Certain neutron stars (extremely dense stars) are believed to be rotating at about 500 rev/s. If such a star has a radius of 17 km, what must be its minimum mass so that material on its surface remains in place during the rapid rotation

7.22 × 10²⁹ kg

Explanation:

For the material to be in place, the gravitational force on the material must equal the centripetal force on the material.

So, F = gravitational force = GMm/R² where M = mass of neutron star, m = mass of object and R = radius of neutron star = 17 km

The centripetal force F' = mRω² where R = radius of neutron star and ω  = angular speed of neutron star

So, since F = F'

GMm/R² = mRω²

GM = R³ω²

M = R³ω²/G

Since ω = 500 rev/s = 500 × 2π rad/s = 1000π rad/s = 3141.6 rad/s = 3.142 × 10³ rad/s and r = 17 km = 17 × 10³ m and G = universal gravitational constant = 6.67 × 10⁻¹¹ Nm²/kg²

Substituting the values of the variables into M, we have

M = R³ω²/G

M = (17 × 10³ m)³(3.142 × 10³ rad/s)²/6.67 × 10⁻¹¹ Nm²/kg²

M = 4913 × 10⁹ m³ × 9.872 × 10⁶ rad²/s²/6.67 × 10⁻¹¹ Nm²/kg²

M = 48,501.942 × 10¹⁵ m³rad²/s² ÷ 6.67 × 10⁻¹¹ Nm²/kg²

M = 7217.66 × 10²⁶ kg

M = 7.21766 × 10²⁹ kg

M ≅ 7.22 × 10²⁹ kg

relativism, roughly put, is the view that truth and falsity, right and wrong, standards of reasoning, and procedures of justification are products of differing conventions and frameworks of assessment and that their authority is confined to the context giving rise to them. more precisely, “relativism” covers views which maintain that—at a high level of abstraction—at least some class of things have the properties they have (e.g., beautiful, morally good, epistemically justified) not simpliciter, but only relative to a given framework of assessment (e.g., local cultural norms, individual standards), and correspondingly, that the truth of claims attributing these properties holds only once the relevant framework of assessment is specified or supplied. relativists characteristically insist, furthermore, that if something is only relatively so, then there can be no framework-independent vantage point from which the matter of whether the thing in question is so can be established.

relativism has been, in its various guises, both one of the most popular and most reviled philosophical doctrines of our time. defenders see it as a harbinger of tolerance and the only ethical and epistemic stance worthy of the open-minded and tolerant. detractors dismiss it for its alleged incoherence and uncritical intellectual permissiveness. debates about relativism permeate the whole spectrum of philosophical sub-disciplines. from ethics to epistemology, science to religion, political theory to ontology, theories of meaning and even logic, philosophy has felt the need to respond to this heady and seemingly subversive idea. discussions of relativism often also invoke considerations relevant to the very nature and methodology of philosophy and to the division between the so-called “analytic and continental” camps in philosophy. and yet, despite a long history of debate going back to plato and an increasingly large body of writing, it is still difficult to come to an agreed definition of what, at its core, relativism is, and what philosophical import it has. this entry attempts to provide a broad account of the many ways in which “relativism” has been defined, explained, defended and criticized.

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