"According to Newton's law of gravity, every object in the universe attracts every other object... with a gravitational force... F = \frac{m M G}{R^2}... almost as famous as E = mc^2... On the left side is the force, F, between two masses... On the right side, the bigger mass is M and the smaller mass is m. ...The last symbol... G, is a numerical constant called Newton's constant. ...Ironically, Newton never knew the value of his own constant. ...G was too small to measure until the end of the eighteenth century. ...Cavendish found that the force between a pair of one-kilogram masses separated by one meter is approximately 6.6 x 10-11 newtons. (The Newton is... about one-fifth of a pound.) ...Newton had one lucky break... the special mathematical properties of the inverse square law. ...[B]y the miracle of mathematics, you can pretend that the entire mass is located at a single point. This... allowed Newton to calculate the ... Escape \; velocity = \sqrt{2MG/R} ... the bigger the mass [M] and the smaller the radius R, the larger the escape velocity."
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Original Language: English
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Sources
Leonard Susskind, The Black Hole War: My Battle with Stephen Hawking to make the World Safe for Quantum Mechanics (2008)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Gravity
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Gravity
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