named leon foucault became famous for
swinging pendulums and claiming their
consequent motions were proof positive
of the earth’s diurnal rotation
since then so-called foucault pendulums
have regularly been swinging at museums
and exposition halls worldwide
purporting to provide everlasting
perpetual proof of the heliocentric
spinning ball earth theory
the truth is however unbeknownst to most
of the duped public that foucault’s
pendulum was a failed experiment which
proved nothing but how easy it is for
pseudoscience to deceive the malleable
masses
to begin with foucault’s pendulums do
not uniformly swing in any one direction
sometimes they rotate clockwise and
sometimes counterclockwise while other
times they fail to rotate or they rotate
far too much
scientists who have repeated variations
of the experiment have conceded time and
again that quote it was difficult to
avoid giving the pendulum some slight
lateral bias at starting
the behavior of the pendulum actually
depends on one the initial force
beginning its swing
and two the ball and socket joint used
which most readily facilitates circular
motion over any other
in fact the majority of foucault’s
pendulums in operation today are not
even based on this design and are
instead electrically powered and fully
adjustable
the supposed rotation of the earth is
completely inconsequential and
irrelevant to the pendulum swing
if the alleged constant rotation of the
earth affected pendulums in any way then
there should be no need to manually
start pendulums in motion
furthermore
if the earth’s alleged rotation actually
caused the 360 degree uniform diurnal
rotation of pendulums then there should
not exist a single stationary pendulum
anywhere on earth
dr samuel robotham wrote
first when a pendulum constructed
according to the plan of mr foucault is
allowed to vibrate its plane of
vibration is often variable not always
the variation when it does occur is not
uniform
is not always the same in the same place
nor always the same either in its rate
or velocity or in its direction
it cannot therefore be taken as evidence
for that which is inconsistent
cannot be used in favor of or against
any given proposition
it therefore is not evidence and proves
nothing
secondly if the plane of vibration is
observed to change where is the
connection between such change and the
supposed motion of the earth
what principle of reasoning guides the
experimenter to the conclusion that it
is the earth which moves underneath the
pendulum and not the pendulum which
moves over the earth
thirdly why was not the peculiar
arrangement of the point of suspension
of the pendulum specially considered in
regard to its possible influence upon
the plane of oscillation
was it not known or was it overlooked or
was it in the climax of theoretical
revelry ignored that a ball and socket
joint is one which facilitates circular
motion more readily than any other
and lady blunt wrote
we believe with all due difference to
the pendulum and its proprietor that it
proves nothing but the craftiness of the
inventor and we can only describe the
show and showmen as deceptions
a thing so childish as this pendulum
proof that it can only be described as
one of the most simple and ridiculous
attempts to gull the public that has
ever been conceived
it has been said that the pendulum
experiment proves the rotation of the
earth but this is quite impossible for
one pendulum turns one way and sometimes
another pendulum turns in the opposite
direction
now we ask does the earth rotate in
opposite directions at different places
at one in the same time we should like
to know perhaps the experimenters will
kindly enlighten us on this point
if the earth had the terrible motions
attributed to it there would be some
sensible effects of such motions but we
neither feel the motion see it nor hear
it and how people can stand watching the
pendulum vibrate and think they are
seeing a proof of the motions of the
earth almost passes comprehension
they are however brought up to believe
it and it is thought to be scientific
to believe what the astronomers teach
My mechanical engineering lab class hung our own Foucault pendulum. We used a gimbal bearing, not a ball and socket joint. Nobody would use a ball and socket in that application, because they have high friction. Foucault pendulums in museums use pendulum motors to keep them swinging, but ours didn’t have one so it ran down after a couple of hours. But for over two hours it registered exactly the correct rotation expected for our latitude. Eric Dubay lied about that in the video. He also lied about the initial force controlling the eventual motion. We started ours the same way Foucault started his. The bob is held at the limit of its swing by a thread, and we burn the thread with a candle flame. No sideways force and no spin is applied to the bob by that mechanism.