ps418

Well, I would think that satellite measurements (e.g. by very long baseline interferometry)would be able to directly test earth expansion once and for all. An expansion rate greater than a few mm/yr would show up in the results. But I cant find any info on this being done.

Skydancer

Of course not. The whole idea is absurd. Although indirectly, it is tested for constantly by the ground-scanning satellites. Height above ground readings are accurate to very close tolerances for some of them, RORSAT among others, and an expanding earth would have been picked up by now in the course of their normal duties. The shifts in mass caused by such events would probably affect satellite orbits as well, especially the GPS birds which are accurate enough to require General Relativity corrections - unless they're positing an expansion mechanism which proceeds in an absolutely uniform fashion.

lpetrich

Continental drift has actually been observed with the help of satellite measurements -- and the observed drift rates are close to drift-rate estimates for the last few million years.

If expansion was duplicating the effect of continental drift, it would have to work at a similar rate, and it would have shown up as a bad fit to continental drift. But there is no evidence of such a bad fit.

Shadowy Man

Maybe it is due to the Hubble expansion.