Like most parents of young children, I've been forcibly made aware of the "fidget spinner" fad. So, the question asked in the Mashable piece is whether a fidget spinner would spin forever in space. Explaining why that is requires a bit of thought about what makes the fidget spinner stop in the first place. The more interesting case is where an astronaut starts the fidget spinner spinning, and then lets it go, so it's freely floating. How long would tidal gravitational forces take to stop a fidget spinner?

Source: Forbes June 18, 2017 20:48 UTC