Why does everything,large or small,have a spherical or spiral shape to it???

Question

What do you think are the under lying causes and then effects that these shapes have on the universe if which we live...tom science

Answer 1

Because the universe is a fractal, every thing is a fractal or is viewed as a fractal, like when you live in a small town and you know every thing that happens in the town the forces that drive your town, the you move to a big city get involved in business, and after some time you understand how the big city works, what are the forces that drive the city, and you are clever you will be able to see that they are the same with different scale, and the world is the same in a much bigger scale, spiral is a fractal, if you look into a galaxy, if you zoom in will will find other spiral just like the galaxy but smaller, every thing is the echo of something bigger and every thing has it own echoes

Answer 2

Think about this in the simplest terms. Gravity pulls in all directions towards the source of the gravity. All the particles are going to be pulled thru the path of least resistance towards the source of gravity. The only existing shape which allows all points on the surface to be the exact same distance from the center is a sphere. That is what the others mean by the most economical shape.



When you referred to a spiral I assume you are asking about spiral galaxies and dust clouds...However there are many different shapes of galaxies in the universe! One generally accepted idea for a spiral galaxy is that at the center of our galaxy is a black hole that serves as the gravitational center for the galaxy. This black hole is imposing it's gravitational force on everything the galaxy. One way to think about this is if you take a small magnet...lets say about the size and shape of a Silver Dollar. Now, if you took some paper clips and layed them out in lines extending out from the magnet with the paper clips closest to the magnet actually touching the magnet. it would sort of look like cross hairs or an X,Y axis right? now if you placed your thumb on the magnet and started turning it (slow enough that you don't disconnect the paper clips). Notice what happens! the clips closest to the magnet move first and it starts to form a spiral b/c the force from the magnet is less on the clips at the outer edges!

Answer 3

Spherical shapes are the most efficient -- they have the smallest surface-area-to-volume ratio of any three-dimensional shape, and are the strongest shapes as well, mechanically speaking. That's why bubbles tend to adopt spherical shapes, because the surface tension pulls them into the most stable form. It's why eggs are spheroid in shape (okay, a lot of them get squeezed when laid, so tend to not be perfectly spherical, but the round cross-section serves the same purpose)



As for spirals, it's a variation on the circle and sphere -- but in this case, it's when the plant or animal needs to increase its volume or surface area. So a fiddlehead fern is tightly coiled into a circle (basically) and then unfurls as it grows to maximize its exposure to the sun. A snail grows over time, but the shell can't expand outward, so the snail forms new shell in an ever-widening spiral to accommodate its larger mass.



That's the naturalistic point of view, of course -- you could ask a mathematician and they might point you to chaos theory, Mandelbrot sets or even the Fibonacci sequence to explain it, but I'm subscribing to Occam's Razor here... keep it simple.

Answer 4

The sphere simply because it is the most stable shape but the spiral is MUCH more interesting. It seems many things including galaxies, honey bees and great artists incorporate what is known as the Golden Sprial and no one really knows why.



Google "Golden Spiral" (include the qoutes) and prepare to have an amazing web surfing educational experiance!

Answer 5

The spiral I have no idea. But the sphere contains the most volume for a given surface area, and so is economical.