this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2024
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Science Memes

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ur dada so buff he falls significantly faster than g (mander.xyz)
submitted 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Tap for spoilerThe bowling ball isn’t falling to the earth faster. The higher perceived acceleration is due to the earth falling toward the bowling ball.

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Brian Cox shows ball and feathers falling together in vacuum: https://youtu.be/E43-CfukEgs

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

The difference in relative acceleration implied by the meme is on the order of tens of yoctometres (10⁻²³ m) per second per second.

It's a difference so small that it would be overshadowed by the fact that you're holding one object femtometres (10⁻¹⁵ m) higher or lower than the other in the gravitational field.

Additional sources of error to consider at this scale might be the heat radiation from the surroundings providing radiation pressure on the object, the sloshing of Earth's core causing time-dependent variations in the gravitational field, the location-dependent variations in the Earth's gravitational field, and the difference in centrifugal (yes, centrifugal in this reference frame) force due to latitude differences of one micrometre, and also due to natural variations in the rate of Earth's rotation over time.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 weeks ago

I love it when scientists who know something to be true in theory get to see practical experiments like this. The jubilation on thier faces.