Re: A few silly questions

Androcles wrote:
"David L. Burkhead" <dburkhead@xxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:e9ydnXCDop5mBE_YnZ2dnUVZ_sGqnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Ben Newsam wrote:
On Fri, 09 Feb 2007 19:56:24 GMT, "Wayne Dobson"
<nospam@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

By the way, I'm not just asking these questions
because I'm too lazy to do any study, but that without any outside
input, I get the feeling that the person I'm arguing with feels at
liberty to call anything I say, wrong, regardless of its merits.

We get a few of those in here.

Unfortunately, Mr. Dobson is one of them. He only came here looking
for "ammo."

If you call education "ammo" then I can spare some.

If he ever actually showed any evidence of learning anything, that would
be a valid point.

I'm the person he was arguing with. The context was from his claim
that, in
the case of a falling body brought to a stop by a cord (as in a
hanging), "considering only those two factors [height and weight],
the forces involved
are very predictable." I immediately pointed out that those two
factors
don't define the problem, let alone lead to "very predictable"
forces.
Given only those two factors, the only thing that can really be said
is 0 <
F < infinity. And since F here is magnitude rather than vector
force,
that's really no restriction at all.


Pity they didn't rip Saddam Hussein's head off too, you mean?
Seems to me that the amount a rope or a neck stretches before it
breaks decides the outcome, otherwise it's a bungee jump.
I'd say the force involved was predictable or people wouldn't
bungee jump.

How much the rope or neck stretches. How much soft tissues sag. How
much the body rotates.

Within broad limits, predictable. But not so predictable that even
experienced executioners did not get the occassional hanging failure of both
types--failure to break the neck or decapitation.

When we went around on this, the infinite force limit was brought up
and Mr.
Dobson said that of course that would require infinite energy (or
words to
that effect).

He's not Mr. Dobson, he's Dobby the House Elf. Be respectful
of his chosen name.

Go read some of his posts in rec.martial-arts and then come talk to me
about being respectful.

The force will not be infinite, the rope or the neck will break.

Had he said that, I would have had no problem with it. But that's not
the argument he made. Instead, he was the one making the argument about
infinite energy being required.

Which I disputed since, yes, you would have infinite force,
but, since (by the initial stipulation of the condition), it would
take
place over zero distance. infinity * zero, undefined but possibly
meaningful if considered as a limit.


I get the feeling that the person Dobby was arguing with feels at
liberty to call anything Dobby says, wrong, regardless of its merits,

You get the feeling wrong.

because the argumentative fuckheaded muggle brought infinity into
the argument in the first place.

And, of course, everybody knows scientists and mathmaticians _never_ use
infinity as one limit of an open interval.

*plonk*

--
David L. Burkhead "Dum Vivimus Vivamus"
mailto:dburkhead@xxxxxxxxxxx "While we live, let us live."
My webcomic Cold Servings
http://www.coldservings.com -- Back from hiatus!
Updates Wednesdays



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