A short rant about the Kate Upton "vomit comet" photo shoot...

[wercal]

49. W=mg

All together now:

W=mg

W=mg

Your weight does not change when you are falling. Your 'apparent weight' when compared to that scale will change. But your weight does not change.

As far as taking a physics course is concerned....you have no idea. But since you brought it up, I just happen to have my first year Physics book here on the shelf in my office. Its by Serway, Second Edition. Per the index, 'Weight' is on page 86.

"The force exerted by earth on a body is called the weight of the body W." No editorializing here - Serway put Weight in bold.

Ok - well lets look up 'apparent weight' in the index. Page 92. Example 5.6 Weighing a fish in an Elevator.

"A person weighs a fish on a spring scale attached to the ceiling of an elevator, as shown in Figure 5.13. Show that if the elevator accelerates or decelerates, the spring scale reads a weight different from the true weight of the fish".

I hope you can understand that. I can, because I don't even remember how many physics courses I've taken....every one of them long before you could look up stuff and mis-interpret it on the internet.