[Physics] Physics Digest, Vol 3, Issue 22

[cj at mb-soft.com]

To Mr. Serret and the others: 
There is a nice example of the sort of sloppy logic which I had recently referred to.




When Kepler lived, he was brilliant in developing his Laws.




But a hundred years later, Newton had noticed some minimal errors, specifically about the Gravitational equation, where Newton made a correction where both masses need to be included in the calculation, which we all use today.




However, even Newton made a logical error there in neglecting to apply his Fluxions / Calculus.




In order for that Gravitational equation to be more accurate, the Mass of the Sun needs to include all the collective masses in the Solar System, and so he should have done a Summation to determine that mass, which is clearly slightly greater than we generally realize. An interesting detail is whether that mass of the Sun (for the gravitational equation) might also need to include the mass of the Earth, where we would participate in both factors of the Gravitation equation.




However, our knowledge of the Gravitational Constant is rather poor, only around three digits accuracy. Until some day in the future when we know G more precisely, we simply tweak the value of G to correct for the true total mass of the Sun in that equation.




My concern here is not so much in the math involved, but more in being really careful in applying truly strict logic, to enable Physics to grow and advance for the future.




Carl Johnson









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