Seven Things That Don't Make Sense About Gravity

A terrible list.

#1. "What is gravity?" That is the same as saying, "We don't know everything about gravity," or even better, "This list exists."

#2. "Why does gravity only pull?" To my knowledge, the strong force, one of the four (or three) fundamental forces besides gravity, weak and electromagnetic (or electroweak) only pulls too. Am I correct?

#4. "Why is gravity fine tuned?", better phrased as "Why does gravity have exactly the value that it does, thereby allowing matter and the universe as we know it to exist?" But that same question applies to several other physical constants, so in my mind, it is just part of a larger question.

#5. "Does life need gravity? ...Life of all stripes seems to need gravity to work properly [sic]" Do fish need gravity? Amoebae?

I'm with you. It is garbage reporting.

Do fish need gravity?[i[

Just a guess... but, fish might need gravity to keep them mostly in the water, so they can employ their gills for the purpose for which gills have evolved, and indirectly, I suspect it is gravity that keeps water attached to the planet.

Just a guess... but, fish might need gravity to keep them mostly in the water, so they can employ their gills for the purpose for which gills have evolved

Nope, the surface tension of the water would keep them nicely inside, at least if they are smallish fish. Larger fish would have enough momentum to let them break the surface easily.

... and indirectly, I suspect it is gravity that keeps water attached to the planet.

But that is not the question (as posed by the article.) The question was not "Does life on Earth need gravity to stay in their current environment, e.g., birds in the air, fishies in the sea." The question was, "Does life need gravity?" Pretty obviously, life does not. On the other hand, I could have phrased my answer more clearly. Fish don't need gravity in the same way they need need oxygen, water, worms to eat, etc. Gravity is not a biological necessity. Gravity is a necessity for maintaining their environment, as you say.

I recall reading a sci-fi novel which proposed an ecosystem evolved in the atmosphere around a black hole. The fellow apparently did some calculations and discovered that there could be sufficient gas density in a donut-shaped region surrounding a black hole to support life. All the native lifeforms had evolved in that zero-g environment and were all flyers of some kind; bird-like things with three wings arranged radially around a torpedo-shaped body, gas dirigible-like things, etc. Ha! It was Integral Trees, by Larry Niven. The environment struck me as unlikely, but once you accept that, the lifeforms seemed plausible.

Perhaps you didn't notice that I responded to your question, "Do fish need gravity?", not to the OP's, "Does life need gravity?" Few fish can live out of water for very long.

Gravity is not a biological necessity. Gravity is a necessity for maintaining their environment, as you say.

Pardon me, but I think you have stumbled into a fallacy of logic. I'm betting that biologists consider environment to be a biological necessity. Then, it follows that if gravity is necessary for maintaining an environment, therefore gravity is a biological necessity.

You may want to be cautious poking around at gravity, you just might float away when you find the answer ?

Let's bring gravity down to earth.

For a simpleton (I said it) like me, would someone say
concisely why we are not flung off into space with the
speed and spin of the world? What is the maths for this?

Yes, the "gravity" is greater than the centrifugal force,
(otherwise I wouldn't be here) but is it? (disbeliever)
In that, is there some other "force?" (dark side)

Conversely is there a limiting mass? particles thrown "off"?
Where as the "free to run" sea water remains? (stays)
(please don't say escape velocity etc. - is there more?)
Waters affected by the planets (tides) but not the earth spin?

I find it very confusing. The gravity affecting my mass is as
nothing compared to the speed and spin of the earth? (in space)
So why am I not spaced out? No enough medication I presume.

Learned friends can you show me the other (dark) side?

jt.

I can stop taking the pills then..

An eighth thing that really doesn't make any sense about gravity:

That list.

Fellow victims, recipients and interpreters of gravity:

Not in any of the replies have I found opposition to the claim that there is only one kind of gravity. There is another gravity that is as important, if not more influential, than an apple falling off a tree and that is the gravity of a good idea or theory.

Although it is not a measurable unit (well maybe the sales figures or party members could be an indication), it has influence on all our lives and on a daily basis. Like the participants that have reacted to this post, it was gravity towards the subject that caused our responses, well, at least mine. This gravity would not have sucked me in, if it would have concerned trivial matters. I would not have responded to the forces of the 7 questions which have nothing to do with my kind of proposed gravity.

Gravity needs substance of what ever kind. If an idea or theory has no substance it will not attract thought or discourse, which gives them mass, of some kind. As with "real" gravity, mental/spiritual gravity is of real importance for man kind. We could start with world religions, which have sucked in many generations of humans or could use the game of chess as another. The more refined the rules the more it attracts the followers, players. This second kind of gravity is everywhere and attracts everything. It even follows us in our dreams and can not be avoided there, like with "real gravity", that can be overcome by the ability to fly or fall with out resulting in death or injury.

The higher the quality of an idea,theory, philosophy or political party the more attraction it displays. As one would say "it has gravity". Even a black president is a messenger of gravity in some ways. He has attracted more than others and the opponents have great difficulty neutralizing his attraction, so it must be real, although not measurable with any of our diagnostic tools.

If a football team does not fill a stadium, it has no gravity. The spectators will stay home or visit the stadium of the winning team. 'To pull a crowd' is what it is called and music and the other arts (including engineering) work in the some way. No substance no attraction, no gravity.

I just thought I should throw this interpretation of mine into the discussion and don't tell me that this kind of gravity is not as important as the one one the table. It is a "New Tone" and I think it's more interesting than wondering about a broken egg on the floor. It got there due to carelessness and not because the earth sucks. If we are not careful and look after the effects of the "New Tone Gravity" we will not only have eggs on the floor but on our faces.

Welcome to the world of "Newtoneian Gravity", Ky.

Ky,

You have outweirded me, which is a real achievement.

-ask anybody.

Anybody?

Has he got gravity?

I mean that irresistible force, coming from nowhere else but from being able to detect attraction? My post has been going through my head all day, while I was trying to control a three way venturi, using the one pressure source. Although attracted by the irrelevant issues of gravity it seemed relevant at many stages of my endeavor.

Over coming gravity and its derivations, is not a problem but living with them seems to be, for some. Out side a box, or inside, weird it is. Definitions are in dire need of placing them were they need being. In a real world with unreal attractions galore. Gravity is just another word for attraction, in what ever field you want to use the terminology. The rules stay the same in the end, even if you would try to explain my 35th wedding anniversary, in a few days time.

Calling gravity an old hat would not do the terminology justice but this is not a world were justice counts, is it? If so, we would all be coming down at the same speed, but we don't, do we?

Without weirdos, the planet would be as predictable as an apple falling. Welcome to the club Trans! Hope your still with the drift of what I am trying to state, which is:

Gravity is more than a force that brings things down. It could be a force that causes confusion and discourse as well as consolidating different forces to a point were equilibrium is achieved, to the good of all and at the cost of nobody. Your still with me?

Talk to you soon my friend, Ky.

There maybe much more to the picture then meets the eye ?

Much more than all of your sensory organs could detect anyway, I suppose. Words are like sound and smoke, they dissipate into nowhere, even with out gravity, Ky.

Sophia Loren has gravity. Barnie Frank has anti-gravity. Susplain me that.

Gravity is a thought, if you think hard enough (believe), what we understand as gravity can be altered (levitate)

Gravity at a quantum level (as far as the human can understand) is an energy without mass or volume. Only a tiny phenomena (infinitley small) in the grand scheme of the space time continuum.

Perhaps we will never understand (in this life), scientifically, the gravity of the situation.

Lets make this really simple: Robin Williams ( yes, the comedian ) once said " There is no gravity, the earth sucks." What if there is no gravity and we are all held on by some giant earth internal vacuum system? Would that explain, since things boil at lower temps in a vacuum, why there is lava?

Enough said.

Cheers!