The Drunken Astronaut

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by EBTX</i>
<br />by orbital dynamics alone, it must come back to him at some point, i.e. the new orbits of astronaut and bottle must intersect at some point resulting in a collision.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

That is generally true for orbits that intersect when gravity is the only force acting. Only ejections or collisions with the central mass can interrupt the certainty that two once-intersecting orbits will eventually arrive again at the same place at the same time. -|Tom|-

Tom,

So the moral of the story is throwing him out was not only futile but stupid since he will return to the space craft and will be sobered up plus ****ed off at that.[]

"Imagination is more important than Knowledge" -- Albert Einstien

Score one for time reversal symmetry which the standard model says gravity is invariant with respect to.

While I'm on the subject, what do you think about time reversal symmetry in the case of a supposed black hole? Would this not constitute a violation?

A craft falls into a black hole. The film of the event run backwards shows an unpowered craft coming out of a black hole. Since the event is impossible by definition (not just improbable), is this not a straightforward breach?

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by EBTX</i>
<br />Score one for time reversal symmetry which the standard model says gravity is invariant with respect to.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">All dynamicists know that time can be reversed in equations of motion. However, path probabilities and stabilities are not equal in both directions. For example, capture of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 by Jupiter was a highly improbable event. But once captured, escape again becomes certain provided collision does not happen first.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">While I'm on the subject, what do you think about time reversal symmetry in the case of a supposed black hole? Would this not constitute a violation?<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">Black holes are a mathematical concept, but quite impossible in physics. For example, they violate the physical principle "the finite cannot become infinite". When sensible physics is used, we get "Mitchell stars" instead of "black holes". -|Tom|-