Russell Kent wrote in :

Back up your claim that pounds are not units of mass. That's where
you falsely
claimed that Dave S. was making an error.

Actually, I intended only to claim that Dave S. incorrectly stated
mass when he should have stated weight. From my perspective, the
respondent about whom Dave S. was complaining clearly intended "lbs"
as a unit of weight.


Gene is correct, although mass and weight are equal in the same
environment (i.e. good ole earth gravity) so really correcting someone
on that is akin to correcting spelling mistakes on use-net.... kind of
useless.

Lbs IS a measure of mass (to us "common" folk) IFF acceleration is
either identified or implied. i.e. My mass is 195lbs at earth sea
level. Most people would say then mass = weight and weight = mass.

BUT I would say most of us have had experience where that is not true.
If you've traveled on an airplane... or ... perhaps flown one grin,
the acceleration factor has been at least momentarily increased or
decreased... with maneuvering... so even though you weigh 200lbs before
the you stepped into the plane, when you banked into that 30 degree
turn, you probably weighed something like 250+, but your mass never
changed.... When I took physics, mass was measured in a.u.'s & I have
no idea what the a stands for, and I think the u just meant "unit"

Although I beleive the correction was a bit petty... The hostle response
was a bit uncalled for, especially since Gene was correct.

Here is a good link that explains:

http://www.nyu.edu/pages/mathmol/tex...ightvmass.html

ET


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