N:dlzc D:aol T:com (dlzc) wrote:

Dear Bill Hobba:

"Bill Hobba" wrote in
message
news ...

There is no big deal. If you consider the
bucket rotating in an inertial frame then you
get the standard curved water shape as a result
of centrifugal forces. But the question is
how does the water know how to curve? - the
answer is - because it is rotating relative to
an inertial frame. But wait a minute - an
inertial frame is simply a conceptual
conventional standard of rest with a conceptual
coordinate system - how

can

acceleration wrt to something conceptual cause
the water to curve? The answer of course is
that it is no more a problem than the forces
that

appear

when you accelerate wrt to an internal frame
(it fact it is a result of those). To get
around these 'problems' Mach proposed it was
rotation relative to the distant stars. It has
long been known that a frame at

rest

relative to the distant stars was inertial.
This provided the 'thing' it accelerated
relative to when an inertial frame was
otherwise just

something

conceptual. Me - I think it is a load of
codswallop - but each to their own. The answer
is obvious - Newton's first law is in fact
saying the conceptually there always exits a
frame where particles move with

constant

velocity unless acted on by a force - whenever
we see non inertial forces appear it is obvious
you must be accelerating wrt to some frame -
even if

it

is just conceptual. The is not to say Mach's
principle is wrong - it may

be

correct - I just think it is not required.


It would be a little hard to spin the Universe to
find out, wouldn't it?

How would you feel if Gravity probe B showed
frame dragging? Wouldn't this apply to the
"bucket test"?

(In case you hadn't figured it out, I pretty much
like Mach's interpretation.)

You will like it even more once you realize that a
clock is an inertiameter. The Earth does not only
drags the frames, it creates its own inertia. Every
inertiameter, formerly called clock, shows that on
Earth inertia is a little bit higher, one in a
billion. We just need to look at the inertiameters
that are carried on board of the gps-satellites :
these run fast, because there is a billionth part
less inertia at their altitude. Mach's principle is
confirmed by every clock, but we morons looked right
past it, all the time, or should I say, with all our
inertia ? :-)

Uwe Hayek.

--
To be controlled in our economic pursuits,
is to be controlled in everything -- F.A.Hayek.