I understand that in order for an object to maintain circular motion, its velocity vector must be travelling perpendicular to its position vector and constantly changing inwards, hence an acceleration towards the center of the circle. I know that the acceleration towards the center is typically caused by other forces, like tension on a string, and that these are called centripetal forces I believe? However, objects in circular motion tend to want to be away from the center instead of towards. A bucket of water tied to a string and twirled around in a circle will result in the water staying in the bucket: if the water is exhibiting circular motion, would it not thusly be accelerating inward, and thus escaping the bucket? I’ve heard that it’s a difference of frame of reference, but even looking from out to in, I can’t see how the water would be accelerating inward and yet remain in the bucket without support. Would there not be some force pushing the water into the bucket? And yet, centrifugal force is considered a fictitious force. I don’t understand. I know I understand some level of physics but please explain it like I’m 5 because I can’t seem to actually understand this.
I recommend you look at some physics resources, perhaps even YouTube videos, searching beyond the AI-generated summary that your web search gives. You wrote almost word for word what google serves back as AI summary for a “centripetal vs centrifugal” search. Look further. Plenty of science educators have posted high-quality lessons for those who seek them out.
Don’t give up when the AI summary doesn’t make sense. Effective websearching is still a modern critical skill despite AI summaries, heck, even more so because of AI summaries.
No offense but please don’t insult me like this. I abhor AI and the whole reason I ask this is because I’ve been reading through my old physics text book and got to the part with circular motion. I’ve watched the crash course video on circular motion and have read through physics forums explaining this and the Wikipedia article for this subject and I still don’t understand it.
I understand where you’re coming from and I know you don’t know me, so it’s a fair assumption considering how much fucking AI there is, and I appreciate you encouraging actual research instead of consulting AI, but damn do I feel insulted.