Preferred reference frame

[Johnny5]

A thought has been coming to me lately.

 

The title of this thread doesn't mean a frame in which the speed of light is c.

 

It has to do more with the work of Mach.

 

In an otherwise empty universe, how can you tell whether or not something is spinning?

 

Also Newton's bucket has been on my mind.

 

Also the principle of equivalence has been on my mind.

 

But what has really been on my mind is Galileo's law of inertia, or if you prefer, Newton's first law of motion.

 

Postulate 1: Somewhere in the universe is the center of mass of the universe.

 

Ok so postulate one asserts the existence of a preferred location in space, a special place in the universe.

 

Now, suppose you were located there, and you could watch the motion of all the suns, stars, galaxies, moons, planets everything.

 

And you can turn your head so as to look in any direction.

 

View the universe in frames of reference of this kind.

 

What Kind?

 

Ones in which the center of mass of the universe is permanently at rest.

 

Now, there is still the possibility that some of you will choose reference frames which are spinning wildly.

 

But in any of these kinds of frames, Galileo's law of inertia will be false.

 

Which brings me to where I am.

 

I am considering reference frames with origin at the center of the universe, and in which Galileo's law of inertia is true.

 

Are these frames special, in the sense that Mach's problem is solved?

 

That's my question.

 

The inertial frames are going to be ones in which a free particle is at rest, or moving in a straight line in one of the frames.

 

So if you have just an eight ball that exists if there is a particle on the surface which isn't subjected to any force then either it should be at rest or moving in a straight line.

 

If the eight ball appears to be spinning, then Galileo's law is false, which implies that such a frame isn't inertial.

 

So the point then is this... special frames (or preferred frames) are ones in which Galileo's law is true in.

 

Somehow, Galileo's law of inertia unifies physics.