Re: planetary and atmospheric rotation - origins, direction, etc

::: If you interpose a completely frictionless membrane along the
::: ground, to isolate the air from any lateral influence from the
::: ground, it'd still experience coriolis forces. 

:: Only if it was still spinning.  Without any coupling with the ground,
:: it would have no reason to spin at the same rate, and would long ago
:: have ceased spinning. 

: Erik Max Francis <max@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
: Wuhhh?  He said frictionless.  If there's no friction, what slows it
down? 

Plus which also, it's "without any coupling to the ground".  Which
was the upthread context, and why I said frictionless in the first place,
and clarified "no lateral infulence" (so we're assuming no bumps).

So, what *did* it couple to to dump the angular momentum, and how?
Or maybe this before Newton, when Aristotle's notion about objects in
motion tend to come to rest was still in charge?


    "In the age of demons, when the Earth was still flat,
     a daughter was born to a mortal beauty and Azhram, 
     Demon Lord of Night."

          --- "Night's Master", "Tales of the Flat Earth", Tanith Lee


Wayne Throop   throopw@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
   http://sheol.org/throopw