Water Flows Uphill 437
An anonymous reader writes "The BBC are reporting James Dyson's new garden feature, a waterfall with water flowing uphill. Apparently, he wanted to recreate an Escher drawing."
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Water Flows Uphill
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Where there's a will, there's an Inheritance Tax.
It's not a waterfall then, is it? (Score:3, Funny)
Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Informative)
1) We have no experimental evidence as to how antimatter reacts to gravity (beond a couple of small ones where the externally-caused experimental error bars render the results statistically meaningless)
2) We don't know how gravity works. In GR, yes, antimatter has normal mass and reacts normally to gravity. But GR is not the last and final word on how gravity works, and several models otherwise fully consistent with known experimental data allow for anitmatter to be affected to a greater or lesser extent than normal matter by gravity, even to the point of sign reversal.
Since we have no experimental evidence and several potentially correct theories that give different answers, the only conclusion is that we don't know. The general opinion is that animatter is affected by gravity as normal matter, but we don't know that it is.
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Informative)
If antimatter is repelled by gravity then you either have a violation of conservation of energy, or physics constants are not constant.
-
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Informative)
First of all, the only relevant physical quantity to determine how something is affected by gravity is its mass (and equivalently, in relativity, energy). That's practically the definition of gravity -- the force one body exerts on another by virtue of its mass. In physicist speak, the gravitational field "couples" to mass/energy. Any force having an origin in some other physical quantity is by definition not gravity.
Now we have plenty of experimental evidence -- eg from particle accelerators that antimatter has positive mass, just like regular matter. Indeed, antiparticles have IDENTICAL masses to their corresponding real particles. Therefore they must be affected in the same way as regular matter by gravity.
Secondly, in both relativistic and quantum frameworks, gravity can only be understood if it is always attractive. In other words, mass can only be positive. In quantum terms, this comes out of the fact that gravity must be "spin 2" field. (There's a nice book by Feynman on his attempts to come up with a quantum theory of gravity that explains why it has to be spin 2).
Thirdly, according to quantum field theory the vacuum is filled with "virtual" particles and antiparticles -- that's the zero-point energy of the vacuum. Now the whole point about the vacuum is that it's the lowest possible energy state. If anti particles had negative mass-energy, they'd be in a lower energy state than the vacuum, which means that they'd be stable compared to the vacuum and would not decay back into the vacuum.
If that were true, the universe would long ago have filled up with antiparticles...
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:2, Funny)
...In Soviet Russia.
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Funny)
Come on, it's obvious.. ANTI-WATER PASSES YOU!
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:5, Funny)
In other words, he's using anti-time! By covering the ramps with a thin coating of later (rather than the usual layers of earlier that surround most objects) the water actually flows backwards in time. This, of course, causes its normal downhill motion under gravity to occur retrotemporally, giving the fluid the appearance of syntemporal uphill motion.
Contratemporal epitaxy, eh? I tell you, that Dyson's a genius!
Grammar nazi (Score:3, Funny)
I know we're supposed to concentrate on the content, and not the form of comments. But you pulled of the rare feat of making 3 simple grammatical errors in that sentence. I suggest you order the book "1001 Tense Formations", by Dr. Dan Streetmentioner, from your favourite Internet book store, and re-fresh your grammar. Next time Read It Before You Post [slashdot.org].
Re:Grammar nazi (Score:3, Informative)
The gramattical guide book to which the parent refers is from the hitch hiker's guide to the galaxy (think about it. How often do you find a grammer guide for time travel in your local bookshop?)
--- quote ---
One of the major problems encountered in time travel is not that
of accidentally becoming your own father or mother. There is no
problem involved in becoming your own father or mother that a
broadminded and well-adjusted family can't cope with. There is
also no problem a
Re:Simple... it's antiwater (Score:3, Funny)
Interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
(-:Stephonovich:-)
Re:Interesting... (Score:2, Interesting)
If it looked like it's flowing up then it wouldn't "work." You follow the water from the waterfall down, then as it flows horizontally for a while, and everything seems normal, except that you've somehow gotten back to the top. At that point you get the standard "WTF?" Escher moment.
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Funny)
Indeed. It reminds me of a few companies I've worked for.
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Funny)
Escher-esque Management.
Let's push it onto a few blogs and see if it doesn't end up in Wired next month.
Here's the image I think (Score:5, Informative)
Nope (Score:2)
Re:Nope (Score:2, Informative)
RTFAWC:
The WC is for 'With Care' - the BBC write-up mentions the marching soldiers in an aside. Dyson himself mentions no such work directly (as quoted).
Re:Here's the image I think (Score:3, Informative)
Yes, that's the one. The BBC piece actually links to another representation of the same [mcescher.nl]. Their link is in the righthand sidebar adjacent to the article - not hard to miss.
This is.. (Score:5, Funny)
"Wait, we swim upstr..dow...wtf?"
Poor fish =(
Re:This is.. (Score:4, Interesting)
Location: Hell's Gate, a set of rapids in the Fraser River, BC, created by an engineering mistake while blasting for the CN (?) rail line.
Time: Earlier part of the century. Last century.
Problem: Salmon can't fight their way past the rapids. This is a disaster: the Fraser is one of the "motherlode" salmon rivers. It's an ecological disaster of such magnitude that even those living in the early part of the century recognized it. (Remember that this is a time when burning down entire forests to clear the ground for gold exploration was acceptable!)
Solution: Assist the fish. Using a big net, scoop the fish up at the bottom of the rapids, raise them tens of feet up in the air, and dump them in a sluice box which inclines down to the top of the rapids. Water is being piped from higher up the river to flood the sluice.
Result: The fish, dumped into the sluice, try to continue to swim upstream against the sluice water. Consequently, they swim out the high end of the sluice, plummeting back into the river... beneath the rapids.
Damn!
(Eventually a weir system of complicated breakwaters and eddies and multi-level entrances and all that was built of concrete. It slows the water enough that the fish can swim against the current.)
Oops... (Score:3, Funny)
Wonder if he knows that the BBC gave away his secret.
Although, Maybe the explanation in the article was oversimplified?
England's Dean Kamen (Score:5, Informative)
I think James Dyson belongs in the permanent Nerd Hall of Fame. His vacuum cleaner is one of the hands-down coolest devices I have ever owned. It represents the most significant advance in vacuum-cleaner technology in decades. See it at www.dyson.com. I would sooner downgrade my Mac than give up my Dyson. Well... maybe not, but I DO love my Dyson (in a geeky way, of course).
I demonstrate that sucker by turning it on (with the reservoir half full, mind?it uses no bags yet maintains consistent suction even when nearly full?the bane of most vacuums) and inviting the victim to insert a finger in the nozzle. The amount of suction is astounding. On top of that, he wound up having to defend his patent is court for years and finally won out against the big boys of the vacuum universe.
Dyson is a true genius and he?s a quirky Englishman to boot which is cool in my book. I have a funny feeling he?s not a
He is Englands Dean Kamen, methinks.
Re:England's Dean Kamen (Score:3, Funny)
Cool. Finally something for the female geeks.
Re:England's Dean Kamen (Score:5, Funny)
And for male geeks too, assuming the suction hose hasn't got one of those rotating chopping blades in it!
Warning (Score:5, Informative)
Cool. Finally something for the female geeks.
Yes. Scientific research has demonstrated that male geeks should stay away from vacuum cleaners. Some cautionary citations:
Forrest, J.B. and Gillenwater, J.Y. "The hand vacuum cleaner - friend or foe?" J. Urology vol. 128 no. 4, p. 829 (1982).
Benson, R.C. "Vacuum cleaner injury to penis - a common urologic problem". Urology vol. 25 no. 1, p. 41 (1985).
Lewi, H., Drury, J.K., Monsour, M. "Vacuum cleaner injury to penis". Urology vol. 26 no. 3, p. 321 (1985).
Imami, R.H., Kemal, M. "Vacuum cleaner use in autoerotic death". Am. J. Forensic Med. Path. vol. 9 no. 3, p. 246 (1988).
Be afraid.
Re:England's Dean Kamen (Score:2, Funny)
And now he's made one that really blows!
(The air in the water feater...geddit? oh never mind)
Re:England's Dean Kamen (Score:5, Funny)
You do see the correlation, dont you?
Re:England's Dean Kamen (Score:3, Informative)
Isn't Dyson the guy from Terminator 2? (Score:5, Funny)
I saw we find this guy and get that "Terminator hand" back, so we can destroy it. I don't care how cool this uphill water thing is.
Re:England's Dean Kamen (Score:5, Informative)
Dyson invented his Vacuum cleaner in around 1983.
Manufacturing in asian countries (Score:3, Informative)
I was at a recent seminar given by him in Wellington, New Zealand. Considering he said so much about how he wanted to promote invention, manufacturing and practical innovation in western countries, someone asked him about that.
His reasoning was that for as much as he wants to manufacture there, it
I want one on my desk :-) (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I want one on my desk :-) (Score:2)
Uphill water flow at Disneyworld since 1971.. (Score:5, Informative)
The Imagineers did it cleverly with a slanted room and no point of reference. Not as geeky, but a really cool effect nonetheless which amazed me back in the day.
Re:Uphill water flow at Disneyworld since 1971.. (Score:5, Interesting)
I havent seen it myself, but I understand its quite a mind bender to see.
There is also an optical illusion near there in..Moncton i think? You go to the base of the hill, put your car in neutral, and your car will roll up the hill. Its an optical illusion, you are actually rolling downhill, but you look and it looks uphill, no amount of thinking its downhill dispells that.
Some very neet stuff, and example of an Eschery world in real life.
Re:Uphill water flow at Disneyworld since 1971.. (Score:2, Informative)
Was a rather unsafe place to drive - the road went thru' thickish scrub and you'd come around the top or bottom corners of the hill and find some car creeping in the middle of the road, sometimes with open doors and no-one
Electric Brae, it's called. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Uphill water flow at Disneyworld since 1971.. (Score:5, Informative)
There are many places like this [adelaide.edu.au]:
- Mystery Spot Road, off Branciforte Dr. Santa Cruz, CA, USA.
A spot 50m in diameter in the redwoods of the Santa Cruz Mountains
- Mystery Spot, Putney Road, Benzie County, Michigan, USA.
- Gravity Hill, Northwest Baltimore County, USA. along a public road
that ran through the Soldier's Delight environmental area.
- Gravity Hill, Mooresville, Southwest Indianapolis, USA. Located off SR 42 on the South side of Mooresville.
- Gravity Road, Ewing Road exit ramp off Route 208, Franklin Lakes, USA.
- Mystery Hill, Blowing Rock, hwy 321, Carolina, USA.
- Confusion Hill, Idelwild Park, Ligonier, Pennsylvania, USA.
- Gravity Hill, off of State Route 96 just south of New Paris, Bedford County, Pennsylvania, USA.
- Gravity Hill (near White's Hill) , just South of Rennick Road, on County Truck U, South of Shullsburg, in LaFayette County, Wisconsin, USA
- Oregon Vortex, near Gold-Hill, Grants Pass, Oregon, USA.
- Spook Hill, North Wales Drive, North Avenue, Lake Wales, Florida, USA.
- Spook Hill, Gapland Road just outside Burkittsville, Gapland (Frederick County), Maryland, USA.
- Magnetic Hill, Near Neepawa in Manitoba, Canada.
- Magnetic Mountain, just off the Trans Canada highway, Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada.
- Gravity Hill, on McKee Rd. just before Ledgeview Golf Course in Abbotsford, British Columbia, Canada.
- Electric Brae, on the A719, Near Croy Bay, South of Ayr, Ayeshire, Scotland.
- Anti-Gravity Hill, Straws Lane Road, Wood-End, Near hanging rock, Victoria, Australia
- Morgan Lewis Hill, St Andrew, Barbados.
- Hill South of Rome, in Colli Albani, near Frascati, Italy.
- Malveira da Serra, on N247 coast road West of Lisbon, Portugal
- Mount Penteli, on a road to Mount Penteli, Athens, Greece
- Mount Halla, on the 1.100 highway a few miles south of the airport, near Mount Halla, on the island of Cheju Do, South Korea
There's another place named "spook hill" with this illusion in Florida [historiclakewales.com]Re:Tidal Bore was better 30 years ago. (Score:3, Informative)
I think the "rich landowners" thing is pretty funny, Moncton isn't known for its wealth. The houses along that artifical lake are pretty middle class, we're not talking about millionaires. Also, while those guys oppose *removing* the causeway, they didn't have anything to do with *building* it in the first place.
Also, as the linked article points out, the fishermen downstream oppose removing the causeway
More MC Escher drawing (Score:5, Informative)
Re:More MC Escher drawing (Score:2)
That he was indeed. Without a doubt, the works of Escher can be considered art by nearly everyone. It's good to see his works in times where anyone who can jam on a piano and/or playback is a mucisian and that throwing a bucket of paint on some cloth makes you an artist.
And referring to your sig, what the hell is wrong with being a Seth? :o(
i have previously achieved this same illusion (Score:5, Interesting)
When i saw dysons outdoor version while touring the flower show I hoped he had somehow used lasers to implement the strobe technique outdoors in full daylight - that would be cool. But no he is just using pumped air - no surprise really considering hes a vacuum genius
Re:i have previously achieved this same illusion (Score:2)
Sigh... (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, why would he do that? I know it might be a rhetorical question, but honestly though - all he would do, I presume, is to limit this neat but useless (admit it - this is as useless as your lava-lamp and plasma-ball (no seminal jokes please)) thing out of mainstream for a long time - instead of giving him eternal fame, etc.
Now - an interesting question to think about is what part of our pattern-recognizing brain is responsible for *falling* for such a visual illusion? Research like this can shed light on the workings of the mind, I think.
Re:Sigh... (Score:4, Insightful)
Slashthink (Score:3, Funny)
No!!! IP laws are evil! They are outdated and wrong! There is no purpose to them other than giving the man a tool to keep his jackboot on my neck!
Re:Sigh... (Score:2)
no offense, but i call bullshit. this idea gets overused far too much on slashdot.
people patent their ideas to protect their possible income. whilst frivolous and trivial patents are undoubtably a bad thing, patenting something truely unique and new is a perfectly valid protective measure to take. and i'm sure most inventors would much rather license their patents out at reasonable rates than to h
Re:Sigh... (Score:2, Insightful)
James Dyson would be a fool if he were to patent this invention and then not license it out to anyone. Many inventors are quite liberal with their licensing policies, and want to make
licensing? (Score:2)
I believe his bagless version is quite some bit more advanced than the most (all?) of the other ones out there.
However, you are expected to pay some 400 dollars for a vacuum.
Now, that's very cool technology that he is touting, but no way in a billion years that i will choke up that kind of money for a vacuum - the fact is, if his vacuum technology is licensed liberally (or, I might add, not patented altogether), manufacturing for it would be drop in pri
Re:licensing? (Score:2)
Re:Sigh... (Score:2, Informative)
360 deg view of the waterfall here... (Score:5, Informative)
And for his next trick... (Score:2, Funny)
(don't bother replying with a debunk of the "Coriolis force" - I already know)
Immediate dissapointment (Score:5, Informative)
Sadly, I would be completely dissapointed.
Re:Immediate dissapointment (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Immediate dissapointment (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Immediate dissapointment (Score:4, Informative)
Obligatory POV-Ray Reference! (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.irtc.org/ftp/pub/anims/2000-07-15/h20f
(setting up a BT would nice for this so IRTC.ORG doesn't get bandwidth destroyed. I'd do it, but I should be really studying for final exams
Notes
http://www.irtc.org/ftp/pub/anims/2000-07-15/h20f
Comments
http://www.irtc.org/ftp/pub/anims/2000-07-15/comm
From here
http://www.irtc.org/anims/2000-07-15.html [irtc.org]
All credit for the animation goes to Joe Wise.
urinals (Score:5, Funny)
Perhaps some sort of spinoff of Marcel Duchamp's 1917 work of "art" [the-artfile.com].
Those crazy dadaists! [bbc.co.uk]
that's pretty damned cool... (Score:3)
That's pretty well done! of course it's a trick, but it's one I haven't seen before, AND it's a *good* trick!
This Bring Back Fond Memories... (Score:5, Interesting)
This brings back fond memories of an illusion I first saw when I was a kid. I saw it in Springfield Mall. It was put on by a plumbing contractor, or a hot tub installer, or somebody like that.
It was a faucet, seemingly suspended in mid-air, with an endless supply of water coming from it.
I marvelled at it for several minutes, pondering how it could be done, yet my child's mind, while knowing it wasn't real, was beyond fathoming any art or science that could accomplish this.
Leaning closer to inspect it, my suspicions were aroused by the strange apparatus in the catch basin, but I still needed a full explanation from an adult:
All you do is run a pipe up to the faucet. The pipe supports the faucet. The faucent contains a concavity that directs the water to flow in a hollow cylinder that hides the pipe and completes the illusion.
You can buy table-top models of this, with yellow-dyed water flowing into a mug of beer.
Kudos to this guy though, for taking the concept and wedding it to Escher in a novel way.
Re:This Bring Back Fond Memories... (Score:2)
The ring was suspended by 4 small clotheshanger-diameter sized wire bars that had the ends running through the walls of the box.
The walls were freely accessible, and the top was open so you could see inside. No other tubes or wires were evident. As a kid, I suspected trickery.
Now, after years of drinking and drugging, trying to escape the unfathomable mystery of the unsolv
Another cool idea... (Score:2)
Or what about a room of relativity, where one person's stares going up are another person's stares going down? [ex-cult.org]
BBC Slashdotted? (Score:2)
--jeff++
Cease and Desist (Score:5, Funny)
Dyson didnt invent this , Derek Phillips did ! (Score:4, Informative)
If you RTFA
Derek Phillips, the Dyson engineer who spent 12 months building the feature, told BBC News Online that his head was spinning when he was given his brief.
"James came up to me and said he wanted this idea to make water go uphill. My initial reaction was to look for Paul Daniels' phone number. But I've had to become a bit of an illusionist myself."
so i think the credit goes to Mr Phillips for actually pulling it off, Dyson loves taking credit for other peoples work
Re:Dyson didnt invent this , Derek Phillips did ! (Score:3, Insightful)
Nice for your home garden (Score:2, Interesting)
That thing would look awesome in your garden. I'd buy one. (If I had the money, and if I had a garden to put it in.)
I'd also want to put one of those non-linear water wheels. You have buckets on a wheel and they get filled up by a source of water. As they fill, they begin to rotate the wheel. However, the buckets have holes on the bottom. This causes the water in the buckets to flow out. What results is a wheel that moves in a decidedly non-linear fashion. That'd be a nice companion to the Escher
Water Bongs (Score:3, Funny)
And for his next trick... (Score:3, Funny)
And for his next trick, maybe he could do a mini "hell freezing over".
Hey, then we'd all get laid! Quick, where's his phone number?
Video (Score:2)
Liquid that really flows uphill...kind of (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Liquid that really flows uphill...kind of (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Liquid that really flows uphill...kind of (Score:3, Interesting)
Superfluidity of liquid helium (He4) below about 2K (that's 2 kelvin above absolute zero) has been known for a very long time -- since around 1952 or '53 I think. Helium had been liquefied in 1927, but superfluidity wasn't noticed till the 50s.It's a quantum phenomenon. These 1996 Nobel laureates showed
Water running uphill (Score:2, Insightful)
Still, this does look really cool even though it is a trompe l'oeil.
Patented without disclosure? (Score:2)
Imagine that! Apparently he's been granted a patent on this invention but he's "not telling" people how it works. Whatever happened to full disclosure before being granted a patent? You know, advancing the arts and all that? Or is he perhaps going for a different kind of IP protection, like Penrose and his idiotic toilet paper lawsuit
Look it up, then. (Score:2)
Look it up if you want to know.
Re:Look it up, then. (Score:2)
Re:Patented without disclosure? (Score:2)
Didn't they do this with a gradient of teflon? (Score:3, Interesting)
Almost as good as... (Score:4, Interesting)
Escher's work is damn cool.
Not Impressed (Score:2)
Seen water running uphill for real (Score:2, Interesting)
This is only on optical illusion, but one made by nature! Google has a few mentions [google.com] of it too
Gravity is dying! (Score:3, Funny)
You don't need to be a Newton to predict gravity's future. The hand writing is on the wall: gravity faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all because gravity is dying. Things are looking very bad for gravity. Red ink flows like an uphill river of blood.
Magnetic Hill (Score:4, Interesting)
In Moncton [greatermoncton.com], NB, Canada (where I was born), there is a tourist attraction called Magnetic Hill [tourismnbcanada.com]. It is a really cool experience where you park your car on a hill, and it (seemengly) rolls *up* the hill. This was not designed by "imagineers" or anyone else, it is a natrually occuring illusion... something to do with the way the land grades there in relation to the center of earths gravity. Water also flows uphill there.. totally naturally. Its the only place I know of in the world where this happens.
Re:Magnetic Hill (Score:3, Informative)
http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/General/r
For his next trick.... (Score:3, Funny)
Making the bubbles in a Guiness flow up! [slashdot.org]
In Montana there is a river that is ... (Score:3, Informative)
It's the Powder River, runs into the Yellowstone to the Missouri. There are places it appears to run uphill because the wind blows the surface backward. It's generally pretty shallow, hence 'the inch deep' and, well, the name.
There is no link I can point to on the web. Not even Google knows about it. Montana is very unwired.
Re:It's not a new phenomenon (Score:3, Informative)
Re:"thin later of water" (Score:2)
Unlike Slashdot, the BBC will correct errors if you inform them. Send an email to newsonline.errors@bbc.co.uk.
Re:It's not a new phenomenon (Score:5, Insightful)
Futhermore, this is not meant as a confirmation of laws of gravity and conservation of momentum (as if they need further confirmation - in case if one still doesn't believe in this thing called gravity?). I mean, you think someone who does not believe in gravity would change his mind after he sees this!?
Oh, lastly, I am 100% sure this really does not impresses the chicks at the parties when you say "hey, here is a fun thing to discuss..."
Re:The house at Disneyland... (Score:2, Informative)
An identical copy of the Haunted Shack was built at the Calico Ghost Town where it was called the Mystery Shack, but it burned down in 2001 and is currently being rebuilt.
Re:The house at Disneyland... (Score:2)
There were all sorts of visual gags in there, goofy floors, tilted stuff, you know..
Great fun for the kids, pretty fun for the older folks too, but tough to walk through if you have a bum leg..
Re:This is really neat. (Score:4, Funny)
My sympathies, really...