Slashdot Mirror
Physicists Finally Solve the Falling-Paper Problem
neutron_p writes "The so-called "falling paper" problem has long intrigued scientists. James C. Maxwell pondered the tumbling motions of playing cards in 1853. Why don't flat things fall straight down? Pieces of paper fall down, then rise into the air, then glide along, then again rise... It occurs in a seemingly chaotic manner. Now researchers at Cornell University have solved the falling paper problem by calculating the motions of a scientific journal page in flight and there were a few surprises." There's also a story in the Cornell Sun.
Now they just need to solve the 8+ folds problem...
Paper is affected by air as it falls! Astounding. ;-)
air currents? Dumbass scientists with nothing better to live for than proving evolution and why pieces of paper fall slowly. Why not cure cancer you retards?
You know, when they finally do find the cure for cancer through a process that involves falling paper, I bet someone is going to feel awfully silly.
This is just a rehash of an old study showing why open-faced peanut butter sandwiches always land face down.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Has anyone combined this with other falling-object problems?
For example, if one butters one side of the paper, will it still land face down, even if it's floating about?
Since cats fall on their feet, what happens if you wrap playing cards on each of their legs? Will their happy flight downwards be interrupted by randomly flying limbs?
What if you wrap the cat in a piece of paper that has been formed to make a Moebius strip, butter the other side of the animal, then tie it together to another cat? I suspect this may be the way to create time travel or a perpetual motion machine.
I hereby ask everyone to funnel funds towards this dynamic Cat, Toast, and Paper Research. I approximate we have about 4 years to prepare to salute our new Paper Machie Strawberry Jelly Cat Overlords.
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.
by calculating the motions of a scientific journal page in flight
... they still need to repeat the experiment with different types of journals; psychology, home decorating, sports and paranormal to be absolutely sure.
..and it was well behaved and obeyed the laws of physics. I want to see what happens when they repeat it with a bible page.
Paperweight - stop it going floating in the first place.
Due to lack of disk space this user has been discontinued
Physicists Finally Solve the Failing-Paper Problem
Oh, if only :~(
<mutter>back to studying I guess.</mutter>
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
Notice the "Related Stories" section. It is blank. This doesn't relate to anything. Does that tell you something?
Finally, a possible answer to why Toast ALWAYS falls butter side down in uncontrolled experiments !
Of course, this still doesn't mean we can get a perpetual motion engine by strapping said toast to a cats back, but we can hope !
I see a new form of energy just round the corner, CatToastOnics !
A slashdotting - you get the stick first and then the carrot !
Probably not, since it's unpredictable... which could translate to, say, random 30ft drops. Which would be rather unpleasant if you happened to be 29ft from the ground.
You'd need a parachute to deploy when you got close to the ground ;-)
Parachutes made of paper?
No, it's easy ... just fold it about nine times and it should fit.
I wonder if this could be used in some way for parachutes.
Step 1: Flatten self into a 1mm-thick sheet.
Step 2... Uh, actually, we seem to be running into a problem at step 1.
Sure a cure for cancer would be nice, but atleast I can use this to calculate how many of those leaves from my neighbor's damned tree are going to end up on my lawn.
Maybe now I can bill him for raking...
Brandon Petersen
Get Firefox!
Do smooth initial conditions always lead to smooth solutions?
Well from personal experience I know that if she has not waxed then there will be a major reluctance to be a smoothie on my part. So the answer is yes.
Where's my million bucks?
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
The flattening is not the problem. That will be achieved. Timing is the problem.
You need to flat yourself _before_ you hit the ground.
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
They've problery already found the cure. Now they just try to calculate were it landed... Everything got an purpose...
Congratulations. Within the span of two words you have personally offended (along with the parent poster):
- people who can't speak
- donkeys
- mentally retarded people
In the future, I would kindly request that you try to be more politically correct and just say 'fuck you'.HTH. HAND.
?-|||-----x<*))))><
'fuck you' is offensive to people who have no or non-functional genitalia, you insensitive clod! That includes most of the slashdot editors, a large portion of the trolls, victims of ritual female genital mutilation, mules, and Barbie.
"There is a $1,000,000 prize for the answer to the question: Do smooth initial conditions always lead to smooth solutions?"
:)
Hmm. Tell you what... I'll submit a "yes" and you submit a "no" and whichever of us wins will split the money with the loser. Sound like a good deal?
The army has made deals with major defense contractors to provide soldiers with large pieces of paper to replace their now-obsolete parachutes.
"Physicists Finally Solve the Falling-Paper Problem"
Step 1: Get rock.
Step 2: Put rock on top of paper.
Optional Step: Remove rock when access to paper is required.
(Patent Pending)
this is slashdot. and that's a sport.
The More Laws, the less Justice --Marcus Tullius Cicero
Interestingly, when scientists were making progress in cancer treatments, I asked a similar question of "cancer? Dumbass scientists with nothing better to live for than proving evolution and curing cancer? Why not solve the falling paper dilemma you retards?
Neil is that you? Yeah yeah, it's me... Neil...
It shows that there are applications of this which we might not fully understand after reading an article on the Internet.
Hey, we don't even have to read the article in order to not fully understand it!
True confidence comes not from realising you are as good as your peers, but that your peers are as bad as you are.
"You need to flat yourself _before_ you hit the ground."
I think that the bigger problem is that you would want to *unflat* yourself afterwards...
Of course, if you could do that you could probably do without the parachute.
I think we may have a winner....
OTOH, curing cancer is a pseudoscientific attempt to interfere with the clear intention of the divine. In fact, by curing cancer, and going beyond the understanding of the divine to the prideful attempt to compete with the divine, we are surely condemning ourselves to eternal suffering. All to prevent a few years of suffering in this life. How gauche.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
With any luck it will fly around a bit, swoopishly. The circulation caused by the back-spin generates lift, same as airfoil-shape induced circulation (faster airflow on top, slower on the bottom) as per that well known Kutta-Joukowski formula s * b * mu * gamma.
Which is apropos of nothing. Also, the Navier-Stokes equations can't be solved around a singularity like the edge without a simplification which usually takes the form of an assumed boundary layer of some sort (probably laminar at these Reynolds numbers which makes it a lot easier). Also, N-S is initial-condition sensitive because the solutions have bad scale missmatch, so you'll want to use your duodecaduple precision math library.
I didn't really understand from the blurb if they were talking about bendy things like paper pages. That would make it a fluid-structural coupled problem. Very tricky. The hardest part of that is getting the fluids guys to return the structures guys' phone calls.
Equine Mammals Are Considerably Smaller
What is surprising is the reason the Air Force is so interested in this subject. Nothing related to aeronautical engineering or operational missions... They're looking to improve their staffing and paperwork flow. Because right now, throwing your Staff Summary package out the window at HQ appears to work better than walking the damn thing around directorate admin offices.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.