Why Is There Gravity?

Why Is There Gravity?

When you pick up a stone and release it falls to the ground. This seemingly simple concept has been known throughout history as gravitation. Isaac Newton managed to explain gravity in terms of its effects, but few have come up with a working explanation for the driving force behind it. The mysterious nature of some of the more peculiar effects of gravity, as well as the simple ones, indicate that explaining why there is gravity will be a long, difficult, yet intriguing task.

Ohanian (1976) writes that without other forces interfering, mass attracts mass. This is the fundamental concept behind gravitation. Newton explained it as "there is a power of gravity pertaining to all bodies, proportional to the several quantities of matter which they contain… The force of gravity towards the several equal parts of any body is inversely as the square of the distance of places from the particles." This description of gravity creates the simple mathematical explanation of gravity: that the force of attraction, F, equals G * ((m1 * m2) / r^2).

This holds true for most gravitational interactions on earth, so any proper theory of gravity would have to include similar results for these interactions. Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler (1973) explain that there are, however, some more complex aspects of gravity that this law does not account for. One of these strange gravitational effects is observed in the "perihelion shift" movement of planets, the most dramatic...

Why Is There Gravity?

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