Flat Earth Society

Do please name that firearm. I have a reference book describing many pistols and rifles (even some antique pieces). Each description includes that firearm's muzzle velocity in fps and range (both effective and maximum) in meters. Your stated muzzle velocity of 11.2 km/s translates to 36,745.4 fps. I would be extremely interested to know what firearm has a muzzle velocity that great.Here are a few examples. For range, I will only give the maximum range since that is pertinent to this question:

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Firearm                           Muzzle Velocity (fps)      Max Range (m)
Pistols:
Tannenburg Hand Cannon (c. 1400)       400                       1280
.54 Flintlock (1806)                   725                        500
Styer GB 80 (1981)                    1214                       2140
Mauser M1896 (1896)                   1400                       1800
P-08 Luger (1908)                     1150                       2012
Walther PPK (1930)                     970                       1360
Walther P-38 (P-1) (1938)             1150                       2012
Beretta M92S (1976)                   1155                       2012
Colt M1911A1                           860                       1463
Rifles:
Styer SSG-69 (1969)                   2820                       3725
Heckler & Koch 33A2 (1968)            3150                       2575
Heckler & Koch G-11 (1980)            3051                       3266
Walther WA-2000 (1982)                3070                       4084
Winchester Model 1873                 1325                        915
Winchester M1894                      2410                       2830
M1 Garand (1932)                      2805                       3155
M16A1 (1957)                          3280                       2653
AR 10 (1955)                          2772                       3690
Remington M700 (1960)                 2800                       3100
Sharps .50-140 (1874/1880)            1800                       2552
M19 SPIW (1973)                       4850                      +2500

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So the highest muzzle velocity I could find was 4850 fps (1.478 km/s). Not even close to your required muzzle velocity.So then do please tell us what firearm is capable of that muzzle velocity. We would really want to know.And just how much of a factor would the earth's curvature be at 4084 meters? Actually I would think that air resistance would be a greater factor, but then this was a basic physics problem.

If you were to review my table in Message 39, you would notice that there's not much correlation between the muzzle velocity and the maximum range. For example, the Sharps with a muzzle velocity of only 1800 fps has a maximum range of 2552, whereas the M19 SPIW with a much greater muzzle velocity (4850 fps) has about the same maximum range or only slightly greater.I think that that has to do with the mass of the slug that they're throwing (in science fiction that class of weapon is referred to as "slug throwers", though in a German castle I did see some literal slug throwers, medieval hand-held catapults). If you have ever seen actual gun trajectories, you will have noticed that they're not parabolas, but rather they start out as a parabola but then towards the end they quickly drop to the ground foreshortening the end of the trajectory greatly. This is because aerodynamic drag slows the projectile down along its horizontal vector. Based on that, I would assume that the apparent discrepancies between muzzle velocity and maximum range are due to the different masses of the projectiles, a property which I don't recall being given specifically in my reference. As you will recall from when you studied physics (which for me was about 30 years ago), a projectile of greater mass can resist aerodynamic drag longer than a projectile of lesser mass can.But then Tyson's and Galileo's experiments were not dynamics problems (where mass matters), but rather kinematic problems (where mass does not matter), as you should recall from physics class (even I can recall that).Also, your calculation can lead us to false assumptions such as that the drop didn't begin until at the end of that maximum range -- I had performed the same calculation. Rather, that projectile had started dropping at the very instant that it left the muzzle and our calculations must take that into account.Doing my own integrating to obtain the formulae:

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Acceleration: a(t) = g
Velocity: v(t) = gt
Displacement: s(t) = (1/2)gt²

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Yes, that should be negative because of the downward direction, but we're concerned here with the magnitude so we can safely take the absolute value.Using my Meterstock, I found that my shoulders are at a height of 1.5 meters, so if I were to aim level and fire that Walther WA-2000 (muzzle velocity of 3070 fps (935.736 m/s), max range 4084m) then it would be from that height. Let t_drop be the time for a bullet falling from that height to hit the ground:

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s(t_drop) = (1/2)gt_drop² = 1.5m
t_drop² = 2 × 1.5m / g
g = 9.80665 m/sec²
t_drop² = 2 × 1.5m / (9.80665 m/sec²
t_drop² = 0.3059 (m s² / m) = 0.3059 sec²
t_drop = 0.553 sec

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In 0.553 sec, a WA-2000 bullet will have traveled 517.462 meters. At that distance, the dip of the earth's surface due to curvature would be 0.021 meters. Plugging that into the time calculation above would yield a travel time of 0.55695 sec, just about 4 milliseconds greater (0.7%). Minimal difference.Yeah, I just now have realized that myself, that I had chosen the wrong range value. Sorry, my mistake. Maximum range is obtained by firing up at about an angle of 45°, whereas we need the range when firing level. Effective range would be pointing at a target, which should be much closer to firing level. No, actually not, since you have to aim higher to account for distance, so even the effective range would not be indicative of its range if aimed level, but rather the range where the bullet hasn't slowed down so much that it can no longer do damage -- I think that the term for a bullet that travels beyond its effective range is "spent bullet". Sorry, but it looks like the stated ranges have nothing to do with our problem, whereas the muzzle velocity does, so we're back on the right track now.OK, now let's do the same for the highest muzzle velocity in that list, the M19 SPIW at 4850 fps (1478.28 m/s). In 0.553 sec, the time that it takes a bullet dropped from my shoulder height to hit the ground, an M19 bullet will have traveled 817.48884 meters. At that distance, the dip of the earth's surface due to curvature would be 0.05245 meters. Plugging that into the time calculation above would yield a travel time of 0.5627 sec, just about 10 milliseconds greater (1.8%). Still a minimal difference.Of course, we are not taking all factors into account, such as aerodynamic drag (which would only serve to shorten the level-flight range and hence the extra time), gravitational effects of the sun and moon and of the truck in the parking lot, relativistic effects however minimal. Obviously, adding all factors would only make the problem far more complex than it needs to be, even too complex to be able to solve the problem, while contributing nothing to the solution. Well, with the possible exception of aerodynamic drag, but then that would turn it into a dynamics problem which would be dependent on factors that could change (eg, mass of the projectile, density and temperature of the air), all of which would detract from the basic questions of acceleration, velocity, and displacement which is what we're actually interested in here.IOW, in order to determine the effects of one set of factors, it is common practice to either hold all other factors as constant or else simplify them out. That's basically what you do with partial derivatives. Another classic example is an electrical circuit in which we only work with the values of the resistors, capacitors, inductors, and power sources (eg, batteries) we place in that circuit while ignoring all the resistance, capacitance, and induction (referred to as "stray" or "parasitic")inherent in all the components and wiring; that doesn't mean we don't know they're there, but rather we don't know their actual values so we can't work with them analytically (though we do employ practices to try to minimize them). Simplifying out dynamics in a kinematics problem does not mean that we don't believe in dynamics. Nor does simplifying out the curvature of the earth in a basic kinematics problem mean that we believe in a flat earth. {eye-roll}Of course, if you disagree then you can point out personally to Neil deGrasse Tyson himself that he's really a flat-earther. Be sure to share his response with us. Quoted in its entirety verbatim along with your email to him quoted in its entirety and verbatim (sorry, but we have had far too much real-life experience with creationists).

Look at the lower-right corner of any message. You will see two buttons: Reply and Peek.As you finally learned, clicking on the Reply button allows you to reply to a specific message while linking to that message, something which benefits everybody here, so it is very much encouraged.As for Peek. Are you familiar with HTML (Hyper-Text Markup Language)? That is the formatting markup language for web pages. Tags, which tell you the functionality, are encoded within "angle brackets" ( > and <, the first one being the "open functionality" and the second "close functionality"). This forum's software recognizes them.There are also bbCode codes ("bulletin board codes"? -- some history there that I could inform you of) which function very similarly to HTML, only with square brackets ( [ ] ) instead of angle brackets ( < > ). There is a reference link somewhere on each page, but I forget where it is.Now for the easy answer. Do you see that Peek button in the lower right-hand corner? If you click on that, then you will see the HTML and bbCode tags embedded within that message. So then, if you ever want to know how one of us had done something in a message, all you need to do is to click on that Peek button and all will be revealed.What you are trying to do involves the img bbCode tag. Here is the basic syntax with key character substitutions: {img}URL of the image{/img}. In that construct, replace the { and } with [ and ]. Now the tricky part is the actual location where the graphic file resides.As far as I know, the forum has no capacity to store your files. That means that you need to upload your own files (eg, graphics files) onto a site where you do have some kind of storage privileges. I have a site or a few on GoDaddy. You need to use whatever you have.Or are you just going to dismiss all that I tell you as "bullshit"?Idiot!Edited by dwise1, : No reason given.

That was not Ringo's question. Rather, his question in Message 84 was: I am much older than you are by nearly half a century. Somewhere in the mid-1980's Atari gaming consoles transitioned from 8-bit microprocessors to 16-bit microprocessors. The advertising hype was to tout their gaming systems as being faster because they were 16-bit instead of 8-bit -- ignoring the simple fact that no new hardware advantage has any effect unless the software can take advantage of it. The catch-phrase in their TV commercials was, "Do the Math". So now whenever a creationist makes any kind of appeal to a mathematical calculation, my response is, "Do the Math". The creationists fail each and every time.Getting back to Ringo's question. Creationists lie. They always do, because their claims are contrary to fact, so any truthful statement would contradict their own party line. At the same time, I would like to believe, most creationists do not realize that they are lying.So then, do please answer Ringo's simple and sincere question: How far away do the folk making that claim think the sun is?

It's a reference to a cure for syphilis circa 1900 by Paul Ehrlich. "Magic bullet" is synonymous.

Somehow in the back of my mind I seem to recall that one of the treatments was the injection of a silver compound. And that those injection sites would show up on x-rays for the rest of the patient's life.Or was it some form of mercury? Do you remember, Doc?