I love Spock. [FONT=Arial]Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I speak from pure logic. If I let go of a hammer on a planet that has a positive gravity, I need not see it fall to know that it has in fact fallen. [/FONT]
Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I speak
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Re: Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I sp
What's always gotten me about that line is the implication that there are planets with negative gravity. How could that happen? How would they even form?
What's always gotten me about that line is the implication that there are planets with negative gravity. How could that happen? How would they even form?
Re: Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I sp
Spin acceleration greater than the gravity generated by the planet?
A strong electromagnetic core that pulls the pieces of the forming planet together despite the acceleration force from the spin? (Pieces would presumably be made of some element highly susceptible to magnetism.) Seems possible, but if I were the first starship captain to come across such a world, I would suspect artificial construction.
Re: Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I sp
But that's not a planet anymore; at best it's a ring of particles.
I haven't worked out numbers for such a thing but I feel confident supposing the lifespan of an electrostatic or magnetostatically bound planet would be ... well, short on the geologic timescale, at least. Artificial constructions are imaginable, and given the nigh-omnipotent beings we see throwing creation around in the Original Trek they might even be annoyingly common. If something could only last (say) 10,000 years, that's long enough for humans to have to deal with it as a fixed feature.
My best guess at making Spock's ``positive gravity'' comment makes sense is to suppose there's some things dubbed planets that have negligible gravity. If you can drop a hammer and you have two weeks to get back to it before it falls appreciably you might as well say there's no gravity worth bothering about; but that leaves the problem of why someplace like that would be dignified with the name of 'planet'. Maybe the locals insisted.
But that's not a planet anymore; at best it's a ring of particles.
I haven't worked out numbers for such a thing but I feel confident supposing the lifespan of an electrostatic or magnetostatically bound planet would be ... well, short on the geologic timescale, at least. Artificial constructions are imaginable, and given the nigh-omnipotent beings we see throwing creation around in the Original Trek they might even be annoyingly common. If something could only last (say) 10,000 years, that's long enough for humans to have to deal with it as a fixed feature.
My best guess at making Spock's ``positive gravity'' comment makes sense is to suppose there's some things dubbed planets that have negligible gravity. If you can drop a hammer and you have two weeks to get back to it before it falls appreciably you might as well say there's no gravity worth bothering about; but that leaves the problem of why someplace like that would be dignified with the name of 'planet'. Maybe the locals insisted.
Re: Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I sp
That wouldn't work, because, mathematically speaking, any number above zero is positive, no matter how small. Not to mention that anything called a planet would have to have a strong enough gravitational field to pull its own mass into a gravitationally relaxed spheroid, so we're talking an acceleration of at least several dozen centimeters per second.
Ultimately, it's just a sloppily written line of dialogue.
That wouldn't work, because, mathematically speaking, any number above zero is positive, no matter how small. Not to mention that anything called a planet would have to have a strong enough gravitational field to pull its own mass into a gravitationally relaxed spheroid, so we're talking an acceleration of at least several dozen centimeters per second.
Ultimately, it's just a sloppily written line of dialogue.
Re: Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I sp
Spock love? Negative gravity? Not sure either one is enough to maintain the conversation much longer, but it seems like there are TWO points. :P
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