3.0 KiB
[RST] [C] Why the Apple Falls (short story)
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Author: u/amennen *
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URL: http://alexmennen.com/index.php/2018/03/09/why-the-apple-falls/
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Score: 47
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Created: 2018-04-26T18:44:09
Post:
Comments:
u/dalitt [+12] (6 hours later)
Really great, though the final explanation was kind of clear from the beginning (maybe because I’ve read a lot of science fiction). I like the names a lot — Isaac (Newton) and Emmy (Noether).
u/amennen [+8] (8 hours later)
Thanks. I wasn't quite sure how obvious to make it; you're not the only person who thought it was too obvious too quickly what was going on, but I've also had someone read the whole thing without realizing it wasn't set on Earth. Hard to make it work for everyone, I guess.
u/dalitt [+3] (8 hours later)
I didn’t mind — it was cool to see how someone in that situation might figure it out!
u/Ristridin1 [+3] (a day later)
It should have been obvious, but I didn't figure it out either until I almost reached the end. I was confused when 'halfway to the other side of the world' was equated to 'going up towards the sun', but my brain somehow jumped to the conclusion that Isaac was suddenly asking a different question. There's probably a term for your brain trying to explain inconsistencies with nonsense; for me this is one of the clearer examples. I even noticed my confusion. Dammit lesswrong, that was supposed to help me!
I did figure it out the second time the 'sun in the center' was mentioned though, near the end.
u/SignoreGalilei [+4] (a day later)
How does the 'sun' on this world work? It seems clear that there is some sort of nighttime, but is there a shade blocking the sun from view some of the time, or is the sun really a giant light that gets turned off or something? BTW I really like how you build up from tiny inconsistencies to the whole picture.
u/amennen [+2] (a day later)
or is the sun really a giant light that gets turned off or something?
That's what I was picturing when I wrote it.
u/Psy-Kosh [+2] (6 days later)
Awesome. Also guessed the explanation because physics geek.
Nitpick though: "But the reason pulling the rock inwards makes you spin faster is that the rock keeps moving at the same speed, but since it's closer to you, a full circle around you is shorter, so it can go around you in less time while moving at the same speed."
Ignoring friction/etc, pulling it in actually speeds it up because you're adding energy to the system (the work to pull it in). Alternately, in terms of angular momentum, to conserve angular momentum as radius is reduced, the velocity (not just the angular velocity, but the linear velocity) has to increase.
u/amennen [+1] (6 days later)
Oops. Thanks for catching this. I will think about how to fix it.
u/amennen [+1] (3 months later)
I finally got around to fixing this.