Experiment to test F=ma

[John Cuthber]

The computer does not need to compensate for an effect which is a figment of your imagination.

I presume that you have not done as Swansont suggested and checked the literature.

 

The equivalence of gravitational and inertial mass has been well documented. There's even a wiki article about it (which shows that you did no research, or you would have found it)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass#Inertial_and_gravitational_mass

It says

"The first experiments demonstrating the universality of free-fall were conducted by Galileo. It is commonly stated that Galileo obtained his results by dropping objects from the Leaning Tower of Pisa, but this is most likely apocryphal; actually, he performed his experiments with balls rolling down inclined planes. Increasingly precise experiments have been performed, such as those performed by Loránd Eötvös,[16] using the torsion balance pendulum, in 1889. As of 2008, no deviation from universality, and thus from Galilean equivalence, has ever been found, at least to the precision 10−12. More precise experimental efforts are still being carried out."

 

so if there's an effect it is at least a million times smaller than you claim.

Edited October 8, 2011 by John Cuthber

[Yaniv]

Again you send me to look at a different experiment than requested.

Can you please find the results of the specified experiment ?

 

 

[John Cuthber]

No, what I did was show you that the experiment you suggest (It's called thermogravimetry) has been done millions of times and did not give the result you expect.

And you ignored it and made up some silly idea about the computer correcting for it.

Then Swansont pointed out that your idea is at odds with a well documented fact- the equivalence of gravitational and inertial mass.

And you ignored that.

What are you looking for? an eMail from God?

[Yaniv]

No, I am not waiting for an email from God. I am waiting for an email from an experimentalist with the results of the specified experiment.

[John Cuthber]

Then I suspect that you will wait a long time.

After all, those who know about these things- like the people who make the analytical equipment I cited earlier, already know what the outcome will be so they are not going to bother repeating the experiment.

[swansont]

No, I am not waiting for an email from God. I am waiting for an email from an experimentalist with the results of the specified experiment.

 

Why can't you look for the articles yourself?

[Yaniv]

When a balance is heated its readings change, this is why it important to keep it at a constant temperature. In thermogravimetric machines the missing weight predicted by my theory could be interpreted as part of a "noise" and compensated before display.

 

I searched the literature to the best of my ability and could not find this experiment. This is why I posted this thread.

 

 

 

[DrRocket]

When a balance is heated its readings change, this is why it important to keep it at a constant temperature. In thermogravimetric machines the missing weight predicted by my theory could be interpreted as part of a "noise" and compensated before display.

 

I searched the literature to the best of my ability and could not find this experiment. This is why I posted this thread.

 

 

 

 

Why would anyone in his right mind heat the balance ? Your theory was that the weight of a test mass would decrease with increasing temperature. That is contradictory to physics.

 

A good experimentalist would likely use an apparatus other than a commercial balance. A sane experimentalist would not heat the measuring apparatus any more than absolutely necessary.

 

Try reading a physics book. The Feynman Lectures on Physics would be a good start.

[Yaniv]

No one in the right mind will heat the balance, but heat convection and conduction and radiation will inevitably heat the balance.

 

 

 

[John Cuthber]

Rather than repeatedly asking us for more data you should be providing us with some.

You are making the extraordinary claim.

Why have you not provided extraordinary evidence?

 

You say "I searched the literature to the best of my ability and could not find this experiment" but also, when presented with the existence of commercial machines that are tailor made to do the experiment and which show that it is done every day all over the world you say "I am not familiar with the machine. ".

Do you want to think for a moment about what that says about the best of your ability?

 

Then you say " Maybe the computer compensate for weight as a function of temperature ?"

Well, with a quick swipe of Occam's razor I'm going to say that it doesn't because it doesn't have to. Of course, it couldn't because that's exactly the effect it is looking for but that's not the point. You are making things up to support your idea.

 

Do you have any actual evidence that your idea isn't rubbish?

If not, why should we waste time on it?

[swansont]

What would be the mechanism of mass changing with temperature? The additional kinetic energy? If it's that, then you should see mass differences in mass spectrometers if the energy is different. If it's not center-of-mass kinetic energy, then why would it be temperature dependent? Mass changes should shift spectroscopic resonances. Why don't we see that? Atomic clocks should detect frequency changes at the part in 10^12 level easily, when we transitioned from hot atomic beams to cold-atom clocks; there was a temperature change of about 8 orders of magnitude.

 

You're looking for an experiment that either occurred a century ago because it was so basic, or hasn't been done because the effects have been ruled out at a much finer level by other techniques.

[Yaniv]

I have just spent a few hours more looking for thermogravimetric results showing weight of heated metals does not change at increasing temperatures. Sorry, can't find it. Can you please help ?

[John Cuthber]

I typed thermogravimetric analysis results into google and asked it to show me images.

There are lots.

Here's the first

http://www.andersonmaterials.com/tga.html

There's a flat bit on the graph.

That's where the mass does not change with temperature. Most of the balance parts will be made of metal. That is experimental refutation of your silly idea.

 

Why couldn't you do that?

Anyway, since you are making some great claim about the whole of physics being wrong, perhaps your next post will actually include some evidence to support it.

Not complaints about the stuff I posted. Not a demand that we provide more information Not a request that we explain anything more.

Let's face it, if you can't provide some evidence for your idea it's not worth spending time reading about it. You just look like a troll.

So let's see some evidence or let's see you accept you were wrong.

[Yaniv]

The evidence for an effect of temperature on weight comes from Glaser and Dmitriev papers. Don't know how you missed it. Dmitriev et al who work in the field of precision measurements had reasons to speculate that temperature has an effect on weight. What are the reasons ? Why his results were ignored and not addressed by the scientific community ?

 

The graph you provided me show changes in weight of a sample. This is what you want from the machine, only weight of the sample. You don't want the machine to show temperature-dependent changes considered as noise. If I was the manufacturer I would correct noise before display to show only changes in weight of the sample. If I was the consumer I would also like a simple display with noise corrected. Are you sure the final graph is not being modified in any way before display ?

 

If you are not going to look for the missing weight predicted by my theory you will never find it. According to science it is not there.

[John Cuthber]

"If I was the manufacturer I would correct noise before display to show only changes in weight of the sample."

How would the machine know what to correct for? Magic? How could it distinguish the change due to decomposition of the sample from a change due to your suggested temperature effect?

 

OK, back to the things that you claim as evidence: a couple of papers.

 

Glaser- the author of the paper, and therefore someone who we can agree knows what he is on about- said

" Buoyancy, adsorption and convection influences are discussed. Quantitative comparisons show that, under such conditions, it is predominantly free convection forces which change the apparent mass."

and just to remind you, Swansont cited that for you earlier.

 

The paper you are using as evidence says there is no change in mass, just the effect of convection currents and so on.

 

I presume the other paper you are referring to is this one or something like it.

http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1105/1105.2666.pdf

 

It says"The decline of interest to such researches, which followed later, might be explained by the authority of the general theory of relativity according to which the temperature dependence of force of gravitation practically can not be observed"

Do you understand what that means.

It means that if you are right then relativity is wrong.

Does your GPS work?

If it does then you have just tested relativity to a high degree of precision. Much greater than, for example, anything you could hope to do with a vacuum balance (they exist, btw and the effect you are wittering on about hasn't been noted. That's odd because if there were an effect then whoever noted it in a real repeatable way could expect to get a Nobel prize for his trouble, yet they chose not to mention it.)

 

 

However the real problem with that paper is that, from the point of view any decent science it is lousy.

 

They blindly state that "the error in reading out the changes of weight in time did not exceed 30 mcg." Without saying what orifice they pulled that number out of.

There's no error analysis. No control experiment. Nothing.

 

That paper would not have been published if I had refereed it because it simply isn't good enough. I would expect better from a student writing up a practical exam.

There's no way to exclude the effect of the RF field they use for heating as the cause for the change in reading. (That's a particularly major fault if it's an electronic balance)

So,

once again

I'm asking you to provide the extraordinary evidence you need to get us to take your extraordinary claim seriously.

[Yaniv]

To distinguish between effects of temperature on balance and on sample I would heat the chamber without a sample and tell the computer this amount of change is noise, remember and correct before display every time when running the program. When a sample is heated any additional deviations from "no sample" to be displayed.

I have a couple of papers, not great and with some problems, but showing that temperature has an effect on weight. You don't have any paper showing weight does not change at increasing temperatures. Thermogravimetric graphs showing no or mild decline over a range of temperatures could be explained with insulators, materials that reflect rather than absorb heat.

Glaser thinks air-related factors contribute to the entire change in weight. He can not make this claim without showing in vacuum weight does not change at all.

Dmitriev thinks temperature decreases rate of fall. I told you in my theory rate of fall should not change.

You seem to come up with all the reasons in the world why NOT to do the experiment. I understand why. All of science is hunging on a few micrograms. A good scientist though will get on with the experiment.

[Schrödinger's hat]

I would think a much better experiment would be to get a double-insulated (possibly vacuum-filled) chamber with a glass window, a microbalance, and a laser

place the sample in the chamber, weight it, then hit it with the laser until it's red-hot.

 

If you really care about this, and you can find no relevant experiments maybe you should run it yourself?

Making the chamber out of a thermos should not be too hard; lasers are cheap.

The most expensive part would be high quality optics which do not heat up when hit with the laser.

Construct the apparatus, then ask nicely at the nearest insitution which owns a microbalance whether you, or a willing member of staff could place it on the balance and press the button.

Results should be immediate and scientists will be more inclined to reproduce your experiment if you confirm your hypothesis.

 

If you are indeed right, the Nobel prize money should more than off-set your costs, so what have you got to lose?

[Ophiolite]

A good scientist though will get on with the experiment.

When do you expect to complete it and present the results?

[John Cuthber]

Actually, I have been bluffing.

I have a theory that, when hung from a balance and heated in a vacuum the test object will turn into a unicorn. I have kept quiet about this because I wanted to win the Nobel prize. However I don't have the money to fund the experiment so I might as well just put the idea forward and see if someone else wants to do my job for me.

 

I'm now going to spend several posts complaining at Yaniv because

1) he won't test my idea and

2) he cannot find a single paper that shows my idea is false.

 

Go on Yaniv- knock yourself out.

 

In the meantime, perhaps you can explain 2 things for me.

When you do thermogravimetry you put the sample in a crucible of some sort- often platinum or fused quartz.

 

So what you actually heat is, for example, 100 mg of limestone and 200 mg of Pt. However, the balance doesn't know that. All it senses is the change in weight.

If you were right then you would heat the sample and it would decompose. It loses very roughly 50% of its weight so, afterwards you are heating 200mg of Pt and 50mg of CaO.

How does tha balance know how much change in weight to correct for?

How come it doesn't "correct" for the loss of weight due to loss of CO"?

 

 

The second question is much simpler.

Why have the makers of these balances not claimed the Nobel prize?

 

I'm still waiting for you to find a paper that shows that the sample doesn't turn into a unicorn too.

[Yaniv]

For years I tried to find scientists to do the experiment. When I was talking about the truth they were talking about unicorns and when I was talking about an experiment they were talking about nobel prizes. Do you now understand why I could not find a scientist to do the experiment ?

The balance could know how much weight to add from the temperature. For example, at 50degC add 1mg, at 100degC add 2mg...

I think the makers of the balance did not claim a nobel prize because they didn't have a theory to predict a link between temperature and weight. In their scientific mind they see it as noise.

I am not an experimentalist. I don't have the skills to set up the apparatus and electronics. This experiment should be carried out by the best experimentalists on the globe.

[swansont]

You never answered the question about whether this should show up for kinetic energy of a single particle and what the cause is if it isn't due to KE. Is it dependent on the temperature alone, or the energy added to the sample?

[John Cuthber]

"When I was talking about the truth they were talking about unicorns"

Three points.

1 you haven't answered my last two questions properly.

2 Whose "truth" are you talking about and

3 Where are the papers saying that no unicorns are produced?

 

The balance makers might not have a theory, but that's not the point.Why have they not published the observation?

 

Incidentally, you don't have a theory either.

What you have is a silly idea based on reading a bad paper and misunderstanding a good one.

[Yaniv]

The truth is the link between temperature and weight has not been thoroughly investigated and further experiments are required.

In my theory weight reduction depends on heat particles added to the sample. So in this sense it depends on the energy added to the sample rather than the temperature of the environment.

[John Cuthber]

"The truth is the link between temperature and weight has not been thoroughly investigated and further experiments are required."

Actually the truth is that it has, but you don't understand the experiments.

 

 

However, the truth of the link between temperature and unicorns has not been thoroughly investigated.

I am disappointed, but not surprised that you have not found a single paper addressing this issue.

Have you even tried?

 

What you are putting forward "In my theory weight reduction depends on heat particles added to the sample." looks a lot like the phlogiston theory

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phlogiston_theory

which was dropped many years ago because it didn't work.

Why are you trying to resurrect it?

[mississippichem]

My differential scanning calorimeter works just fine on the assumption that weight is not a function of temperature. I'm sure there are DSC machines out there with enough sensitivity to measure the proposed phenomenon if it exists.