HELLO to all

I'm rather confused with this stuff:
Do all buildings built on earth (I'll say I'm talking about regular rectangular-land building) look like logs or slashed pyramids?

I'm even more confused

Originally posted by curioucity
HELLO to all

I'm rather confused with this stuff:
Do all buildings built on earth (I'll say I'm talking about regular rectangular-land building) look like logs or slashed pyramids?

:confused:

I see all sorts of shapes of buildings. I don't think you can narrow it down to just log shaped or pyramids. Ummmm....im also confused by your question.

sorry...
I don't have a webpage to load a picture explaining my question, so I apologize...

I hope this is quite an extra for that:
Do the buildings have their vertical parts (like pillars, walls ets) built parallel (so they look like parallel logs 'planted' straight on the earth)? (this according to someone watching our earth from the outer space)
Or do they have their top/flat roof area wider than their base area, so that if 2 lines were to be drawn straight from 2 spots at the top to 2 respectively spots at the bottom (and each pair of top-bottom spots made a vertical line, forming a seemingly 90o angle with the horizontal line), the lines would meet right in the core of the earth?

I'll try to draw it here:

.....|........................|.......on the surface........\........................./
.....|........................|................... ................\......................./
.....|........................|................... .................\...................../
.....|........................|................... ..................\.................../
.....|........................|................... ...................\................./
/==============\ earth's curvy surfc/==============\
.....|........................|................... .....................\............./
.....|........................|................... ......................\.........../
.....|........................|................... .......................\........./
.....|........................|................... ........................\......./
.....|........................|...the imaginary line................\...../
.....|........................|................... ..........................\.../
.....|........................|................... ...........................\./
.....|...........O..........''|................... ............................O

O=earth's core

I don't know it would depend on the quality of how it built, if it was built using a level then it would curve toward the center, if it was built fitting the specific parameters of the blue print it would be strait.

the truth most likely is that all buiding support pillers are off by a 1/10,1/100 or even 1/1000 of a degree at random angles and the build woud look like this:
.....|........................|.......on the surface
..…..|....................…|
...…..|.....................|
...….|.....................|
.....|......................|
/==============\ earth's curvy surfc/
.....|.....................|
....|.....................|
...|.....................|
..|.................…..|
.|................…..|...the imaginary line
|……................|
...…............….|
...…...........O.|

the diagrams hellped. im gonna have to agree with well cooked. theyr not straight.

woulnt they make it narrower at the top?

So, the verticals sides of buildings are then supposed to be non-parallel, right?
Suddenly I want to know if ANY engineer may have thought about this..... towers with 'narrower' bottom are more prone to collapsing, right?

oh, and a rather silly follow up:

Do the buildings with 'seemingly square' bases actually have real square bases, or rather concave-sided square, or even convex-sided square?

The side of the build are suppose to be perfectly parallel but nothing is accurate. If you were to draw lines from the building all the way down to the core the lines would go of at random angles.

The base and floor probably curves to the earth because concrete settles as such and the floor is leveled.

I don't think it matters the tops are made narrower on most buildings any ways. Even if it was even with the base the inaccuracy in the building process would cause more of a problem then the centering effect of earths gravity.

Long suspension bridges have the towers out of parallel by an inch or two. The towers are built vertically, so they are further apart at the top than the bottom.

Ahh! now I understand your point. Yess, if and when we get round to building gigantic buildings that are kilometres on a side, the curvature of the Earth will need to be taken account of.

In fact when large bridges are built, they are built taking into account the curvature of the Earth, just as ceptimus said.

Of course, the directions of Up and Down are also affected slightly by the rotation of the Earth; where I live, you would miss the centre of the Earth by about 70km if you bored a hole straight downwards...
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Here's extra problem:
How can it be applied to hemispheric domes (half ball buildings)?
How can earth's curvature be taken into account?

Except for in the case that eburacum stated, where the base is on the order of square kilometers, isn't curvature of the earth negligible? I suppose it would be a factor in extremely tall buildings as well, but I would think that for normal, run-of-the-mill buildings, it is negligible.

Keep in mind also, that the earth underneath the foundation is usually excavated. Could this not be done in such a way as to eliminate the effect of the curvature of the surface?