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If you placed a rock on a paper towel, the towel will sag and anything else on the paper towel lighter in weight than the rock will fall towards the rock.

Would I be wrong in assuming that space time is like a paper towel and that anything with mass causes lighter objects to fall towards the larger mass because of this funnel-like well the sag creates?

Take a look at this picture of a wormhole - that is where I got my hypothesis from...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Worm3.jpg

2006-08-17 09:58:52 · 4 answers · asked by ? 1 in Science & Mathematics Physics

4 answers

Gravity "bends" spacetime in all three dimensions; it's nothing like a paper towel sagging under the weight of a rock (that's due to electromagnetic forces, which are an entirely different matter). This results in "straight" lines being curved in the presence of a gravitational field. The greater the field, the more extreme the curvature. However, keep in mind that gravity is an extremely weak force. Ordinary everyday objects do have a gravitational field, but it's far too small to measure except with extremely sensitive laboratory instruments.

2006-08-17 10:08:25 · answer #1 · answered by stevewbcanada 6 · 1 1

That is not a picture of a wormhole. It is a graphic representation of what a wormhole, it they exists, might 'look' like. I believe Albert Einstein used this analogy first. I know my high school science teacher beat you to it.

2006-08-17 19:53:51 · answer #2 · answered by STEVEN F 7 · 0 0

Who can test that theory with the earth or any planet or moon sized body without going to the center or the core? No one has yet to do that even to prove if its layers actually go along with the current proposed model of a solid earth.

2006-08-17 17:47:43 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0 0

Yes. But I think Einstein beat you to it.

2006-08-17 17:05:05 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1 0

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