by Jim Wood

Created on: January 22, 2009

Sir Isaac Newton, could he be mistaken?

For years now I have been troubled by the possibility that Isaac Newton's Gravitation formula may be just a little bit from perfect when it gives us the Mass of objects that have moons or satellites. For the Sun the planets can be considered satellites. Because Newton has always been one of my hero's, and because of the great respect the world holds for him, I have been reluctant to go public with my idea on this subject. Note, and make no mistake, I do not contend that any part of Newton's Gravitation formulas are in error. This issue deals with a fine point concerning the results his formula provides for the Mass of objects when considered to be the Mass of the object for the value of the object and the result provided being the "working Mass" of the object and all of its orbiting companions.

This may be a little too unique for me to get into it without some up front explanation. Suppose you were the project engineer for a large tract building operation of 1,000 homes. There will be a lot of traffic and the law requires that you water down the dirt and sand so there will be a minimum of airborne particles. The usual way to do this is to have water trucks go over the areas routinely to wet the ground so the dust will not be carried in the wind. You are concerned with ground surfaces and paved surfaces. You cannot risk cracking the paved surfaces or sinking the truck into the dirt. When you consider the weights involved the truck is advertised with their delivered weight. You must know what the "working weight" will be. The truck plus the 500 gallons of water weight will be the working weight when the truck has a full load. I know that is a long-winded hypothetical, but required.

I will be talking about what I contend is the difference between the actual Weight Mass (AWM) for the Sun, for instance, and the "Working Weight Mass" (WWM) of the Sun. I am doing this because I contend that these two conditions are entirely different. I contend that when an Astronomer calculates the Mass of the Sun using Newton's formulas he is getting the Mass of the Sun and all of the other Mass in the Solar System that is in orbit around the Sun. You could say he is measuring the Mass of the entire Solar System. Why do I believe that, you ask? I have decided years ago that the Solar System is a unit with the focus at the Sun being like an axle for the large wheel that has all the weight of the wheel pulling on the Sun. Because there is only

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