Universal Gravitation

Today we used some fake data to derive the Law of Universal Gravitation (Newtonian graviation). Here is the activity: Universal Gravitation Pseudo-Lab.

Here is what ended up on the board:



And there weren't many good problems in the textbook, so I wrote some and put them on a little strip of paper: Universal Gravitation Homework.

After all of this, we attempted a demonstration that I've never tried before about the idea that gravity isn't really a force, exactly, but the consequences of bending space-time with large masses. This will not be assessed but it is the currently accepted model.

We also talked about gravitational waves, which are super exciting and the first detection of which was only a few years ago. Here is a pretty awesome video from Science Bulletin: Gravity-Making Waves. This was made before the first detection, though.