Why is it that when something pushes/pulls on me, I feel acceleration, but I don’t feel acceleration from the earth’s gravity? I feel a force pushing upward on me, but I don’t feel a downward force.
In: Physics
In reality, there are two forces acting on you when you stand: the gravitational force pulling you down and the normal force pushing back on your feet.
You feel the ground pushing back because the normal force is exerted locally on your feet. Gravity is exerted on every atom in your body in relatively equal magnitude. Therefore, you don’t feel a local force, hence you don’t feel acceleration.
Here are some examples:
When someone shoves you, the part of your body that got shoved accelerates and then drags the rest of your body with it.
If you jump off a cliff, every part of your body feels the same force at the same time, so your brain doesn’t register it as the force you’re familiar with.
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