The Flat Earth Society

Flat Earth Discussion Boards => Flat Earth Theory => Topic started by: ah4truth2017 on December 02, 2017, 11:42:38 PM

Title: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: ah4truth2017 on December 02, 2017, 11:42:38 PM
So after thinking y'all must be crazy, then reading a fair amount of the arguments in favor of FET, I've been shocked how well-reasoned the case is, at least at face value. I do have a few questions that I've yet to see even an attempt at explanation.

Question: Given Universal Acceleration, what causes ones stomach to "rise" when stepping off a cliff/bridge as in cliff jumping, bungee jumping, skydiving, etc? RET would say that gravity pulls you down, and the inertia on your inner organs causes them to delay enough to have nerves sense the movement. However, if UA explains the idea of "falling," then the only sensory effect would be the landing on the ground, right?

Side note: I do realize some in the FET-sphere (pun intended) hold to gravity being a thing, just with a different application than RET. However, since the TFES wiki claims UA as the explanation, I am specifically targeting my question at that viewpoint. Also, I do intend this as a real question, but apologize if it should have been posted in the debate forum, since that may be the logical extension of a response.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Tom Haws on December 03, 2017, 01:53:39 AM
I think the question is based on a misunderstanding of gravity. The feeling of the stomach rising may just as likely be due to the temporary absence of net forces. I don't mean that the stomach does not actually assume a "higher" position in the abdomen. What I mean is that the question has an imprecise insertion of inertia at an inappropriate point.

It's canonical to Newtonian physics that inertial acceleration is indistinguishable from gravitational acceleration. This is why this site's FE Universal Acceleration position is attractive to a certain point.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: ah4truth2017 on December 03, 2017, 05:29:59 AM
Inertia may be the wrong word. (I'm a mathematician, not a physicist) Can you explain what you mean by "temporary absence of net forces"? As I understand the Universal Acceleration argument, there isn't any "force" acting to "pull me to the ground." Rather, what I perceive as falling is the earth accelerating upward to meet me. If I step out from a cliff or bridge:
Now, the math of my "fall" would be equivalent between UA and gravity. But if my stomach does "assume a 'higher' position in the abdomen," what caused it to be pushed upwards while my body is (effectively) floating until I land on the ground.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Roundy on December 03, 2017, 03:49:18 PM
What property of gravity would make your stomach rise when you fall? Everything should fall at the same rate. A tennis ball and a wrecking ball dropped off that cliff at the same time will land at the same time; they will be equal in level at all stages of the fall; one will never have to catch up with the other. That's how gravity works. If your stomach is leaving that cliff at the same time as the rest of your body, stomach and body will fall uniformly together. So if it feels as if your stomach rises when you jump off a cliff it must be caused by something unrelated to gravity.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: StinkyOne on December 03, 2017, 09:38:13 PM
What property of gravity would make your stomach rise when you fall? Everything should fall at the same rate. A tennis ball and a wrecking ball dropped off that cliff at the same time will land at the same time; they will be equal in level at all stages of the fall; one will never have to catch up with the other. That's how gravity works. If your stomach is leaving that cliff at the same time as the rest of your body, stomach and body will fall uniformly together. So if it feels as if your stomach rises when you jump off a cliff it must be caused by something unrelated to gravity.

This is pretty obvious, but when you fall, your organs are no longer resisting gravity. They no longer "feel" the usual weight that is experienced when fighting gravity. I don't think it is a rise more a sudden release of pressure. Once the sudden change has passed, the sensation diminishes. That is why skydivers don't feel like they are falling the whole time.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: devils advocate on December 03, 2017, 10:11:53 PM
What property of gravity would make your stomach rise when you fall? Everything should fall at the same rate. A tennis ball and a wrecking ball dropped off that cliff at the same time will land at the same time; they will be equal in level at all stages of the fall; one will never have to catch up with the other. That's how gravity works. If your stomach is leaving that cliff at the same time as the rest of your body, stomach and body will fall uniformly together. So if it feels as if your stomach rises when you jump off a cliff it must be caused by something unrelated to gravity.

Because your stomach organs have space to move not accorded to the rest of your body as they are essentially bags/tubes of water and muscles thus they experience a less uniform response to falling than say your limbs.

Or maybe earth is flat because it looks flat from my window........
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Tom Haws on December 04, 2017, 12:13:38 AM
Inertia may be the wrong word. (I'm a mathematician, not a physicist) Can you explain what you mean by "temporary absence of net forces"? As I understand the Universal Acceleration argument, there isn't any "force" acting to "pull me to the ground."

Right.

Rather, what I perceive as falling is the earth accelerating upward to meet me. If I step out from a cliff or bridge:

1. No additional acceleration is applied to my body, as would happen if I jumped.[/li][/list]

Right. Your body is suddenly free of the force of the earth resisting falling (Round Earth) or accelerating you (UA)

2. From a literal sense, I float there until the Universal Acceleration causes the ground to meet me.[/li][/list]

Almost. You keep on trucking free of outside forces until the earth at its new speed crashes into you again.

Now, the math of my "fall" would be equivalent between UA and gravity. But if my stomach does "assume a 'higher' position in the abdomen," what caused it to be pushed upwards while my body is (effectively) floating until I land on the ground.


Your organs spend your entire standing life squished against your pelvis by gravity. Remove gravity (or UA) and they are no longer squished. They move to assume the position accounted for only by your body tissues.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: ah4truth2017 on December 04, 2017, 06:21:41 AM
Your organs spend your entire standing life squished against your pelvis by gravity. Remove gravity (or UA) and they are no longer squished. They move to assume the position accounted for only by your body tissues.

Plausible, and tough to really use as an argument for either gravity or UA, since we are both describing the impact of relative acceleration compared to surroundings. (Looks like this is called the "Equivalence Principle"?)

However, it seems to me that some experimentation around this might be in order. We're essentially describing the same fluid dynamics as this question: https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/76222/accelerating-fluid-filled-container (https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/76222/accelerating-fluid-filled-container). (There may be better resources for the principles of physics, that's just the first I saw and had a nice chart)

Proposed Test (that is, what's being tested)
1. With gravity, my velocity starts at zero, and increases at 9.8m/s^2 as I start to drop.
2. Under UA, my initial acceleration is 9.8m/s^2. As I step off, velocity is the current velocity of the earth, and acceleration becomes 0.

Mathematically, these describe very different positions for my body in space (on its own, position relative to the ground is immaterial) and my gut says the fluid dynamics would play out differently as well. However, a physicist would need to 1) describe the expectations in equations 2) determine a test to confirm the behavior. (I'm envisioning dropping a half-filled 2L bottle in slow motion?)
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: douglips on December 04, 2017, 07:15:29 AM
These two situations are in fact identical.

You could determine between UA and gravity with things like measuring the direction of gravity and finding it is sphere shaped instead of plane shaped, or by observing variations related to latitude (which are clearly observed and support round Earth and gravity). But you can't distinguish between them by just jumping off a cliff, because before you jump you are accelerating at 9.8 m/s^2 and after at 0, in both cases. The cause of the acceleration is either the Earth pushing you against it's gravity or actual acceleration, and you can't tell them apart.

That is the equivalence principle, a well established aspect of Einstein's theories.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Tom Haws on December 04, 2017, 10:37:45 PM
Equivalence principle is it. You can't tell. Better to focus on low-hanging fruit like the fact that No flat map can predict commercial airline flight times (http://forum.tfes.org/index.php?topic=6633.msg121952#msg121952) between New York, Paris, Cape Town & Buenos Aires.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: ah4truth2017 on December 05, 2017, 12:28:20 AM
While my intuition still suggests the equivalence principle isn't the complete answer, looking at Wikipedia's explanation did have more to support that conclusion. Particularly helpful was its discussion of free fall and an accelerometer. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerometer (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerometer) As this was just a question and not a debate, I'd say it can be considered answered for now.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Havonii on December 06, 2017, 07:40:39 PM
As far as gravity and UA, wouldn't it be true that,if you jumped off an edge, the initial velocity of the Earth(in UA perspective) would add to that of the force of the jump?

Would you even fall, or would your current acceleration become greater than that of the earth?

Without gravitation, there is no force to naturally pull you down once there is increased upward inertia.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Roger G on December 06, 2017, 07:50:55 PM
Unfortunately your point doesn't stand up, because your feet give you an initial acceleration, but once your feet leave the ground you have nothing to maintain you acceleration, so either the ground moving upwards catches up with you or gravity pulls you back down, take your pick  :)

Roger
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: juner on December 06, 2017, 08:16:29 PM
Come on, everyone, there’s a reason it’s called the Equivalence Principle and not the Mostly Equivalent Principle.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: StinkyOne on December 06, 2017, 11:49:32 PM
Come on, everyone, there’s a reason it’s called the Equivalence Principle and not the Mostly Equivalent Principle.

This is one of the most annoying traits of FEH. It cherry-picks one principle out of a theory that deals with something it says doesn't even exist and treats it as some sort of validation. Einstein did not believe the Earth was flat and obviously knew gravity was real.

Let's assume UA is real. It pushes the Earth, it pushes the sun and moon, it pushes the stars. Why doesn't it also push bodies on the surface of the planet? What prevents us from also being accelerated? Seems like if it is pushing everything else, we (and other surface objects) would also be affected.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: juner on December 07, 2017, 01:31:54 AM
Come on, everyone, there’s a reason it’s called the Equivalence Principle and not the Mostly Equivalent Principle.

This is one of the most annoying traits of FEH. It cherry-picks one principle out of a theory that deals with something it says doesn't even exist and treats it as some sort of validation. Einstein did not believe the Earth was flat and obviously knew gravity was real.

Let's assume UA is real. It pushes the Earth, it pushes the sun and moon, it pushes the stars. Why doesn't it also push bodies on the surface of the planet? What prevents us from also being accelerated? Seems like if it is pushing everything else, we (and other surface objects) would also be affected.

In UAT, if the earth was not between you and the acceleration source, you would be accelerated. That seems a bit nonsensical to suggest. It’s like being inside an accelerating rocket and asking why is only the rocket accelerating and not you specifically.

Try harder.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: nickrulercreator on December 07, 2017, 02:12:58 AM
Come on, everyone, there’s a reason it’s called the Equivalence Principle and not the Mostly Equivalent Principle.

This is one of the most annoying traits of FEH. It cherry-picks one principle out of a theory that deals with something it says doesn't even exist and treats it as some sort of validation. Einstein did not believe the Earth was flat and obviously knew gravity was real.

Let's assume UA is real. It pushes the Earth, it pushes the sun and moon, it pushes the stars. Why doesn't it also push bodies on the surface of the planet? What prevents us from also being accelerated? Seems like if it is pushing everything else, we (and other surface objects) would also be affected.

In UAT, if the earth was not between you and the acceleration source, you would be accelerated. That seems a bit nonsensical to suggest. It’s like being inside an accelerating rocket and asking why is only the rocket accelerating and not you specifically.

Try harder.

Wait, doesn't UAT state that you're also being accelerated upward with the Earth? You stated you'd be accelerated if the Earth WASN'T between you and the acc. source, so is it safe to assume that we aren't being accelerated upward with the Earth?
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Tom Haws on December 07, 2017, 02:28:56 AM
In UAT, if the earth was not between you and the acceleration source, you would be accelerated.

Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You would not instantly stop accelerating and "fall" behind/from/below the earth?
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: StinkyOne on December 07, 2017, 03:05:51 AM
Come on, everyone, there’s a reason it’s called the Equivalence Principle and not the Mostly Equivalent Principle.

This is one of the most annoying traits of FEH. It cherry-picks one principle out of a theory that deals with something it says doesn't even exist and treats it as some sort of validation. Einstein did not believe the Earth was flat and obviously knew gravity was real.

Let's assume UA is real. It pushes the Earth, it pushes the sun and moon, it pushes the stars. Why doesn't it also push bodies on the surface of the planet? What prevents us from also being accelerated? Seems like if it is pushing everything else, we (and other surface objects) would also be affected.

In UAT, if the earth was not between you and the acceleration source, you would be accelerated. That seems a bit nonsensical to suggest. It’s like being inside an accelerating rocket and asking why is only the rocket accelerating and not you specifically.

Try harder.

You should re-read what I said. If the acceleration source is under the Earth, how are the moon, sun, and stars affected??
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: juner on December 07, 2017, 04:25:49 AM
You should re-read what I said. If the acceleration source is under the Earth, how are the moon, sun, and stars affected??

You should re-read what has been discussed dozens of times here before. Everything in earth's non-inertial frame of reference is being accelerated. "Under" is a subjective and meaningless term.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: StinkyOne on December 07, 2017, 01:01:05 PM
You should re-read what I said. If the acceleration source is under the Earth, how are the moon, sun, and stars affected??

You should re-read what has been discussed dozens of times here before. Everything in earth's non-inertial frame of reference is being accelerated. "Under" is a subjective and meaningless term.
Which is my point - if everything is being accelerated, why aren't we??? If this force permeates everything and accelerates everything why does it not also act on our bodies? When we step off a chair, we should keep right on accelerating.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Tom Haws on December 07, 2017, 08:29:30 PM
Which is my point - if everything is being accelerated, why aren't we??? If this force permeates everything and accelerates everything why does it not also act on our bodies? When we step off a chair, we should keep right on accelerating.

That's not how I picture it. Here's how I picture it: Something is accelerating the earth (probably in an orbit around an Anchor Object). Since we are on the earth, we are being accelerated by the earth. I don't see there being a mysterious force that acts independently on everything near the earth. But there's a hole in my model, I guess. Namely, what keeps us all from crashing into the Sun and Moon? Rats. I can't make sense of it.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: StinkyOne on December 07, 2017, 09:40:47 PM
But there's a hole in my model, I guess. Namely, what keeps us all from crashing into the Sun and Moon? Rats. I can't make sense of it.

Yep, this is what I'm asking about. According to UA, the sun and moon are also being accelerated, thus we don't crash into them. If all of these bodies are being accelerated, why isn't everything being accelerated? How does UA pick and choose?
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: ghostopia on December 07, 2017, 09:53:45 PM
But there's a hole in my model, I guess. Namely, what keeps us all from crashing into the Sun and Moon? Rats. I can't make sense of it.

Yep, this is what I'm asking about. According to UA, the sun and moon are also being accelerated, thus we don't crash into them. If all of these bodies are being accelerated, why isn't everything being accelerated? How does UA pick and choose?

Either ways have loopholes. If Earth, Sun, Moon and stars are being accelerated by UA and thus don't crush onto Earth, what keeps us from being accelerated? If Earth is accelerating us, than what keeps Earth from crushing into Sun and Moon as they are not accelerating.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Curious Squirrel on December 07, 2017, 10:19:57 PM
But there's a hole in my model, I guess. Namely, what keeps us all from crashing into the Sun and Moon? Rats. I can't make sense of it.

Yep, this is what I'm asking about. According to UA, the sun and moon are also being accelerated, thus we don't crash into them. If all of these bodies are being accelerated, why isn't everything being accelerated? How does UA pick and choose?
I'll always fall back on this answer, because why not throw in another conspiracy at this point right? The 'best' (by which I mean it explains exactly what it sets out to explain, that being how the sun/moon accelerate with the Earth) explanation I've seen given for this phenomenon is that the sun and moon are on two large celestial poles sticking up out of the North Pole. These carry the sun and moon around in their orbits, and explain how UA is accelerating them both along with the Earth. The stars are then simply a part of the dome covering the Earth.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Tom Haws on December 07, 2017, 10:46:14 PM
Yep, this is what I'm asking about. According to UA, the sun and moon are also being accelerated, thus we don't crash into them. If all of these bodies are being accelerated, why isn't everything being accelerated? How does UA pick and choose?

Either ways have loopholes. If Earth, Sun, Moon and stars are being accelerated by UA and thus don't crush onto Earth, what keeps us from being accelerated? If Earth is accelerating us, than what keeps Earth from crushing into Sun and Moon as they are not accelerating.

Well explained. I get now what you are suggesting. Good question. Actually, I don't see the function of uniform acceleration at all. Why not just have an excessively large diameter flat earth so that gravity lines are essentially parallel?
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: garygreen on December 08, 2017, 03:33:41 PM
But there's a hole in my model, I guess. Namely, what keeps us all from crashing into the Sun and Moon? Rats. I can't make sense of it.

Yep, this is what I'm asking about. According to UA, the sun and moon are also being accelerated, thus we don't crash into them. If all of these bodies are being accelerated, why isn't everything being accelerated? How does UA pick and choose?

in fairness, the same sort of question can be asked of contemporary physics: why does the gravitational force only act on mass?  why not charges, too?  how does gravity pick and choose?
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: ghostopia on December 08, 2017, 05:17:27 PM
But there's a hole in my model, I guess. Namely, what keeps us all from crashing into the Sun and Moon? Rats. I can't make sense of it.

Yep, this is what I'm asking about. According to UA, the sun and moon are also being accelerated, thus we don't crash into them. If all of these bodies are being accelerated, why isn't everything being accelerated? How does UA pick and choose?

in fairness, the same sort of question can be asked of contemporary physics: why does the gravitational force only act on mass?  why not charges, too?  how does gravity pick and choose?

To answer that question, Gravity does not pick and choose. Gravity affects everything with mass, just weaker on object with smaller mass and greater on object with bigger mass.

The reason Gravity act on mass is because the bending of space which cause pull between objects i caused by mass.

So yeah Gravity act on all object with mass but UA either does not work on Sun, Moon, and stars, or only affects us
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: garygreen on December 10, 2017, 05:32:53 PM
To answer that question, Gravity does not pick and choose. Gravity affects everything with mass, just weaker on object with smaller mass and greater on object with bigger mass.

The reason Gravity act on mass is because the bending of space which cause pull between objects i caused by mass.

So yeah Gravity act on all object with mass but UA either does not work on Sun, Moon, and stars, or only affects us

so use the coulomb force instead.  it affects electrons but not neutrons.  why this should be the case is fundamentally mysterious.

the point is that all of the fundamental forces only affect some properties and not others.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: ghostopia on December 10, 2017, 06:14:42 PM
To answer that question, Gravity does not pick and choose. Gravity affects everything with mass, just weaker on object with smaller mass and greater on object with bigger mass.

The reason Gravity act on mass is because the bending of space which cause pull between objects i caused by mass.

So yeah Gravity act on all object with mass but UA either does not work on Sun, Moon, and stars, or only affects us

so use the coulomb force instead.  it affects electrons but not neutrons.  why this should be the case is fundamentally mysterious.

the point is that all of the fundamental forces only affect some properties and not others.

Ok. I can still argue with it. but I will just get to your point.

So you say all of the fundamental forces only affect some properties and not other. So can you tell me which property does UA act upon? I don't see any difference between Sun, Moon, Stars and us as in mass and charge. Can you explain on this?
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: garygreen on December 10, 2017, 06:42:25 PM
So can you tell me which property does UA act upon? I don't see any difference between Sun, Moon, Stars and us as in mass and charge. Can you explain on this?

beats me; i think the earth is round.

but it's not inherently problematic for a force to act on one object/property and not another.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: Havonii on December 20, 2017, 01:42:09 AM
So can you tell me which property does UA act upon? I don't see any difference between Sun, Moon, Stars and us as in mass and charge. Can you explain on this?

beats me; i think the earth is round.

but it's not inherently problematic for a force to act on one object/property and not another.

Well you see, the flat earth is actually stacked on an infinite stack of turtles.
Title: Re: Inertia & A Cliff
Post by: juner on December 20, 2017, 02:11:10 PM
Well you see, the flat earth is actually stacked on an infinite stack of turtles.

Refrain from low-content posting in the  upper fora. 2nd warning.