Saturday, October 17, 1998
Edward Parker's question about the nature of the centrifugal force led three NSS staffers to do a little research. We got back to Edward fairly quickly with some quick and dirty stuff, but sifting through the mound of links to find the best of them took a little more time. The bulk of the work was done by Craig Kott, who wrote the original item about tides that prompted Edward's inquiry. Craig is not a man to do things by halves, so you'll find an eclectic mix of links here.
The basic answer we gave to Edward was that centrifugal force is one of a small handful of forces that science calls fictitious. The fact of its existence rests with the perceptions of the person experiencing its effect and the range of other, real forces at work at a given moment. Its odd non-existence, though, doesn't keep science from taking advantage of it in centrifuge machines. Nor does knowing centrifugal force isn't a true force do anything at all to dampen our enthusiasm for a really ride on the roller coaster in the lunch room at Netsurfer World Headquarters.
Yes, science takes advantage of centrifugal force, even depends on it in some large measures. Is it all just a matter of definition? If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then why is it fictitious? How can something so palpable be a fiction? Those questions made us pursue the question for Edward.
Here's Craig's offering.
Dr. Peter Carruthers was a physics professor at the University of Arizona in Tucson, until his death from liver disease last year. Dr. Carruthers led the effort to bring the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC) to Arizona. He was also a musician and an author who had written books on complexity and trout fishing. In 1995, driving down Campbell Avenue at excessive speed in his 1978 Toyota Land Cruiser, Dr. Carruthers sustained serious injuries when his vehicle overturned while trying to round a curve. Ironic!
A physics professor will be quick to tell you that centrifugal force doesn't really exist, regardless of what you feel when riding in the car or on a roller coaster. No real force acts on the water to hold it in the bucket as you swing it over your head, or on the uranium in your centrifugal separator, or the particles in the cyclotron in your basement. So they would have you believe.
In keeping with our commitment to provide the information needed to make those important daily decisions about buckets and cyclotrons, we collected an impressive array of material related to centrifugal and centripetal forces. You may investigate the matter fully for yourselves to reach your conclusion. Yes, Edward, when the prof says "there is no centrifugal force", his statement is always true when understood in the present tense. But denying its existence is only half the story.
Publisher: Arthur Bebak
Editor: Judith David
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