A short rant about the Kate Upton "vomit comet" photo shoot...

[rrneck]

Let me get this straight. A glossy magazine devoted to the documentation of egregiously frivolous entertainment thought it was a good idea to photograph a woman whose sole job it is to look good in a 133 foot long, 85 ton, $22,000,000 dollar aircraft 33,000 feet off the ground. This technology, that has for most of human history been an impossible dream and requires resources beyond the wildest imagination of anyone only a few hundred years ago, was pressed into service so that we would be able to enjoy photographic evidence of the concept of zero G boobies.

I say concept because I saw the video and I couldn't tell any meaningful difference between airborne zero G boobies and boobies appearing in their natural earthbound environment. That's probably because within the pantheon of soul crushing troubles with which a multi millionaire supermodel may have to contend, gravity ain't one of them.

There should be no need to belabor the gargantuan waste of natural resources required for this vacuous bit of pop meringue, but I will add this: The Boeing 727 used for that exercise in libidinous affectation burned approximately 23,000 pounds of jet fuel. That's about 3,382 gallons, or enough to heat a home for about five years. Maybe longer if you wear an insulated gold bikini.

But there is another insulting waste in the performance of this stupid stunt: the waste of human resources. From the ground crew to the flight crew literally tens of thousands of hours of training and experience are required to keep eighty tons of aircraft in the air. I'd hate to think my career as a highly trained professional depended on making sure somebody got a picture of some mostly naked woman floating in zero gravity.

Among the uncounted fucks that I don't give about stupid shit, whether or not men look at naked women will count for at least a few of them. Men have been looking at women for millions of years, and they will continue to do so as long as they have something to look with and something to look at. But the gigantic wast of real stuff like natural resources, technology, and the expertise of people who take their jobs way too seriously to appreciate a stupid stunt like this should be an embarrassment to anyone with a conscience.

You may resume your regularly scheduled programming.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

1. thank you. I was just thinking we need at least a dozen threads on the topic

and was wondering if more posters were ever going to start their own new ones or do the boring thing and merely reply to one of several other existing threads on the topic.

[rrneck]

2. ...

[Captain Stern]

84. You sound like an asshole....

...but I guess you sound like my kind of asshole.

One of my pet peeves is when people start a new thread about something that's already being discussed in another thread that's current.

I think if you post a comment in the existing thread, and nobody responds, that means nobody gave a shit about what you had to say....it doesn't mean they didn't see it. But "my rant is so important, it deserves it's own thread because I have a different angle"...no it doesn't.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

86. lol. hey, I'll take your backhanded compliment

it's better than none at all, eh?

It's a good thing you replied. I was about ready to start my own thread on this.

[morningfog]

98. You probably still will.

[Pretzel_Warrior]

99. I was feeling lonely

thanks for showing up and making me feel appreciated again you loveable DU citizen. Keep up the good work in ATA and wherever else you leave your mark!!!

[rrneck]

90. I guess I missed it. nt

[JVS]

106. Yeah, I thought there was a rule against that sort of thing.

Something along the lines of no continuing flamewars in other threads. Then again maybe they meant no restarting locked topics.

[CFLDem]

3. Good for you

have a cookie 🍪.

As an aviator I thought it was a marvelous use of an amazing machine. The fact that such a beautiful piece of engineering can contribute to such art only speaks to humanity's greatness.

It really is amazing when you think about it all.

[JVS]

4. No! Jet planes are for bombing foreigners and ferrying families with kids to Orlando!

All else is frivolity.

[rrneck]

6. I agree it's amazing.

But the use to which it was put might, on a good day, generously speaking, be considered performance art. And not good performance art at that.

The technology is very useful for research, and I expect the people they have flying that thing really know their shit more than most people who know their shit, but that mission didn't really offer any bang for the buck.

[Boom Sound 416]

54. That's rather subjective

So if you paint the Mona Lisa at zero G it's ok, but if you throw shit against the wall, the energy is wasted.

So who decides which is which? See Golden rule I presume.

And on that note, those pilots and folk who spent all those hours training don't have much to show for it when their are no clients. They don't have a paycheck either.

[rrneck]

121. Of course it's subjective.

Value judgements are subjective.

The Mona Lisa employed the latest technology available to redefine our understanding of how we see the world. That's what made it important art. And we're still looking at the painting today.

The Upton shoot will be bird cage fodder in a week.

[Boom Sound 416]

124. I don't know

You kind of made an argument for both

[rrneck]

126. Yep. There are no absolutes.

I've posted in this thread about "For the Love of God", a sculpture of a diamond encrusted skull. It uses real, and valuable, materials to make a point. The Upton shoot uses valuable materials to tell people what they want to hear. One is important art, the other is kitsch.

Values are an expression of morality, and morality implies choice.

[Boom Sound 416]

127. You know what

I think I agree. Great post.

[rrneck]

130. Thanks! nt

[arcane1]

59. The method was used much, much better for filming "Apollo 13" if you ask me.

Frankly, I'm kind of surprised that this got so much attention here.

[rrneck]

122. It got attention because of boobies,

not because of waste involved in producing images of boobies. I could rant about but it would do less good than this rant.

[jberryhill]

152. You do know it is a commercial service

http://www.gozerog.com/

The ZERO-G Gift Package includes one ZERO-G Experience®, a ZERO-G Hat and a copy
of The Space Tourist's Handbook for $4,950 (tax and shipping not included).

[rrneck]

154. Sure. That doesn't make it any less wasteful. nt

[jberryhill]

158. But if you had a 727...

[rrneck]

160. If I had a 727

I would like to think I bought it for a more important reason than photographing supermodels.

Of course, for all I know they do research with it too and the Upton shoot helped finance the entire enterprise. But I doubt it. It is a rich assholes toy that costs $2500 an hour to ride. That alone is a lot of resources devoted to entertaining rich assholes. And there is an entire industry devoted to the same thing. It's the height of decadence (sorry about the pun).

I sound like a scold, I know. I don't care. People devour this bullshit and don't stop to think what it's really costing them.

[jberryhill]

163. Take a look around the zero g website

...you may be surprised what else is subsidized by that kind of thing.

[rrneck]

165. Yep. You're right. They do some good work.

But I ain't gonna stop complaining.

Someone asked me the other day why I thought the humanities should be taught is college. My answer in a nutshell was that human nature has been monetized. While Zero G does good work, they couldn't stay in business without the rich guy thrill rides. The frivolous stuff is part of the business model. They should be able to stay busy with real research without depending on the 1% to stay afloat. It's indicative of our priorities as a people. Zero G should be so busy solving problems they don't need to play rich guy roller coaster.

And that's the hell of it too. While five grand a flight is a lot of money for the vast majority of people, it's nothing for rich assholes. That's how bad income disparity is. We have all this potential struggling for scraps off the rich man's table. And at least if some rich guy takes his kid up in that thing, the kid might be inspired to do something more than blow the family fortune. The Upton shoot won't garner much more than a passing grunt from most people, if that.

I'll cop to being an idealistic scold on this one.

[loli phabay]

5. i figure if boobs in space is the new thing, then we will be on alpha centauri within five years

its like the internet, thanks to people wanting to look at boobies and butts forced a lot of the advances in the internet and its tech.

[rrneck]

7. You could get the same effect from a trampoline and photoshop. nt

[loli phabay]

8. probably already been done,

[rrneck]

10. True that. nt

[loli phabay]

12. cant wait until its kates boobs on Mars, would speed up the space race

[rrneck]

21. Probably the oldest incentive known to man. nt

[loli phabay]

22. as it works and has been proven to again and again.

[JVS]

9. Just wait until they start moving at speed approaching the speed of light.

[wercal]

11. She was not weightless

"I saw the video and I couldn't tell any meaningful difference between airborne zero G boobies and boobies appearing in their natural earthbound environment."

There was nothing 'zero G' about this. She's falling to earth, and the airplane around her is falling at about the same rate. Same gravitational force on the boobies as always.

[rrneck]

13. Hence the use of the word "concept". nt

[wercal]

19. Might want to edit out the part about zero gravity then.

"naked woman floating in zero gravity."

[rrneck]

23. Nah, I claim the Bluto exception.

[jberryhill]

31. You'd better tell NASA they don't understand the concept....

Imagine you are in an elevator, standing on a scale. You look down at the scale and see your weight. Let's say you weigh 175.

Now, imagine the cable is cut, the brakes don't work, and you begin to plummet down the elevator shaft inside of the elevator.

On the way down, as you look at the scale, do you have some idea what the scale will say? Will it continue to say "175" or something else?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weightlessness#Weightless_and_reduced_weight_environments

NASA's Zero Gravity Research Facility, located at the Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio, is a 145-meter vertical shaft, largely below the ground, with an integral vacuum drop chamber, in which an experiment vehicle can have a free fall for a duration of 5.18 seconds, falling a distance of 132 meters.

[wercal]

38. You are confused

You are confusing the force that you exert on the scale with weight. You weight on earth is always your mass times g. There are some exceptions to this that deal with moving near the speed of light, Einstein, etc. But leaving Modern Physics out of the discussion, I assure you that your weight is always the same here on earth.

Yes, NASA does all types of stuff to give the sensation of weightlessness. But I could be on a fancy NASA elevator, or sitting across the street at Taco Bell, and gravity would not discriminate. My mass would be the same. Gravity would be the same. And I weigh exactly the same.

[stevenleser]

48. No, see my #47. What we think of as microgravity is experienced in a falling elevator. nt

[wercal]

52. Better yet, see my Post #49

I went to the effort of giving a lesson and listing my sources.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4524052

[stevenleser]

53. You don't address microgravity. That's what we think of when we discuss "weightlessness" or

zero g. You don't account for that at all and that is what is at issue.

[jberryhill]

58. He's dug in

I think he actually thinks there is "no gravity" aboard the space station or in the Apollo capsule heading back to earth.

[wercal]

63. Why would I

I've been talking about weight, not the sensation of weightlessness.

[stevenleser]

65. Because that is what is at issue. nt

[jberryhill]

68. Lol

[wercal]

69. You seem to think it is

But I assure you, with 100% certainty, the gravitational force exerted on you by the earth is constant. It does not matter what direction you are moving - left/right...up/down. 'g' is always the same. Its a constant...quite literally a 'constant' that is abbreviated 'g' in physics.

You are referring to a sensation, in which there is no upward force on your body. This does not affect your weight.

W=mg

Where m is your mass, and g is the constant 32.2 ft/s^2

[jberryhill]

75. Okay, will you answer a direct question?

Do you consider the astronauts in the ISS to be "weightless"?

Here is a picture of one with two grapefruits floating in front of him.



Where the ISS is located, g=7.33 m/s^2.

Why are the grapefruits not falling?

[wercal]

79. No they are not weightless

Not one bit.

Throughout this thread I have constantly stated that no matter what direction you are moving in, your weight remains the same.

And the grapefruits probably are falling. Doesn't change their weight.

Now the answer to your question is complicated by the fact that you have taken the example into space and 'g' is no longer constant, as it can be considered within the confines of our atmosphere. So lets just say that this exact same astronaut and the exact same grapefruits are on the Vomit Comet, within our atmosphere, and the grapefruits were floating in exactly the same manner. Then I would say that, for all intents and purposes, the astronaut's weight in the 747 is exactly the same as it is when he stands on the ground.

[Travis_0004]

94. Gravity is still constant at the international space station.

If I weight 200, I'll weigh about 180 on board the ISS. Gravity onboard the ISS doesn't really change. They slowly fall towards earth (increasing gravity), then when they get too close they turn on the rockets, and get into a higher orbit.

Grapefruit in the ISS is falling. Since Earth has the most gravitational pull, they will fall to earth, but since the ISS is falling at the exact same speed, it looks like its floating, since it is (relative to the ISS).

I think you are getting the term weightlessness confused. Weightlessness is the absence of stress from externally applied forces.

When I jump in the air, I'm said to be weightless for a second or so. There is gravity bringing me back down, but there is no externally applied force, until I land on the floor, and the floor is the force that is applied to me.

Being on board the ISS isn't really a lot different. They are falling back to the earth, and if the rocket boosters failed, they would eventually crash into the earth, so its just a big free fall that may last for a few years.

[Gravitycollapse]

95. Then weightlessness in popular vernacular is a misnomer.

[pokerfan]

104. I believe you are conflating weight and mass

Objects in orbit are weightless but not massless, if that helps.

[jberryhill]

51. "You are confusing the force that you exert on the scale with weight"

No, you never took physics. That is the operational definition of "weight".

No, you have the same mass in free fall, in that it takes the same amount of force to induce movement. But you have no "weight" in free fall. That is why the bathroom scale in your falling elevator will read "0".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weightlessness

Weightlessness, or an absence of 'weight', is in fact an absence of stress and strain resulting from externally applied forces, typically contact forces from floors, seats, beds, scales, and the like. Counterintuitively, a uniform gravitational field does not by itself cause stress or strain, and a body in free fall in such an environment experiences no g-force acceleration and feels weightless. This is also termed zero-g.

[...]

The myth that satellites remain in orbit because they have "escaped Earth's gravity" is perpetuated further (and falsely) by almost universal misuse of the word "zero gravity" to describe the free-falling conditions aboard orbiting space vehicles. Of course, this isn't true; gravity still exists in space. It keeps satellites from flying straight off into interstellar emptiness. What's missing is "weight", the resistance of gravitational attraction by an anchored structure or a counterforce. Satellites stay in space because of their tremendous horizontal speed, which allows them — while being unavoidably pulled toward Earth by gravity — to fall "over the horizon." The ground's curved withdrawal along the Earth's round surface offsets the satellites' fall toward the ground. Speed, not position or lack of gravity, keeps satellites in orbit around the earth.

At the altitude of the space station, the earth's gravitational force is considerable - it holds the moon, which is 250,000 miles away, in orbit as well. If it weren't for the fact that it had a high horizontal velocity, the ISS would drop like a rock.

[wercal]

56. You are wrong

See post #49 for the lesson

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4524052

This statement would get you laughed out of class:

"But you have no "weight" in free fall"

Say it again brother: W=mg, W=mg

[jberryhill]

57. "mg" is the force exerted on you at rest on the ground by the earth

....when you are on it.

You are really not going to answer the question about what the bathroom scale says when you are in a falling elevator, and you are not at rest on the ground due to the counteracting force of weight exerted between your feet and the ground.

[wercal]

64. That is a very false statement

""mg" is the force exerted on you at rest on the ground by the earth"

I cannot tell you how false that is. Now if you read my lesson, I looked up the fish in an elevator example in my physics book. Yes, a scale will read differently. That is the difference between True weight (the term used by Serway) and Apparent weight. This is the entire source of your confusion. I fully accept the scale will read differently, and quite frankly I expect that. But that has not one thing to do with an object's weight.

[Gravitycollapse]

77. I believe that once you stop accelerating, you could measure your weight in the elevator.

Because the perceptual interference of acceleration (positive or negative) and the lack of drag acting independently on the scale or your body, would add up to nil. You aren't less subject to the gravitational constant if you're moving towards the Earth at speed.

[Gravitycollapse]

73. The force of gravity is constant at a given distance, regardless of your movement.

Inertial forces (from parabolic trajectory) can counter the pull of gravity, and the absence of any floor or ground zeros out compressive forces and this gives the sensation of weightlessness. But your weight is a function of your mass and the gravitational constant.

As gravity is subject to an inverse square law, an aircraft that is relatively close to Earth will see little difference in the pull of gravity. Orbiting height is a different story. But close to Earth, it's essentially the same force.

What NASA is talking about is the perception of weightlessness.

[jberryhill]

76. Orbiting height is not a different story

At the height of the ISS, g is 88% of what it is on the surface.

[Gravitycollapse]

80. You know what I mean. The inverse square rule becomes more significant at greater distance.

The real reason why humans in orbit feel weightless is that they are on a parabolic trajectory, just like the vomit comet. The difference is the space craft have enough distance and the correct angle of trajectory to induce a sort of stasis. They fall around the Earth continuously.

[muriel_volestrangler]

87. Elliptical, not parabolic

Since this whole sub-thread is about being pedantic. A parabolic trajectory would mean the spacecraft is at escape velocity. Objects in orbit at less than escape velocity move in ellipses.

[Gravitycollapse]

91. That's actually not pedantic at all. And it is totally a big error on my part.

It's been several years since I've been in any astrophysics lectures. An unpracticed brain forgets a lot. Even basic laws of orbit.

Kepler would be ashamed.

[jberryhill]

93. The point being....

...that "weightlessness" is a function of being in free fall, regardless of what the gravitational field strength is at any point.

It is why "weight" is measured with a scale, and "mass" is measured with a balance.

Cluelessness is another story entirely.

[Gravitycollapse]

96. Weightlessness is thus a misnomer. The international measure of weight is the Newton.

Which is a function of mass and gravitational acceleration. None of those variables change because the object is in motion relative to the Earth.

[jberryhill]

97. "Weightlessness is thus a misnomer"

Okay, let's recap the subthread.

It began with the objection "she is not weightless".

She is, in fact, every bit as "weightless" as an astronaut aboard the space station - and for exactly the same reason.

I will agree with you that "weightless" is a tricky word. But if the objection was "she is not weightless", then perhaps in terms the person making that objection can understand, could you explain what, if anything, is in fact "weightless" anywhere?

[muriel_volestrangler]

105. It's a word that NASA uses all the time, as it does 'zero g'

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:nasa.gov+%22weightlessness%22+|+%22weightless%22
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:nasa.gov+%22zero+g%22+|+%22zero+gravity%22

and encyclopedias and science dictionaries define them in a similar way:
Penguin Dictionary of Physics: weightlessness

The condition of a body in FREE FALL. Since there is no support the body is not acted upon by a force, as described in WEIGHT 1. (d). The condition of weightlessness does not imply that the body is not subject to gravitation, but that no other force acts on it. Since gravity acts uniformly throughout a body it does not by itself cause any stress. Any force exerted by a support on the surface of a body necessarily causes deformation, so the normal condition of living organisms on earth is one of stress, which is removed when in free fall in an orbit.

Hutchinson Encyclopedia: weightlessness

Apparent loss in weight of a body in free fall. Astronauts in an orbiting spacecraft do not feel any weight because they are falling freely in the Earth's gravitational field (not because they are beyond the influence of Earth's gravity). The same phenomenon can be experienced in a falling lift or in an aircraft imitating the path of a freely falling object.

and so on.

[Gravitycollapse]

107. It is still a misnomer.

That definition is incorrect. Since weight is a function of mass and gravitational acceleration, you have weight regardless of movement. Your weight even exerts a force. The difference is there's nothing exerting a force back so there is no perception of weight.

Commonly used words can still be misnomer. NASA is likely dumbing it down so lay people can understand basic concepts.

[muriel_volestrangler]

111. What difference would you expect in the weight of an object at the equator and ...

... of the same object at the North Pole?

NASA uses 'weightless' for things in orbit, or free fall, all over the place, not just in some articles for general consumption. And so do dictionaries and encyclopedias.

[Gravitycollapse]

117. Gravity is subject to an inverse square law.

At any point on Earth the difference from any other point in gravitational constant is negligible.

Misnomers are often defined words that gained popularity through common usage. That doesn't mean they aren't misnomers. A misnomer is a word with some portion of the word lending itself to contradiction or confusion. That doesn't mean it can't be defined specifically and used commonly.

Weightlessness is a misnomer because the word structure implies an entity has no weight. Even though that isn't what it means.

[muriel_volestrangler]

119. "The difference amounts to approximately a half of one percent"

g is also affected by the fact that the Earth rotates and an observer on its surface therefore experiences a centrifugal force.

We can summarise by saying:

(1) If the Earth were a non-rotating perfect sphere, the acceleration due to gravity would be constant.

(2) Because of rotation, the Earth is flattened at poles. This affects g in two ways:-�

(a) g at the poles is greater than g at the equator because R at the poles is less than R at the equator.

(b) rotational force at the Earth surface is at right angles to the axis of rotation and proportional to the distance from that axis. It is therefore zero at the poles and a maximum at the Equator. It acts outwards, reducing g.
...
g at Equator (lat = 0) = 9.780318 m.s-2
g at Pole (lat = 90) = 9.832177 m.s-2

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/EarthSci/people/lidunka/GEOL2014/Geophysics2%20-%20Gravity/gravity.htm

[Gravitycollapse]

120. I just told you that.

[muriel_volestrangler]

136. No, you didn't say anything like that

The link shows you take the rotation of the Earth, ie the velocity of the point you are at, into account when calculating g. This is why 'zero g' is a meaningful term, and when g is zero, the weight is zero too.

[Gravitycollapse]

138. You don't even understand the words you are using here.

I said exactly what you posted. Which is that differences in the gravitational constant at any point on Earth are negligible.

"G" in physics is a representation of how acceleration alters the perceived weight in the opposite direction of travel with the gravitational constant as a unit of measure. When we talk about 3 Gs, we are talking about an accelerative force 3 times that of gravity. This force can be in any direction. If we were pulling 1 G in a turn, it means the force of inertia is equal to the gravitational constant.

Zero G is a balance between competing forces that gives the perception that none exist. It is not a claim that the force of gravity does not exist. Do you get it?

[muriel_volestrangler]

139. You say it's 'negligible'; I, and the scientists, say it's clearly measurable

and the difference is partly due to the motion of the frame of reference in which you measure it.

American Heritage Science Dictionary: zero gravity

The condition of real or apparent weightlessness occurring when any gravitational forces acting on a body meet with no resistance so the body is allowed to accelerate freely. Bodies in free fall (including trajectories like orbits) experience zero gravity; bodies at rest on the Earth's surface do not, since they are subject to the counterforce of the surface supporting them.

Astronomy Encyclopedia, Philip's: zero gravity

Apparent absence of GRAVITATIONAL FORCES within a free-falling system. A body in a ‘zero gravity' or free-fall state experiences no sensation of weight, hence the ‘weightlessness’ of astronauts, since the spacecraft is continuously free falling towards the Earth while its transverse motion ensures that it gets no closer. The term ‘zero gravity’ does not imply a total absence of gravity, rather it refers to an absence of any detectable gravitational forces. Although gravity becomes very weak at large distances from massive bodies, it nowhere declines absolutely to zero. See also ACCELERATION OF FREE FALL

Illustrated Dictionary of Aviation, McGraw-Hill: zero g

The term stands for zero gravity. The aircraft flies in a straight and level flight at 1 g; zero g is normally not experienced. It gives a feeling of weightlessness. Besides being experienced in space, in the aircraft zero g may be experienced momentarily when leveling out from the climb attitude, when the stick is pushed over, and while entering a negative-g regime.

" It is not a claim that the force of gravity does not exist." No-one has ever claimed that. Don't invent strawmen. What we are doing is explaining the use of the terms 'zero g', 'zero gravity', 'weightless' and 'weightlessness' to you. And explaining that the terms are all used to refer to the aircraft flights that are the subject of the OP. By the people who do the flights.

[Gravitycollapse]

142. Go buy a dictionary and look up the definition of negligible.

Until you do that, do not respond to my posts.


" It gives a feeling of weightlessness."

" Apparent absence of GRAVITATIONAL FORCES within a free-falling system."

It gives a FEELING of weightlessness. It is the APPARENT absence of gravity. These publications are discussing how perception of weight changes, not that weight is actually changed.

Are you getting any of this yet?

[muriel_volestrangler]

144. A half percent is not 'negligible'

Ask NASA if they don't care about a half percent difference in a force.

You are reading things without paying any attention. "Within a free-falling system". Which is what the OP is about. A feeling of weightlessness; see #105 for definitions of weightlessness, and note the 'in free fall' bits.

[Gravitycollapse]

145. Jesus Christ, are you unable to even look up the definition of negligible?

Or are you unwilling?

[muriel_volestrangler]

146. I am a native speaker of English

I do not need to look it up. You think that a difference in measurement of a half percent is 'negligible'; a measurement error of a half percent would be unacceptable in any situation. You also think that stating "At any point on Earth the difference from any other point in gravitational constant is negligible" is equivalent to pointing out that the variation in the value of g is well known. You are wrong.

[Gravitycollapse]

153. As we are talking about perception of weight, a difference of half a percent is negligible.

Meaning, a measurement small enough to make no difference in the PERCEPTION of weight.

There are plenty of native English speakers who need to carry a dictionary with them. I'm done with this stupid bullshit volley of a discussion.

[jberryhill]

148. You do know why labs use balances, and not spring scales, eh?

You measure weight with this:



You measure mass with this:



The reason is that the first apparatus will correctly tell you, wherever you are, how much force it takes to counteract the influence of gravity on the object. The second apparatus will correctly tell you whether objects on the pans have the same mass, regardless of what the local gravity happens to be.

"Weight" is a measure of FORCE - the force required to counteract gravity, which is equal to the force exerted by the body on whatever is holding it up. When an object is in free-fall, it does not make sense to talk about its "weight".

[Gravitycollapse]

156. "When an object is in free-fall, it does not make sense to talk about its "weight"."

Says who?

[jberryhill]

166. Because it is offensive to talk about weight

The object should be judged on its merits, and now by how heavy it is.

And if it posts a personal ad on the Internet, it gets 20 pounds lighter.

[jberryhill]

115. Try this....

It comes down to whether one uses the operational definition of "weight":

http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0505193

With rare exceptions, in high school and college/university physics courses literature and in journals of physics, the weight is defined as a gravitational force or an exclusive consequence of it. These definitions lack logic from the perspective of present knowledge and can be misleading. The operational definition of weight of a body as the force the body exerts on its support or suspender can eliminate the ambiguities associated to "true weight", "apparent weight", "state of weightlessness", "zero weight", "zero gravity", "microgravity", "vertical", "up" and "down". Nevertheless, the concept of weight of a body is not fundamental in Physics and its exclusion from the physics vocabulary will eliminate some of former concepts or their ambiguousness with evident benefit for physics teaching and learning. This paper discusses weight of a body concepts and presents several examples that show the advantages of avoiding its use or adopting the above-mentioned operational definition. It is believed that this will eliminates the frequent identification with the body's mass and will boost student's understanding associated subjects.

[Gravitycollapse]

118. I know all of that.

It still doesn't mean the international definition of weight according to the Newton, is wrong.

That article is discussing weight perception.

[jberryhill]

141. The international definition of temperature in deg C doesn't make you hot

Nor does the international definition of the kilometer make you tall.

The word "weightless" is used, consistently and definitely, to refer to a state of free-fall, in which there is no external support of a body.

[Gravitycollapse]

143. What you just typed is completely nonsensical.

The international definitions of temperature and distance are standardized methods of identifying quantifiable subjects.

Seriously, what you just said about hot and tall is essentially word salad. It demonstrates just about no understanding of the subject on your part.

[jberryhill]

147. The point is

Saying "the international definition of weight is the Newton and it is mg" does not have any relevance to the usage of the word "weightless" as it is indeed used by NASA and everyone else to refer to a condition of free fall where there are no external opposing forces countering the action of gravity on a body.

"Weight" is not intrinsic. When a body of mass m is sitting on a table, it is - yes indeed - exerting a force of mg on the table, and the table is exerting a counteracting force of mg on the body. And, sure enough, both of those forces are measured in Newtons. The Newton is a unit of FORCE, and is the gravitational case of F=ma, which is the inertial force equation. The "weight", in Newtons, tells you what those equal and opposite forces are when that body is sitting on the table.

Now, the table and the mass are in a falling elevator, an elliptical airplane ride, or the space station. The body is no longer exerting any force, in Newtons, on the table, and vice versa. In that context, there is nothing, nada, zero that you are going to measure in Newtons between that body and that table. The body has become weightless - you cannot measure its weight (i.e. the force, in Newtons, it would exert on the table) because it is not exerting any weight on the table, and the table is not exerting a counteracting force back. Because - in the weightless, free-fall condition, there are no forces being exerted between them.

That is why it is correct to refer to the Newton as a measure of "weight" because, more fundamentally, the Newton is a measure of FORCE, and it falls right out of the Newtonian inertial equation of F=ma.

"Weightlessness" is the condition of a body upon which no external forces are acting. And by that we don't mean "it is falling under the influence of gravity, so gravity is acting on it" - we mean "there is nothing imposing a FORCE on the body to counteract gravity".

It is not a misnomer.

[Gravitycollapse]

155. The inability to measure weight does not mean a body is weightless.

There is the existence of a physical quantity and then there is OUR ability to measure said quantity. The lack of ability to measure weight does not mean weight does not exist. It is our tools that have circumstantial function that are limited to specific preconditions in order to measure weight.

[jberryhill]

159. Weight is the FORCE exerted on the body

The Newton is a measure of FORCE exerted by a body on its support and vice versa.

That's the point.

The inability to measure that force under conditions of weightlessness is not some limitation of the apparatus - it is the apparatus doing what it is supposed to be doing, i.e. telling you that the body is weightless because it is in a condition of free fall. There is no force being exerted to constrain its motion. Yes, it is subject to gravitational acceleration, but it is not exerting a single Newton (or pound) against anything else and vice versa.

[jberryhill]

17. Umm....

Methinks you do not understand the concept of weightlessness.

The International Space Station is in free fall too. It is constantly falling toward the earth. However, what keeps a satellite in orbit is that it is also moving in a direction that causes it to "miss" the earth at a constant rate.

The astronauts returning from the moon were also falling toward earth the entire time.

Free fall IS weightlessness.



The entire reason WHY astronauts are trained in airplanes following parabolic trajectories is because it is one way of producing a zero g environment.

[rrneck]

20. Would that condition be described by the special theory of relativity?

I'm obviously not a physicist. And I haven't been to a Holiday Inn in years.

[jberryhill]

26. It has nothing to do with relatively

"Weight" is that sensation you feel on the bottom of your feet when you are standing on the ground.

"Mass" is a measure of the quantity of matter in an object.

An object falling in a vacuum (or, such as in an airplane, with the entire air mass around it moving with it) has no "weight".

Jump up and down on a bathroom scale for a while... you'll get the idea.

[rrneck]

28. I'm too tired. I'll take your word for it. nt

[muriel_volestrangler]

83. Unless, that is, we get into Einstein's ideas about the equivalance of a gravitational field

and an accelerating field of reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equivalence_principle

But that is general relativity, not special.

[wercal]

24. Methinks I know quite a bit about Weightlessness

Trust me - she's in the atmosphere, her 'boobies' are subject to the exact same gravitational force on the ground or at 33,000 feet.

[jberryhill]

30. I see, and what does the atmosphere have to do with it?

So you are saying that these guys:



are somehow shielded from the earth's gravity?

No, they are in free fall - following an orbital path in that fall.

No, you do not understand the concept of weightlessness in the least.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced_gravity_aircraft

The aircraft gives its occupants the sensation of weightlessness by following an (approximately parabolic) elliptic flight path relative to the center of the Earth. While following this path, the aircraft and its payload are in free fall at certain points of its flight path. The aircraft is used in this way to demonstrate to astronauts what it is like to orbit the Earth. During this time the aircraft does not exert any ground reaction force on its contents, causing the sensation of weightlessness.

[wercal]

33. You should check the stuff you scab from wikipedia before you post it

"The aircraft gives its occupants the sensation of weightlessness"

Sensation

Sensation

Just like the top of the hill on a roller coaster

Just like jumping on a trampoline

Yet 100% of the time subject to gravity.

And btw, gravity up in orbit is around 10% of what we experience here on terra firma - that is why I pointed out she was in our atmosphere...experiencing exactly the same gravity that the rest of us do.

Do you doubt that you are subject to gravity 100% of the time you are on the 'Zero-G' plane ride?

[jberryhill]

37. And you should take a physics course

"Weight" IS a sensation.

And, no, I did not scab any of my technical degrees from Wikipedia, but helped that it could convey the concept to you. Clearly not.

Answer my question above about what the scale under your feet says when you are in a falling elevator.

[stevenleser]

43. You are right but I don't think many people understand this at all. There is no zero gravity.

First of all, there is no such thing as zero gravity. Basic physics tells us that all objects in the universe are always exerting gravitational force on every other object. It's just that the force of most objects in the universe is too minute due to distance to have a palpable effect on a particular object.

Free fall causes what we think of as zero gravity conditions to occur.

[wercal]

49. W=mg

All together now:

W=mg

W=mg

Your weight does not change when you are falling. Your 'apparent weight' when compared to that scale will change. But your weight does not change.

As far as taking a physics course is concerned....you have no idea. But since you brought it up, I just happen to have my first year Physics book here on the shelf in my office. Its by Serway, Second Edition. Per the index, 'Weight' is on page 86.

"The force exerted by earth on a body is called the weight of the body W." No editorializing here - Serway put Weight in bold.

Ok - well lets look up 'apparent weight' in the index. Page 92. Example 5.6 Weighing a fish in an Elevator.

"A person weighs a fish on a spring scale attached to the ceiling of an elevator, as shown in Figure 5.13. Show that if the elevator accelerates or decelerates, the spring scale reads a weight different from the true weight of the fish".

I hope you can understand that. I can, because I don't even remember how many physics courses I've taken....every one of them long before you could look up stuff and mis-interpret it on the internet.

[jberryhill]

55. Look at the definition in the book

The force exerted by earth on a body is called the weight of the body W

Think about that, slowly:

The force exerted by earth on a body is called the weight of the body W

YES - when you are at rest, on the ground, THE FORCE EXERTED BY THE EARTH ON YOU IS YOUR WEIGHT. You can feel that force on the soles of your feet.

[wercal]

61. Using that logic, all objects would become weightless when not on the ground

On earth, gravitational forces pull an object downward, towards the center of the earth. I hope you understand that. It is most certainly not the force you feel on the soles of your feet.

The force you feel on the soles of your feet are an upward force, exerted on you. This is not gravity, and it has nothing to do with weight. Now most of the time, these forces are equal - which causes confusion in a lot of people.

Imagine being in a hot air balloon, floating level. That force you feel on your feet - it is an upward force being exerted on you by the basket of the balloon. It is not your weight. It is equal to your weight - but it is not your weight. Your weight is the force being exerted down by your body onto the basket.

[stevenleser]

62. No, not "on earth". Every object in the universe is being tugged on by the earth toward its center.

There is no zero gravity. What we are talking about is microgravity.

[wercal]

66. In my example

It is important to establish that we are earth, so I can explain the forces on the balloon basket...and that, on earth, the gravitational force is a downward force.

Yes, I am familiar with Newton's second law, which is what you are describing.

And I am not talking about micro-gravity one bit. I'm talking about your weight, which is constant, unless you were to leave earth and take a long trip.

[jberryhill]

67. No....

What you feel in the basket of the balloon is your weight being supported by the basket. You are right - it is an upward force being exerted on you by the basket. Actually, the wikipedia article on "weightlessness" covers this situation, but you aren't going to read it.

Now, if the basket breaks, and there is nothing supporting you, then you don't feel that on the bottom of your feet. Now, you do reach terminal velocity because of wind resistance.

"Free fall" IS "weightlessness". Astronauts don't float around in the ISS a mere 230 miles above the earth because they are substantially free of earth's gravitational field. They aren't.

Now, you keep saying that W=mg... which is true at the earth's surface (and g drops off as an inverse square). Are you also going to tell me that your "weight" is the same on, say, the moon?

Now, let's look again at the ISS. It is 230 miles up. That's only 370 km.

http://www.physicsclassroom.com/class/circles/u6l3e

Location Value of g m/s2

Earth's surface 9.8

1000 km above surface 7.33

The value of g is NOT appreciably different in the International Space Station than it is on the ground. And yet, the astronauts in it are "weightless". They are only "weightless" because the ISS is in free-fall.

In order to reduce g by half, you have to be about 2,000 miles up - nearly ten times higher than the ISS:

[wercal]

72. To answer your moon question

"Are you also going to tell me that your "weight" is the same on, say, the moon?"

No, I'm not. That's why I've tried to qualify my statements as being on earth...and you got all bent out of shape about it and posted a photo of a spacewalk.

But w=mg works quite well for the model flying at 33k feet, in our atmosphere (to repeat the term that was so upsetting before).

"Free Fall" IS NOT weightlessness.

Once again, the example of weighing the fish in the elevator, in my Physics book, Serway, 2nd Edition, yada yada is specifically, quite targeted, deliberately, tailored towards explaining to a first year physics student that your weight is constant, no matter what the scale says.

"Free Fall" gives a sensation of weightlessness, because there is no upwards force on your body. But your weight is quite simply defined. Once again, it is the product of your mass and a constant force in nature (on earth, I will qualify)...and that constant force is gravity...'g'...a 'constant' used in thousands of physics equations. So, unless your mass changes, your weight stays the same.

[stevenleser]

47. You are always 100% of the time subject to gravity. Even if you were outside the solar system.

Every object in the universe is constantly exerting a gravitational pull on all other objects in the universe. There is no such thing as zero gravity. There are the effects we associate with what is called microgravity which are indistinguishable from being in free fall. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micro-g_environment

As Newton said

"The gravitational attraction force between two point masses is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of their separation distance. The force is always attractive and acts along the line joining them from their center."

[muriel_volestrangler]

70. "gravity up in orbit is around 10% of what we experience here on terra firma" - a number you pulled

out of - thin air? A vacuum? Somewhere else?

The ISS orbits around 420 km above the Earth's surface. The Earth's radius is about 6370 km. So gravity there is about (6370/(6370+420))^2 of that at the surface, ie about 88%.

I don't think you should continue to lecture us on gravity.

[jberryhill]

71. I don't think he thinks the astronauts in the ISS are "weightless"

If he's logically consistent, then he would say their weight is only reduced by 12%.

How they float around the cabin at 88% of their "weight" is something he hasn't explained yet.

[wercal]

74. My fault - I meant to say 10% less than.

I'm typing fast and schooling a lot of people.

[jberryhill]

78. Okay, so why do the astronauts float around in the ISS?

In other words, someone who weighs 200 pounds on earth's surface will, in your view, weigh 180 pounds in the International Space Station.

Is that your position?

[wercal]

82. NO!!!!!!

I tried to keep the discussion 'on earth' by pointing out that Kate Upton was still in our atmosphere.

For some reason you found fault with that....and quite frankly implied that gravity at the ISS was the same as it is on earth (must not have found that wiki page yet). Yes, if you want to get into a whole Newtonian discussion, objects exert less of a force on each other the further apart they get.

But that is a diversion. One earth (or 33k feet in the air), g is g is g is g.

And Ms. Upton weights 135 lb on earth, on a train, on a plane, in a boat...everywhere (except of course space).

[jberryhill]

92. What difference does the atmosphere make?

The earth's gravitational field at the altitude of the ISS is 88% what it is on the earth's surface. A 200 pound person would be a little under 180 pounds there.

There is no sign that says "Welcome to Space" next to a red border line somewhere.

"Weightlessness" is a consequence of being in a state of free fall. There is gravity everywhere in the Universe. You only experience "weight" when there is something counteracting what gravity wants you to do.

The reduction in g at the height of the ISS is not all that much. Are you seriously suggesting that gravity at 230 miles up is negligible, but is somehow sufficient to capture the moon in orbit at 250,000 miles?

[muriel_volestrangler]

81. You're not 'schooling' anyone

You're being pedantic, about phrasing that is in common use, as the reference to how NASA uses 'weightless' shows. If we're going to be really pedantic about it, the OP you criticised never used the words 'weight' or 'weightless'; just 'zero G' - another phrase NASA uses extensively, give or take the capital 'G', as does the BBC, and Oxford Dictionaries.

[jberryhill]

14. We spent more than that to look at a flag on the moon

[rrneck]

15. We didn't go up there just to look at a flag. nt

[Botany]

16. why do you hate science?

[rrneck]

18. LOL!

Well played sir. Well played indeed.

[Blue_Adept]

45. Barbarella made real

Hence a worthy pursuit of all our resources.

[Warren DeMontague]

25. They did the same thing for Stephen Hawking.

Humans do a lot of "frivolous" stuff. The world would be awfully boring without it.

[rrneck]

27. Hawking has a bit more gravitas.

This has gone beyond frivolity into downright decadence.

[Warren DeMontague]

29. Being anti-decadence is overrated, in my experience.

Some probably think it's a character flaw of mine.

[rrneck]

32. We all need to indulge in a bit of decadence now and then.

But spectacle bereft of any redeeming social value on such a scale far outweighs any benefit it might deliver. There is no difference between an image of Kate Upton in that airplane and any other. It's analogous to the sculptures on Easter Island. They destroyed their culture with outrageous spectacle.

It would be easy for me to be a curmudgeon and harumph about it, (I guess I already have), but there is nothing any better about those images of that woman for having been taken under those conditions. It costs about five grand a head to take ride thing and I saw about eight or ten people in that video. And that's not to mention what they had to pay Upton do exactly what she does on the ground. The quality of the product didn't warrant the effort to produce it.

[Warren DeMontague]

34. I think our culture will survive the Zero-G bikini shoot.

I wouldn't call it a Rapa Nui level catastrophe.

[rrneck]

36. Of course it would.

But then again, that's just one instance isn't it? I'm sure you are aware of our environmental footprint. When we have to shrink that footprint, stuff like this will be a memory. Hell, it'll be a memory in a week anyway.

[Warren DeMontague]

39. And again, there is a lot of carbon activity that you or i might consider "frivolous"

The bottom line is, we need clean renewable ways of powering our shit. I haven't given up on a hail mary breakthrough, although the clock is ticking.

I do my part by refusing to fly unless absolutely necessary, only partially encouraged in that by the fact that i can't fucking stand how miserable they have made the experience.

Still, per capita energy use is down to. 2000 levels in the US. There are positive trends.

[rrneck]

41. You just insist in being reasonable

when I'm in the middle of a red ass rant, don't you?

[Warren DeMontague]

42. I admit, sometimes I do it just to piss people off

But here, it's totally out of love!

[Orrex]

161. The force of gravitas is constant at a given distance, regardless of your movement.

Wait. What?

[rrneck]

162. Okay, I'm calling thread win right there. nt

[Warren DeMontague]

167. Not true.

I don't care how far away they are, no one looks serious wearing one of these.

[boston bean]

35. Maybe this is the break women are looking for...

they can get into space and become astronauts because of.... boobies!!!



How wonderful for woman kind!

[Warren DeMontague]

40. In space, no one can hear you

[AnalystInParadise]

44. Why do you care what

a private organization does with their money? I have a conscience and my wife has one too, we both thought it was cheeky and unique.

[rrneck]

46. It's a culture thing.

I'm ranting about the decadence of our wasteful culture. Yeah, it's thier money. And the money SI gets for doing the shoot was regular Joes Shmoe's money who won't get anything meaningful at all out of their investment. We're pissing away a mountain of wealth on bullshit. This is just one small example.

[bobclark86]

60. The Taliban called, they want their talking point back... n/t

[rrneck]

88. They called the wrong number.

There's a big difference between cultural objectives based on religious doctrine and cultural objectives based on empirical evidence.

[Blue_Adept]

108. One mans bullshit...

is another mans art.

Why do we piss away our wealth on movies, TV, comic books, art, music, etc...

[rrneck]

113. For the Love of God...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_Love_of_God

For the Love of God is a sculpture by artist Damien Hirst produced in 2007. It consists of a platinum cast of an 18th-century human skull encrusted with 8,601 flawless diamonds, including a pear-shaped pink diamond located in the forehead that is known as the Skull Star Diamond. The skull's teeth are original, and were purchased by Hirst in London. The artwork is a Memento mori, or reminder of the mortality of the viewer. In 2007, art historian Rudi Fuchs, observed: 'The skull is out of this world, celestial almost. It proclaims victory over decay. At the same time it represents death as something infinitely more relentless. Compared to the tearful sadness of a vanitas scene, the diamond skull is glory itself.'[1] Costing £50 million to produce, the work was placed on its inaugural display at the White Cube gallery in London in an exhibition Beyond belief with an asking price of £50 million. This would have been the highest price ever paid for a single work by a living artist.[2] According to Art Knowledge News, a sale was being completed at the $100 million asking price.[3]

The difference between art and bullshit is a fuzzy one indeed. The difference between For the Love of God and the Upton photo shoot revolves around whether the work is prompting you to think about something in a new way or presenting what you already think in a new way. One is art, the other is kitsch.

[AnalystInParadise]

125. Why do you care?

Isn't it a Repuke trait to shame others for their behavior? (Not calling you one, just asking the question)

[rrneck]

129. It's a perfectly appropriate question.

Shaming is a human trait. It's one method we use to maintain social parity. Given my political leanings, I don't mind one bit shaming egregious waste to enrich the already shamefully wealthy.

Of course, I'm no saint either. I was thinking about the shoot and felt like writing some snarky shit about it. So my motives, like the motives of everyone else, were not entirely selfless. None of us can deny our own self interest.

So, to (finally) answer your question: I have little tolerance for affectation, and less tolerance for waste at the service of vacuous content.

[AnalystInParadise]

132. So shaming of women

that want abortions is cool? Shaming of gay couples whose only crime is love is cool? Or are you just a hypocrite and want to shame things you don't like?

[rrneck]

133. I don't think shaming the groups you mentioned is "cool"

because they didn't do anything that I think they should be ashamed of.

[AnalystInParadise]

137. So

Just shaming people that do things you don't like...........I got it, hypocritical behavior is cool with you.

[rrneck]

140. So

should Senator Jill Holtzman Vogel (R) be ashamed of this? Should these people feel shame? Should any lawbreaker be ashamed of that they do?

The expectation of shame assumes a moral failing. The requirement that someone experience shame depends on moral authority. Now, generally speaking authoritarian motivations are an important part of the values of the political right. The political left depends more on nurture and support for the support of its values. This is of course a dramatic oversimplification.

As I said, I have little patience for affectation. When we overemphasize the methods of one ideology over another at the expense of important tools for social organization we are indulging in a bit of political affectation. In short, liberals nurture and conservatives shame, so shaming is bad.

Shaming is not bad. It is one tool of social organization among many.

[AnalystInParadise]

149. You are judging someone doing something you don't like

Right so hypocritical shaming of things you want to scold other about. Got it man. Spin it anyway you want, you are a hypocrite and someone who wants to tell others what they can and can't do with their bodies, their money, their resources. Got it man.

[rrneck]

150. A fine libertarian position you got there.

And a lack of reading comprehension to boot. I already said I didn't care about images of naked women. But feel free to scrabble for slut shaming all you want. Your time is your own to waste.

There are three questions pending.

[thelordofhell]

85. Then you better not watch Barbarella..........

[rrneck]

89. I've seen it. It had more redeeming value. Not a lot, but some.

And it was made thirty years ago.

[Logical]

100. No different than spending 150 million on a movie. Correct? nt

[rrneck]

102. Exactly the same

if it's a Micheal Bay movie.

[Lost_Count]

101. Seems you give at least one counted fuck...

[rrneck]

103. Not about ogling naked women...

at least not while I'm suffering hyperbolisis.

[Sheldon Cooper]

109. Look.

Red-blooded men need, NEED, a constant stream of fresh new wanking material. If someone with big boobs has to get sent up to space to provide it, then so be it. You women who are complaining about this need to get with the program. We are going to jack off to big jugs and that's that. I'm waiting for Deep Sea Boobies myself.

<-----for the impaired.

[snooper2]

114. I'm not sure how deep boobies actually dive

I'm sure there is some video out there somewhere




http://marinebio.org/species.asp?id=527

Feeding Behavior (Ecology)

A skilled hunter in the air and on water despite its awkward gait on land, blue-footed boobies dine solely on fish. Flying over the water, generally no higher than 25 [external link] m, they keep their bill pointed downward, poised for action. When they spot a fish they break into a graceful dive, making almost no splash as they enter the water like an arrow, then popping up on the surface a few feet away with their prize. These birds are such accurate dive bombers that they have even been known to catch flying fish [external link] mid-leap. Unlike other boobies, blue-footed boobies can also dive from a floating position on the surface of the water as well.

[cbdo2007]

110. None of that was a waste....because here you are talking and ranting about it in a public forum.

The more you talk about it, the more people will talk about it at home with their spouses, then at work with their coworkers, then on radio stations and tv stations, and all over social media.

Every time someone rants about how much of a waste this is, it makes another 100 people watch the video and another 10 people buy the magazine - all of which makes the company money, which they used to purchase the services you are complaining about.

I love people who promote something by complaining about it, which has the opposite effect of what they were trying to do. You should at least request a commission from Sports Illustrated for still keeping the story alive. lol

[rrneck]

116. That sort of thinking is a two way street and both directions lead to a dead end.

We can discuss/rant/complain and give the phenomena what it wants, which is exposure. Or we can say nothing and let it go on hoping nobody will notice a scantily clad woman in an exotic locale. That's how the 1% wins.

A large part of our economy profits from human misery and conflict. From war to private prisons to short selling on the market, we are investing in failure and hate. The silly rant in the OP is not about naked women, it's about waste at the service of affectation.

This OP lasted a lot longer than most of the OP's I write. It's just an offhand rant after all. But the underlying principle is sound. If we don't examine the world around us, we can't have an impact on it. And we can't examine it without discussing it. Change requires discussion, and discussion requires exposure.

[NM_Birder]

112. I knew nothing about this, but will research it ......happily :)

[Cleita]

123. To tell the truth, I'm more offended by pictures of women with mops,

dish detergent, vacuum cleaners and frying pans. Many women have been emancipated from those chores so to rev up the stereotype is very misogynistic IMHO. An attractive young woman taking advantage of her physical assets is okay with me. No one forced Kate Upton to do this photo shoot. She probably got oodles of money for it and frankly she will be too old to take advantage of those opportunities in five years. So also, this stunt provided jobs for many others than Kate Upton, so I'm good with it. I rather the Boeing 727 be used this way than transporting a billionaire and his entourage to have dinner in Paris and then fly back home.

[Bok_Tukalo]

128. All the effort making the video and all the controversy surrounding it made me seek it out.

Meh. It was a bust.

[rrneck]

131. Good. nt

[Peregrine Took]

134. I'd like to see ole "Barbie", I mean "Kate" in about 10 years ...

I wonder how much she'll get for showing off then.

[Cleita]

135. Hey I'd do it if I got paid what she did.

Also, I'd be a better subject. Since my boobs have given into gravity at the age of 74, this would be a real test of where they go in an anti-gravity environment.

[Cofitachequi]

151. Huuuuhhhhh,huhhhh,huhhhh,hhhuuuuhhhhh.........

he said "boobies".

HHhuuuuhhhh.......

[nomorenomore08]

157. Any political squabbling aside, I can certainly agree that the "zero-G boobs" thing is inane and

pointless. Yes, like any heterosexual man I do take notice of good-looking women - and I've certainly taken notice of Ms. Upton in the past - but this kind of stuff makes me think that we're inching closer and closer to "Idiocracy."

Yeah, sure, boobs are great. But they're far from the only thing in life.

[PowerToThePeople]

164. BOOBIES!!!

Oh, wait. I have not been 14 in a very long time. Trash thread.