Tides in the sea are caused by-?

Answer 1

Tides result mostly from the mutual gravitational attraction between the earth and the moon. The sun's gravity plays a part in magnifying the effects of the tides, but over-all the moon's effect is stronger. The part of earth facing the moon, and the opposite part of earth (180 degrees of longitude away) have similar tides. This is counter-intuitive, isn't it? How could there be high tides on opposites sides of the planet? The earth and moon can be roughly thought of as a double planet, or binary system. The earth and moon orbit around each other in a sense. They actually orbit around their mutual center of gravity, the barycenter. Because the earth's mass is so much greater than the moon's, the earth-moon barycenter happens to be within the body of the earth. Have your big, jolly and friendly uncle go out in the yard with you with a length of rope. Each hold an end, and carefully start swinging around each other as you pull on the rope. Chances are, you will be moving a lot; Uncle Joe may not have to move much, but the faster you go, the more he will have to make a circle with his center of gravity in order to keep you in your circle. As the earth and moon orbit the barycenter, the same thing happens; you would witness a wobble in earth's movement that is keeping step with the moon's orbit. The 'back' side of the earth pushes out, adding to the effect of tides on the side farthest from the moon. Also, since that part of earth is farther from the moon, the moon's over-all gravity is less strong than it is on the moon-side of earth.

Answer 2

Tides are caused by the 'tidal gravity' created by moon. The moon exerts it's gravitational force upon the earth. However it exerts more gravity on the near side of the earth, than the center, and more on the center than the far side. This causes the earth to bulge slightly along a line from the center of the earth, towards the moon.

As the oceans can move far more easily than the surface of the earth, the tides are most evident there, shifting by an average of ~2 meters. The earths surface shifts by about 20cm during a high tide.

Answer 3

A2. The tides in the seas of Earth are caused by the gravitational attraction of the Moon, and of the Sun. (In order of effect).

When the Sun and the Moon are both on the same side of the Earth, (ie New Moon) then the tides are of greatest amplitude. When these two bodies are on opposite sides of the earth (Full Moon) then the amplitude of the tides will be least. For their effects tend to cancel each other out

When Mars is closest to Earth in its orbit, then its attraction is added to both Sun and Moon, we have extra large tides. But fortunately this is not a common occurrence.

[Due to the tides, some of the kinetic energy is lost as heat, but that is small.

Due to the "equal and opposite reactions", the forces on the Earth are similarly felt on the Moon. In a coupled system, energy is transferred between the members and some of Earth's tidal energy is transferred to the moon, where it appears as greater kinetic energy. And is revealed as an increasing orbital distance from Earth. On Earth, this loss of kinetic energy shows up as the earth slowing down its rotational speed very slightly.

This same tidal pull has resulted in the Moon only showing one face to the earth (its heaviest side). ]

Answer 4

The tides are caused by the gravitational pull of the moon as it orbits the earth - and to some extent the sun, as the earth revolves around it.