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Gravity, the weakest force in the universe
The only reason we initially noticed gravity is thanks to the size of huge and easily observable objects like the planets — but all material possesses this force and scientists are determined to measure it, even at the atomic level. ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and JOEL HELLEWELL report

THE world is in free-fall. This seems obvious enough in a world in which billionaires have collectively got richer by $3.9 trillion during a pandemic, exceeding by $0.2 trn the global combined wage income lost by workers in the same time.

However, beyond the inability of governments to regulate capital, the Earth itself is falling towards the Sun, always “overshooting” but being pulled constantly down in a way that creates its orbit.

This is the effect of gravity, the force that keeps us stuck on Earth, the Earth spinning round the Sun, and the Sun moving through space as part of an enormous galaxy. 

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