Para los dos fisicos guapos en mi vida… (que entienden espanol). Que les disfrutes! Aunque solo uno lean mi blog….

A New Year’s gift for all the nerds out there.

Some brain teasers from 2 Reasons Physics Doesn’t Work in the Real World via Mental Floss magazine blog.

You might think physicists have it all figured out. But the fact is, some of the best theories just don’t work anywhere but on the blackboard.

1. Science Friction: F = ma (Force = Mass x Acceleration)

Sure, this fundamental equation of physics is simple to memorize, but it’s virtually useless in real life. In fact, engineers almost never use it. The reason? Friction—that awful complication that keeps physics demonstrations from working. So, how do you calculate friction? If you ask an engineer, he’ll give you an empirical co-efficient that he measured from previous experiments.

But the truth of it is that physics is useless for most everyday phenomena.

That’s why physicists like to confine their research to atoms, nuclei, and space. In these realms, friction is either absent or it behaves according to simple rules. Anything that doesn’t obey simple rules in physics is labeled “engineering,” “chemistry,” or something else.

2. Light Concerns

The speed of light is about 186,284 miles per second. But when light goes through air or glass, it slows down. Einstein assumed when he made his theory of general relativity that everyone would know he was referring to the speed of light in a vacuum. Because light is thought to have no mass, it’ll always move at this fundamental speed. The concern here, though, is that if we discover someday that light has a very small but non-zero rest mass, then even light would never travel at the speed of light. Who knows? If that happens, we might have to rename the fundamental speed the Einstein velocity.