Re: Challenge to Jim Scotti

Article: <6ht5g6$90i@dfw-ixnews8.ix.netcom.com> 
Subject: Re: Challenge to Jim Scotti
Date: 25 Apr 1998 17:11:34 GMT

In article: <6hpens$gml@pmgm.Stanford.EDU> John Ladasky writes:
>> You've made a leap!  Stop and explain this leap!  We're OK
>> while moving in a straight line, toward the gravitational giant.
>> That's your inverse square law.
>
> That's only half of the story, and you're deliberately ignoring the
> other half -- or else you don't understand it.  The orbiting object
> (let's call it A) also has an initial velocity, v.  This velocity is
a 
> vector in three dimensions.  Given two point masses, the orbiting
> object will *never* crash into the orbited object (let's call this 
> one B) unless this velocity vector is pointed *exactly at* or 
> *exactly away from* the object being orbited.  And if A is 
> moving away from B at faster than the escape velocity, it will 
> never return.

(Begin ZetaTalk[TM])
You're leaving the arena of comparing your theories on ellipses
alongside your gravity theories.  In this premise you state, above,
you're stating that an orbiting body that is turning TOWARD a
gravitational giant can maintain its speed, even while being turned,
continually, from a straight line path.  You are claiming that the
curve is the natural state, but bodies move ALWAYS in a straight line,
the curve only being a complicated situation where other factors are
present.  We explained sometime back just why your theory, on its face,
would inevitably cause an orbit to decay, just as your satellite orbits
decay, and are asking our emissary, Nancy, to repost our statement on
this.  
(End ZetaTalk[TM])

As requested, the existing ZetaTalk on Centrifugal Force.  They are
stating, as I understand it, that your theories of the vectors has an
intrinsic drag in its, and thus the motion would not remain the same
unless there was a PUSH.
(Begin ZetaTalk[TM])
Motion is not a thing, immutable, unchangeable, eternal, once born at
the start, as during a big bang or whatever, never to go away.  Motion
is not a thing, it is a result, a reaction, and as such it changes. 
Human astronomers explain orbits as a balance between a straight line
motion tangental to the sun and a gravity tug to the side, and assume
that the forward motion is translated into a centrifugal force that
never erodes as it is a thing.  This looks good on paper, but examine
the reality a bit closer and the contradictions and inadequacy of that
argument emerge.

Each time an orbiting object corrects its straight line path due to
gravity tug, its straight line path would be diminished in its
intensity.  Is this not the case in your all-too-familiar situation of
having to put on the brakes when driving?  The car is in motion along a
flat plane, propelled continuously only as long as the foot is on the
gas pedal.  This equates to the forward or tangential motion of the
planet.  Should one brake simultaneously while still stepping on the
gas, the car slows.  This equates to the interference in the orbiting
planet's tangential motion caused by gravity.  Now take the foot off
the pedal, and you do not have the same forward motion as before.  It
was not a thing, but a reaction, and now it is a reaction to the push
caused by the foot on the gas while starting from the car's state of
rest.

Just so, the orbiting planet requires a continual push, from something,
in order to continue to move.  Left without this push, the object would
steadily spiral into the sun, and humans would scarcely have had time
to evolve into intelligent creatures pondering this scenario as the
spiral would not take all that long!  This spiral is what happens to
your Earth orbiting satellites, which are often kept aloft only due to
a puff now and then from the jets built into them.  Left alone, they
spiral to Earth, the gravity tug affecting their forward motion each
instant.  The gravity tug is not strictly a sideways tug, as in all
cases the planet's path is pointed away from the sun, however slightly.
 For any given instant moment: 

- draw a line representing the planet's straight line path, 

- draw a second line representing the path the planet is being set upon
by the gravity tug, essentially a second tangent to the sun, 

- the angle between these two lines is the degree of backward tug that
the planet is experiencing.

Thus, there is erosion in the forward motion, which is not a thing but
a reaction.  In order to keep the planet continuously revolving, there
must be a push, and a push there is.  It is caused by the swirling
matter in the sun's core, which creates fields of influence such as
magnetic fields that affect the orbiting planets to varying degrees
depending upon their composition.  Why do you suppose that planets
orbit all in the same direction?  Is it by accident that this same
pattern presents in all solar systems?  Retrograde planet motion is the
extreme exception, so the fact that planets invariably revolve in the
same direction should be a compelling clue to anyone seeking an
explanation for why planets continue to revolve.  
(End ZetaTalk[TM])