The dumb questions thread

[Juma]

Zenos paradox is just a paradox, a wrong-think, not some physical law.
It is totally possible to move through an infinity of positions.

I was making a point.If distance is infinitely divisible you can end up with the paradox.

People use the words space and time without definition as some metaphysical obstruction. In relativity space is in meters and time is in seconds. The meter is defined as an integer number of wavelengths of light.

What space 'is' for me has no meaning. Unless we can quantify something we can not scientifically describe it. Space is separation in meters.

Space is so much more than just separation. What we really habe is spacetime.
But you are right in that mot have problem seeing past their own metaphysical/folkpsychological model of spsce and time.
But, no, zenons paradox is still nothing more than a ”wrong-think”, even in a continous room.

 

[Jokodo]

Zenos paradox is just a paradox, a wrong-think, not some physical law.
It is totally possible to move through an infinity of positions.

I was making a point.If distance is infinitely divisible you can end up with the paradox.

People use the words space and time without definition as some metaphysical obstruction. In relativity space is in meters and time is in seconds. The meter is defined as an integer number of wavelengths of light.

OT, but this is incorrect. The metre is defined as an integer fraction of (1/299792458 to be precise) of the distance light travels in a second, and the second in turn is defined as "the duration of 9 192 631 770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the caesium 133 atom".

If the metre were defined as you put it as "an integer number of wavelengths of light", it would be undefined since light comes in all kinds of wavelengths.

 

[Derec]

The meter is defined as an integer number of wavelengths of light.

OT, but this is incorrect. The metre is defined as an integer fraction of (1/299792458 to be precise) of the distance light travels in a second, and the second in turn is defined as "the duration of 9 192 631 770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the caesium 133 atom".

If the metre were defined as you put it as "an integer number of wavelengths of light", it would be undefined since light comes in all kinds of wavelengths.

That actually used to be the definition before the speed of light one.
"In 1893, the standard metre was first measured with an interferometer by Albert A. Michelson, the inventor of the device and an advocate of using some particular wavelength of light as a standard of length. By 1925, interferometry was in regular use at the BIPM. However, the International Prototype Metre remained the standard until 1960, when the eleventh CGPM defined the metre in the new International System of Units (SI) as equal to 1 650 763.73 wavelengths of the orange-red emission line in the electromagnetic spectrum of the krypton-86 atom in a vacuum.[26]"

Not quite an integer and not any more since 1983, but not completely wrong either.

 

[Wiploc]

I was making a point.If distance is infinitely divisible you can end up with the paradox.

Unless time is also infinitely divisible. There's no "paradox" unless you treat one as infinitely divisible while "forgetting" to treat the other the same way.

 

[skepticalbip]

I was making a point.If distance is infinitely divisible you can end up with the paradox.

Unless time is also infinitely divisible. There's no "paradox" unless you treat one as infinitely divisible while "forgetting" to treat the other the same way.

Right, Zeno didn't know calculus.

 

[rousseau]

What happens to insects in the winter?

 

[beero1000]

What happens to insects in the winter?

I think they mostly just go dormant. There are some that migrate (like monarch butterflies), and likely some other strategies too.

 

[rousseau]

What happens to insects in the winter?

I think they mostly just go dormant. There are some that migrate (like monarch butterflies), and likely some other strategies too.

Yea I wondered if, for a lot of them, lower temperature lowers their metabolism to such a rate that it effectively freezes them until it warms up and they start moving again.

But does it get any more complex than that? Does the social-network of an ant community change seasonally? Or do they just kinda.. stop moving.

 

[Kharakov]

What happens to insects in the winter?

I think they mostly just go dormant. There are some that migrate (like monarch butterflies), and likely some other strategies too.

Yea I wondered if, for a lot of them, lower temperature lowers their metabolism to such a rate that it effectively freezes them until it warms up and they start moving again.

But does it get any more complex than that? Does the social-network of an ant community change seasonally? Or do they just kinda.. stop moving.

Are you a Canadian without a wood stove? I remember bringing in wood, and sometimes I'd get a piece that had ants in it (well, this one winter, I got this cord of wood that had ants in it).

The frozen ants would sometimes fall out on the floor, and start running around after they thawed. Pretty interesting. Of course, also got lots of spiders, etc.

Bugs come with antifreeze. I forget which kind they recommend for humbleguy's vehicle. I think the blue koolaid is supposed to be the best.


Rock on -pi/12.

 

[bilby]

What happens to insects in the winter?

The New Zealand Alpine Weta can survive being frozen solid, and will not die unless their body temperature falls below -10°C

This ability is presumably rare amongst insects, as the Alpine Weta is, I understand, considered remarkable by entomologists for this trait.

Studies of the precise mechanism by which this species is able to tolerate the freezing of its tissues are ongoing, in the hope that this might lead to methods for non-destructive freeze preservation of human tissues (eg organs for transplant), amongst other potential uses.

 

[Kharakov]

Scenario:


Free fall at the edge of gravity gradients between 2 equally massed objects that are rotating around the point you are located.... at.

You are a spherical shaped cow, with muscles, etc. balanced exactly. A robotic, spherical shaped cow (no blood flow, etc. to upset the balance, all decisions are simulated on 2 chips towards either gravity well, etc. etc.), but you can move weights inside of you, changing your balance).

Can you alter your structure, without detaching part of yourself, so that you fall into either gravity well?

 

[Jokodo]

Scenario:


Free fall at the edge of gravity gradients between 2 equally massed objects that are rotating around the point you are located.... at.

You are a spherical shaped cow, with muscles, etc. balanced exactly. A robotic, spherical shaped cow (no blood flow, etc. to upset the balance, all decisions are simulated on 2 chips towards either gravity well, etc. etc.), but you can move weights inside of you, changing your balance).

Can you alter your structure, without detaching part of yourself, so that you fall into either gravity well?

I'd have to think it through (so ignore my ad hoc answer if you need to be certain), but I guess yes.

If you move mass within your sphere, you are shifting the rest of the sphere in the opposite direction proportionally. But that displacement is strictly linear, while gravitational attraction diminishes with the square of the distance.

 

[skepticalbip]

Can you alter your structure, without detaching part of yourself, so that you fall into either gravity well?

Just a quick knee-jerk thought is that you couldn't since the center of mass could not be moved toward either gravity well with any imaginable change of shape. However, second thought is that if one teat were stretched out into a chosen gravity well (making the spherical cow look like a tootsie pop with a long stick) then the greater tidal forces acting along the long stretched out teat should do the trick even though the spherical section would move toward the other gravity well slightly.

 

[beero1000]

Scenario:


Free fall at the edge of gravity gradients between 2 equally massed objects that are rotating around the point you are located.... at.

You are a spherical shaped cow, with muscles, etc. balanced exactly. A robotic, spherical shaped cow (no blood flow, etc. to upset the balance, all decisions are simulated on 2 chips towards either gravity well, etc. etc.), but you can move weights inside of you, changing your balance).

Can you alter your structure, without detaching part of yourself, so that you fall into either gravity well?

I'd have to think it through (so ignore my ad hoc answer if you need to be certain), but I guess yes.

If you move mass within your sphere, you are shifting the rest of the sphere in the opposite direction proportionally. But that displacement is strictly linear, while gravitational attraction diminishes with the square of the distance.

This. For example, move 1/3 of the mass towards one of the objects and 2/3 toward the other.

 

[Kharakov]

Now, can you reform into a non-spherical cow without falling towards either object?

 

[bilby]

Now, can you reform into a non-spherical cow without falling towards either object?

A quick review of the literature indicates to me that the cow jumped OVER the moon, implying that it does not become stranded at L₁ - a finding that is in keeping with both the fact that L₁ is a point of unstable equilibrium, and with the observation that the dish ran away with the spoon.

 

[Kharakov]

Now, can you reform into a non-spherical cow without falling towards either object?

A quick review of the literature indicates to me that the cow jumped OVER the moon, implying that it does not become stranded at L₁ - a finding that is in keeping with both the fact that L₁ is a point of unstable equilibrium, and with the observation that the dish ran away with the spoon.

Would you please explain that without using cowculus?

 

[bilby]

Now, can you reform into a non-spherical cow without falling towards either object?

A quick review of the literature indicates to me that the cow jumped OVER the moon, implying that it does not become stranded at L₁ - a finding that is in keeping with both the fact that L₁ is a point of unstable equilibrium, and with the observation that the dish ran away with the spoon.

Would you please explain that without using cowculus?

I could, but then all you would have herd was a lot of bull.

 

[Malintent]

I'm patty sure this means the thread has been milked. mooooooving on....

 

[steve_bank]

Can somebody summarize gravity assist slingshot for me?

A ship heads for the moon and gains energy from gravity. It circles round and leaves. It seems like the energy gained by gravitational acceleration should be lost leaving against the moon's gravity.