In article , Roger Chapman wrote:
On 11/10/2010 15:51, Rick Cavallaro wrote:
If we're still imagining the air cloud to be a shell with nothing in
the middle (i.e. the place where the earth is missing), objects would
not sink to the middle of that void. There's no gravity inside a
uniform shell of any thickness.

You sure about that?

He ought to be, it's a standard result:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_theorem

Whether a spinning atmosphere with weather patterns will remain as
approximately a spherical shell for long when the earth disappears is
another question, but he did say "If we're still imagining ..."