Or pots of petunias.
[0] https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/198068-another-thing-that-g...
the cat experiences "zero-g" as it accelerates towards terminal velocity
I'm guessing in most cat falling situations the cat does not reach terminal velocity, so it is accelerating the whole time and can adjust based on the direction of acceleration.
If you're accelerating, you're experience some "g" force, not "zero-g".
Spend long enough out of gravity, and it will get confused. As do we.
[1] https://www.military.com/history/how-naked-skydive-inspired-...
Could be wrong, but that’s my guess.
Nice joy ride BTW.
Ah, yes, I see your point. Air resistance would eventually kick in and provide positive G, but not in a short enough fall. And cats are heavy enough that "a short enough fall" probably includes most falls in which they are observed to land on their feet.
Cats also have memory. They remember in which direction gravity was pulling them before the fall. Absent every other sensation that memory should be enough to get the process going even absent new sensations.
Yet, I hope no one tries this as it might perhaps be traumatic to cats.
This Veritasium video gives an intuitive explanation: https://youtu.be/XRr1kaXKBsU
Consider this: if you hold an accelerometer while stationary on the ground, it will read 1g (accelerating). If you read an accelerometer while in free-fall, it will read 0g (ignoring wind resistance). In the first scenario, you are accelerating compared to your rest frame, even if you are standing still.
This is not an arbitrary distinction either. The 1g of acceleration while stationary on the ground produces measurable relativistic effects.
The only time the accelerometer reads something other than 0 is when something pushes it away from an inertial reference frame. This is true when you're on the ground: spacetime is curved, and "flows" towards the center of the Earth. The ground pushes you against the flow of spacetime, and the difference between these two frames of reference is 1g. Note that this 1g is not "caused" by gravity, it's caused by the electromagnetic force. Forces push matter away from an inertial reference frame. Gravity is different. It decides where an inertial reference frame goes by curving spacetime - it is not a force.
Hypothetically, if you were are the center of the Earth, the accelerometer would read 0g. There would be nothing pushing you in any particular direction - you would be in an inertial reference frame (ignoring the minor detail of being crushed by all of the Earth's mass).
Again, I'm trying to show the subtle difference between accelerating compared to a fixed coordinate system, and accelerating compared to an inertial reference frame. The fixed coordinate system does not take into account the curvature of spacetime. If it did, the coordinates would be "accelerating" towards the center of the Earth at 1g - congratulations, you've defined an inertial reference frame.
I hope that makes sense. It blew my mind when this idea clicked: that space and time are not two distinct things, they are two parts of the same thing.
If the "wind" theory is true, would a cat would have it's paws pointing upwards while flying up?
It actually makes an interesting puzzle to figure out what a cat is actually responding to when it lands on its feet after a fall.