Do we orbit the sun or the centre of the solar system mass which happens to be by the sun?
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answers:
Ronald 7 say: Yes
Both can be said to be right
The Sun makes up about 99% or more of the whole Solar System together
Including Jupiter
All orbits are Elliptical, which means the Centre of Mass of the Sun gets moved all the time, even by tiny amounts
Many Exoplanets have been detected from the slight wobble of their parent Star
Gravity is everything
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JosephV say: Yes, we do. The point where the Big Bang occurred remains the universal center around which in warped space shells we find various systems, including our own galaxy (1.3 million mph) in which is the solar system, sun (514,000 mph) and Earth (67,000 mph) in orbit around Sun. The speed and central point varies slightly due to the ellipse in accordance with Kepler's law: A radius vector joining any planet to the Sun sweeps out equal areas in equal lengths of time.
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Clive say: Neither. We orbit the centre of gravity of the Earth/Sun system, with small perturbations caused by other solar system objects. Ignoring those because they're small works well for a first approximation, and with the Sun being so much more massive than the Earth, the centre of gravity of the two is very close to the centre of the Sun. So in fact, "we orbit the Sun" isn't far off the truth.
Just look at the facts - the Earth's orbit is almost circular, slightly elliptical because the centre of gravity isn't at the Sun's centre, but not by much.
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Jeffrey K say: Earth orbits around the sun/earth center of mass. Since the sun is much bigger, that center of mass is very near the center of the sun. The other planets cause small perturbations in earth's orbit. A many body system's equations of motion can not be solve exactly. We must make approximations, like ignoring the other planets. This approximation is a good one.
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CarolOklaNola say: No. We orbit the barycenter, the center of mass of the Solar System, and that is constantly moving because the planets ate constant moving. The barycenter CA
N be inside the Sun, but often it is NOT in the Sun.
The Wikipedia article on barycenter has a good image of how the Solar System's barycenter has moved.
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Henry say: None. The earth is stationary and flat.
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az_lender say: We orbit the center of mass of the earth-sun system, which is quite near the center of the sun.
The center of mass of the solar system is displaced somewhat more, from the sun's center, because of the huge mass of Jupiter. Our own path is also slightly perturbed by the attraction of Jupiter. But we basically orbit the center of mass of the earth-sun system.
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