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The geographical center of Earth is the geometric center of all land surfaces on
Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's sur ...
. Geometrically defined it is the
Centroid In mathematics and physics, the centroid, also known as geometric center or center of figure, of a plane figure or solid figure is the arithmetic mean position of all the points in the surface of the figure. The same definition extends to any ...
of all land surfaces within the two dimensions of the Geoid surface which approximates the Earth's outer shape. The term ''center of minimum distance'' specifies the concept more precisely as the domain is the sphere surface without boundary and not the sphere as three-dimensional body. Explained in a different way, it is the location on the surface of Earth where the sum of distances to all locations on land is the smallest. If you had an airplane with an infinite energy resource and fly from one start location on Earth to one location on a land surface somewhere on Earth and back again and repeat that from the same start location to all possible destination locations, the starting locations where the total travel distance sums up as the smallest, marks the geographical center of Earth. Its distance definition follows the shortest path on the surface of Earth along the
Great Circle In mathematics, a great circle or orthodrome is the circular intersection of a sphere and a plane passing through the sphere's center point. Any arc of a great circle is a geodesic of the sphere, so that great circles in spherical geome ...
(orthodrome).


History of the concept

In 1864,
Charles Piazzi Smyth Charles Piazzi Smyth (3 January 1819 – 21 February 1900) was an Italian-born British astronomer who was Astronomer Royal for Scotland from 1846 to 1888; he is known for many innovations in astronomy and, along with his wife Jessica Duncan P ...
, Astronomer Royal for Scotland, gave in his book ''Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid'' the coordinates with , the location of the
Great Pyramid of Giza The Great Pyramid of Giza is the biggest Egyptian pyramid and the tomb of Fourth Dynasty pharaoh Khufu. Built in the early 26th century BC during a period of around 27 years, the pyramid is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient Worl ...
in Egypt. He stated that this had been calculated by "carefully summing up all the dry land habitable by man all the wide world over". In October of that year, Smyth proposed to position the
prime meridian A prime meridian is an arbitrary meridian (a line of longitude) in a geographic coordinate system at which longitude is defined to be 0°. Together, a prime meridian and its anti-meridian (the 180th meridian in a 360°-system) form a great ...
at the longitude of the Great Pyramid because there it would "pass over more land than tany other ocation. He also argued the cultural significance of the location and its vicinity to
Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
. The expert committee deciding the issue, however, voted for Greenwich because "so many ships used the port of London". In 1973, Andrew J. Woods, a physicist with Gulf Energy and Environmental Systems in
San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United States ...
,
California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
, used a digital global map and calculated the coordinates on a mainframe system as , in modern-day
Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula ...
, near the
district A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivision ...
of
Kırşehir Kırşehir, formerly Mocissus ( grc, Μωκισσός) and Justinianopolis (Ἰουστινιανούπολις), is a city in Turkey. It is the capital district of the Kırşehir Province. According to the 2000 census, the population of the distr ...
, Kırşehir Province, approx. 1,800 km north of
Giza Giza (; sometimes spelled ''Gizah'' arz, الجيزة ' ) is the second-largest city in Egypt after Cairo and fourth-largest city in Africa after Kinshasa, Lagos and Cairo. It is the capital of Giza Governorate with a total population of 9.2 ...
. In 2003, a refined result was yielded by Holger Isenberg: ,Isenberg, Holger. ''Giza: Center of Earth'', pages 4-6, 2003. http://mars-news.de/pyramids/gizacenter.html also in Turkey, near the district of İskilip,
Çorum Province Çorum ( tr, ) is a province in the Black Sea Region of Turkey, but lying inland and having more characteristics of Central Anatolia than the Black Sea coast. Its provincial capital is the city of Çorum, the traffic code is 19. History Excav ...
, approx. 200 km northeast of
Ankara Ankara ( , ; ), historically known as Ancyra and Angora, is the capital of Turkey. Located in the central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5.1 million in its urban center and over 5.7 million in Ankara Province, maki ...
. In 2016,
Google Maps Google Maps is a web mapping platform and consumer application offered by Google. It offers satellite imagery, aerial photography, street maps, 360° interactive panoramic views of streets (Street View), real-time traffic conditions, and rou ...
marked Isenberg's result of as the geographical center of Earth.


Differentiation from other definitions and calculations

Various definitions of geographical centers exists. The definition used by the references in this article refer to calculations within the 2 dimensions of a surface, mainly as the surface of Earth is the domain of human cultural existence. Other definitions refer to calculations based on three-dimensional objects, for example the Newtonian gravity center of the whole Earth (physical Barycenter) or the Newtonian gravity center of only the continents as uniform thick three-dimensional objects. Those centers can be found inside Earth mostly near its core. A projection of those centers towards the surface would be then an alternative definition of the geographical center, some of those calculations result in a surface location projection not that far away from the geographical center.


See also

*
Center of the universe (disambiguation) The center of the universe may refer to: Astronomy *Geocentric model, the astronomical model which places Earth at the orbital center of all celestial bodies *Heliocentrism, the astronomical model in which the Sun is at the orbital center of the ...
*
Omphalos of Delphi The Omphalos of Delphi is an ancient marble monument that was found at the archaeological site of Delphi, Greece. According to the Ancient Greek myths regarding the founding of the Delphic Oracle, the god Zeus, in his attempt to locate the cen ...
(ancient Greeks' navel of the Earth) *
History of the center of the Universe The center of the Universe is a concept that lacks a coherent definition in modern astronomy; according to standard cosmological theories on the shape of the universe, it has no center. Historically, different people have suggested various lo ...
* Land and water hemispheres


References

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Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's sur ...