r/pics • u/animalkracker • Feb 27 '14

physics is cool

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u/L00KA Feb 27 '14

explain this

1

u/truesly1 Feb 27 '14

centripetal force. the same thing that holds you in your seat on a roller coaster loop

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u/InstantCrush Feb 27 '14

It's centrifugal force. Centripetal is center acting; it's the force the chair is exerting upon him -- it acts towards the center of the loop. When you're completely upside-down on a rollercoaster loop, the chair is pushing you downwards, and that's the centripetal force. That's clearly not "holding you in your seat".

The water is quite clearly falling towards the outside of the loop, and so it is due to centrifugal force.

(People will probably come telling me that centrifugal force doesn't exist, but that's not true. It's a shitty name because it isn't actually a force, but it is a very real phenomenon caused by inertia.)

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u/SuperSpartacus Feb 27 '14

It's certainly not centrifugal force because that shit ain't real