TLDW
A paper, by philosopher of physics John Norton, describes a scenario in which a ball is placed at the apex of a perfectly smooth and frictionless dome. The paper argues that, according to Newton’s laws, the ball will spontaneously start rolling down the dome at some random time, without any external force acting on it. Norton’s claim suggests that Newtonian mechanics may not a deterministic theory or that there are multiple possible interpretations.
https://sites.pitt.edu/~jdnorton/papers/DomePSA2006.pdf
What? An object at rest stays at rest unless acted upon by an outside force. If there are no outside forces, there is no reason for it to roll off.
This wouldn’t be an open debate in the scientific community if there was a clear cut answer. You should let all the experts know you’ve figured it out though.
I’ve never heard of this being an open debate, and I don’t see anything in the paper that explains why this would be a “loophole” in Newton’s laws. What am I missing here?
Just because you haven’t heard of something doesn’t mean it’s not happening. If the paper is too hard for you grasp, then you can always watch the video attached that chews it up though.
This commenter is a reactionary who’s caught a lot of bans. I guess this kind of rigid thinking is why they’re reactionary in the first place.
ha