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Author | Topic: Counter-Intuitive Science | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Much of science is counter-intuitive. One could talk here about relativity or quantum theory, but there are examples that are easier to grasp and equally counter-intuitive at first glance. For example, the world being round. (I can still recall my own incredulity when my mother told me about that one.) Or the fact that large stars burn through their fuel faster than small ones.
What are your favorite examples?
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
However, I just wanna point out that this is a strawman. As far as I know, the argument isn't ''if we were even the least bit closer we'd burn up and the least bit farther away we'd freeze'' ... On this very forum:
Doubting Too writes: For example, the position of the earth vis a vis the sun. Our planet is so well placed vis a vis the sun. A few feet away from the sun (compared to where we are now) , and we all freeze to death. A few feet near the sun and we all burn. Evidently he has never asked himself why going upstairs isn't fatal.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Years ago I saw a sample test question from a poll measuring scientific literacy. It showed a spiral track and a marble rolling down it, about to come to the end of the spiral track whereupon it would roll off into free-fall. 3 or 4 pictures provided the possible answers. The one picked by the most respondents showed the marble falling in a spiral trajectory, having "remembered" its previous motion on the spiral track. Curvilinear Motion in the Absence of External Forces: Nave Beliefs About the Motion of Objects
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
I'll be honest, I hadn't heard of anything like it. What there seems to be is one person sayign something stupid on FB, and everybody thinking this represents a real creationist position. Well, it's a position of real creationists.
http://www.otakara-island.com/forum/lofiversion/index.php The main reason I believe in God is because the Universe is so perfect, do you know that if the Earth was a few inches closer to the sun, or a few inches further there would be no life here? I mean, it's all so perfect, cant be a coincidence. http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=2010061103... Why is our planet the only one in our solor system with life? The sky is blue with beautiful clouds, some one had to create it. If you look into our body you will find a cell, which has DNA which has a code. All that coudlnt have been out of thin air, God created us in his own image.Our planet is like in th emost perfect spot, just a few inches closer to the sun and it would be the end of us, just s few feet away and it will be ice age. All the answers are around us. Open your eyes, which he created for us to see clearly with 3D. And all the colors of the raint bow. Atualize seu navegador | Facebook The real knowledge has to do with Allah and His creations. SubhanAllah if we were just a few inches closer to the sun we would burn, likewise positioned a few inches away from it we would all freeze to death. Just completely shocking but people go on with their days as though all of this wasn't carefully designed and computed. http://www.topix.com/.../world/lesotho/TTIJTA65LGGDGI8MK/p12 Did you know hore if the earth could move just few inches closer to the sun we would all burn to death? If it could move aware by just few inches it would get so cold that we would all freeze. But that doesnt happen. Why? Do you think it just doesnt happen without the reason? No. God created them to stay like that... and nothing or nobudy can no nothing to change that http://www.fortunecity.co.uk/...e/29/webschool/fndtns01.html Science tells us that if the earth were only a few inches closer to the sun, all water would eventually vaporise, and a few inches farther, it would freeze. And those are just the people who said "a few inches closer to the sun".
It's a bit like the old ''If evolution is true, why are there still monkeys ?''. Let's go for the double:
Page not found | Writing Forums By the way, what is keeping the earth in place? A few inches closer to the sun and we'd all be meeting our maker or not. Why haven't humans evolved into another species after at least 2 thousand years if not thousands more? Why are there still monkeys walking around if human beings have surpassed their ancestors in genes? Because if I've never heard it before, and it's blatantly stupid, then chances are it wasn't ''claimed and insisted on'' by a ''parade of creationists'' ... Either that or you've lived a very sheltered life.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
That deleterious alleles that fix in a population take exactly as long to fix as beneficial alleles do. Now that I didn't know. Can I see the math/reasoning? Thanks.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Oh, here's one that happened to me.
Once I was walking towards a set of sliding doors. I noticed them open and close for a group of people walking ahead of me, but when I came to them they wouldn't open. Judging that the sensors weren't sensitive enough to detect my modest weight, I decided to leap vertically in the air in the hope that when I came down the extra force of my impact would open the doors. It did not, and couldn't have done. Why not?
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Because it employed an optical sensor and not a pressure one. Obviously I'd have been wrong if I'd been wrong about how the door worked. But I'd also have been wrong if I'd been right about how the door worked (which I was).
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Weight is not affected by velocity. But obviously such a device doesn't measure weight as such. If you hit a set of bathroom scales with a sledgehammer, does it just register the weight of the hammer?
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
I had better tell everyone so that the course of the thread can be resumed.
I distinctly said that my leap was vertical; and I said that hoped the force with which I came down would be sufficient to open the door. But if the force with which I came down was sufficient to open the door, then so would be the equal force with which I went up, and the door would (as in fact it did) open when I left the ground, not when I struck it. This all goes to show, I think, that the simplest aspects of physics can elude the intuition of the cleverest people.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Judging that the sensors weren't sensitive enough to detect my modest weight, I decided to leap vertically in the air in the hope that when I came down the extra force of my impact would open the doors.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
This one tells us more about morbid psychology than it does about physics. Asking you questions that you can't answer is not, I think, listed in the latest edition of the DSM; but if you write to them and ask nicely perhaps they'll put it in the next one.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
I could tell you many strange stories of counter-intuitive math (my favorite of all my own theorems is the one that makes everyone cry: "That can't be true") but this one has the merit of being comprehensible to everyone who can do division.
The story goes (it doesn't matter if it's true) that at a certain university it was noted that in every single subject a higher proportion of the male applicants were admitted than the proportion of female applicants who were admitted. Everyone was all set for a big lawsuit when some smart alec observed that for the university as a whole a higher proportion of female applicants were admitted than male applicants. This sounds impossible. --- Now watch this. Suppose there are only two subjects taught, subject A and subject B. 10 male students apply to study subject A, and 5 get in.10 female students apply to study subject A, and 4 get in. 10 male students apply to study subject B, and 10 get in. 20 female students apply to study subject B, and 19 get in. 23/30 > 15/20. So much for the Fallacy Of Composition.
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
The most intuitive explanation I can think of is this.
Suppose there were a thousand doors, you pick one, and then the host opens 998 out of the 999 that you didn't pick. Is there really a 1 in 1000 chance that the door he didn't open is the one with the car behind it?
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 311 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
1/3. The chance of it being green is 1/6. Which means that there must be a 1/2 chance of ... what? It gets eaten by raccoons before you see what color it is?
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