"Six Easy Pieces" is available to view page flip fashion here: https://archive.org/details/6-easy-pieces/mode/2up
I would be grateful if you should point me to the page where Feynman says "To give an idea of how much stronger electricity is than gravitation, consider two grains of sand, a millimeter across, thirty meters apart".
If aliens created our Universe, who created their Universe?
If I got a Buck for every time I am quoted.... 🙁
But to reiterate a splendid and record-breakingly long post which has sadly been forgotten due to your last post, which spitefully turned the page on it, one feels.:
Vis
My mind was quite in a whirl after discovering an astonishing fact in Mr. Feynman's rapid survey of the State of Physics as it was known in 1962: Six Easy Pieces.
He is very clear on what was not known then, but this fact is still true, I believe, unless the charge on the electron has waned in recent years:
"To give an idea of how much stronger electricity is than gravitation, consider two grains of sand, a millimeter across, thirty meters apart."
OK, I can consider this. 😎
"If the force between them were not balanced, if everything attracted everything else, instead of likes repelling, so that there were no cancellation, how much force would there be?"
OK, I can do this, let's see, the square of the charge, divided by the square of the distance and 4 Pi Epsilon nought.... 😕
ANSWER:
Is that a lot? 🤔
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/was-our-universe-created-in-a-laboratory?
Trusted source in Scientific American. I checked the date and it is not April the First. But it is extremely funny in many diverse ways. And full of bogus links. Is Spoof Science getting back to the good old days of Adequacy and Slashdot an' all that? I hope so.🙂
Forewardslash Vis
I had to review #5400 to remind myself what I had said, but it seems the salient quote is here on page 29:
The highlight text is, in fact the point at which Stephen Hawking was reading it for me in his unmistakeable voice in the Audio option. Good Heavens, it seemed like a voice from the grave.
Whilst reviewing the page I also noticed that I exceeded your own lofty ramblings on that page by 8 to 7!
Which was, of course, my deeper purpose in posting at all. I am shallow and competitive, I now learn. Well suited to a career in Particle Physics.
But to reiterate a splendid and record-breakingly long post which has sadly been forgotten due to your last post, which spitefully turned the page on it, one feels.:
Vis
My mind was quite in a whirl after discovering an astonishing fact in Mr. Feynman's rapid survey of the State of Physics as it was known in 1962: Six Easy Pieces.
He is very clear on what was not known then, but this fact is still true, I believe, unless the charge on the electron has waned in recent years:
"To give an idea of how much stronger electricity is than gravitation, consider two grains of sand, a millimeter across, thirty meters apart."
OK, I can consider this. 😎
"If the force between them were not balanced, if everything attracted everything else, instead of likes repelling, so that there were no cancellation, how much force would there be?"
OK, I can do this, let's see, the square of the charge, divided by the square of the distance and 4 Pi Epsilon nought.... 😕
ANSWER:
"Three Million Tons."
Is that a lot? 🤔
Was Our Universe Created in a Laboratory?
Developing quantum-gravity technologies may elevate us to a “class A” civilization, capable of creating a baby universe.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/was-our-universe-created-in-a-laboratory?
Trusted source in Scientific American. I checked the date and it is not April the First. But it is extremely funny in many diverse ways. And full of bogus links. Is Spoof Science getting back to the good old days of Adequacy and Slashdot an' all that? I hope so.🙂
Forewardslash Vis
I had to review #5400 to remind myself what I had said, but it seems the salient quote is here on page 29:
The highlight text is, in fact the point at which Stephen Hawking was reading it for me in his unmistakeable voice in the Audio option. Good Heavens, it seemed like a voice from the grave.
Whilst reviewing the page I also noticed that I exceeded your own lofty ramblings on that page by 8 to 7!
Which was, of course, my deeper purpose in posting at all. I am shallow and competitive, I now learn. Well suited to a career in Particle Physics.
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Since I quoted your "splendid" post, I don't see that there was any need to reiterate it.
I'm sure that interested parties are quite capable of clicking back one page when necessary!
Feynman gives no details of the basis on which he calculates the three million tons figure.
He is apparently regarding every charged particle in a mm grain of sand to be attracting every charged particle in a mm grain of sand that is 30 m distant.
I'd very much like to see the figures on which he based his calculation.
I see a relevant discussion here: https://physics.stackexchange.com/q...ains-of-sand-with-unbalanced-charge-placed-30
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My neighbour says gravity is an electrical potential difference aspect... he seems kinda smart... but who knows...
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That's another 2 Bucks you owe me, Galu.
And the worst thing is you flood my alerts box, which distracts me from "Likes" from my adoring fans in Multi-Way:
It WAS a rather good post, though I had entirely forgotten about it:
https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/wlm-stella-clone.212020/#post-6785058
And burgunder has taken 4 years to respond, which is why one must move on in life.
To address recent issues here, I would say that it is TNT's Neighbour's Democratic Right to believe anything he wants to believe. A principle applied in US Politics to this day.
And if Feynman says it is 3 Million Tons, as the inventor of Quantum Electro-Dynamics, the most accurate theory in Physics, I would trepidate (Is that a verb?) to argue with him.
Er, QED. 🤣
And the worst thing is you flood my alerts box, which distracts me from "Likes" from my adoring fans in Multi-Way:
It WAS a rather good post, though I had entirely forgotten about it:
https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/wlm-stella-clone.212020/#post-6785058
And burgunder has taken 4 years to respond, which is why one must move on in life.
To address recent issues here, I would say that it is TNT's Neighbour's Democratic Right to believe anything he wants to believe. A principle applied in US Politics to this day.
And if Feynman says it is 3 Million Tons, as the inventor of Quantum Electro-Dynamics, the most accurate theory in Physics, I would trepidate (Is that a verb?) to argue with him.
Er, QED. 🤣
"Trepidate" is an intransitive verb meaning "to feel trepidation": https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/trepidate
Feynman would have been aware of how shaky his 3 million ton figure was, having lectured on the existence of doubt and uncertainty in science!
I recall this talk about lighting, mainly one detail - the distance it can travel is roughly proportional to voltage, except above a certain value where it can travel many, many times the "predicted" value, as in miles.
Jeez, @benb, 56 minutes?!? I mean, LIKE, OMG! WTF? ORLY?
One for Gulu: HOW MUCH IS Pi?
Bargains! Let's see now. 35 minutes at 180C. Can't wait! 😀
I looked up Adequacy.org, basis of most of my writing style:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adequacy.org
But most strangely, when I googled it I got this very surreal site:
How do I sign in as a robot? 🤔
One for Gulu: HOW MUCH IS Pi?
Bargains! Let's see now. 35 minutes at 180C. Can't wait! 😀
I looked up Adequacy.org, basis of most of my writing style:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adequacy.org
But most strangely, when I googled it I got this very surreal site:
How do I sign in as a robot? 🤔
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"MAIN FOR 2"
Stove, how much pi is too much pi?
Your video content on lightning could be a 'stroke' of genius or a load of cosmic bull...
...but at almost one hour long, I'm unlikely to watch it to its conclusion!
Off Topic (to a degree)
Having been a fisherman for nearly all of my 82 years I remember well when the traditional fly rods - fashioned from split, baked, glued in hexagonal form - were largely displaced by rods made from rolled carbon-fibre tubes. Back then these 'new' rods usually carried a warning stating that they were dangerous during thunderstorms and acted as lightening attractors which could be lethal. Next it became common shared knowledge among fishermen that - especially during humid conditions - power could arc from overhead power lines to a carbon fibre rod!
On many occasions at the first signs of thunder storms I dropped the rod and got the hell out of the area...and had to go back later, often in the dark, to rescue that rod. It did not take long for me to take an older bamboo rod to use on days when thunder was forcast.
Having been a fisherman for nearly all of my 82 years I remember well when the traditional fly rods - fashioned from split, baked, glued in hexagonal form - were largely displaced by rods made from rolled carbon-fibre tubes. Back then these 'new' rods usually carried a warning stating that they were dangerous during thunderstorms and acted as lightening attractors which could be lethal. Next it became common shared knowledge among fishermen that - especially during humid conditions - power could arc from overhead power lines to a carbon fibre rod!
On many occasions at the first signs of thunder storms I dropped the rod and got the hell out of the area...and had to go back later, often in the dark, to rescue that rod. It did not take long for me to take an older bamboo rod to use on days when thunder was forcast.
Not Off Topic at all! I have just made the sacrifice of an hour of my time, mainly to get one up on the notoriously lazy Galu, but here repost benb's splendid video about LIGHTNING:
I was soon absolutely GRIPPED:
No wonder dogs hide under the table in Lightning Storms. They detect unworldly ANTI-MATTER!
I, of course am familiar with High Voltage experiments, having rebuilt a Van Der Graaf generator in the basement Physics Lab with a sellotape belt to replace the perished rubber one, doubtless from the time of John Cockcroft's experiments:
My view is that gadgets must work, or they might as well not be there. Maybe just me.
I managed to create a spark 10cm long, and therefore 200 kV, which fritzed the nearby College Computer for the afternoon, and the graph output of my simultaneous Mossbauer experiment.
How we laughed!
Future research indicated for bigger sparks:
The Marx Generator.
John Cockcroft was, in fact, the inventor of the first successful Atomic Pile, so is my sort of guy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cockcroft
Now I feel quite tired, and must rest the old head. 😴
I was soon absolutely GRIPPED:
No wonder dogs hide under the table in Lightning Storms. They detect unworldly ANTI-MATTER!
I, of course am familiar with High Voltage experiments, having rebuilt a Van Der Graaf generator in the basement Physics Lab with a sellotape belt to replace the perished rubber one, doubtless from the time of John Cockcroft's experiments:
My view is that gadgets must work, or they might as well not be there. Maybe just me.
I managed to create a spark 10cm long, and therefore 200 kV, which fritzed the nearby College Computer for the afternoon, and the graph output of my simultaneous Mossbauer experiment.
How we laughed!
Future research indicated for bigger sparks:
The Marx Generator.
John Cockcroft was, in fact, the inventor of the first successful Atomic Pile, so is my sort of guy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cockcroft
Now I feel quite tired, and must rest the old head. 😴
What - in simple principle - is the essential difference between your Van Der Graaf machine and the much earlier Whimshurst Machine which h I played with in School?
The VdG produces charge through a contact process. The rubber belt is charged through frictional contact with the motor-driven roller at the base. The charge is carried up to the top of the generator where it is stored on the large metal dome.
The Whimshurst machine produces charge through the non-contact process of electrostatic induction. In simplified terms, charges on one rotating disc induce equal and opposite charges on the oppositely rotating disc, and vice versa. As the charge on each of the discs builds up it is collected in Leyden jar capacitors.
An electrophorus gives a simple illustration of charging by induction:
The insulating ebonite plate is given a negative charge by friction. 1. The negative charge on the plate repels electrons to the top of the brass disc. 2. By momentarily touching the top of the brass disc, electrons are repelled to ground. 3. The brass plate is left with an induced positive charge which can be transferred to, and built up on, other metal objects by touching them with the charged brass plate
You can charge the brass disc as often as you like without affecting the negative charge which stays on the insulating ebonite plate. There is a conversion of mechanical energy to electrical energy as work is done in separating the brass disc from the ebonite plate against the force of their electrostatic attraction.
P.S. Note that the brass disc does not need to contact the ebonite plate for the induction to happen. In practice it does contact for convenience, but since ebonite is an insulator, negative charge can not flow from the ebonite plate onto the brass disc.
The Whimshurst machine produces charge through the non-contact process of electrostatic induction. In simplified terms, charges on one rotating disc induce equal and opposite charges on the oppositely rotating disc, and vice versa. As the charge on each of the discs builds up it is collected in Leyden jar capacitors.
An electrophorus gives a simple illustration of charging by induction:
The insulating ebonite plate is given a negative charge by friction. 1. The negative charge on the plate repels electrons to the top of the brass disc. 2. By momentarily touching the top of the brass disc, electrons are repelled to ground. 3. The brass plate is left with an induced positive charge which can be transferred to, and built up on, other metal objects by touching them with the charged brass plate
You can charge the brass disc as often as you like without affecting the negative charge which stays on the insulating ebonite plate. There is a conversion of mechanical energy to electrical energy as work is done in separating the brass disc from the ebonite plate against the force of their electrostatic attraction.
P.S. Note that the brass disc does not need to contact the ebonite plate for the induction to happen. In practice it does contact for convenience, but since ebonite is an insulator, negative charge can not flow from the ebonite plate onto the brass disc.
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Or, IN SIMPLE PRINCIPLE, the Whimsical (sic) Machine is very much "Il Football de Villaggio" in producing sparks compared to a Van Der Graaf Generator which is like "Serie A" Napoli!
Edit: Sorry, I thought @brianco was displaying the Italian Flag, but doubtless catches my patronising drift. 😳
Bigger Sparks open up possibilities to even Raise the Dead to a premature Resurrection before God's appointed Day of Reckoning:
My mind is still reeling from the realisation that what I thought was a mere LIGHTNING BOLT designed to strike down the UNJUST and PROFANE, is, in fact, God's own ANTIMATTER PARTICLE ACCELERATOR in the Sky! 😎
Edit: Sorry, I thought @brianco was displaying the Italian Flag, but doubtless catches my patronising drift. 😳
Bigger Sparks open up possibilities to even Raise the Dead to a premature Resurrection before God's appointed Day of Reckoning:
My mind is still reeling from the realisation that what I thought was a mere LIGHTNING BOLT designed to strike down the UNJUST and PROFANE, is, in fact, God's own ANTIMATTER PARTICLE ACCELERATOR in the Sky! 😎
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My dear brianco, ask yourself: "Should I listen to an alleged scientist who clearly gets all his information from the Google Search Engine or someone who has dug at the very Coalface of Modern Electrical Theory?"
My illustrious career in the Physics Department at Bedford College for Women, London, is a matter of documentation:
Here I naturally diversified into Astronomy as a Minor. How I slipped in there is still pondered in Physics circles.
We had one strict rule. WHAT GOES ON in the Physics Laboratory, STAYS in the Physics Laboratory!
However, since most of the participants are now deceased, I might be persuaded to tell the story of Doctor Frank, The Modern Promethius, who put his eye too close to an Electrically Charged Microscope.
This wraith-like apparition, missing hair on one side of his head, would haunt the Corridors of the Bedford College Physics department, causing Alarm and Distress to passing undergraduates.
He was, in fact, on return to work light duties after THE TERRIBLE ACCIDENT. Naturally the College denied any lack of Health and Safety measures, but always said that Electricity is dangerous, so get used to it.
My illustrious career in the Physics Department at Bedford College for Women, London, is a matter of documentation:
Here I naturally diversified into Astronomy as a Minor. How I slipped in there is still pondered in Physics circles.
We had one strict rule. WHAT GOES ON in the Physics Laboratory, STAYS in the Physics Laboratory!
However, since most of the participants are now deceased, I might be persuaded to tell the story of Doctor Frank, The Modern Promethius, who put his eye too close to an Electrically Charged Microscope.
This wraith-like apparition, missing hair on one side of his head, would haunt the Corridors of the Bedford College Physics department, causing Alarm and Distress to passing undergraduates.
He was, in fact, on return to work light duties after THE TERRIBLE ACCIDENT. Naturally the College denied any lack of Health and Safety measures, but always said that Electricity is dangerous, so get used to it.
Thank you @brianco.
And allow me to assure you that the description I gave of charging by induction came straight out of my own mind!
The only google search I undertook was to find an image of the electrophorus.
I can also assure you that our friend Stove, although he has a big head, is nowhere near as handsome as the unfortunate creature in the image!
