Comment on Anon is a physicist
kromem@lemmy.world 6 months ago
Lucretius, writing in 50 BCE:
Whatever falls through water or thin air, the rate Of speed at which it falls must be related to its weight, Because the substance of water and the nature of thin air Do not resist all objects equally, but give way faster To heavier objects, overcome, while on the other hand Empty void cannot at any part or time withstand Any object, but it must continually heed Its nature and give way, so all things fall at equal speed, Even though of differing weights, through the still void.
- De Rerum Natura book 2 lines 230-239
VindictiveJudge@lemmy.world 6 months ago
He’s still arguing that heavy objects would fall faster when dropped anywhere on Earth, though, specifically bringing up air resistance as the reason. His argument is that they would fall at the same rate in a vacuum.
HandwovenConsensus@lemm.ee 6 months ago
But that’s true, isn’t it? Putting aside volume and shape.
VindictiveJudge@lemmy.world 6 months ago
He’s close, but not quite there. Air resistance slows things, and in a vacuum all things will fall at the same rate, yes. But, weight has zero impact on the rate an object falls through the atmosphere. Air resistance affects things based on their shape and permeability. He’s still saying that a heavier object will fall faster in atmosphere, all other things being equal, which is false.
MrConfusion@lemmy.world 6 months ago
Hi. Physicist here. You are absolutely wrong. The mass of an object does not affect the magnitude of force of air resistance which acts upon a falling object. But the acceleration that object will have is given by Newton’s second law as Force divided by mass. So a heavy and a light ball with the same shape will experience the same air resistance, but the heavy ball will care less and thus fall faster.
dreugeworst@lemmy.ml 6 months ago
But it does affect the downward force acting on the object. Given two objects of the same shape but with different masses, one will indeed fall slower than the other. This is because the ratio of weight to surface area differs a lot between the two. Here’s a calculator from NASA you can play with, and a relevant passage from the same page:
www1.grc.nasa.gov/…/termvel/
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world 6 months ago
A ping-pong ball sized lead shot and a ping-pong ball both fall at the same rate though air?
That doesn’t sound right.
andmonad@lemmy.world 6 months ago
I don’t think he’s talking about air resistance but about density, which is pretty close to the notion of weight and also affect fall speed. He probably came to this conclusion by looking at how things fall (or not) through water.