I’m reading a book on the history of quantum physics and never put together that Ernest Rutherford, discoverer of the nucleus, was from New Zealand. I knew James Clark Maxwell was the consumate Scotsman and once used a bagpipe to save a prized sheep in a combination of wonderful stereotypes. Anyway, so this kiwi discovers the nucleus, I really hope he yelled “Crikey!” when he interpreted the results of his gold foil experiment. Likewise, I really hope Chadwick shouted “bully!” when he discovered the neutron.
Tag: science
The Tesla of Our Times
I’ve been running Engineering merit badge over the past few months for a troop and one requirement is to document power usage in your home for 10 devices, documenting its wattage and estimated monthly usage. Below is listed one Scout’s device/wattage draw info.
Dryer – 100 watts
Nintendo Wii – 700 watts
Oven – 800 watts
Washing Machine – 4,000 watts
Lightbulb – 10,000 watts
Hm… My guess is that his dryer consists of a table fan and a CFL, his Wii is diesel powered, his washing machine is a jet turbine and he lives either in a lighthouse or at the top of the Luxor. In any case, I’d love to see his woodchipper/blender and the Farraday cage he sleeps in so his fillings aren’t pulled out by the transformer for his 15,000 watt phone.
The Tesla of Our Times
I’ve been running Engineering merit badge over the past few months for a troop and one requirement is to document power usage in your home for 10 devices, documenting its wattage and estimated monthly usage. Below is listed one Scout’s device/wattage draw info.
Dryer – 100 watts
Nintendo Wii – 700 watts
Oven – 800 watts
Washing Machine – 4,000 watts
Lightbulb – 10,000 watts
Hm… My guess is that his dryer consists of a table fan and a CFL, his Wii is diesel powered, his washing machine is a jet turbine and he lives either in a lighthouse or at the top of the Luxor. In any case, I’d love to see his woodchipper/blender and the Farraday cage he sleeps in so his fillings aren’t pulled out by the transformer for his 15,000 watt phone.
Coke/Pepsi Challenge Results
New Years Eve held the Coke/Pepsi 3-shot challenge pitting the discerning palettes of my guests against a gauntlet of samples. The preponderance of guests stated they’d be able to tell them apart at a statistically significant level.
Purpose: Determine if a tester can accurately identify samples of Coke or Pepsi when presented in lots of three. Success will be defined as properly identifying all samples in six of nine lots of three.
Protocol:
- A pseudorandom sequence of ones and zeros were generated as the seed data. Zeros were Coke samples and ones were Pepsi samples.
- Cups were numbered sequentially and filled with approximately 1-2 oz of the appropriate beverage as listed.
- Testers were allowed to take calibration samples of each beverage from a control bottle.
- Each tester received 3 sequential cups and after sampling, received a data sheet requesting the cup number and the corresponding observation.
- To be statistically significant, each tester had to consume 9 sets, but after much bitching and complaining, we stopped at 7.
Results: After 108 samples tested, approximately 50 samples were properly identified breaking the Colobus Barrier. Of the 36 lots tested, only 3 went 3 for 3 correctly identifying samples, once again doing worse than chance. No tester was able to identify samples at a level above chance.
Considerations/Stuff People Bitched About: The soda was flat; each specimen was poured from a bottle that had been open within the previous 30 minutes. The soda was warm; this was done specifically at the request of Pat Toye and may have partially caused the previous accusation of flatness.
Interlab Repeatability: If anyone would like to stage a repeat under similar conditions with a changed variable of temperature, brands, specimen (cup) size, participants or tester, please contact me.
Neutral Buoyance: Fail Slowly
An activity I enjoy doing in Engineering merit badge is the neutral buoyancy contest. Scouts receive a collection of wires, cork pieces, and washers and attempt to create a device that’s neutrally buoyant, failing that, one that falls the slowest. Today’s youth are quite clever but sometimes fail to grasp how the challenge works, like when I said the device must be free-floating and can’t touch the container, one kid thought that making a wire hook on the side was “free floating” or another that made a compression pin that held the device fast against the sides of the container.
Groups would drops their devices in the test column and watch in wonder thinking they’d reached neutral buoyancy as the downward force of gravity and upward force of Brownian motion and a density difference cancelled out. “Terry, come quick while it’s balanced!” If it’s neutrally buoyant now, it should be neutrally buoyant 10 seconds from now. The containers slowly grew cloudy from many unwashed hands and the children learned the importance of contaminating ones test environment. These budding astrologers were also quick to blame the pseudoscientific ,from air bubbles stuck to the side of containers to my mere presence one kid saying “you did that” followed by the angry glare. I’m not sure if there were commenting on my carriage or my ownership of an anti-physics gun.
The winning group fell 14 inches in 30 seconds and proved that kids could be competative about anything as the gaggle of winning 12-year olds went over to older kids and started chanting “In your face! In your face!” I imagine Nobel laureats have a similar ritual.
Teaching Science to Scouts or Some Other Crap
I was asked to run a session on teach Cub Scouts Science and one of the points I try to drive home was that most kids have some sort of “Wow” moment. Mine were viewing the rings of Saturn on a camping trip and learning about some absoludicrously old rocks in Canada. I use the pillars of creation in the Eagle Nebula and some very small pictures.
I quickly determined that I had a lot of work to do after the following:
- One person asked if a magnetized quarter would still work (I’m not sure how they were planning to magnetize it)
- Someone declared that a jet engine and a flying hoop operated on the same principle
- Someone kept referring to how she was going to have her kids “make science” which sounds like a euphemism biologists use
- After deploying a water bottle rocket someone asked if a foot pump would work instead of a bicycle pump and if one could use another fluid besides water which begs yet more questions
One fellow seemed to be bent on oneupsmanship and rattled off 6 activities he’d done with his Scouts asking after each “have you tried that?” To all 6 boring milquetoast ideas that Mr. Wizard couldn’t make fun, yes. I felt like a bit of a dick and thought I should go into blackface and thank massa for showerin’ learning on me. Luckily most of these folk will be dead by the time I enter science advocacy 45 years from now. If only I could stop their children.
Mad Scientist Training Weekend Recap
I’d unwittingly volunteered to do a Webelos Weekend and spent far more time preparing for it compared to any program I’ve ever run. The theme was “Mad Scientist Training Weekend” and kids completed the Science related activity pins.
Highlights:
- A fight between the Scout professional and the event staff over the breakfast drinks between water and juice. The compromise: Tang
- A leader asked if I could leave the pavilion light on as he graded papers saying he was a college professor. I checked back and he was grading papers titled “and now you try: identifying nouns”
- The evening meal for the kids was a mini-pizza and pasta for the adults. A leader asked if he could bring out his propane stove to cook something and the administrative head shot it down. He later approached me and offered me an Omaha Steak in return for some black-market grilling.
- My dad was pressed into running a station after a station lead texted out sick. Normally he doesn’t smoke on Scout trips as the outdoors calms him, apparently Cub Scouts don’t as he decimated cigarettes between groups in about 8 seconds.
- The evening presentation involved five rapid-fire demos that Joe and I did involving Newton’s First Law of Motion and atmospheric pressure. Joe and I made up a neat presentation where he breaks a brick over my hand with a hammer without injuring my hand to which no one responded. HE BROKE A BRICK OVER MY HAND. But when I used a playing card to seal a graduated cylinder everyone was stunned. After the presentation no less than 5 kids approached doubting the card’s efficacy until they tried it. Each was completely uninterested in how a brick broke over my hand.
- I had to drive home to grab a broom to clean up the next day and picked up Max so he could go for a run in the park. He was very interested the trip until he arrived, took a massive dump and ran back to the car. I think my family’s dog may be responsible for a series of shit-n-runs.
Go Webelos.
Science Center Advertising
I had an idea for a banner in front of the Science Center.
“OSR Science: The only place in Scouting you can talk about torquing Uranus without violating youth protection”
-Ed. with should be without, fixed.
A Beer for Science
Dave came over after a girlfriend-induced 2-hour delay and we planned operation “Is this beer too small” begun in a previous post. The 23 oz glass seemed to barely accommodate much more than a single 12 oz soda and I restrained myself from speed-dialing the Department of Weights and Measures and instead chose guerrilla science.
Dave and I smuggled in measuring equipment and all went well until drink orders. Dave was supposed to get a 23 oz drink for me to measure, but then something went horribly long…
Server:Â What can I get you to drink?
Me: I’ll have a water.
Dave:Â I’ll have a Sprite.
Server: Okay, I’ll….
Me: I’ll have a 23 oz black and tan.
Dave: I don’t like black and tans.
Me: I’ll have a lager.
Dave: Yuengling.
Server: Okay, do you want two glasses?
Dave: Yes.
Me: No.
I no way did we look like tards at this point. Honest. She returned with the drinks and I realized that we were a vessel short. I downed my water and dumped my ice into Dave’s Sprite and hastily pored the lager into the measuring cup creating a ridiculous amount of head. So, at this point, there was a 1/2 empty Brewtus glass, my empty water glass, Dave’s Sprite overflowing with ice, and a very frothy beer in an OXO measuring cup. Time was ticking away for the foam to clear before the server returned and I caught some odd looks from the restaurant inhabitants as I ineffectively blew on the beer. The head cleared, I dumped the beer into my empty vessel and filled the remaining beer into the measuring cup, 24 oz, fuck. Everything gets consolidated back into Dave’s glass as the server returned and offered to refilled my de-beered water glass. I demanded a new glass and got the hairy eyeball, and broke down and explained the situation and she was surprisingly understanding and stated that they did have a smaller 16 oz glass but we’d clearly gotten the 23 oz one. I asked the server if I could buy the glass for further analysis and she asked her manager.
Server: We’re not supposed to sell the glasses.
Me: What happens if someone breaks one?
Server: We sweep it up…
Me: No no, do you charge them?
Server: No, we don’t.
Me: So we can break your glasses?
Server: Well, I guess, but you might get kicked out.
Me: Hm…
Minutes later she passed by and looked at us, flashed us an open spread hand and mouthed the word “5” to us. We added 5 to the 60% tip and Dave slipped the glass into his hoodie’s main pocket. At home, I pulled out the two glasses. Same damn size. So, did space-time bend or did I get a super can of Pepsi Max that could nearly fill a 23 oz glass. Or, option C, I’m a complete tard.