Brain Teasers
Perfectly Balanced
Tom spun a geometric object (such as a cylinder, cube, pyramid, rectangular prism, etc.) like a top. However, when it stopped, it was still standing up with no noticeable differences. How is this possible?
Hint
Perfect in all ways.Answer
Tom actually spun a sphere. It didn't matter if it spun or not, it looked the same.Hide Hint Show Hint Hide Answer Show Answer
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Comments
I said circle instead of sphere. Almost get it correct.
Raspberries! I wondered if you thought sphere was the answer. And, sure enough, that's what you wrote. I don't feel a sphere is ever "standing up." It is merely at rest. A short cylinder, like a hockey puck, and any number of geometric solids with circular cross sections, like lenses, hemi-spheres, discuses, and m&m's, would also serve as the answer. On a low fricton surfaces, even a taller cylinder could do some real spinning and stay upright, if one used a little care.
More berries. Since no computations are involved in what is really a matter of intuited physics this belongs in science or some other category.
I agree. "Math brain teasers require computations to solve."
Yet when I submit a correction for this, it is rejected.
Yet when I submit a correction for this, it is rejected.
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