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Re: CAUSALITY IN PHYSICS (was drag force)



In Philosophy 1, I learned there is no cause and effect only temporal propinquity.

bc

P.s. A building at UCSB is named after the Prof.

P.p.s If this doesn't start something, I don't know what will.

Ludwik Kowalski wrote:

Ludwik Kowalski wrote:

Cause and effect is a big and profound issue.
Are we trying to avoid it in physics?

In the terminal velocity problem of Justin the drag force
is proportional to the mass. Nobody disagrees with this.
Likewise, we would probably agree that the drag force
(under clearly specified conditions) is proprtional to the
cross sectional area of the falling object.

But (in my mind) there is something profoundly different
in these two proportionalities. "F_drag just happen to be
proportional to m" is not the same as "F_drag is large
because the cross sectional area is large". Can one also
say that "F_drag is large because the mass is large"? Yes,
one can justify this as well. But for some reason the
"because" word seems to be more appropriate in the
first context.

As Brian W. wrote: "there is a wide range of terminal
velocities available for any given mass or drag force,
and a wide range of masses for any given terminal
velocity or drag force."

WHAT DOES THE WORD "BECAUSE" MEAN IN
PHYSICS? SHOULD THE WORDS "CORRELATED"
OR "PROPORTIONAL" BE USED INSTEAD?
Ludwik Kowalski