Post #1698140
2026-04-26 12:16 UTC
The Foucault pendulum rotates due to the Coriolis force, that's something known from classical mechanics.
But Padmanabhan (Sleeping Beauties in Theoretical Physics) suggests an intriguing analogy: you can also see it as a result of the parallel transport of the vector of the plane of the pendulum; if the pendulum would be in the Equator, it wouldn't rotate, there the Coriolis force is 0, but also it is a geodesic and the parallel transport doesn't change the vector.
I love this kind of connections between fields (or subfields).
Replies (3)
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@alison@burningboard.net 2026-04-26 19:34
@davidsuculum@mathstodon.xyz What does "vector of the plane" mean? A vector perpendicular to the plane which thus uniquely defines its orientation? To me, coriolis force is an oscillation in an accelerating reference frame, but clearly all these explanations amount to the same thing.
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@davidsuculum@mathstodon.xyz 2026-04-26 22:53
(I meant the horizontal component of the Coriolis force). BTW, Padmanabhan takes his analogy further, claiming that the relativistic phenomenon known as the Thomas precession is the analogy of the Foucault's pendulum but in velocity space, but here I'm speaking from memory only.
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@RobJLow@mathstodon.xyz 2026-04-26 12:24
@davidsuculum@mathstodon.xyz coincidentally, I'm at the Pendulum Hotel in Manchester for #oggCamp2026