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Galileo and inertia?


Hello2

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I would like to know more about inertia, or laziness, and I have a question: Galileo was the first to discover that in a vacuum heavy objects don’t fall faster than lighter objects.

That was a counter-intuïtive discovery, and I wonder:

Is it possible that he also discovered that lighter objects fall faster than heavy ones, and this is also important for the orbits of satellites?

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Please correct me if I am wrong but shouldn't there be a distinction made between inertia and acceleration? Is it inertia that causes both the hammer and the feather to fall at the same rate? The OP connects Galileo to inertia? Is there a connection, or is it the wrong term?

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7 hours ago, jajrussel said:

Please correct me if I am wrong but shouldn't there be a distinction made between inertia and acceleration? Is it inertia that causes both the hammer and the feather to fall at the same rate? The OP connects Galileo to inertia? Is there a connection, or is it the wrong term?

Inertia is resistance to change of acceleration and is a function of mass and velocity. Acceleration due to gravity (free fall) is not affected by mass, so it should be clear that inertia does not affect free fall.

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14 hours ago, StringJunky said:

Inertia is resistance to change of acceleration[/quote]

resistance to change of velocity.

14 hours ago, StringJunky said:
Quote

and is a function of mass and velocity. Acceleration due to gravity (free fall) is not affected by mass, so it should be clear that inertia does not affect free fall.

 

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