The sun., 1918-10-03
OLD GALILEO'S BLUNDER.
A Kansas City Savant Seeks to Cor
rect Its Influence.

To THE EDITOR OF THE SUN-Sir:
One Of the most unfortunate things
that ever happened to the scientific
world was Galileo's blunder at the
Tower Of Pisa. 1t has kept the people
from understanding the secret of weight.
the cause Of winter and summer, and
how the world can be heated and lighted
by means Of its own force by taking
adrs ntage Of the unlimited amount OF
alignments Of orbit planes. Of little sys-
TENS Of the earth and atmosphere which
will be done when all the coal is gone
and man becomes forced to take a busi-
ness-like interest in this subject. for the
world waits until dire conditions force
1t into preparedness.
The conclusion Of Galileo's expert
ment has been regarded as q matter of
fact. although 1t is absolutely untrue.
He did not carry the reasoning OF his
experiment far enough.
The south half OF the earth Is COM
posed Of matter of greater gravitating
tendency than that of the north half,
as is shown by the fact that more OF
the south half has gravitated below the
level of the sea. These two halves fall
L
1. In falling these 5000. 900 miles the
south half gravitates faster than the
north half, thus inclining the earth's
axis toward the sun by January 1. When
they began this race July the north
half was nearer the sun, but after fall
ing six months toward the sun the south
half Is nearer the sun on January /,
causing summer In the southern hemi-
sphere and winter in the northern hemi-
sphere.
4 little learning is n dangerous thing.
Drink deep. or taste not the Pierian spring
A recent article stated that heating
boiler OF water does not change It's
weight Whoever weighed 1t made the
same kind Of mistake that Calico made |:
he did not go far enough.
Fill balloon with cold air and weigh
It. Say the balloon and air weigh 500
pounds. Then heat the air and watch
the scales. The hot air will soon weigh
practically nothing. Weight is the ef-
feet OF gravitation. The air will no
longer gravitate toward the earth, but
will rise from the scales, taking the
balloon with II. II there were no at
mosphere to pass through and you con-
tinued to heat that air it would repel
Itself away from the earth like the tail
Of comet, and according to the scales
II would weigh nothing.
On the night of May IS. 1910, a large
portion of the tail OF Halleys comet
disappeared. The comet was coming
around the sun from the west and II
met the force OF the planet Mercury.
coming around the sun from the east.
That night. just before the comet passed
between the earth and sun. Mercury
forced the comet outward a little from
the sun. causing the large portion Of the
tail to suddenly lower its temperature
condensing its material. which CRAWL
tated back to the comet, thus disappear
ing from our view next day.
While 1t was extended across the sky
at the high temperature Of the night be-
fore. that portion OF the tail would have
weighed nothing according to scales on
the comet, but as soon as the tempera-
ture was reduced that night, that portion
of the tail that gravitated back toward
the comet, II 1t could have fallen upon
scales, would have weighed billions OF
tons. d. A, N. GROVER.
KANSAS CRY, Mo, September 80.