The Physics of Christmas

Well, with Christmas just around the corner, I'd like to thank Joe Mahoney for sending us a review of Can Reindeer Fly - The Science of Christmas, known in the States as The Physics of Christmas: From the Aerodynamics of Reindeer to the Thermodynamics of Turkey. It's an amusing little piece - and just in time for holiday shopping, I offer this blatant plug: Jon Katz' new book Geeks is ready for pre-order at ThinkGeek. It's really good, even though it's dedicated to two bozos who run this site. *grin* Can Reindeer Fly - The Science of Christmas author Roger Highfield pages 294 publisher Metro Books, 11/1998 rating 8/10 reviewer Joe Mahoney ISBN 0316366110 summary A fascinating discussion of the mechanics of Christmas magic The Scenario Can Reindeer Fly is a book about the culture, science, technologies and traditions that contribute to the Christmas season. Dr Highfield is a respected author and scientist who has written a well researched book that will appeal to a wide variety of people.

What's Good? If you liked the various 'Science of Star Trek' books and websites, you will probably enjoy this book. Dr Highfield covers almost every area of modern day science - from genetics to quantum theory to dieting to explain or theorize about many of the different aspects of Christmas. Christmas in different cultures is discussed too, with chapters on food and gift giving around the world. I really enjoyed Dr Highfield's approach. Rather than trying to disprove theories and legends, he tries to use every scientific tool available to see if something could be done - this is especially true in a chapter on the virgin birth of Jesus. Unfortunatley, Dr Highfield wasn't able to conclude that Santa Claus employs warp powered reindeer to boot it round the earth on Christmas eve :- What's Bad? This probably isn't an issue for most slashdot readers, but I found there was a definite Northern Hemisphere bias. Several chapters take it for granted that Christmas will be celebrated in the middle of Winter. Where I live, Dec 25 is usually a hot summer day and rather than building a snowman after a huge turky dinner, I am more likely to lie in the sun after a huge BBQ. It's not a big issue and it doesn't really detract from the text in any way.

So What's In It For Me? ThereÕs really something for everyone in 'Can Reindeer Fly'. If you want to know about the origins of the Christmas tree and other traditions there are several chapters to keep you happy. Interested in astronomy? A chapter on the Bethlehem star is what you're after. Science geeks will be interested in chapters on Snow and the tech involved to get a sleigh to travel to the hopes of every good little boy and girl. Dieticians will be interested in the chapter on Santa's diet and genetics.

Purchase this boook at fatbrain.

Table of Contents

1. Acknowledgements
2. Introduction: Christmas and the Scientist
3. 1. The Bethlehem Star
4. 2. Miracle
5. 3. Santa and Those Reindeer
6. 4. Gluttony; Santa's Genetics
7. 5. The flame and the Tree
8. 6. Giving and Shopping
9. 7. Snow
10. 8. Festive Fare
11. 9. Christmas Spirit
12. 10. Christmas Blues and Seasonal Moods
13. 11. Santa's Science
14. 12 Christmas 2020
15. Appendix The Formula for Christmas Day
16. Glossary
17. Bibliography
18. Index

Comments

Re:Everybody knows...

[tigereye]

There is off course the explanation that Santa employs the powers of quantum mechanics. In this case the use of the multiuniverse theory (or the other theory - depending on your point of view) can be used.

By quantum mechanics Santa manages to manifest himself in all states in the same point in time. Santa can employ quantum mechanics based on the uncertainty principle of "Does Santa Claus exist or not?" and "Have I been a good boy/girl/it?".

In this way Santa assumes all states at once. Being in all chimneys, filling all stockings, eatting the mince pie left out for him, etc etc, all at the same single point in time.

Now the really clever part is how does Santa manage to forge every single person's pareints signature. ;)

Katz In Action

[Anonymous Coward]

transcript of Katz interview for his latest artcicle: Creationism in the Hellmouth of Geekdom and Nerdity

Katz: So, you're a teenager in a high school. Is that correct?
Teenager: Yes, that is correct.
Katz: You don't play team sports and are very pimply. You are a geek, is that correct?
Teenager: Well, I've never referred to myself that way, but I guess I see how one would think that.
Katz: Tell me how horrible your life is as a result of being a geeky teenager.
Teenager: Huh?
Katz: You can start off by telling me about the daily beatings you suffer and then move on to the alienation and administration apathy which has your bordering on suicide
Teenager: What are you talking about? I've never been beaten. I'm a Regents Scholar and have a great relationship with my teachers.
Katz: Yes, that must have been horrible
Teenager: Uh, are you listening to me?
Katz: After that horrible incident, how close were you to murdering your schoolmates and/or killing yourself
Teenager: Murder my schoolmates? Why would I do that. I just came back from christmas break vacation with several of them. We had a blast. As far as killing myself, that would never happen. I have a full scholarship to Berkley. My future is great.
Katz: Thank you for giving us an insight into the horrors of being a geeky teenager. Sharing your experiences with the world will help others like you and will help me get a house in the south of France.
Teenager: You need Ritalin, dude.

Everybody knows...

[DGregory]

SANTA CLAUS: An Engineer's Perspective

I. There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to the Population Reference Bureau). At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that comes to 108 million homes, presuming that there is at least one good child in each.

II. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000 of a second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh and get on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom
stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second -- 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles
per second, and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.

III. The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized Lego set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the "flying" reindeer could pull ten times the normal amount, the job can't be done with eight or even nine of them-Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).

IV. 600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second crates enormous air resistance-this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft reentering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip. Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 m.p.s. in 0.001 seconds, would be subjected to centrifugal forces of 17,500 g's. A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo.

V. Therefore, if Santa did exist, he's dead now.