this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2024
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Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

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Gravitational force is never truly zero. If it has mass, it is pulling at you, though it may be so close to zero that you don't realize it.

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[–] radix@lemmy.world 43 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Any given star is constantly emitting an unimaginably large, but finite, number of photons. A tiny few of them travel tens to hundreds of (Earth) years, only to end their journey in your eyeballs.

[–] NOT_RICK@lemmy.world 17 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Even crazier when you consider how long that photon bounced around inside the star before escaping out into space

[–] rockerface@lemm.ee 5 points 2 years ago

Screw photons, neutrinos are where the real numbers start racking up

[–] Jilanico@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago

And from the photon's perspective, it all happened in an instant 🀯

[–] AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.world 22 points 2 years ago (1 children)

They’re also exerting a minute amount of electrostatic attraction or repulsion.

[–] kometes@lemmy.world 10 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Technically correct, but the gravity from stars is dwarfed by the gravity from yo momma.

[–] Enkrod@feddit.de 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Actually tru for every value of yo mama, from xs to xxxxxxxxxl

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

So, horoscopes are true? /s

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 7 points 2 years ago (1 children)

While you are affected by gravity, it'd have less of an effect than other things.

For instance we can scientifically show your birth date does influence your personality, as long as you don't live on the equator.

The further North/South you go, the more pronounced the effect becomes.

That is to say that from large samplings, you can see that extroverted traits are more common with babies born in Spring (in the Northern hemisphere), while introversion is more associated with being born in autumn.

That ofc doesn't mean that a person who was born in November will automatically be less extroverted than one born in March, but if you pick two random people from those groups, it's X% more likely that it is so.

Astrology is complete fucking bullshit though.

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Astrology is complete fucking bullshit though.

I know. That's why I added the "/s" tag.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

I was just pointing that out because me saying birth months can affect personality isn't me validating any aspect of astrology.

Just wanted to make sure no-one thinks I'm trying some feeble defense of it.

[–] nephelekonstantatou@lemmy.world 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

While that's technically true, it's good to note that this doesn't excuse astrology, which is based on the false fact that the gravity of celestial bodies influences our decisions in everyday life. The gravity of you Karen influences my "daily life" more than these celestial bodies and especially your belief in astrology. πŸ˜„

[–] Jilanico@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago

Agreed 🀝

[–] flakpanzer@lemmy.world 5 points 2 years ago (4 children)

Wait, I thought gravity is not a "force" but the curvature of spacetime, so at some point the curvature gotta end or be disturbed by some other source nearby, right? A star so far away is not exerting any "force" on me as I already have two massive objects Earth and Sun twisting the spacetime around me so much. I could however be getting some gravitational waves from that star but not sure how strong they'd be or if they reach me at all (again given Sun and Earth).

(NOTE: I'm an engineer not a physicist so my understanding could all be wrong)

[–] mumblerfish@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago

Eh. It's not really a definite distinction. Even in GR you formulate effective potentials and the gradient on those potentials are still called forces. Then, what is a force on microscopic scale? It is the exchange of force mediators, like photons. If gravitons exists, then there is even a similar framework for defining a force on a microscopic level for electromagnetism as well as gravity. Furthermore, electromagnetism (qed) also has an interpretation as a curvature, as it is a gauge theory, just not a curvature of physical spacetime, and that does not disqualify if from being called a "force".

[–] bjoern_tantau@swg-empire.de 2 points 2 years ago

With gravity wave detectors we are able to measure gravitational waves from two merging black holes distorting space-time even here on earth. The distortion is less than the width of the nucleus of an atom.

[–] NaibofTabr@infosec.pub 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

"What you do... is something that the whole universe is doing in the place you call 'here and now'." Alan Watts

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

That's called microgravity

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 2 points 2 years ago

So small, you can’t see it without a microscope

[–] raynethackery@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago

Well, Proxima Centauri better stop pulling on me or I'm going to smack it.

[–] Kolanaki@yiffit.net 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

And they call it the weak force. Bah!

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 10 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] Kolanaki@yiffit.net 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

A weak force, then? I know I've heard gravity described as the weakest force before... But I also got a D in physics so... πŸ€·πŸ»β€β™‚οΈ

[–] hperrin@lemmy.world 9 points 2 years ago (2 children)

It is the weakest force, but there’s also a force named the weak force. It is many orders of magnitude stronger than gravity. But it’s not as strong as the strong force.

[–] rockerface@lemm.ee 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Technically, they're weak nuclear and strong nuclear forces, but yeah, we love confusing names in physics. Like quark flavours, which include top and bottom

[–] swab148@startrek.website 6 points 2 years ago

What if we kissed under the Higgs-Boson 😳 Haha j/k... unless πŸ₯ΊπŸ‘‰πŸ‘ˆ

[–] tdawg@lemmy.world 5 points 2 years ago

We should rename gravity to weakest force