The earth is about 45 minutes away from Jupiter. Wouldn't we be being tugged by Jupiter from where Jupiter was 45 minutes ago, rather than where Jupiter is now?
Is this effect so small that it is still unmeasureable or has someone already looked into it?
Just wondering.
To observe things in our solar system we use light waves. Any observation of gravity would travel to us at the same rate. By the time we see it, it’s happened essentially. Indirect stellar measurements with much larger masses make it easier. If you want to test say, the concept of a battery for instance. It’s much easier to confirm a car battery’s got juice as opposed to a watch battery. It’s a matter of scale. Binary stars decaying in orbit with respect to each other are much easier to measure as the forces are larger and the decay rate itself is dependent on gravity.
Just thought I should add. The models used to calculate the speed of gravity through gravitational dampening with respect to binary pulsars, I don’t agree with personally. It’s the best we’ve got at this point. Like you implied earlier. Theorists need more people who think outside the box. The boxes we’re in are leading to dead ends at this point.