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A paper, by philosopher of physics John Norton, describes a scenario in which a ball is placed at the apex of a perfectly smooth and frictionless dome. The paper argues that, according to Newton’s laws, the ball will spontaneously start rolling down the dome at some random time, without any external force acting on it. Norton’s claim suggests that Newtonian mechanics may not a deterministic theory or that there are multiple possible interpretations.

https://sites.pitt.edu/~jdnorton/papers/DomePSA2006.pdf

  • catloaf@lemm.ee
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    2 days ago

    It’s not spontaneously starting to move from rest. There was a force exerted on it to cause it to stop. That force will cause it to start moving in time-reversal.

    • Liwott@framapiaf.org
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      1 day ago

      The loophole here is that the motion starts so smoothly from rest that there is still no force at the starting point, but that it rather appears simulatneously with the motion

      • catloaf@lemm.ee
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        1 day ago

        It doesn’t matter how smooth it is. If it came to a stop, there was an outside force.