But if a bee is flying inside a ball and pushes against the side, what’s causing the ball to move relative to the earth? None of the wind can escape, it’s just air moving around inside the ball.
But the hamster is rolling the ball, not flying, so it can take advantage of friction with the ground times the normal force. If a flying bee hits the wall of the ball, then it’s pushing back on air and the net momentum of the ball and its contents is unchanged.
I think the ball filled with bees would just fall to the ground.
By a bee bopping into the top of the ball from below, assuming it was flying upward fast enough. The ball is sitting on the ground otherwise with no vertical momentum.
The forces don’t cancel out completely. You get a sort of random motion, effectively Brownian motion.
Why bees and not flies? Because bees are cute.
But if a bee is flying inside a ball and pushes against the side, what’s causing the ball to move relative to the earth? None of the wind can escape, it’s just air moving around inside the ball.
When the bee bops into the wall of the ball, it transfers momentum to the ball. It’s no different from a hamster in a ball, just smaller.
But the hamster is rolling the ball, not flying, so it can take advantage of friction with the ground times the normal force. If a flying bee hits the wall of the ball, then it’s pushing back on air and the net momentum of the ball and its contents is unchanged.
I think the ball filled with bees would just fall to the ground.
Sure but nobody said the ball could fly? It could definitely jump though, as well as roll around.
How would it jump?
By a bee bopping into the top of the ball from below, assuming it was flying upward fast enough. The ball is sitting on the ground otherwise with no vertical momentum.