Arugement against the Copernican system comes from the effects one would expect to see if the Earth?

Question

Part of the argument against the Copernican system comes from the effects one would expect to see if the Earth moves. This argument has more depth than most accounts of it realize.

The first part of the argument questions "Why don't we see things left behind by the Earth as it spins and travels around the sun?" For example, why does a ball dropped from the top of high tower fall to the base of the tower instead of being left behind by the spinning earth to finally hit the ground some place far away?

The second part of the argument asks "Why don't things get thrown off by the spinning earth in the way we see other things thrown from spinning objects, such as water flying from a car tire after it rolls through a puddle?"

Answer 1

I will try to be as simple as possible without any technical details....

The earth does rotate around the sun, and the effects you talk about should be true for rotating objects, but you are not taking into account something....

We don't feel the rotation by ourselves or by the effects you talk about because gravity is much greater. If the earth suddenly spun faster, then you would notice what you speak of, or maybe if gravity instantly disappeared, you would also see the effects.

Right now we are under both influences, what we feel and measure is a combination where the spinning turns out to have a very small effect when taking gravity into account.... and If i might add, the efects are small BUT measurable!!!... and get this, completely predictable by the Copernican system.

Answer 2

I like Heinz's answer as well as some of the others, but I want to point out a few things.

First, we DO measure affects from a spinning Earth. Since the Earth spins, it is not a perfect "Inertial Frame of Reference." An Inertial Frame is one, simply, where Newton's Laws of Motion are valid. But it's pretty darn close to it. So we generally ignore the effects of the Earth's rotation. But not always.

One effect of a rotating Earth is that objects closer to the equator experience more outward force due to the spin of the Earth (and their spin with the Earth - like a bucket of water swung over the head, the water stays in the bucket due to this apparent force). This is measurable, and is an important fact for those in the rocket business. Rockets launched closer to the equator require less fuel to reach escape velocity because of this effect (the escape velocity is slightly lower). That's why we launch the shuttle from the tip of FL.

Second effect is known as the Coriolis Force. You remember the myth that toilets spin the other way when you flush them south of the equator? Well, that's not true (from what I hear), but the basis for it is true. There's a slight deflection of missles and projectiles (and wind currents) when they are fired over long distances due to the rotation of the Earth. North of the equator they go one way and South of the equator they go the other. How much of a deflection? I don't remember, but I do remember this story. When the British went to war over the Faulkland Islands in the Southern Hemisphere, their ships that fired the long range missiles had an automatic correction to account for this deflection. Problem was, they had it set for the Northern Hemisphere. They were missing their targets by exactly twice the distance of the deflection. So they had to correct it to go the other way after they figured out the problem.

So, your arguments are flawed for the examples given, but more than that, the actual predicted effects of a spinning Earth has been measured and documented.

Now about the Earth going around the Sun...the very fact that we can predict the location of the planets and their orbits so precisely - I mean we send probes to the outer planets that rely on those planets being exactly where they're supposed to be, is a testament to the accuracy of Newton's Law of Gravity and Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. Both of these Laws support the fact that the Earth orbits the Sun. To be more specific, the Earth and Sun orbit their center of gravity, which just so happens to be very close to the center of the Sun. If that wasn't the case, we would know it by the inaccuracies due to the models and predictions.

But I guess, if you want to put the Earth at the center of the universe, according to Einstein's Theories of Relativity and Cosmology, the Earth being the center is just as good as any other postion being the center. But trust me, the Math works a LOT easier if you just put the Sun in the center of the solar system and let it orbit the center of the galaxy. But, technically, it is perfectly legal to make the Earth the center of the universe...

And if it really makes you happy, let the center of the universe be whereever you are at any given moment. Then you can say that from your reference frame, the universe really does revolve around you.

Answer 3

The first part, both the tower and the ball are moving at the same speed. it is exactly the same raeson why you land on the same spot if you jump straight up, and why a hot air balloon does not head east at about 1000 mph.

The second part. Gravity is an interaction between two masses. The earth attracts me in the same way I attract the Earth, but the earth is bigger so it wins.

You could walk through the deepest part of your theory, and not get your ankles wet, I'm afraid.

Answer 4

Point one:
Gravity holds everything close to the planet and is moving at the same speed as earth.
Point 2:
Anything dropped from a tower is travelling at the same speed as the earth's surface and continues at that speed as it drops towards earth (in other words the momentum it has does NOT get killed by being dropped!)
Point 3:
The escape velocity from earth is 7.5 miles/sec or about 27,000 mph. So, IF the earth at the equator was speeding along at that speed, things WOULD spontaneously launch themselves into space.
But the earth only has a speed of only just over 1,000 mph at the equator. This DOES help in launching rockets from there in the direction of the spin of the earth (towards the East) and lowers the fuel requirement.

Answer 5

Whose argument is this? It is appropriately pre-Newtonian. But a more convincing argument might be: itsn't it OBVIOUS that the sun goes round the earth? One powerful argument in favor of the Copernican theory is that it's a much simpler description of the universe than what came before.

Answer 6

Eris, the main important dwarf planet basic, develop into got here upon in an ongoing survey at Palomar Observatory's Samuel Oschin telescope by astronomers Mike Brown (Caltech), Chad Trujillo (Gemini Observatory), and David Rabinowitz (Yale college). We formally pronounced the call on 6 September 2006, and it develop into known and introduced on 13 September 2006.

Answer 7

1. the ball is travelling at the same speed that the earth is rotating at when its dropped
2. a force called gravity, the water off the freshly washed car is due to the fact that the car is accellerating away from the water...I.E. the car has just changed the rate of speed in comparison to the water

Answer 8

The church lost on this issue long time ago. If you want to argue something forever try creation.