Re: FREEFALL OR NOT

[John Mallinckrodt <ajmallinckro@CSUPOMONA.EDU>]

On Thu, 14 Oct 1999, Richard Tarara wrote:

> Yes, of course that is more correct--but then the term 'free fall' is
> somewhat less descriptive for this situation and the deep space, no forces
> at all one.

Rick,

I think you are objecting to the term "free fall" in situations in which
there seems to be no "falling" going on.  Nevertheless, I would challenge
you or anyone to tell me how to determine the distance from some "large
gravitating body" at which free fall becomes something else.  In the book
Spacetime Physics, Taylor and Wheeler use the term "free float."  That
term has the opposite disadvantage.  Nevertheless, both "free fall" and
"free float" refer to absolutely indistinguishable locally detectable
conditions and one can always produce arbitrary local gravitational forces
by departing from those conditions.

John Mallinckrodt      mailto:ajm@csupomona.edu
Cal Poly Pomona          http://www.csupomona.edu/~ajm