heliocentric orbit and then it still requires ${\frac {1}{{\sqrt {2}}-1}}$ times the $\Delta v$ compared to throwing it completely out of the solar system. The rocket launch would create more dust than you can put in the capsule. Better combust it into simple molecules. PiusImpavidus (talk) 10:58, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Our Dust article says: "Dust in homes is composed of about 20–50% dead skin cells". Alansplodge (talk) 14:25, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Have you tried the Black & Decker DustBuster? Available at all good hardware stores. There are probably some instructions on what to do when the planet gets full. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:49, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

That would be good info for April 1 (along with the original question here). ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:54, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

I suspect James Dyson's business model relies on the earth never running out of dust. The more the merrier, in fact. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:06, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

There is a humorous short story in which household dust is teleported to a neighboring universe, until the people there get fed up and start sending trash back. —Tamfang (talk) 00:33, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Somebody get this hero a dust barnstar pronto Ευtγchεα 20:52, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Rosh Hashanah and centuries in the Gregorian calendar

In the Gregorian calendar, which repeats every 400 years, centuries (starting with years ending with "01") only start on Monday, Saturday, Thursday, or Tuesday. So, no century in the Gregorian calendar starts on Sunday, Wednesday, or Friday. Well, coincidentally, those are also the three days of the week that Rosh Hashanah cannot fall on.

But is there any significance of this coincidence? GTrang (talk) 16:07, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Rosh Hashanah postponement rules? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 01:47, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

The Jewish calendar is not influenced by the Gregorian calendar in any way, shape or form. Cullen328 (talk) 08:52, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

And the Rosh Hashanah postponement rules were not influenced by the Gregorian calendar, being hundreds of years older than the Gregorian calendar. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 14:07, 14 March 2024 (UTC)