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Who calculated the circumference of the Earth?
Eratosthenes
Eratosthenes sent a man to Syene from Alexandria on foot to measure the distance between Alexandria and Syene. Thus, Eratosthenes measured the distance between the two cities is 800 km. He multiplied by 800 km to 50 and calculated that the Earth’s circumference is 40,000 km.
How did Aristotle calculate the circumference of the Earth?
He could then use simple proportions to find the Earth’s circumference — 7.2 degrees is 1/50 of 360 degrees, so 800 times 50 equals 40,000 kilometers.
How did Eratosthenes calculate the Earth’s circumference?
Eratosthenes divided 360° by 7.2° and got 50, which told him that the distance between Alexandria and Syene (500 miles) was 1/50 of the total distance around the Earth. So he multiplied 500 by 50 to arrive at his estimate of the Earth’s circumference: 25,000 miles.
What is the formula to calculate the Earth’s circumference?
The formula for calculating the circumference of a sphere is 2 x pi x radius. So, the radius of the Earth is 6371 km. Plug that into the formula, and you get 2 x 3.1415 x 6378.1 = 40,074.
When did people calculate the circumference of the Earth?
240 B.C.
By around 500 B.C., most ancient Greeks believed that Earth was round, not flat. But they had no idea how big the planet is until about 240 B.C., when Eratosthenes devised a clever method of estimating its circumference.
How did the Greeks calculate the Earth’s circumference?
In the third century BCE , Eratosthenes, a Greek librarian in Alexandria , Egypt , determined the earth’s circumference to be 40,250 to 45,900 kilometers (25,000 to 28,500 miles) by comparing the Sun’s relative position at two different locations on the earth’s surface.
How do you find the circumference of a planet?
If you like, you can calculate the Earth’s circumference yourself. The formula for calculating the circumference of a sphere is 2 x pi x radius. So, the radius of the Earth is 6371 km. Plug that into the formula, and you get 2 x 3.1415 x 6378.1 = 40,074.
How was the Earth measured?
Many scholars believe Eratosthenes measured the distance by measuring a single pace and then counting the number of paces from Syene to Alexandria . Next, he multiplied this distance by 50 to get 40,250 kilometers (25,000 miles). Today, most scientists set the earth’s circumference at 40,096 kilometers (24,901 miles).