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Water Flows Uphill

Posted by michael on from the now-you-see-it dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The BBC are reporting James Dyson's new garden feature, a waterfall with water flowing uphill. Apparently, he wanted to recreate an Escher drawing."

47 of 365 comments (clear)

  1. It's not a waterfall then, is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    It's a water elevator, or something.

  2. Simple... it's antiwater by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Antiwater (two part antihydrogen and one part antioxygen) is repelled by the force of gravity.

    1. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      If only antimatter was repelled by gravity. Antimatter is just normal matter with reverse charge and spin, so it obeys all normal physical laws. So-called "negative matter" would be repelled by gravity, but we don't know if it even exists or can be made.

    2. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by nomadic · · Score: 5, Funny

      If you drink anti-water, do you become thirsty?

    3. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by commodoresloat · · Score: 4, Funny

      Well, that rules out antiwater. The answer, then, is clear. It is antigravity, not antiwater, that makes water go up.

    4. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by SEE · · Score: 5, Informative

      The troubles here are two:

      1) We have no experimental evidence as to how antimatter reacts to gravity (beond a couple of small ones where the externally-caused experimental error bars render the results statistically meaningless)

      2) We don't know how gravity works. In GR, yes, antimatter has normal mass and reacts normally to gravity. But GR is not the last and final word on how gravity works, and several models otherwise fully consistent with known experimental data allow for anitmatter to be affected to a greater or lesser extent than normal matter by gravity, even to the point of sign reversal.

      Since we have no experimental evidence and several potentially correct theories that give different answers, the only conclusion is that we don't know. The general opinion is that animatter is affected by gravity as normal matter, but we don't know that it is.

    5. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by Yakman · · Score: 4, Funny

      In normal circumstances you can pass water, but with anti-water.... ** his mind boggles **

      Come on, it's obvious.. ANTI-WATER PASSES YOU!

    6. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by thoughtstream · · Score: 5, Funny
      Close, but no cigar. The clue is in the article, where it's explained that a "thin later of water" is used.

      In other words, he's using anti-time! By covering the ramps with a thin coating of later (rather than the usual layers of earlier that surround most objects) the water actually flows backwards in time. This, of course, causes its normal downhill motion under gravity to occur retrotemporally, giving the fluid the appearance of syntemporal uphill motion.

      Contratemporal epitaxy, eh? I tell you, that Dyson's a genius!

    7. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by Alsee · · Score: 5, Informative

      We don't have experimental proof yet, but we have overwhelming reason to believe antimatter fall down just like matter. You can work it out based on hysical constants and conservation of energy in a matter/antimatter annihilation. It is explained in this physics FAQ.

      If antimatter is repelled by gravity then you either have a violation of conservation of energy, or physics constants are not constant.

      -

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    8. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by The-Bus · · Score: 3, Funny

      Or feed it after midnight?

      --

      Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.

    9. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by misterpies · · Score: 5, Informative

      There can be no doubt, for solid physical reasons, that antiparticles behave identically to regular particles when it comes to gravity.

      First of all, the only relevant physical quantity to determine how something is affected by gravity is its mass (and equivalently, in relativity, energy). That's practically the definition of gravity -- the force one body exerts on another by virtue of its mass. In physicist speak, the gravitational field "couples" to mass/energy. Any force having an origin in some other physical quantity is by definition not gravity.

      Now we have plenty of experimental evidence -- eg from particle accelerators that antimatter has positive mass, just like regular matter. Indeed, antiparticles have IDENTICAL masses to their corresponding real particles. Therefore they must be affected in the same way as regular matter by gravity.

      Secondly, in both relativistic and quantum frameworks, gravity can only be understood if it is always attractive. In other words, mass can only be positive. In quantum terms, this comes out of the fact that gravity must be "spin 2" field. (There's a nice book by Feynman on his attempts to come up with a quantum theory of gravity that explains why it has to be spin 2).

      Thirdly, according to quantum field theory the vacuum is filled with "virtual" particles and antiparticles -- that's the zero-point energy of the vacuum. Now the whole point about the vacuum is that it's the lowest possible energy state. If anti particles had negative mass-energy, they'd be in a lower energy state than the vacuum, which means that they'd be stable compared to the vacuum and would not decay back into the vacuum.
      If that were true, the universe would long ago have filled up with antiparticles...

      --
      The author of this post asserts his moral rights.
    10. Re:Simple... it's antiwater by John+Zebedee · · Score: 3, Funny

      Speaking of antiwater, we need to be careful with that stuff!

      --
      The future is here. It's just not evenly distributed yet. -- William Gibson
  3. Interesting... by Stephonovich · · Score: 5, Informative
    Quite an elaborate optical illusion. The original drawing is also worth looking at.

    (-:Stephonovich:-)

    --
    "Who needs reincarnation when we've got parallel universes?" -Me
    1. Re:Interesting... by Amiga+Trombone · · Score: 5, Funny

      Escher makes my brain hurt. It's so obvious something is wrong, but it's impossible to focus on it. Argh, this makes me want to gouge out my eyes.

      Indeed. It reminds me of a few companies I've worked for.

    2. Re:Interesting... by Afrosheen · · Score: 5, Funny

      Dude, you just helped me coin a new term:

      Escher-esque Management.

      Let's push it onto a few blogs and see if it doesn't end up in Wired next month.

  4. Here's the image I think by friedegg · · Score: 4, Informative

    Waterfall.

    --
    Google doesn't index user sigs, so stop trying to "Google Bomb" with them.
    1. Re:Here's the image I think by great+throwdini · · Score: 3, Informative

      Yes, that's the one. The BBC piece actually links to another representation of the same. Their link is in the righthand sidebar adjacent to the article - not hard to miss.

  5. I want one on my desk :-) by newsdee · · Score: 4, Interesting

    That would look really cool if it was a small widget-type zen thing, so I can have one on my desk to contemplate while trying to be inspired. :-)

    --
    The ENIAC Demo Competition
  6. Uphill water flow at Disneyworld since 1971.. by droopus · · Score: 5, Informative

    Since the 70's, there has been a cave on Tom Sawyer Island in Disneyworld in which water appears to flow uphill.

    The Imagineers did it cleverly with a slanted room and no point of reference. Not as geeky, but a really cool effect nonetheless which amazed me back in the day.

    --
    "The pie shall be cut in half and each man shall receive.....death. I'll eat the pie."
    1. Re:Uphill water flow at Disneyworld since 1971.. by anethema · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I always thought the most famous of these things was at the bay of Fundy. The level of the tide rises higher than the river level and causes REAL uphill rapids, and a semi illusionary uphill waterfall.

      I havent seen it myself, but I understand its quite a mind bender to see.

      There is also an optical illusion near there in..Moncton i think? You go to the base of the hill, put your car in neutral, and your car will roll up the hill. Its an optical illusion, you are actually rolling downhill, but you look and it looks uphill, no amount of thinking its downhill dispells that.

      Some very neet stuff, and example of an Eschery world in real life.

      --


      It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
    2. Re:Uphill water flow at Disneyworld since 1971.. by evenprime · · Score: 4, Informative
      There is also an optical illusion near there in..Moncton i think? You go to the base of the hill, put your car in neutral, and your car will roll up the hill. Its an optical illusion, you are actually rolling downhill, but you look and it looks uphill, no amount of thinking its downhill dispells that.

      There are many places like this:
      • Mystery Spot Road, off Branciforte Dr. Santa Cruz, CA, USA. A spot 50m in diameter in the redwoods of the Santa Cruz Mountains
      • Mystery Spot, Putney Road, Benzie County, Michigan, USA.
      • Gravity Hill, Northwest Baltimore County, USA. along a public road that ran through the Soldier's Delight environmental area.
      • Gravity Hill, Mooresville, Southwest Indianapolis, USA. Located off SR 42 on the South side of Mooresville.
      • Gravity Road, Ewing Road exit ramp off Route 208, Franklin Lakes, USA.
      • Mystery Hill, Blowing Rock, hwy 321, Carolina, USA.
      • Confusion Hill, Idelwild Park, Ligonier, Pennsylvania, USA.
      • Gravity Hill, off of State Route 96 just south of New Paris, Bedford County, Pennsylvania, USA.
      • Gravity Hill (near White's Hill) , just South of Rennick Road, on County Truck U, South of Shullsburg, in LaFayette County, Wisconsin, USA
      • Oregon Vortex, near Gold-Hill, Grants Pass, Oregon, USA.
      • Spook Hill, North Wales Drive, North Avenue, Lake Wales, Florida, USA.
      • Spook Hill, Gapland Road just outside Burkittsville, Gapland (Frederick County), Maryland, USA.
      • Magnetic Hill, Near Neepawa in Manitoba, Canada.
      • Magnetic Mountain, just off the Trans Canada highway, Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada.
      • Gravity Hill, on McKee Rd. just before Ledgeview Golf Course in Abbotsford, British Columbia, Canada.
      • Electric Brae, on the A719, Near Croy Bay, South of Ayr, Ayeshire, Scotland.
      • Anti-Gravity Hill, Straws Lane Road, Wood-End, Near hanging rock, Victoria, Australia
      • Morgan Lewis Hill, St Andrew, Barbados.
      • Hill South of Rome, in Colli Albani, near Frascati, Italy.
      • Malveira da Serra, on N247 coast road West of Lisbon, Portugal
      • Mount Penteli, on a road to Mount Penteli, Athens, Greece
      • Mount Halla, on the 1.100 highway a few miles south of the airport, near Mount Halla, on the island of Cheju Do, South Korea
      There's another place named "spook hill" with this illusion in Florida
      --

      "Weapons should be hardy rather than decorative" - Miyamoto Musashi
      I think that goes for OS's too
  7. More MC Escher drawing by Michael's+a+Jerk! · · Score: 5, Informative

    are at the World of Escher. The man was a genius.

    --

    I'm not Seth.

  8. i have previously achieved this same illusion by Miguel+de+Icaza · · Score: 5, Interesting

    but using a different technique. I used a strobe on a small waterfall in a dark room- this works in the same way you can sometimes see car wheels spinning in the wrong dirrection.

    When i saw dysons outdoor version while touring the flower show I hoped he had somehow used lasers to implement the strobe technique outdoors in full daylight - that would be cool. But no he is just using pumped air - no surprise really considering hes a vacuum genius :^)

    --
    Before adopting WHATWG, read the moonlight.NET EULA [http://www.microsoft.com/interop/msnovellcollab/moonlight.mspx]
  9. Sigh... by lingqi · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Before someone tries to market their own uphill water feature, they had better be warned. James Dyson - no stranger to court battles over patents - has presumably taken care of the necessary legal business.

    Now, why would he do that? I know it might be a rhetorical question, but honestly though - all he would do, I presume, is to limit this neat but useless (admit it - this is as useless as your lava-lamp and plasma-ball (no seminal jokes please)) thing out of mainstream for a long time - instead of giving him eternal fame, etc.

    Now - an interesting question to think about is what part of our pattern-recognizing brain is responsible for *falling* for such a visual illusion? Research like this can shed light on the workings of the mind, I think.

    --

    My life in the land of the rising sun.

    1. Re:Sigh... by Abcd1234 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Forget about the usefulness of the invention for a moment (patents have never been concerned with the merits of the invention), this guy created something new and unique, and something which, to some, could be pretty valuable. After all, the exact things you list as examples (lava lamps and plasma balls) have made tons of cash (hell, I have a lava lamp on my desk). So why shouldn't Dyson be allowed exclusive rights to his invention and any monetary rewards it generates for a time? That's exactly what patents were created for! To allow the "little guy" to innovate, and benefit from those innovations.

  10. 360 deg view of the waterfall here... by mrklin · · Score: 4, Informative

    A video would be much better but there is the iPix version.

  11. Immediate dissapointment by Malicious · · Score: 4, Informative

    The first thing i would do having this invention in front of me, is to put a small floatation device (leaf, paper boat, etc...) at the bottom of the hill, to watch it float uphill.
    Sadly, I would be completely dissapointed.

    --
    01101001001000000110000101101101001000000110001001 10000101110100011011010110000101101110
    1. Re:Immediate dissapointment by trout_fish · · Score: 4, Informative

      But then it wouldn't have the gentle, relaxing qualities that you would want in your garden. The idea is that it looks to be flowing naturally uphill, not being forced up it.

  12. Obligatory POV-Ray Reference! by PovRayMan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Check this animation out from an old IRTC round.

    http://www.irtc.org/ftp/pub/anims/2000-07-15/h20fa ll.mpg

    (setting up a BT would nice for this so IRTC.ORG doesn't get bandwidth destroyed. I'd do it, but I should be really studying for final exams :-) )

    Notes
    http://www.irtc.org/ftp/pub/anims/2000-07-15/h20fa ll.txt
    Comments
    http://www.irtc.org/ftp/pub/anims/2000-07-15/comme nts/h20fall.comments

    From here

    http://www.irtc.org/anims/2000-07-15.html

    All credit for the animation goes to Joe Wise.

    --
    ----------
    Check out my blackbox styles
  13. urinals by scubacuda · · Score: 5, Funny
    Maybe he could make a urinal that does that.

    Perhaps some sort of spinoff of Marcel Duchamp's 1917 work of "art".

    Those crazy dadaists!

  14. Re:This is really neat. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    It's the only exercise my brain gets outside of /.

    My sympathies, really...

  15. that's pretty damned cool... by Machine9 · · Score: 3
    Just to counter-balance the usual array of cynical and downright unfriendly Slashdot responses, I'm gonna say:

    That's pretty well done! of course it's a trick, but it's one I haven't seen before, AND it's a *good* trick!

    --

    Machine9dotNet

  16. This Bring Back Fond Memories... by istartedi · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This brings back fond memories of an illusion I first saw when I was a kid. I saw it in Springfield Mall. It was put on by a plumbing contractor, or a hot tub installer, or somebody like that.

    It was a faucet, seemingly suspended in mid-air, with an endless supply of water coming from it.

    I marvelled at it for several minutes, pondering how it could be done, yet my child's mind, while knowing it wasn't real, was beyond fathoming any art or science that could accomplish this.

    Leaning closer to inspect it, my suspicions were aroused by the strange apparatus in the catch basin, but I still needed a full explanation from an adult:

    All you do is run a pipe up to the faucet. The pipe supports the faucet. The faucent contains a concavity that directs the water to flow in a hollow cylinder that hides the pipe and completes the illusion.

    You can buy table-top models of this, with yellow-dyed water flowing into a mug of beer.

    Kudos to this guy though, for taking the concept and wedding it to Escher in a novel way.

    --
    For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
  17. Cease and Desist by AvantLegion · · Score: 4, Funny

    Dear Mr. Dyson, We, the FBI, have become aware of your projects. We understand that you have been reverse-engineering water, and this is in violation of the DMCA, PATRIOT, and PATRIOT II acts. You have been flagged for interrogation as a potential terrorist. Until you can be brought in, you are asked to cease all water reverse-engineering. Sincerely, Agent J. Mehoff

  18. Dyson didnt invent this , Derek Phillips did ! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative


    If you RTFA

    Derek Phillips, the Dyson engineer who spent 12 months building the feature, told BBC News Online that his head was spinning when he was given his brief.
    "James came up to me and said he wanted this idea to make water go uphill. My initial reaction was to look for Paul Daniels' phone number. But I've had to become a bit of an illusionist myself."

    so i think the credit goes to Mr Phillips for actually pulling it off, Dyson loves taking credit for other peoples work

  19. Water Bongs by RightInTheNeck · · Score: 3, Funny

    The story leaves out that after the reporters were done taking pictures for the day, he put the big glass bowl centerpiece back in the middle and he showed them what it was really built for. Its rumored that everyone lost thier lighter.

  20. And for his next trick... by arpy · · Score: 3, Funny

    And for his next trick, maybe he could do a mini "hell freezing over".

    Hey, then we'd all get laid! Quick, where's his phone number?

  21. Liquid that really flows uphill...kind of by valloq · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This reminded me of something I read in the paper years back, turns out back in 1996 some scientists were awarded the Nobel Prize for discovering a liquid that actually flows uphill, some sort of special property about temperatures approaching absolute zero that cause liquid to move in a coordinated manner and lack all inner friction. That's the extent of the stuff I can understand, check the article out for yourselves.

    1. Re:Liquid that really flows uphill...kind of by panurge · · Score: 4, Informative

      Liquid helium at close to absolute zero. It doesn't flow uphill, it displays enormous capillary effect which can pull it right out of a container.

      --
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  22. Didn't they do this with a gradient of teflon? by Darwiniac · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I remember seeing this ridiculous pop science show that was trying to come up with any evidence to support various bible stories. In one of them the tried to support the splitting of the red sea by showing some researchers who got water to flow up a gradient of decreasingly hydrophobic material (teflon I think). I remember thinking, "Oh yeah, Moses was an expert in poly-flourinated chemistry!" Does this ring a bell for anyone? The teflon gradient that is, not the cooky show.

  23. Electric Brae, it's called. by Gordonjcp · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's just north of Ayr, near a place called Dunure. Quite a bizarre thing, too. Website here

  24. Almost as good as... by UnixRevolution · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Those Escher Lego Pictures from a while back.

    Escher's work is damn cool. :)

    --
    You like your new Mac more than you like me, don't you, Dave? Dave? I asked...She said Yes.
  25. Grammar nazi by GQuon · · Score: 3, Funny

    This, of course, causes its normal downhill motion under gravity to occur retrotemporally, giving the fluid the appearance of syntemporal uphill motion.

    I know we're supposed to concentrate on the content, and not the form of comments. But you pulled of the rare feat of making 3 simple grammatical errors in that sentence. I suggest you order the book "1001 Tense Formations", by Dr. Dan Streetmentioner, from your favourite Internet book store, and re-fresh your grammar. Next time Read It Before You Post.

    --
    Irene KHAAAAAAN!
    1. Re:Grammar nazi by RichardX · · Score: 3, Informative

      Sorry, the Duh! is on you.
      The gramattical guide book to which the parent refers is from the hitch hiker's guide to the galaxy (think about it. How often do you find a grammer guide for time travel in your local bookshop?)

      --- quote ---
      One of the major problems encountered in time travel is not that
      of accidentally becoming your own father or mother. There is no
      problem involved in becoming your own father or mother that a
      broadminded and well-adjusted family can't cope with. There is
      also no problem about changing the course of history - the course
      of history does not change because it all fits together like a
      jigsaw. All the important changes have happened before the things
      they were supposed to change and it all sorts itself out in the
      end.

      The major problem is quite simply one of grammar, and the main
      work to consult in this matter is Dr Dan Streetmentioner's Time
      Traveller's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations. It will tell you
      for instance how to describe something that was about to happen
      to you in the past before you avoided it by time-jumping forward
      two days in order to avoid it. The event will be described
      differently according to whether you are talking about it from
      the standpoint of your own natural time, from a time in the
      further future, or a time in the further past and is further
      complicated by the possibility of conducting conversations whilst
      you are actually travelling from one time to another with the
      intention of becoming your own father or mother.

      Most readers get as far as the Future Semi-Conditionally Modified
      Subinverted Plagal Past Subjunctive Intentional before giving up:
      and in fact in later editions of the book all the pages beyond
      this point have been left blank to save on printing costs.

      The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy skips lightly over this
      tangle of academic abstraction, pausing only to note that the
      term "Future Perfect" has been abandoned since it was discovered
      not to be.

      --
      Curiosity was framed. Ignorance killed the cat.
  26. Magnetic Hill by brunes69 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    In Moncton, NB, Canada (where I was born), there is a tourist attraction called Magnetic Hill. It is a really cool experience where you park your car on a hill, and it (seemengly) rolls *up* the hill. This was not designed by "imagineers" or anyone else, it is a natrually occuring illusion... something to do with the way the land grades there in relation to the center of earths gravity. Water also flows uphill there.. totally naturally. Its the only place I know of in the world where this happens.

  27. For his next trick.... by wowbagger · · Score: 3, Funny

    For his next trick....

    Making the bubbles in a Guiness flow up!

    --
    www.eFax.com are spammers
  28. In Montana there is a river that is ... by danieleran · · Score: 3, Informative

    "a mile wide, an inch deep and runs uphill," as Lewis and Clark described it.

    It's the Powder River, runs into the Yellowstone to the Missouri. There are places it appears to run uphill because the wind blows the surface backward. It's generally pretty shallow, hence 'the inch deep' and, well, the name.

    There is no link I can point to on the web. Not even Google knows about it. Montana is very unwired.