Timeline for What does it mean to say "Gravity is the weakest of the forces"?
Current License: CC BY-SA 2.5
14 events
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| May 11, 2011 at 7:23 | comment | added | jdm | @Smashery, all: Actually the question why gravity is weak in some peoples mind and strong in others is interesting in its own right! Physicists usually decide gravity is weak because they compare the gravitational force with the EM force between, e.g., two electrons. There is some arbitrariness to this. I could also say "gravity is a strong force - but an electron only has very tiny gravitational charge!". It's like comparing apples to pears. There is a scale factor one has to decide on. | |
| Feb 1, 2011 at 6:21 | comment | added | user346 | @Smashery you have surely not offended anyone :) However please do keep in mind that on a site such as this you should expect answers from experts. Obviously these are likely to be technical. | |
| Feb 1, 2011 at 5:43 | comment | added | Smashery | Lawrence and Gordon are obviously knowledgeable; I thank them both for their efforts (and have upvoted their excellent answers elsewhere); but these answers here were not useful in helping me understand. The appropriate thing to do to filter out answers which do not help answer the question is to downvote them. My apologies if I have offended anyone by doing so. | |
| Feb 1, 2011 at 5:40 | comment | added | Smashery | What Spencer and others have done in their answers is shown me where my misunderstanding is: my forgetting that gravity is purely attractive, whereas the electromagnetic force has both attractive and repulsive forces. By reminding me that these positive and negative charges usually balance each other out, it all made sense to me. Yes, I'm a layman when it comes to these things; a good answerer will try to get inside my head and help me with my real misunderstanding. | |
| Feb 1, 2011 at 5:37 | comment | added | Smashery | @space_cadet- No, it's not the best answer to my question (and this may sound arrogant; but I think, as the person who is having trouble understanding something, I should be the judge on whether it has helped me understand). This answer may be a completely accurate reason as to physical reasons why gravity is stronger; but if you read the question, I'm not disputing the fact that gravity is weaker: I already believe the physicists who say it is. I'm saying it doesn't make sense to me since gravity seems to have more of an effect on me. | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 21:27 | comment | added | user346 | @Spencer I guess it boils down to a difference in perspective. When you get to a certain level you realize that there's no two ways about it. Either you discuss the physics aspect or the pop-science version. Or perhaps I am just a jaded cynic. In any case @Smashery is entitled to his perspective and so are you. | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 21:18 | comment | added | spencer nelson | @space_cadet I understand that this is the deeper reason, but it's also impenetrable to someone just trying to understand how physics interacts with daily life. Perhaps this is a discussion which should be had on meta - it seems like we are returning to the very-common 'how advanced should physics.se be' question. | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 21:02 | comment | added | user346 | Hi @Spencer. If you were to ask a physicist today the question "why is gravity the weakest force" then of the many ways of stating the problem, one way is to note (as @Lawrence did) the tremendous difference between the natural mass scale of gravity and that of the standard model. This is what is referred to as the "hierarchy problem". Ask a postdoc or a professor about it and I'm sure they would be delighted to explain. The tidbit about S-duality is only one of many ways to find a resolution to this question, another one being the Randall-Sundrum model as @Gordon mentions in his answer. | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 20:25 | comment | added | spencer nelson | @space_cadet Not sure why this is such a crazy request by @Smashery. He wants an explanation of how to reconcile everyday phenomena with commonly cited theory: "Gravity seems to be the most important force in my life, yet people say it's the weakest. Explain." Do you see how talking about Chan-Paton factors might not be a satisfactory response? | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 19:42 | comment | added | user346 | @Smashery this is the best answer to your question. To repeat myself, please do not down-vote unless you actually have a good reason to do so. And if you do do so, don't proclaim it. It hurts your credibility. | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 14:33 | comment | added | pho | Then look for answers on a psychology site, not a physics site. We're supposed to be answering physics questions, not explaining how your mind works. | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 4:03 | comment | added | Smashery | To explain the down-vote: the question isn't about why gravity appears weaker. It's the fact that, in my mind, gravity doesn't appear weaker. | |
| Jan 31, 2011 at 2:58 | history | edited | Lawrence B. Crowell | CC BY-SA 2.5 |
added 8 characters in body
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| Jan 31, 2011 at 1:59 | history | answered | Lawrence B. Crowell | CC BY-SA 2.5 |