RE: The Rauber Marlow Chronicles

["Paul Camp" <pjcamp@coastal.edu>]

Nor should you abandon weight in an introductory class -- you have to 
crawl before you can walk. But is fact according to the equivalence 
principle, this is just what you DO have to postulate. Gravity is 
locally equivalent to a uniform acceleration; i.e. a noninertial 
frame.


> Do we have to postulate a frame without ANY gravitational
> effects to have an inertial frame--that is, must we be very far away from
> any massive body?  Somehow I just don't see abandoning weight as a force
> in introductory courses.  None of the dynamics we normally work on will
> work without it (at least without mental gymnastics way beyond my
> students).
>
> Rick 

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