Centrifugal Force Around Black Holes:

Much Ado About Nothing?

  -- Shakespeare

or

Yo! What's the Big Deal?

  --South Philly


(for a general audience)

bob jantzen
dept of mathematical sciences, villanova university

Centrifugal force is a useful idea that helps us in many ways in classical nonrelativistic physics. To what extent can it be a useful concept in strong gravitational fields within the context of general relativity? Too many papers have been written on this topic when the situation is not all that complicated, but it is rich enough to make it somewhat controversial. An attempt will be made to describe the problem which does not rely on expert knowledge of general relativity.

This is a handwaving talk meant to convey general ideas. Details of ingredients of this discussion are unimportant. Just try to get the big picture.

Outline and transparencies

[University of Missouri-Columbia, Dept of Physics and Astronomy, O.M. Steward Colloquium, Wednesday, March 1, 2000]

25-feb-2000: robert.jantzen@villanova.edu
http://www.homepage.villanova.edu/robert.jantzen