Physics Blog "Watching T.V."

I didn’t have my glasses yesterday, and I couldn’t read the words on the television.  I was too lazy to find my glasses, and I couldn’t move the couch closer to the television because that would be too much hassle.  In order to see the television clearer, I proceeded to squint my eyes.  squinting my eyes caused less light to enter my eye through the lens causing the image to become more focused.  Because I didn’t want to squint while watching the show, I went to my room and grabbed my glasses.  After putting them on, I could see the show clearly without having to squint.  My glasses are diverging lens because I am nearsighted causing the light to bend outward before entering my eye.  Because the light bends outward before entering my eye, the lens in my eye bends the bent light inward causing a clear image to be projected on my retina.  I realized that if my eye was shorter, I would be able to see far away objects clearly because then the retina would be a shorter distance away from the lens.  After watching the show, I resumed work on the computer and needed to take off my glasses because I had no use for the diverging lens anymore. 

Physics Blog 13 "Paint & Nails"

When painting someone's nails, mixing bottles of nail polish to create a certain color is called color by subtraction.  it's called color by subtraction because when too many bottles are mixed, the resultant color is black.  if the resultant color were white, the process would be called color by addition.  when someone paints their nails red, blue, or green, the colors reflected are red, blue, and green, respectively.  the colors absorbed are the colors not reflected.  when black is used , all visible light is absorbed, and when white is used, all visible light is reflected.

Physics Blog 12 "Waiting for the Physics"

Yesterday, I was in the car listening to "Waiting for the End" by Linkin Park.  This song got me thinking about what we just learned in physics.  First of all, I started thinking about beats.  The sound waves in the song over lapped in a way that waves were added to cause compressions and other waves were subtracted to cause rarefractions creating beats.  Because I noticed that compressions and rarefractions were made, I also noted that the sound waves were longitudinal because the sound waves traveled parallel to the original vibrations.  Lead singers Mike Shinoda and Chester Bennington both sound different because of timbre.  Both singers could be singing the same note, but a person listening can distinguish between the two voices because Mike Shinoda's voice and Chester Bennington's voice is made up of different frequencies.  Later, I realized that when I turned the volume up, I only changed the amplitude of the sound waves and not the period.  :D

Blog 11 "Out of Power"

I was sleeping and I awoke to the sound of rain falling hard and no fan.  A few days ago, it rained super hard and the power went out across the island, but the rain and power outage hit Ewa especially hard.  The power lines literally went down…I mean they came crashing down.  So, basically, no current traveled to the homes and businesses in Ewa because there was no closed circuit as a result of the fallen power lines.  Because there was no flow of electrons, there was no voltage and no voltage difference across the wall outlets in my house.  Nothing worked.  Later though, power was restored to the homes in Ewa (no thanks to the HECO workers that went on strike), save for a few close to the fallen power lines.  This got me thinking about parallel circuits.  In Ewa there must exist a parallel circuit because some homes didn’t have electricity while the rest of the island did. 

Physics Blog 10 "Doppler Effect"

Every time I pass an ambulance with blaring sirens, I think of the Doppler Effect.  I learned about the Doppler Effect during my freshman year of high school, and it has stuck with me ever since.  Basicaly, the Doppler Effect is the change in sound wave frequency of a moving object.  When the moving object is coming closer, the sound waves are getting shorter which causes the frequency to increase and the sound to be more shrill (higher), but when the object passes, the sound waves become elongated again because there is nothing in the way of the sound waves.  The result of the elongated waves is a deeper (lower) sound. 

Physics Blog 9 "Eragon...movie version"

So this past weekend, I was watching Eragon, and in one scene, Eragon uses his bow right after exiting the fortune tellers hut.  As he pulled back the arrow in the bow, it got me thinking aobut kinetic and potential energy.  As Eragon pulled the bow back, he was acquiring potential energy, and when he released the bow, he transformed that potential energy into kinetic energy.  While the bow was traveling towards the guys following Eragon and Brom, Eragon says the elfish word for "fire" which causes the arrow to ignite and kill the bad things? i have no idea what they are called.  so in the movie, unlike the world we live in, energy can be created from nothing. 

Physics Blog 8 "Boarding"

This past winter vaca, i went snowboarding, and that got me thinking about monent of inertia, center of mass, area of support, and angular momentum.  when i think back on trying to do 180's, i didn't fall because my center of mass was over my area of support, and i always kept the correct edge up.  at first, my arms remained extended when trying to do the trick which caused me to have a big moment of inertia.  after awhile though, i was able to bring my hands in closer which caused my angular velocity to increase and my moment of inertia to decrease conserving my angular momentum.  i finally got my 180 down and then proceeded to work on my nose and tail presses.  when doing a press, you want one end of the board completely off the ground, which is a little hard because your center of mass needs to remain over you very small area of support in order for the trick to be considered a trick.  it takes a few tries to get your center of mass to remain over your area of support.  :D