Posted: Apr 20, 2018 7:58 am
by Thommo
Yaniv wrote:
Thommo wrote:Ok, here's another simple one.

If you rub a balloon on your jumper it acquires a static charge. In the conventional theory, this static charge will allow it to cling to a wall or ceiling (assume the balloon is filled with air, so would otherwise fall down).

If you're right, this balloon when charged statically would react to the large static charge of the Earth. Again you could easily verify whether this happens in your own home.

The static charge on a balloon brought at close proximity to a wall interacts more strongly with charged particles in the wall than with the earth.


I'm not sure how you'd deduce that without an equation governing force, charge and distance. Or are we to assume Coulomb's law here?

However, you don't have to put the balloon near the wall for the test. If you're right a statically charged balloon should fall much, much, much faster than a non statically charged balllon. This would be easily testable in your own home.