Why do some things fall faster than others?

Answer 1

The first thing to remember is that everything falls at the same speed unless there is something there to slow it down. the only thing that changes that makes a piece of paper or a feather fall more slowly then a lump of lead is the resistance of the air and it buoyancy (the same rule applies underwater as well) The lead slips through the air easily until it hits the ground, so at falls quickly. However if you take something light it is more easily slowed down as the result of the resistance it encounters as it slips through the air added to the fact that the lighter it is the more buoyant it is. If you took two things that are a different weight and dropped them on the moon where there is no air at all they would fall exactly the same speed. Interestingly enough the moon would fall toward them a little as well although the amount would be hard to measure. If you were to do the same experiment under water all of the same rules apply only there buoyancy would play an even more obvious part. For any thing to be able to fall under water it has to have more mass then water Once you have a material that sinks you can alter the rate that it sinks at by altering its shape. For example a one kilo ball of lead would sink rapidly but on the other hand if you were to flatten that one kilo ball of lead into a big thin sheet it would take much longer to sink because of the resistance of the water it has to pass through on its way down. So in the end the reason things fall at different rated in an atmosphere or water is because of the difference in their mass compared to the medium it is falling through (buoyancy) and the shape of the object being subject to the mediums ability to resist its progress downwards. None of this is a problem in a vacuum as there is no resistance nor does the dropped object have any buoyancy.