Archimedes' Lever: Moving the Earth Simulation

Archimedes boasted that with a place to stand he could move the Earth. The law of the lever agrees: a lever balances when the moments match, W₁d₁ = W₂d₂. Put the Earth 1 m from the fulcrum and a 700 N person must stand about 8.4 × 10²² m out — beyond the Andromeda galaxy. This simulation draws the beam on a logarithmic scale so twenty-three powers of ten fit, with markers for the Moon, the Sun, the nearest star and the galaxy.

Change your weight and the balance point moves; fly the camera out along the beam. And notice the price: to lift the Earth by a millimetre, your end must move a millimetre times the lever ratio — about nine thousand light years. The law is not wrong; it simply has no upper limit and does not care whether such a lever could exist.