If I were in a zero-gravity environment with a tennis ball.
The tennis ball would be attracted to my gravity, bringing it close to me?
2007-11-20 03:20:14 · 8 answers · asked by Jansen J 4 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
All the answers are correct. But I thought I'd do the math to see just how much acceleration to you the ball would have as you float around in your zero g chamber.
F = ma = G mM/R^2; where m is the TB mass, M is your's, G is the gravity constant, and R is the distance between you and the ball. For grins, let's assume M = 100 kg, m = .001 kg, R = 2 meters, and G, as always, is = 6.6 X 10^-11.
The m's cancel out in ma = GmM/R^2 leaving only a = GM/R^2. So we don't need to know the TB's mass. It also means that, as long as M >> m, any mass m will accelerate at the same rate towards you at mass M. If M ~ m, the two masses will acclerate towards each other at about a/2 because of the conservation of momentum. Let's see what that rate a might be.
a = GM/R^2 = 6.6 X 10^-11 X 10^2/4 = 1.6 X 10^-9 m/sec^2; that's a = .0000000016 in decimal format. By comparison g = 9.81 m/sec^2, which is the acceleration of any mass m on Earth's surface. Which means g on Earth is 9,810,000,000 times bigger than a in that zero g chamber.
It'll be a long time before that TB hits you. We can find out just how long from R = 1/2 at^2; so that t = sqrt(2R/a); where we found a = 1.6 X 10^-9 m/sec^2 = 16 X 10^-10 and were given R = 2 meters. Thus t = sqrt(4/16 X 10^10)By eyeballing the numbers, we can see that t ~ .5 X 10^5 seconds ~ 14 hours if I did the unit conversion to hours right.
2007-11-20 04:13:01 · answer #1 · answered by oldprof 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
To be perfectly frank there is no such thing as zero gravity, what is assumed to be zero gravity is a net result of all gravitational force is zero.
By the universal law of gravitation any two objects with mass exhibit some force of gravitational attraction, the force may not be enough to overcome other forces by their will be a gravitational attraction.
2007-11-20 11:37:23 · answer #2 · answered by Brian K² 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
yes indeed, it would be attracted by you (and you by it). Given that your inertia is much bigger, the ball would move towards you.
even in your day to day environment, the ball gets attracted to you - you just don't notice the effect because the force is so very small, that it gets dwarfed by other forces such as Earth's gravity, air friction, etc.
hope this helps
2007-11-20 11:25:44 · answer #3 · answered by AntoineBachmann 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
yes, but the force between you and the tennis ball is very small. It may take a very long time for the tennis ball moving to you.
2007-11-20 11:25:54 · answer #4 · answered by yyc031403 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Yes. If the ball was 5 feet away from you, then after about 3 hours it will finally arrive.
The problem though, is that initilal velocity of the ball must be extremely small, or it will escape to infinity.
2007-11-20 11:28:56 · answer #5 · answered by Alexander 6 · 3⤊ 0⤋
Inertia would be overcome. Gravitational mass is strictly proportional to inertial mass. There is no "cut-off point". Luckily, otherwise we wouldn't have nice things like stars and galaxies.
2007-11-20 11:49:50 · answer #6 · answered by SonniS 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
yes, as all but the first answer have indicated.
in zero gravity, its battle of inertia i guess.
if you were very obese, it might hit you quite hard....
2007-11-20 11:30:09 · answer #7 · answered by browian_ratchet 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Yes, but not enough to overcome its inertia. (the ball would stay where it was)
2007-11-20 11:25:19 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 4⤋