23 ms·
How to define "floating freely" is not easy to define. The potential energy surface of gravitation extends in 1/r wgich makes it a long range interaction. So if
by tc4v 1y ago
How to define "floating freely" is not easy to define. The potential energy surface of gravitation extends in 1/r wgich makes it a long range interaction. So if the earth attraction is small enough that you want to neglect it, you may still be trapped in the sun potential well. And if you can escape the sun attraction you are still prisoner of the galaxy. There is no 0 gravity, but there is various levels of neglectable gravity of course. But neglectable is always defined relative to whatever you want to measure.
- dahart 1y ago> potential energy surface of gravitation extends in 1/r What does this mean? Gravity falloff is 1/r^2 right?
- RunningDroid 1y agoGP may have used superscript that got stripped, here's a test with normal numbers followed by the superscript version : 0⁰ 1¹ 2²
- T-A 1y agoGravitational attraction falls off as 1 / r^2; potential energy falls off as 1 / r. The former (a force) is the derivative of the latter. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_energy#Newtonian_mechanics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_energy#Newtonian...
- 9dev 1y agoBut what about the point where your own attraction offsets that of any other nearby objects? Wouldn’t that be zero gravity, if the forces cancel out?