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Re: little gee and its sign



I've always thought g was the local gravitational field.
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-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Green [mailto:JMGreen@SISNA.COM]
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2001 11:47 PM
To: PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu
Subject: Re: little gee and its sign



It seems to me calling g a gravitational constant is a bit dangerous
since we give a similar name to G.

I agree, Doug, but when I suggested gravitational variable, there was a
loud noise. As I say one can sneak this in initially in an intro class and
have it be a variable in a week or two. In any case it would be a "Local
Gravitational Constant" (sort of) while G is a "Universal Gravitational
Constant". What ever floats your ship.

But it ain't acceleration!

Jim Green

Also, I like to stress that the
value of g is a local phenomena, in which case calling it a constant
seems inconsistent. In my own mind, if not in my lectures, g is the
gravitational field in the same way as E is the electric field. This
way of thinking is so far off the textbook approach that I hesitate to
bring it up.

\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\_/^\

Doug Craigen
http://www.dctech.com/physics/about_dc.html


Jim Green
mailto:JMGreen@sisna.com
http://users.sisna.com/jmgreen