As you all know I am a part-time student
teacher and one of my specialist subjects is OIT Obscure Irrational Theories
mainly the big ones relating to the universe, not small ones devoted to why
hamsters run in small wheels. . . . . . AH as it happens that is one of the big
ones but not today’s story, although the more science minded of you will see
the link straight away.
Anyway today’s lesson was my first
practical on OIT and I was trying to explain why galaxies spiral, much like
water spirals down the plug hole. You see a spinning galaxy is in fact a huge
gyroscope, and like a gyroscope, if you put it on top of a pointy stick at
right angles rather than fall off the pointy stick the gravitational forces are
moved to the pivot point and the gyroscope will start to rotate round the
pivot. (OK I know some of you are saying WHAT?) As you may guess some of my students got a bit
confused, so I used the Random
Apple Tower
.
Anyway what you need is a
selection of random apples from an apple tree; say anything from ten to about
fifty and you have to make a tower. It is a well known fact that after a
maximum of five apples the tower will fall over, the interesting point is no
matter which apples or which combination you choose the tower will never get
higher than five apples. Well if you cheat by using super glue or small skewers
or use modern GM apples then it will but in nature the universe is the universe
and cheating is not an option. After
many hours the class tried and failed to improve on a tower of five apples
until Esmeralda got bored and turned the whole lot into toffee apples and the
class ate the universe.
However it proved the
point I needed to make about why galaxies spiral although I must admit some of
the class still looked a little perplexed, so I told them to try the experiment
at home and get their parents to explain it.
Five is the limit? You have me curious now. It is too late in the day here for me to go play in the fruit section of the groc store, plus I need a camera with some empty space.
ReplyDeleteIf you manage more than five using non GM based apples then I will have to rewrite the laws of nature. It will mean the universe is not as I perceived it.
DeleteLook at that Mr Newt man all that happened to him was an apple fell on his head and he wrote a dead cool law of nature
I once stacked six apples and broke physics, which was a bad day all round. Luckily, when they restarted the physics servers that night, everything wen t back to normal and no one could remember my feat. I've been too scared to repeat my experiment ever since.
ReplyDeleteAs a man of science, I thought you might understand.
As a man of science it does not surprise me that no one remembers your feet....
DeleteI have a pear tree and a cherry tree. Can I mix n match in order to break the laws of Physics? The pears are starting to drop so I need to do something with them....
ReplyDelete