Can somebody explain gravity to me?

Question

if i were to attach an object to a tennis ball with velcro, it would stick, but if I were to spin it fast enough [like a planet}, centrifugal force would force the object to fly away from the ball, right?

So how do "spaceballs" (planets, etc) manage to glue objects to their surface?

kiru? booyakasha, respek sista. u may have a white avatar, but me kno u iz a sista becausa de way u use "da" instead of "the" ;)

ok, me try da dust ting {dam, ya got me talkin like dat now).

OK, I tried it, and the dust still flies out as if it were in a centrifuge.

RESPEK SIS! x

sorry talempley. still none the wiser.

If it's down to mass, then why isn't a speck of dust attracted to a 20' diameter ball of uranium? (without the help of static)

If I'm wrong, please message me to correct me. I was going to try an experiment, but you'd cringe at what what iranian government wanted to charge me for a 20' ball of uranium!

OU812: you should apply for a knighthood.

Don't laugh, it worked for Sir Isaac Newton!

Sorry Frank, but by my thinking, the water is held in the spinning bucket by centrifugal force, correct? (please correct me if not).

There are 2 ways 4 the water to escape - slow the spin enough to allow the water to escape the force - or spin it so fast that the mass of the water can break through the base of the bucket!

When u spin the bucket, the base of the bucket stops the water flying away, but spaceballs have no such base to stop objects flying away from their surface.

Answer 1

gravity is a natural pulling force produced by all matter.

gravity is directly proportional to the mass of the object(s) involved and inversely proportional to the square of the distance of that/those object(s) with another object.

big objects have more gravitational pull than smaller objects thus big objects tend to pull small objects towards them and not the other way around.

there's a scientific/mathematical formula for this but i won't bother to explain that.

going back to your spaceballs, planets are massive enough to attract smaller objects, eg, rocks, to its surface without the objects falling off or flying off to space despite the quick rotation of the planet. perhaps, if you could make one planet to rotate fast enough such that its centrifugal force is greater than the planet's required escape velocity, then the objects would be thrown off the surface and into space.

Answer 2

we have to distinguish which pulls are gravity pulls and which are electro static pulls(push).
gravity is the pulling force between two objects or more that have masses. It is physical characteristic of mass (don't ask me why it has such characteristic).
Rotating an object will creates centrifugal force and somehow can balance the gravity force between the object and the mass in the center. If the centrifugal force is greater then the object will leave the mass, and if less the object will moves toward the mass otherwise it will stay "floating" rotating around the mass, as we have in our galaxy. We call the rotational path orbit.
We and other objects on earth have gravitational force greater than the centrifugal force due to rotation of earth (1 rotation per 24 hour) that makes us stick on earth. Not with satelites, they are floating in our sphere because the gravitational force equals to centrifugal force.

Answer 3

there are a couple of theories about how gravity works.
If it is thought of as a force (Newtonian physics) then it is a weak force kind of like magnetism that lets objects attract to each other. It is much weaker than magnetism though.
In Relativity theory (Einstein) space and time are warped by mass. The image is of a trampoline with a bowling ball on it. Other balls warp the trampoline in their own areas. if they are close enough their warped areas (gravity fields) combine and they roll into each other. Both of these theories have many fine points that I won't go into. you have enough for a start and can look up more if you need it. Relativity is more accurate,makes better predictions and we would never have put a man on the moon without it. It is the correct theory at this time, but for most purposes Newton's is close enough and simpler to work.

Answer 4

Objects in space, such as planets, have such immense mass that all of the other objects around them are attracted to them. This attraction is known as gravity. Gravity is due to mass. All objects in the Universe from the planet Jupiter, to the pencil sitting on your desk, to the air that you breathe... has mass and therefore has attraction to other objects with mass. That is why we don't go flying off of the Earth into space. Our mass is attracted to the Earth's mass. The gravity we experience is overpowering any centrifugal force that is acting upon us.

If the Earth stopped spinning, our weight would multiply exponentially because of the absence of centrifugal force.

*Your experiment with a 20' ball of uranium and a speck of dust wouldn't yield a result unless you could place them both in a vacuum. This would be the only way to isolate your objects and observe their attraction. If you could not place them in a vacuum then the Earth's gravitational forces would overpower any gravitational forces between the speck of dust and the 20' ball of uranium and yield your experiement void.

In the experiment of "going about our daily lives" there are two forces acting upon our bodies at all times. Those are gravitational attraction and centrifugal force. The two forces want to produce a completely opposite result from the other. It just so happens that the gravitational force on our bodies is stronger than the centrifugal force on our bodies.

The people giving me a thumb's down must be clueless about physics.

Answer 5

It is not difficult to explain.
Gravity is a property of mass. If an object has mass it possesses gravity. The more massive an object the stronger it's gravitational pull. The tennis racket DOES have a gravitational pull on the ball, however spinning the racket will exert a force greater than the gravitational pull of the racket. The Earth has a stronger gravitational pull than the racket so the ball will be attracted to the Earth.
The spinning of the Earth would send us flying out into space, if there was no gravity. Gravity holds us onto the planet.

Answer 6

Gravity is the force that retains things to larger objects and with the earth we are controlled by both gravity and air pressure (which is the result of gravity pulling down the air) but what you are talking about is escape velocity which is the speed necessary to overcome the gravitational pull. While the earth is traveling at great speed, the gravity or pull of the vast volume of the earth holds us anchored, if however we increased the rotational speed of the earth, we would finally reach escape velocity. At the moment we are like water in a bucket that is swung around in a circle. The momentum reached is capable of holding the water to the bottom of the bucket...the earth is that bucket. By increasing rpm, the we reach escape velocity and are able to overpower gravity.

Answer 7

Your velcro is an artificial force. Glue, solder, etc., the same. Gravity is an attractive force intrinsic to all matter - which is positivly proportional to the sum of the two masses being attracted, and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them - or, between their centers of mass. If one could accelerate the moon its orbit would expand. Speed it up enough and its gravitational "teather" would not be strong enough to keep it "attached" to earth. (Unfortunately, you're too late to get a really good answer: Albert Einstein is not currently available!)

Answer 8

I believe that the earth is a huge magnet with a + magnetic force at the center and a - force at the end of it's field that repels against the force of the suns energy. The energy of the sun expands outward to it's ends and everything in the path floats on what would be a field of energy that binds the earth into it's own field of energy which creates the force of gravity once the - magnetism end is repelled back to the earth. The energy created between the space when two opposite ends are combined.

Answer 9

De "SPACE BALL" as u say, do spin really fast, but de gravitational force actually depends on de masses of de planets n de distance of de obejcts from de planets. Planets r huge in size n de objects attracted 2wards them would be smaller in size.
Why dont u take an example of small dust particles n you!!!!

Answer 10

It's easy. What goes up must come down. An apple doesn't fall far from the tree, but it does fall. Does that help?