Re: acceleration contributed by gravity

["John S. Denker" <jsd@MONMOUTH.COM>]

At 08:38 AM 1/26/01 -0500, David Bowman wrote:
> I would prefer,
> initially, at least, "the strength of gravity", "weight-to-mass ratio",
> "surface gravity", etc. (almost anything except phrases mentioning
> "acceleration").  Later, I would relax a little,

I still think the key point here is to recognize that the force in the LHS
of the gravity equation is rarely the total force.  The direct solution is
to write something like
        F_grav = m g
        F_total = F_grav + other forces
        a_total = g + other accelerations

If you want to emphasize this aspect of g, you could call it the
"acceleration _contributed_ by gravity" making it clear that there are
other contributions.

Other people have suggested fooling with the units on g (e.g. drawing a
pseudo-distinction between N/kg and m/s^2), but that is like treating a
strep infection with magnet-therapy.  It focusses attention on the wrong
side of the equation, and distracts attention from the place where real
improvements can be made.