Re: what to call little "g"

[gregm@magi.com (Greg Marshall)]

> I'm doing some editing for a publisher and have had a pet peeve of
> mine disturbed one too many times, so please let me vent. I hope it's
> constructive.
>
> My peeve is the naming of little g as "the acceleration of (or due
> to) gravity" Both phrases are wildly misleading. Using "of gravity" is
> obviously a conceptual disaster since gravity is not accelerating.
> However, saying "acceleration due to gravity" is very misleading
> because there are lots of situations (like everything except airless
> freefall) there the acceleration is not 9.8 m/s^2.
(stuff deleted)

> John E. Gastineau
> 304 296 1966
> Morgantown, WV
> http://www.badgerden.com/~gastineau
> email: gastineau@badgerden.com   <==== NEW as of 10/1/96

How about gravitational force per unit mass, or maybe the gravitational
field constant.
Pedagogically if you go through a basic demo using a newton spring scale, a
bunch of 1-kg masses, and plot the graph of F vs m, you can approach the
constant first and move to the dynamic aspect afterward.
Some other things that help...
        periodically checking that the constant really is (opportunity for
comedy here... keep the spring scale around as a prop)
        elaborating on the regime in which in can be treated as constant
        relating it to the Universal Law and emphasizing the connection
        when you do treat the dynamics of a falling body, workin the
connection to the second law

Works for me, and most of my Grade 11 kids can tell you the difference
between G, g, and a-sub-g

Cheers
Greg