Math Questions (as in "please do this math for me...")
Why should a person's perception of a mile change, just because (s)he has been shrunk? If you measure distance by counting strides then fair enough, but if the person is travelling in a car, or just looking out of a window, wouldn't a mile still seem like a mile?
slimshady2357
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I think it would seem longer than a mile, because you would compare it to what you are used to seeing. For instance I was considering how tall my desk would seem if I was shrunk to 1/25 of an inch.... certainly it would not seem like it was still only 3 feet tall!
It's because I would still be basing comparisons on what I am used to, such as me being 6' tall. So I might say "That desk is like a 1/4 mile tall now!
"
But travelling in a car is an interesting one.... because I might be looking outside saying "look at those freaking HUGE trees going by!!!" and at the same time realizing that the trees are passing at the normal speed.... it would all make sense of course if you just knew you were smaller! 
Anyway, interesting question ceptimus. I think things would look much bigger, so a mile might seem much longer.
Adam
It's because I would still be basing comparisons on what I am used to, such as me being 6' tall. So I might say "That desk is like a 1/4 mile tall now!
"But travelling in a car is an interesting one.... because I might be looking outside saying "look at those freaking HUGE trees going by!!!
" and at the same time realizing that the trees are passing at the normal speed.... it would all make sense of course if you just knew you were smaller! Anyway, interesting question ceptimus. I think things would look much bigger, so a mile might seem much longer.
Adam
phildonnia
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c0rbin said:
Well, it would subtend the same angle on your shrunk retina, so I guess it depends what you mean by "seems".
ETA: I think it is worth mentioning that in the laws of physics there is no symmetry of change of scale, a fact first noticed by Galileo.
slimshady, in your desk example, you assume that you would be down on the floor, looking up at the desk, so your 'point of view' (in the literal sense) changes. But if, as you shrunk, your eyes remained in the same position as before (say the chair you are sitting in also shrinks, but is lifted up on a hydraulic ram) then your view would not change at all. There would be some loss of stereoscopic depth perception, as your eyes moved closer together, so lets say you do the test with one eye closed.
Even the relative size of (say) your hands would seem the same to you, in your field of view, because as your hands shrunk, they would also get closer to your eye. Of course, if you tried to reach out and type on your keyboard, you would soon realise something was amiss, but otherwise, how could you tell that you had been shrunk? Say you have your hands behind your back, so you can't see any part of your body, in your field of view.
Even the relative size of (say) your hands would seem the same to you, in your field of view, because as your hands shrunk, they would also get closer to your eye. Of course, if you tried to reach out and type on your keyboard, you would soon realise something was amiss, but otherwise, how could you tell that you had been shrunk? Say you have your hands behind your back, so you can't see any part of your body, in your field of view.
This is nifty stuff. Thanks all so far for taking part.
Could you expand on this?
Also, I would like to clarify "seems"
A person who was only 0.1 mm tall who had to walk ten meters might relate it to walking several kilometers (really only crossing several meters). A matter of scale.
Could you expand on this?
Also, I would like to clarify "seems"
A person who was only 0.1 mm tall who had to walk ten meters might relate it to walking several kilometers (really only crossing several meters). A matter of scale.
slimshady2357
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ceptimus said:
I see what you're saying, and I've had an enjoyable 5 mins thinking of being shunk in such a way
Hmmm what about tilting your head up and down?... or the fact you can see the one side of your nose clearly with one eye shut?
But I'm trying to consider the case where you cannot see any part of your body (as you suggested
) and you don't move your point of view at all.Does the fact that your eye is so much smaller change the size of the field of vision? For instance, say with one eye open you can see 140 degrees of the 180 in front of you. You are shrunk. Now you can still see that same degree-size of slice, but your pupil is smaller.
Sort of like \./ compared to \O/ with the "." being my small eye and the "O" being my regular eye.
Wouldn't that mean that as you shrink your visual field would change such that you couldn't see as much?
Adam
What about the situation where the desk grows in size instead. Surely it would look bigger unless, at the same time, it also moved further away from you (imagine you and the desk in space)
By analogy, if you shrunk, the desk would look bigger unless, at the same time, it moved away from you.
There is an illusion based on this where you look through one hole and see a match-box car and through another hole and see a real car but much further away so that it looks the same size as the match-box car.
BillyJoe
By analogy, if you shrunk, the desk would look bigger unless, at the same time, it moved away from you.
There is an illusion based on this where you look through one hole and see a match-box car and through another hole and see a real car but much further away so that it looks the same size as the match-box car.
BillyJoe
Re: Re: Math Questions (as in "please do this math for me...")
You are standing on a ten foot long mat and suddenly you are shrunken to 1/25 inches tall. You think everything will remain the same?
You are holding a one foot ruler and suddenly you are shrunken to 1/25 inches tall and you don't think you'll notice any difference?
You shrink to 1/25 inches tall except for your dick and you don't think you'll be pleased as punch?
Come on!
Ah, come on...Yahweh said:
You are standing on a ten foot long mat and suddenly you are shrunken to 1/25 inches tall. You think everything will remain the same?
You are holding a one foot ruler and suddenly you are shrunken to 1/25 inches tall and you don't think you'll notice any difference?
You shrink to 1/25 inches tall except for your dick and you don't think you'll be pleased as punch?
Come on!
We're not talking about touching things here. Does a small camera produce photographs that make things look further away than a big camera does?
Providing that the relative focal lengths of the two cameras are the same, the photos will be identical.
Providing that the relative focal lengths of the two cameras are the same, the photos will be identical.
slimshady2357
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ceptimus said:
This doesn't seem to address the question I asked. I was saying that the total amount of stuff you can see would be less.
I think a camera as big as a wall with a lens that had a diameter of 3 feet would take a picture of more of the room then one with a 3 millimeter diameter.
I mentioned why in a post above, I'm not sure I'm right. What do you think?
Adam
Crossbow
Seeking Honesty and Sanity
c0rbin said:
A mile is 5280 feet regardless of how tall or how short one is.
However, if one were to define a mile as the number the of paces that one took instead of using a fixed distance value, then results would vary upon the length of ones pace (which is largely dependent upon one's height).
The average human pace is about 2.75 feet, therefore it takes the average human about 1920 paces to cover one mile.
For the average human shrunk down to 1/25 inches, they are reduced in size by a factor of about 1700 times, therefore it would take such a person about 3,264,000 paces to cover one mile.
You can do the math for the metric component of your question.
I don't think you're right slimshady. A small camera can have a very wide field of view. Conversely, a large camera, with a telephoto lens, can have a very narrow field of view. The ultimate, is an astronomical telecsope, which might have an aperture of 5 metres or more, but a field of view of just a few arcminutes.
If you put a camera (or an eye) in the 'shrinker' then the lens would get smaller and more curved, as the film (or retina) got closer to it. I think the angle of view would remain the same, but I'm not sure about that.
If the image remains in sharp focus, as the camera is shrunk, I thing the view angle definitely remains the same. If it doesn't (and as I say, I'm not sure) then you would have to alter the refractive properties of the lens, to keep the focus sharp, as you shrunk the camera, and then the view angle would still be the same.
rustypouch can probably help us on this one - he is a photgraphic expert.
If you put a camera (or an eye) in the 'shrinker' then the lens would get smaller and more curved, as the film (or retina) got closer to it. I think the angle of view would remain the same, but I'm not sure about that.
If the image remains in sharp focus, as the camera is shrunk, I thing the view angle definitely remains the same. If it doesn't (and as I say, I'm not sure) then you would have to alter the refractive properties of the lens, to keep the focus sharp, as you shrunk the camera, and then the view angle would still be the same.
rustypouch can probably help us on this one - he is a photgraphic expert.
Actually, if you were scaled down to only 1/25 of an inch tall, then the pupils of your eyes would be so tiny, that you would get diffraction effects through them, and you'd not be able to see clearly anyway. We can get round this to some extent, by using shorter wavelength light, but eventually you get up to X-Rays, which can't be easily focused.
I suppose we have to ignore diffraction effects, if we are to be shrunk really small. But we could be shrunk down to a few inches tall, and would still be able to see pretty clearly, using normal light, I think.
I suppose we have to ignore diffraction effects, if we are to be shrunk really small. But we could be shrunk down to a few inches tall, and would still be able to see pretty clearly, using normal light, I think.
slimshady2357
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ceptimus said:
Well, yes of course, that can be the case. But we're talking about the same lens being shrunk. Not two lens that are designed differently.
Why would the lens become more curved? And I think the angle of view would remain the same too, it's the space between were each edge of the open angle starts that gets smaller. I wish I could draw what I mean better.
Yes, the focal point would change too.
Code:
\ /
\ /
\ /
\BigEye/
\ /
\ /
\ /
\[size=1]e[/size]/That's sort of what I mean
Adam
phildonnia
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c0rbin said:
The laws of physics seem to stay the same under certain types of transformations. (For example, translation in space, rotation by a fixed angle, inertial motion, reversal in space (with some exceptions))
But not change in scale. The laws of physics have a fixed "size". If you were 1/25 inch tall, you could tell the difference, for example by seeing how long it takes light to travel the length of your body. Actually shrinking yourself to 1/25 inch in all respects would involve changing the size of the atoms, which would require changing fundamental constants of nature.
Galileo did some experiments with crushing dog bones, and noticed that the strength of a bone was proportional to its cross-sectional area. He reasoned that a dog that was twice the size of a normal dog would have 4 times the bone strength, but 8 times the weight, and would be unable to support itself. Thus, dogs (and other structures) are a certain size because of a "size bias" built right into the laws of nature.