Chronology | Current Month | Current Thread | Current Date |
[Year List] [Month List (current year)] | [Date Index] [Thread Index] | [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] | [Date Prev] [Date Next] |
| I understand that lots of people (including apparently the folks at
| NIST) want weight to be the same thing as gravitational
| force, but I have yet to hear one compelling reason for that.
|
That's not how I read the following:
"According to NIST (http://physics.nist.gov/Pubs/SP811/sec08.html) - the
closest we have in the US to an "official definition":
"In science and technology, the weight of a body in a particular
reference frame is defined as the force that gives the body an
acceleration equal to the local acceleration of free fall in that
reference frame . . ."
Doesn't this say that the weight of an astronaught is zero in the rest
frame of the orbiting shuttle, since the local free-fall acceleration is
zero in that frame. Therefore the force to give it that acceleration is
zero, i.e. weightless??