The "Intelligent Falling" Theory

[The Yankee]

Actually, what is funny is when they write an article parodying a group, and that group turns around and uses it as evidence for their argument. Like their most famous, "Harry Potter promotes Satanism" article.

I did once find a radical pro-life blog that copied an "opinion" piece from The Onion that said the writer couldn't wait to have her next abortion. This was then followed by 780 comments of "What the heck is wrong with you? Why did you take that seriously?"

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Yeah, and I think the Chinese media jumped all over the "Congress threatens to leave Washington if they don't get a new Capitol building" as proof of Western decadence.

 

[oagersnap]

Oh, it's from The Onion... Didn't check the link, but I thought I'd seen it somewhere before.
Hmm, I feel somewhat stupid now for believing it was real. But you never know what thos crazy fundamentalists will think of next.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Actually, I was reading something the other day (can't quite remember where) that this argument actually predates their article, someone made a parody back in 2002.

 

[silver 2039]

Heh....I was almost about to bang my head against the wall before I saw the link....

 

[Gilder]

Whew, dodged a bullet there.

 

[Erik Mesoy]

Gravity doesn't go at a speed. It is caused by curvature in space and time.

Oblique approach: The Earth is in an orbit. If the Sun were to suddenly vanish, how long would it take for the Sun's gravitational effect on Earth to cease, thus making the Earth travel in a straight line instead of a circle-approaching ellipsoid?

Now divide the Earth-Sun distance by that time and you have the "speed" I want.

---

Alternative response: Ha! You gravitationists can't answer the question, you're dodging!

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Try this link for size:

http://metaresearch.org/cosmology/speed_of_gravity.asp

(Quick answer: very fast).

 

[nivi]

To paraphrase:

"Religion's problem with science is that it can't explain everything.
Science's problem with religion is that it explains everything but makes absolutly no sense whatsoever."

 

[brennan]

Oblique approach: The Earth is in an orbit. If the Sun were to suddenly vanish, how long would it take for the Sun's gravitational effect on Earth to cease, thus making the Earth travel in a straight line instead of a circle-approaching ellipsoid?

The change in the gravitational field would propagate at light speed. So about 10 minutes, roughly speaking.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Not according to the link I posted above. It claims the field would propogate at a speed > 20000000000c.

 

[Masquerouge]

The change in the gravitational field would propagate at light speed. So about 10 minutes, roughly speaking.

Really? Are you implying gravity is carried by photons?

 

[brennan]

*Quotes the above source at you*:

Gravitational radiation, which surely does propagate at lightspeed

 

[Fugitive Sisyphus]

Really? Are you implying gravity is carried by photons?

Not carries by photons but moving at the same speed as photons. Nothing can faster than light and gravity is no exception.

 

[bhsup]

Before this gets too far, I feel I need to again remind people that "Creationist" does not automatically mean belief in a 6,000 year old Earth. Those are "Young Earth Creationists."

Let's not ball up everyone together now, okay?

 

[Masquerouge]

Try this link for size:

http://metaresearch.org/cosmology/speed_of_gravity.asp

(Quick answer: very fast).

great link!

 

[Masquerouge]

*Quotes the above source at you*:

Not carries by photons but moving at the same speed as photons. Nothing can faster than light and gravity is no exception.

Apparently gravity does, and gravity waves is not equivalent to gravity.

The strongest argument is that in order to accurately determine the position and movements of objects in space, you have to take into accounts their real positions in an instant t - not their future positions. In other words, you have to postulate that gravity is instantaneous.

If you try to calculate orbits by applying a delaying effect to gravity (saying it can not go faster than the speed of light) it is impossible to get the correct results.
Also it is impossible to have stable orbits if you postulate that gravity propagates no faster than the speed of light.

 

[brennan]

That link is a bit misleading actually, having skimmed through it. It tries to suggest that gravity acts instantaneously, rather than with a LS delay, but I rather think the same results would be expected if you represented a gravitational field as space-time geometry without resorting to instantaneous effects. Guess what relativity does?

Col is probably the man to ask.

 

[Masquerouge]

Col is probably the man to ask.

Agreed. Even though the orbit calculation argument seems pretty convincing

 

[brennan]

The strongest argument is that in order to accurately determine the position and movements of objects in space, you have to take into accounts their real positions in an instant t - not their future positions. In other words, you have to postulate that gravity is instantaneous.

Or that gravity is a durable distortion in space-time. Why does the Earth act as though the sun is where the sun is? because the geometry of space around the sun is constantly distorted by a gravitational field. If I moved a magnet to a point within the magnetic field of another magnet do I have to wait for an LS delay before a force is felt? No; the field (and its associated electroweak interaction particles) is already there.