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The 20p Question Thread
- Thread starter Drago
- Start date
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OP
OP
Drago
Legendary Member
- Location
- Suburban Poshshire
If over time you replace parts on a car, at what point does it stop being the same car you bought? How many parts do you need to replace to make it a new car?
craigwend
Grimpeur des terrains plats
According to TrigerBroomNometry its always the same car / broom...
nickyboy
Norven Mankey
- Location
- You want hills? We got hills
Talking of boring holes in the earth, if I bored a hole from Glossop, through the middle of the earth and out the other side and then I drop a weight into the hole, what would the weight do (assuming no friction)?
Would it just pop out in NZ or wherever, then zoom back in the opposite direction and reappear in Glossop?
Would it just pop out in NZ or wherever, then zoom back in the opposite direction and reappear in Glossop?
It'll melt a long time before it gets to the core. A theoretical unmeltable weight, though, would overshoot the centre of the Earth a bit, but not all the way to NZ as it'd have lost energy to friction. Then it'd bounce back through the centre, part way back to Glossop and continue see-sawing smaller and smaller distances till it eventually settled in the centre.
edit: sorry, you said 'ignore friction'. If there were no losses then it would continue appearing alternately in Glossop and NZ forever.
newfhouse
Resolutely on topic
I think it would come to rest in the centre after a bit of to-ing and fro-ing. I don’t think it would make it as far as the other end of your borehole.
If it's not losing potential energy through friction, and I can't think of any other way for it to lose it, it would surely keep going forever?
newfhouse
Resolutely on topic
Once it passes the centre, the bulk of gravitational attraction will be behind it, thus causing a deceleration. I think...
D
Deleted member 26715
Guest
Sorry for the sensible answer, my father's neighbour used to be a prison guard & used to take prisoners to Parkhurst & we talked about last year when discussing the ferry routes. They stay in the vehicle.
Where has the potential energy it had when it left Derbyshire gone though? It'd turn into kinetic energy as it progressed, then momentum would keep it going past the centre till it all turned back to potential energy at a point equidistant from the centre of the earth to Glossop.
That's boring (hah! see what I accidentally did there) though. I checked, and the hole that Nickyboy drilled comes under the ocean south of NZ, so in the spirit of this thread: what happens to the Pacific Ocean if a hole is drilled from its bed all the way to Glossop? Would there be steam? Would boiled fish rain down on the hills of Derbyshire?
newts
Veteran
- Location
- Isca Dumnoniorum
If you own your land right through to the centre of the planet & then dig your tunnel through to the opposite side, you'd have tresspased onto every freehold worldwide?
Imagine the class action suit!
nickyboy
Norven Mankey
- Location
- You want hills? We got hills
Hmmm....I think if my drill hole mistakenly punctures the Pacific Ocean, what happens is the seawater accelerates down the hole like my weight from Glossop in reverse, until the hole is full of seawater. But then the water would become superheated in the middle, resulting in something like Old Faithful in the Peak District and one of those "black smokers" in the Pacific. And free poached fish for all
The force of superheated steam exiting New Faithful would be enough to shunt the Earth out of its orbit, possibly bumping the moon out of the way as it went, and leading us to boldly go where no cyclist has boldly gone before. Boldly. But there'd be free poached fish, so I'd be ok with that.
