Sunday, July 22, 2007

A recent physics problem..go ahead, be a nerd!

A woman stands between a vertical mirror 1/2 m tall and a distant tree whose height is unknown. She is 1.0 m from the mirror and the tree is 11.0 m from the mirror. If she sees the tree just fill the mirror, how tall is the tree?

give it a try, what could it hurt!
Virtual m&m's for the winner, oh now it's worth it.

17 comments:

Dani said...

I believe that is 24 meters.

She is seeing the tree from 12 meters away, but I'm not sure if I'm suppose to multiple that out or not.

I did this in physics, but so don't remember...

Unknown said...

What could it hurt? Are you seriously asking that question? As a nurse I can tell you that it can hurt:
my brain
my pride
my will to live

toesthattwinkle said...

Well, seeing as I'm an expert on the instructional usage of the knowledge of physics....I have no idea. I have no idea what I just said....:)

strem said...

Hello. I'm Mr. Yadamec's friend.(I'm also Dani's email/blog/phone friend.) I have been reading your blog from time to time, and I hope it is OK that I write in to comment.

But, first, I have one question. Does it matter how tall the woman is?

Owl of the Desert said...

Oh yes, please do comment, Strem!

Table, I have no idea...although, after putting it on paper, I'm going to guess I would need to know my triangle properties.

Table of Stone said...

no strem, the height of the woman doesn't matter. Good question though. And triangles would probably help owl but there is actually a very simple solution as well

Table of Stone said...

ok, i guess it's been long enough...the answer is 6 meters. 11.0 plus 1 times 0.5.

Owl of the Desert said...

Now, the question is, WHY?

Dani said...

well, the 11 + 1, is her distance from the tree to her eye. it's times .5 (I did 2 instead) because that's the size of it in the mirror.

make sense?

Table of Stone said...

well put dani!! Maybe you should consider physicists as a career!

Owl of the Desert said...

I'm confused about the "tree to her eye" part...

Dani said...

she is not seeing the tree, but instead she is seeing the reflection of the tree. The tree is 11 meters away from the mirror, plus she is 1 meter from the mirror, so the total distance from her to the tree (in the way that she sees it) is 12 meters.

You have to look at how far the light travels from the tree to her eye. Make any better sense now?

I thought about doing physics for the longest, and did better in all my physics classes than I did most of my history classes. I like doing stuff with light and sound waves and astronomy. BUT anyway...

Owl of the Desert said...

Ohh...I see. That is all so confusing for my brain, but I get it now. Thanks for the explanation, Dani!

strem said...

I do see it now, also. I am sorry I left the conversation, went on vacation, and didn't come back in time to participate further. I've had two different LONG conversations with my brother about this (a physics and chemistry teacher), and we've gone in all sorts of directions with it. The problem is I think we got too technical right from the start. (Too many theories in his head!) I'll have to call him with this solution. Thanks for helping my brain think extra hard. Now, we need a new physics problem!!!

Brittany said...

I'm glad you guys figured this out. I got it but only once my motor was kick started. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I'm a nursing major!

Table of Stone said...

I"ll try to wrestle another one up. This was fun if you ask me

Something Creative said...

See, I totally didn't check this in time to answer. Sad day!