Gravity. It disproves FE Theory.

Gravity fails to explain the motion of planets.  And it always fails to explain the reason why the orbits of planets have lasted as long as they have.  If the universe was really billions of years old, the orbits of many planets would have decayed already and entered the sun.  There is a deity hence there has to be a flat earth model.  There is another force at work besides gravity that makes the orbits established.  Just mere Big Bang does not suffice...

I wasn't talking about the age of the universe or its origins.

There's no other force necessary to explain the motion of the planets. I don't know where you're getting that idea other than someone (maybe from your church?) told you that, or that just "seems right" to you.

I don't see why the existence (or not) of a deity impacts the shape of the Earth, unless you hold to some particular Creation story, like Genesis, as being literally true.

Quote from: Jingle Jangle on May 08, 2013, 03:40:08 PM

Gravity fails to explain the motion of planets.  And it always fails to explain the reason why the orbits of planets have lasted as long as they have.  If the universe was really billions of years old, the orbits of many planets would have decayed already and entered the sun.  There is a deity hence there has to be a flat earth model.  There is another force at work besides gravity that makes the orbits established.  Just mere Big Bang does not suffice...

I wasn't talking about the age of the universe or its origins.

There's no other force necessary to explain the motion of the planets. I don't know where you're getting that idea other than someone (maybe from your church?) told you that, or that just "seems right" to you.

I don't see why the existence (or not) of a deity impacts the shape of the Earth, unless you hold to some particular Creation story, like Genesis, as being literally true.

Even Genesis literalists tend to believe in a RE that is the center of the universe, not the floor of it.

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 03:59:29 PM

Quote from: Jingle Jangle on May 08, 2013, 03:40:08 PM

Gravity fails to explain the motion of planets.  And it always fails to explain the reason why the orbits of planets have lasted as long as they have.  If the universe was really billions of years old, the orbits of many planets would have decayed already and entered the sun.  There is a deity hence there has to be a flat earth model.  There is another force at work besides gravity that makes the orbits established.  Just mere Big Bang does not suffice...

I wasn't talking about the age of the universe or its origins.

There's no other force necessary to explain the motion of the planets. I don't know where you're getting that idea other than someone (maybe from your church?) told you that, or that just "seems right" to you.

I don't see why the existence (or not) of a deity impacts the shape of the Earth, unless you hold to some particular Creation story, like Genesis, as being literally true.

Even Genesis literalists tend to believe in a RE that is the center of the universe, not the floor of it.

That's true, although there are a few that get flatness out of the Bible, something about the corners of the Earth I think. Apparently some Muslims think it's flat too, again there's no consensus I'm aware of. It's JJ that claims a deity means the Earth is flat. My point is that a "deity" is non specific, therefore has no bearing on the Earth's shape. I don't know where exactly he gets it, but apparently some deity in particular that he believes in created a flat Earth (I guess?).

Quote from: DuckDodgers on May 08, 2013, 04:09:29 PM

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 03:59:29 PM

Quote from: Jingle Jangle on May 08, 2013, 03:40:08 PM

Gravity fails to explain the motion of planets.  And it always fails to explain the reason why the orbits of planets have lasted as long as they have.  If the universe was really billions of years old, the orbits of many planets would have decayed already and entered the sun.  There is a deity hence there has to be a flat earth model.  There is another force at work besides gravity that makes the orbits established.  Just mere Big Bang does not suffice...

I wasn't talking about the age of the universe or its origins.

There's no other force necessary to explain the motion of the planets. I don't know where you're getting that idea other than someone (maybe from your church?) told you that, or that just "seems right" to you.

I don't see why the existence (or not) of a deity impacts the shape of the Earth, unless you hold to some particular Creation story, like Genesis, as being literally true.

Even Genesis literalists tend to believe in a RE that is the center of the universe, not the floor of it.

That's true, although there are a few that get flatness out of the Bible, something about the corners of the Earth I think. Apparently some Muslims think it's flat too, again there's no consensus I'm aware of. It's JJ that claims a deity means the Earth is flat. My point is that a "deity" is non specific, therefore has no bearing on the Earth's shape. I don't know where exactly he gets it, but apparently some deity in particular that he believes in created a flat Earth (I guess?).

Yeah, I'm with you on wondering why a deity means the Earth is flat.  It'd be just as easy to argue that since a deity exists the Earth must be round.

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

Anyway, to your previous comment:


Yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets. Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Newton's law of gravitation can be shown to be mathematically equivalent to Kepler's laws and can be used as an accurate descriptor of all classical orbits.  Richard Feynman shows the equivalence rather quickly in his lecture, "The Character of Natural Law".

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

I don't know that any theory is ever definitively proven. Newton's theory worked extremely well for centuries, but turned out to be incomplete when Einstein came along. There's nothing wrong with accepting the best available theory, as long as you leave room for the better one that comes next.

As for the local differences, it's pretty well established that they are real, but if you want to measure it yourself, that would definitely be interesting.

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 04:54:58 PM

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Newton's law of gravitation can be shown to be mathematically equivalent to Kepler's laws and can be used as an accurate descriptor of all classical orbits.  Richard Feynman shows the equivalence rather quickly in his lecture, "The Character of Natural Law".

Right, as I said, the conclusion is based on assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote from: Rama Set on May 08, 2013, 05:08:32 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 04:54:58 PM

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Newton's law of gravitation can be shown to be mathematically equivalent to Kepler's laws and can be used as an accurate descriptor of all classical orbits.  Richard Feynman shows the equivalence rather quickly in his lecture, "The Character of Natural Law".

Right, as I said, the conclusion is based on assumptions about the nature of the universe.

That's not what I said. Feel free to specifically address my comment in a substantial way.

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 04:54:58 PM

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Newton's law of gravitation can be shown to be mathematically equivalent to Kepler's laws and can be used as an accurate descriptor of all classical orbits.  Richard Feynman shows the equivalence rather quickly in his lecture, "The Character of Natural Law".

Sadly I could not get Sceptimatic to even look at this lecture because he said he switched it off as soon as he heard about Feynman being involved in the Manhattan project. It's really too bad, because Feynman was a true Zetetic at heart, I think. He loved to perform his own experiments himself, and he only made some of the discoveries he did because he insisted on working things out from first principles in terms he could understand. In fact he may have missed out on some Nobel prizes due to this. Once he solved a problem to his own satisfaction he often lost interest, while other physicists would carry through on his ideas and publish them. He had to be goaded into publishing his own ideas.

Anyway, I digress. But if Zetetics are inclined to trust anyone elses work, Feynman would be the logical choice.

I am not sure you can even win the Nobel  more than once.

Gravity fails to explain the motion of planets.  And it always fails to explain the reason why the orbits of planets have lasted as long as they have.  If the universe was really billions of years old, the orbits of many planets would have decayed already and entered the sun.  There is a deity hence there has to be a flat earth model.  There is another force at work besides gravity that makes the orbits established.  Just mere Big Bang does not suffice...

The 'magic' is the mass of the globe. Space is like a fabric, although it is not a real fabric the same principle works. Lay down on your bed. Put a marble next to you. Where does the marble go? It will move towards you. You have lots of mass, the mass of the marble is very tiny, so it moves towards you. You bent your matress and form a slope.

Now in space the same principle applies. The mass forms a slope. Objects with lower mass are pulled towards the objects with high mass. Hence we orbit the sun, because it has a huge mass.

Put two marbles on your bed and nothing will happen, move them closer to each other and see them move towards eachother. Use some heavy marbles though, because your mattress is pretty stiff. Or use a cloth you span across horizontally over some object (with the middle clear of any obstructions).

Now why don't we move towards the sun is because of our speed. We have an orbital speed, which allows us to stay in our track around the sun. The same thing as a roulette table. The ball is located on a slope, but due to the high speed it maintains its path and spins around. It slows down due to friction with the table and the air, slowly going towards the middle. The same would happen to the earth if you were able to stop it from moving around. In space there is no friction and all the planets are nicely lined up so they do not affect each other's path. This was different about 4.5 billion years ago when our solar system was formed. It just all settled in the many, many years that were to come.

Edit: It needs to be explained that mass and weight are two complete different things. Weight is the force that is acting down on you, where mass is the actual 'weight' an object has. If you take a plane and make a parabolic flight, once you go down you feel weightless. Zero gravity. It is expressed in g-force and 0 g-force is when you could float through the air. You also experience this in a rollercoaster (much cheaper alternative). Once you go down with high speed, you will actually start to become weightless, hence the safety harness to keep you aboard. Once you go up, you feel very heavy, and you are pushed inside your seat.

However do you actually lose weight while on a ride in a rollercoaster? Would a scale tell you, you weigh different when measuring before or after the ride? The answer is no (unless you puked, but that is never a significant change). You remain your same body as you go along in the ride, yet you feel heavier. You did not gain in mass, obviously, you are still the same person, but you feel heavier and that has to do with the kind of force that (what's in the word?) weighs upon you.

Quote from: Rama Set on May 08, 2013, 05:08:32 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 04:54:58 PM

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Newton's law of gravitation can be shown to be mathematically equivalent to Kepler's laws and can be used as an accurate descriptor of all classical orbits.  Richard Feynman shows the equivalence rather quickly in his lecture, "The Character of Natural Law".

Right, as I said, the conclusion is based on assumptions about the nature of the universe.

When assumptions are made in science it is usually with good reason. Nevertheless if the assumptions are proven false by experiment they have to be thrown out. I'm not sure what assumptions you're referring to specifically, but the fact that the theories about gravity lasted so long suggests they probably are right.

That the theory predicted the existence and neighborhood of Neptune should be taken as proof that it is a good theory.

I am not sure you can even win the Nobel  more than once.

You can, but maybe not in the same field? Marie Curie won one in Physics and one in chemistry.

Quote from: Rama Set on May 08, 2013, 05:40:19 PM

I am not sure you can even win the Nobel  more than once.

You can, but maybe not in the same field? Marie Curie won one in Physics and one in chemistry.

It looks like you can win more than once in the same field, but you'll probably have to share.
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/nobelprize_facts.html

  Multiple Nobel Laureates  The work of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has been honoured by a Nobel Peace Prize three times. Besides, the founder of the ICRC, Henry Dunant, was awarded the first Nobel Peace Prize in 1901.
 
 Linus Pauling is the only person to have been awarded two unshared Nobel Prizes - the 1954 Nobel Prize in Chemistry and the 1962 Nobel Peace Prize.
 

J. Bardeen	M. Curie	L. Pauling
Physics 1956  Physics 1972	Physics 1903  Chemistry 1911	Chemistry 1954  Peace 1962
F. Sanger	ICRC	UNHCR
Chemistry 1958  Chemistry 1980	Peace 1917  Peace 1944  Peace 1963	Peace 1954  Peace 1981

Quote from: Tausami on May 07, 2013, 05:15:24 PM

Because the natural position of Earthly objects is the center of the universe, of course 

In seriousness, though, the prevailing theories are that the Earth is either accelerating upwards at 9.81 m/s² or that the Earth is infinitely large.

So does an Earth that is an infinite plane have gravity?

Yes

Quote from: Manarq on May 08, 2013, 09:18:39 AM

Quote from: Tausami on May 07, 2013, 05:15:24 PM

Because the natural position of Earthly objects is the center of the universe, of course 

In seriousness, though, the prevailing theories are that the Earth is either accelerating upwards at 9.81 m/s² or that the Earth is infinitely large.

So does an Earth that is an infinite plane have gravity?

Yes

Except for Tom Bishop's infinite plane which doesn't.

I would like to thank Roundy for his intelligent input on this subject.

http://i.imgur.com/anTo0.gif

The 'magic' is the mass of the globe. Space is like a fabric, although it is not a real fabric the same principle works. Lay down on your bed. Put a marble next to you. Where does the marble go? It will move towards you. You have lots of mass, the mass of the marble is very tiny, so it moves towards you. You bent your matress and form a slope.

If I do this, will the marble go in circles around me for billions of years?

Quote from: Lolflatdisc on May 08, 2013, 05:43:32 PM

The 'magic' is the mass of the globe. Space is like a fabric, although it is not a real fabric the same principle works. Lay down on your bed. Put a marble next to you. Where does the marble go? It will move towards you. You have lots of mass, the mass of the marble is very tiny, so it moves towards you. You bent your matress and form a slope.

If I do this, will the marble go in circles around me for billions of years?

That is an incredibly stupid (trollish?) question, but anyway, the answer is no. There is a tremendous amount of friction between the marble and your mattress, which will slow the marble drastically. In the near-total vacuum of space however, there is no friction, no drag, and it is possible for objects to reach a state of equilibrium, where all forces - such as the centripetal force pulling a planet out of it's orbit, and gravity pulling it in - are equally balanced, and an orbit can be sustained for many billions of years.

Quote from: jroa on May 08, 2013, 11:10:30 PM

Quote from: Lolflatdisc on May 08, 2013, 05:43:32 PM

The 'magic' is the mass of the globe. Space is like a fabric, although it is not a real fabric the same principle works. Lay down on your bed. Put a marble next to you. Where does the marble go? It will move towards you. You have lots of mass, the mass of the marble is very tiny, so it moves towards you. You bent your matress and form a slope.

If I do this, will the marble go in circles around me for billions of years?

That is an incredibly stupid (trollish?) question, but anyway, the answer is no. There is a tremendous amount of friction between the marble and your mattress, which will slow the marble drastically. In the near-total vacuum of space however, there is no friction, no drag, and it is possible for objects to reach a state of equilibrium, where all forces - such as the centripetal force pulling a planet out of it's orbit, and gravity pulling it in - are equally balanced, and an orbit can be sustained for many billions of years.

Who is trolling here?  You are the one who comes to a web forum that you do not believe in just to ridicule the people on it.

Anyway, yes a marble will roll towards me if I lay in my bed.  That does not explain gravity or  even planetary motion. 

Who is trolling here?  You are the one who comes to a web forum that you do not believe in just to ridicule the people on it.

Anyway, yes a marble will roll towards me if I lay in my bed.  That does not explain gravity or  even planetary motion.

I originally came to see if there was any credible evidence to support the idea of a flat earth. So far, I haven't really seen any. There have been a couple of interesting ideas, but nothing really solid that can explain everyday observations. Now I just try to point out and clarify errors when I see them. I try to avoid responding to sarcastic questions, but sometimes I just can't help myself!

The marble isn't exactly meant to be an explanation, more a demonstration of a concept. Not so much a "this is how it works", more "this is a rough representation of the observed behaviour".

The marble isn't exactly meant to be an explanation, more a demonstration of a concept. Not so much a "this is how it works", more "this is a rough representation of the observed behaviour".

So, it is kind of like that, but not really?

Quote from: Lolflatdisc on May 08, 2013, 05:43:32 PM

The 'magic' is the mass of the globe. Space is like a fabric, although it is not a real fabric the same principle works. Lay down on your bed. Put a marble next to you. Where does the marble go? It will move towards you. You have lots of mass, the mass of the marble is very tiny, so it moves towards you. You bent your matress and form a slope.

If I do this, will the marble go in circles around me for billions of years?

I really appreciate if you did actually test it yourself to see it. To answer your question. The marble could circle around you if you give it some speed to turn around you. I am not sure if your matress is going to be big enough, but if you sit on it you will have more room. Give the marble some speed parallel to you. You will see it will bend around you. The problem with your matress though is that it is pretty rough, so the marble loses its speed before it could encircle you completely. It is friction. Also if you do not give the marble enough speed, you are not going to see it bend, instead it will come right to you.

Now a way to test it better is if you could span a cloth over some points, with the middle clear of anything. There should be enough room for the cloth to bend downwards. You could then also test different masses of marbles. You could put a small one on the cloth first, and start testing with a bigger one around it. This is for you to test and see for yourself how more mass influences the path of the marbles you put to the test.

But also in this experiment, friction with the cloth will prevent the marbles to encircle it nicely. Hence I also gave the example of a roulette table. I hope you know what it looks like and especially the wheel where they spin the ball in?
The surface of the wheel is sloped. Furthermore the surface is smoother, so there is less friction. The employee spins the ball around at high speed, but as you know, the surface is sloped. The ball will maintain its path around the sloped surface, due to its high speed. That is called the orbital speed. However since they do not expect the  employee to spin the the ball around at exactly the orbital speed, they build a small vertical wall, to prevent the ball from flying outwards. But just like the marbles on the cloth, the ball experiences friction from the air and moreover the surface, slowing it down. At some point the ball will start to roll towards the center and enter into one of the number slots.

In space there is no friction from cloth, air or a roulette table. The planets move around in vacuum and are not stopped by anything. If you were able to stop the earth from moving around, it would also start to go towards the sun. Objects which did not have enough speed would have gone into the sun. Objects which have higher speed than the orbital speed just simply fly past the sun, earth, and other planets. The earth and the other planets got their orbital speed and maintained their path around the sun, because nothing was there to stop it from going around. Allowing them to go round and round and round for billions of years.

Quote from: Jingle Jangle on May 08, 2013, 03:40:08 PM

Gravity fails to explain the motion of planets.  And it always fails to explain the reason why the orbits of planets have lasted as long as they have.  If the universe was really billions of years old, the orbits of many planets would have decayed already and entered the sun.  There is a deity hence there has to be a flat earth model.  There is another force at work besides gravity that makes the orbits established.  Just mere Big Bang does not suffice...

The 'magic' is the mass of the globe. Space is like a fabric, although it is not a real fabric the same principle works. Lay down on your bed. Put a marble next to you. Where does the marble go? It will move towards you. You have lots of mass, the mass of the marble is very tiny, so it moves towards you. You bent your matress and form a slope.

Now in space the same principle applies. The mass forms a slope. Objects with lower mass are pulled towards the objects with high mass. Hence we orbit the sun, because it has a huge mass.

Put two marbles on your bed and nothing will happen, move them closer to each other and see them move towards eachother. Use some heavy marbles though, because your mattress is pretty stiff. Or use a cloth you span across horizontally over some object (with the middle clear of any obstructions).

Now why don't we move towards the sun is because of our speed. We have an orbital speed, which allows us to stay in our track around the sun. The same thing as a roulette table. The ball is located on a slope, but due to the high speed it maintains its path and spins around. It slows down due to friction with the table and the air, slowly going towards the middle. The same would happen to the earth if you were able to stop it from moving around. In space there is no friction and all the planets are nicely lined up so they do not affect each other's path. This was different about 4.5 billion years ago when our solar system was formed. It just all settled in the many, many years that were to come.

Edit: It needs to be explained that mass and weight are two complete different things. Weight is the force that is acting down on you, where mass is the actual 'weight' an object has. If you take a plane and make a parabolic flight, once you go down you feel weightless. Zero gravity. It is expressed in g-force and 0 g-force is when you could float through the air. You also experience this in a rollercoaster (much cheaper alternative). Once you go down with high speed, you will actually start to become weightless, hence the safety harness to keep you aboard. Once you go up, you feel very heavy, and you are pushed inside your seat.

However do you actually lose weight while on a ride in a rollercoaster? Would a scale tell you, you weigh different when measuring before or after the ride? The answer is no (unless you puked, but that is never a significant change). You remain your same body as you go along in the ride, yet you feel heavier. You did not gain in mass, obviously, you are still the same person, but you feel heavier and that has to do with the kind of force that (what's in the word?) weighs upon you.

But still, the speed that keeps the orbits stable cannot occur by just a chance of big bang.  A sudden explosion wouldn't be able to create that level of order and balance in the solar system.

But still, the speed that keeps the orbits stable cannot occur by just a chance of big bang.  A sudden explosion wouldn't be able to create that level of order and balance in the solar system.

Although we cannot know for sure what the universe was like when it started, it must have been quite chaotic, true. However our solar system was not created right when the big ban occured. The estimated age of the universe is about 14 billion years, while our solar system is dated not to be older than 4.6 billion years. How they know the universe is 14 billion years old? The thruth is, they don't know for sure. They have been measuring the expand rate of other galaxies and based on that, they calculated the age. However we do not know if the galaxies are actually slowing down, accelerating or they have maintained the same speed of expanding. So 14 billion is the most valid, based on current findings.

As for our solar system, they have studied isotopes. Isotopes have a very linear decay time. Some isotopes have a decay rate of just nanoseconds, others have decay rate of billions of years. Using them allow you to determine the age of a rock after it was last melted or disturbed sufficiently to re-homogenize its radioactive elements. Now again, the age 4,6 billion is not truly certain. One has to find a rock which isotopes have decayed further, to show the earth is even older than thought. Again, 4,6 billion is the most valid, based on current findings.

How come there came order and balance in our solar system? It has to do with clumping of mass. As with the experiment I have explained earlier, the marbles move together once they get close to each other. Add enough marbles and you end up with a planet, or a sun (though it would be made out of glass edit: if you only use marbles). The mass of the planets as of today were distant enough from the mass of the sun, not to be taken in. Although our solar system may seem stable and balanced right now, it is far from stable. The planets have formed and are in a stable orbital path around the sun, that much order and balance has taken place. But apart from that it is still very much chaotic as we humans experienced just recently this year. A meteor of significant size crashed into the earth. There are still many asteroids out there, not ordered and balanced nicely and still form a threath to life on earth.  Luckily for earth however, we have Jupiter and Neptune. Two large planets, with greater gravitational pull than the earth. Asteroids coming from the outskirts of the solar system, or from outside the solar system, first have to pass those two. Chances are higher they are taken in by Neptune and Jupiter.

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 05:28:55 PM

Quote from: Rama Set on May 08, 2013, 05:08:32 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 04:54:58 PM

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

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Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Newton's law of gravitation can be shown to be mathematically equivalent to Kepler's laws and can be used as an accurate descriptor of all classical orbits.  Richard Feynman shows the equivalence rather quickly in his lecture, "The Character of Natural Law".

Right, as I said, the conclusion is based on assumptions about the nature of the universe.

That's not what I said.

No, that is what you said.  You said Newton's Law of Gravity is mathematically equivalent to Kepler's Laws.  Kepler's Laws are based on the assumption that the Earth is not flat and that the planets are revolving around the sun.  In other words, it's based on assumptions about the nature of the universe.  And I see no reason to put blind faith in that.

Sorry about the delay in response.  I've been feeling kind of groggy lately.  I blame the painkillers.  And I went back to work today.

Quote from: Rama Set on May 08, 2013, 05:38:35 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 05:28:55 PM

Quote from: Rama Set on May 08, 2013, 05:08:32 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 04:54:58 PM

Quote from: Shmeggley on May 08, 2013, 04:44:17 PM

Quote from: Roundy the Truthinessist on May 08, 2013, 10:37:32 AM

Okay, guys, keep focusing on the easy target if that's what you feel you need to do (I understand, arguing for RE when the Earth is so obviously flat is hard!).  Just remember that you're arguing with a single goofball with, um, opinions of his own that most of us consider, um, controversial, and not the FES when you go after him.

Haha, sorry Roundy, Sceptimatic just comes up with stuff that seems to demand a response. Not that you don't I guess, but he's on another level.

I understand, and you're probably performing a service.   I think he desperately needs to be taught.

Quote

Anyway, to your comment, yes, things fall at a measurable rate. However that's not all we have to go on. It just turns out that not only does gravity explain trajectories of falling objects on Earth, it also explains the motion of the Moon, stars and planets.

I don't believe this has been definitively proven.  It is just accepted because it appears to elegantly explain something that was once considered a mystery, based on long-held assumptions about the nature of the universe.

Quote

Also, local variations of acceleration can't be explained by the Earth simply accelerating at a constant rate.

I agree that if this phenomenon is a real one it is a problem with the accelerating Earth model.  It's one reason why as a zetetic I feel I can only definitively conclude that things appear to fall at a measurable rate.

Newton's law of gravitation can be shown to be mathematically equivalent to Kepler's laws and can be used as an accurate descriptor of all classical orbits.  Richard Feynman shows the equivalence rather quickly in his lecture, "The Character of Natural Law".

Right, as I said, the conclusion is based on assumptions about the nature of the universe.

That's not what I said.

No, that is what you said.  You said Newton's Law of Gravity is mathematically equivalent to Kepler's Laws.  Kepler's Laws are based on the assumption that the Earth is not flat and that the planets are revolving around the sun.  In other words, it's based on assumptions about the nature of the universe.  And I see no reason to put blind faith in that.

Sorry about the delay in response.  I've been feeling kind of groggy lately.  I blame the painkillers.  And I went back to work today.

Every single scientific theory is based on some sort of assumption, it has to.  The assumptions are not blind assumptions either, they are one of potentially more than one plausible description of nature.  There is also evidence to support that view of the universe.  But what makes Kepler's Laws and Newton's Laws worth anything, what makes them special, and what makes them completely unlike FE hypotheses, is that they accurately describe the motion of the planets.  If you think that predicting the existence of Neptune and where to find it within one degree of its position is trivial, then that is your prerogative, but I think that is spectacular, and that it is prohibitively unlikely to be chance.  But this site offers nothing that can come remotely close to that level of success and they did this 400 hundred years ago.

That is what you have contend with, and it is the standard you should hold yourselves to.  Any theory you come up with to describe a Flat Earth should be able to make bold predictions, they should be testable, and the predictions will have to prove true.