So yeah, as the title says. If you fart do you become lighter because you loose mass or does the loss of buoyancy make you heavier ?
A balloon full of helium has more mass than a balloon without helium, but less weight https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_versus_weight.
~~Methane weighs more than nitrogen (70% of atmosphere); you lose weight and mass. Molar mass of nitrogen 7; methane 16. ~~
https://discuss.tchncs.de/comment/19776581
Edited to comment about mass: Except that a) methane is leaving the body and is not necessarily being replaced; the volume is simply taken up by a contracting colon and b) methane may be less dense than air, but it does contain fecal particles as well, which are tiny but still heavier than air.
This guy farts.
But he doesn’t let it weigh him down.
A balloon full of helium has more mass than a balloon without helium, but less weight
That’s not true. A balloon full of helium has more mass and more weight than a balloon without helium. Weight is dependent only on the mass of the balloon+helium and the mass of the planet (Earth).
The balloon full of helium displaces way more air than the balloon without helium since it is inflated. The volume of displaced air of the inflated balloon has more weight than the combined weight of the balloon and helium within, so it floats due to buoyancy from the atmosphere. Its weight is the same regardless of the medium it’s in, but the net forces experienced by it are not.
Sharting makes you lighter for sure
Only if you’re naked.
Farts are mostly particulate. So, you’d be lighter.Edit: I did not have “researching farts” on my dance card today, but here we are - I have inadvertently repeated a misnomer. While flatulence can be accompanied by aerosolized liquid, microbial elements, and particulate fecal matter, our gut is actually much more efficient than previously thought at separating gasses. Healthy farts do not contain a significant amount of non-gaseous material. A tiny bit of such material would weigh more than the gaseous content, hence the misnomer that farts are mostly liquid and solid material by weight.
As the gasses contain hydrogen and sometimes methane, they are indeed lighter than air, on average. They may also contain sulfides and carbon dioxide that are heavier than air, but in smaller quantities.
So, according to flatus experts (yes, that’s a thing), yes, farting on Earth likely makes you heavier.
For those who want to suffer as I have, here is a fairly comprehensive article on the matter.
As a homogenous blob, you would become lighter and denser.
You get heavier, totally anecdotal evidence on my part but I’ve stepped on the scale in the morning, let a glorious one rip, and the number went up by 0.1.
I am not saying that I gained 0.1 lbs, just that afterward the scale rounded it up instead of down.
Methane is lighter than air, so farting makes you heavier.
But not in any measurable way.
Makes me muuuuuch lighter. At least that’s the feeling in my belly!
