Mystery Definition and 897 Threads

  1. wolram

    My Kitchen Reflection Mystery: Bikes, Jumpers, and a Ghostly Shape

    My kitchen window looks into an (out house) the out house is where i keep my bikes so it is securely locked. So at night i am cooking a meal and see my reflection in the window just as clear as in a mirror. I am wearing a stripey jumper which also shows clearly in the reflection, as i move...
  2. S

    Medical Bringing Back Life: The Mystery of Natural Death

    If someone dies in a hospital a member of medical staff tries to brings their heart back to life, sometimes this works. Why if someone dies of nateral causes can't their heart be braught back to life after a while?
  3. wolram

    Why Did My Oven Start Smoking Unexpectedly?

    I was going to have baked potatoes for lunch so i put them in the oven on high, half an hour later the houses filled with smoke, it is still lingering now, what ever had spilled over in the oven previously must have burnt and burnt and burnt, strange as the last thing i baked did not cause any...
  4. M

    How Can Chlorine Have a Half-AMU Mass Despite Having 17 Electrons?

    I was looking at my periodic table in Chemistry today and noticed that Chlorine's relative mass was 35.5, how can it have half an amu when it has 17 electrons? That's not 0.5amu, is it?
  5. matthyaouw

    Unraveling a Mysterious Hut: A Puzzling Discovery in the Wilderness

    I was out for a wander yesterday when I stumbled across a little run-down hut with 3 walls and no door. Inside was a table, 3 chairs, remnants of some candles and a pile of poppy seed heads. Written in pencil all over the table was some notation. It was mainly numbers set out in rows, arranged...
  6. Danger

    Honda's Bizarre V4 Concept Bike: Can You Solve the Mystery?

    I love Gizmag, and they've presented a challenge. (Actually, Honda presented it; Gizmag is passing it on.) The link shows a Honda concept bike that appears to have no tires, suspension, or drive train. I can think of a few ways that the suspension, steering, and power system might be done...
  7. DaveC426913

    Solving the Mystery of My Itchy Bites

    I'm trying to figure out where I'm getting these bites from. Skeets or fleas or whatever. I've got about six bites in the soft crook behind my left knee. None behind the right knee. They are very itchy. They have been occurring over at least a week or more. Still occurring, in fact. I've...
  8. H

    Kinetic Friction & Accelerating Crate: Unraveling the Mystery

    1. Why does a crate on an accelerating truck accelerate backwards proportional to the amount of kinetic friction? I don't understand why the crate accelerates backwards as if kinetic friction was the only force acting on it. 2. Homework Equations : F=ma
  9. E

    Engineering What Impedance Components Are Present in This AC Circuit?

    Homework Statement http://img159.imageshack.us/img159/1867/es100wi8.th.png http://g.imageshack.us/thpix.php a) Write an expression for V1 and V2 both in time domain and phasor domain (Solved) b) Write an expression for the current I both in time domain and phasor domain (Solved) c) Calculate...
  10. U

    The Mystery of Ball Bearing: Height, Velocity and Position

    The question states: Ball bearing are made by letting spherical drops of molten metal fall inside a tall tower, and they solidify as they fall. a) If a bearing needs 4.0s to solidify, how high must the tower be? b) What is the bearing velocity when it reaches the bottom? c) What...
  11. G

    Mystery of Magnetic Flux: Example 6.2 Revealed

    http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v235/gsan_bot/magnetic1.jpg" Refer to example 6.2 shown in the picture, the magnetic flux = -1.2t and the deriative time of magnetic flux should be -1.2, thus, the flux is decreasing and the direction of the induced current should be reverse. but why it say...
  12. madmike159

    Unraveling the Mystery of [Topic]: Implications of [Effect]

    After doing some research on the subject I have managed to work out roughly how it works. What I havn't been able to find out is what it does. Were there any implications from this effect? Did it lead to disproving or proving a theory? Any help would be very usful.
  13. G

    Solving the Mystery of Directional Sound: A 19cm Challenge

    The brain can sense the direction of a sound source by noting how much earlier a sound is heard in one ear than in the other. Model your ears as two sensors 19.0 cm apart. If a click from a distant source is heard 210 x 10^-6 s earlier in the left ear than in the right, from what direction...
  14. Z

    Comparing Two Stones: Solving the Mystery of Height and Time

    I've been kicking myself in the head all day trying to figure this one out. I'm completely bewildered.:rolleyes: Please help meeee! A stone is thrown vertically upward at a speed of 43.00 m/s at time t=0. A second stone is thrown upward with the same speed 2.250 seconds later. At what...
  15. Ivan Seeking

    What is the Mysterious Paulding Light in Michigan?

    http://www.wluctv6.com/news/news_story.aspx?id=185121 Video http://www.wluctv6.com/news/video.aspx?id=185121 They say that these lights have been observed for 40 years.
  16. L

    What Causes a 1000 Times Weight Increase Without Overcoming Gravity?

    not able to pick up a 1 kg iron object off the ground by overcoming the gravitational force between Earth and the object. Consider this : It can pick up a 1 gram (iron) object easily. Then, the increase (from 1gm to 1 kg) would be by a 1000 times. Clearly that increase cannot account for the...
  17. B

    Solve the Post Bean-Counting Scandal Mystery

    Help me out please, a friend sent this to me and I can't seem to figure it out. Thanks! "Congresswoman Smith opened the Post and saw that a bean-counting scandal had been leaked to the press. Outraged, Smith immediately called an emergency meeting with the five other members of the Special...
  18. E

    Unravelling the Mystery of Poles and Residues

    I still don't quite fully understand about the order of poles and calculating residues. Take f(z) = 1/sin z at z=0 for example. When I try putting that into Laurent expansion about z=0, 1/ sin z = 2i/ (e^z - e^(-z)) = 2ie^(-z) / ( 1 - e^(-2z)) = 2ie^(-z) [ 1 - e^(-2z) + e^(-4z) - e^(-6z) +...
  19. F

    Why is My Dell Inspiron 1525 Laptop Using More Hard Drive Space Than Expected?

    Hello all. I have a dell inspiron 1525 laptop, and I've had it for about 4 months. I've been downloading music here and there, but nothing too major. Earlier this week I realized that my computer had used about 70gb of memory, and I had no idea where it was. So I downloaded a disk analyzer...
  20. D

    Why Are Iron and Nickel the Only Heavy Metals in Earth's Core?

    I'm curious as to why there aren't heavier metals in the Earth's core than iron and nickel. Why those two? Anyone have any insight?
  21. Greg Bernhardt

    Is It a Turtle or a Monster? The Mystery Unfolds

    Is it a turtle or a monster?? :) http://www.newsday.com/news/columnists/ny-lijoy0801,0,5138315.column
  22. wolram

    Typing Superhumans: The Mystery Unveiled

    Who are you people that can type fast, where the heck did you learn this skill, it seems that there are people out there that can type with more than one finger, what the hey are you people mutants?
  23. P

    The Mystery of Photons and Gravity

    I've learned that photons have no mass, so why they are still influenced by black holes or other large celestial bodies?
  24. D

    Axiom of Choice: Unveiling the Mystery Behind Unsolvable Problems

    Can someone give me a list of problems which at first sight require the axiom of choice, but do not?
  25. C

    Unravelling the Mystery of Free Energy

    free energy?? water disasotiates to H+ and 0H- if you could take the dissasociated ions away, and combine them how much energy could you get out? In the liquid remaining, more would dissosciate, and the process could be continued. Where does this energy come from - it sounds like free...
  26. Phrak

    Mystery IC 576002-3: Two-Wire Digital Transmitter Datasheet Search

    I'm searching for a datasheet. This IC device is a two-wire, differental, digital transmitter. Each leg has three output states (hi, lo, gnd). The otputs are differential and trapizoidal in shape. The logo on the chip is a solid white triangle with the point upward. And a Google search...
  27. S

    What Explains the Mass Differences Among the Three Pions?

    The 3 pions have different masses and we say this so because of the electro magnetic energy.if this is so then we can never measure a mass because the magnitude of the EM energy that a particle receives depends on the charged particles around it. if you help with this dilemma i would be grateful.
  28. C

    A Mathematical Mystery Revealed

    A very interesting article for all. http://www.math.utah.edu/~palais/pi.html Quote from the article: "What really worries me is that the first thing we broadcast to the cosmos to demonstrate our 'intelligence' is 3.14... I am a bit concerned about what the lifeforms who receive it will do...
  29. P

    Mystery of the "Cosmic Blank Spot": A Billion Light Year Void

    Recently, a rather large nothing was discovered in the Universe (last August by the University of Minnesota team). This cosmic blank spot has no stray stars, no black holes, not even dark matter, and is a billion light years across. Is there a possibility that this could be the result of a...
  30. Ed Aboud

    The Mystery of the Endless Decimals: Can .9 Recurring Equal 1?

    Hi all. I can't remember where I saw this but it really confuses me. If x = .999999999... 10x = 9.9999999... 10x - x = 9x x = 1? So does that mean if that .9 recurring is 1 exactly? Thanks for any help.
  31. M

    Quantum Wave Function: Dependency & Increment Mystery

    Hi everyone, Can anybody solve my simple problems of quantum: Usually we say, that wave function Ψ is dependent on r,θ,Φ .But this is just a coordinate system,or more than that. Imagination to this is qite difficult. Moreover somewhere in a book I have read that if Ψ = f(r,θ) exp(imΦ),then on...
  32. M

    Why Do Light Bulbs Blow When You Turn Them On?

    Homework Statement We did an experiment in class abvout resistance and temperature. The teacher told us to find out why light bulbs usually blow when you turn on the light. It must be related to the experiment we did which was seeing how resistance changed with temperature Homework...
  33. C

    Solving a Physics Puzzle: Unraveling the Mystery of Iron-56

    i got a atronphysics question that i have a hard time to solve it: In the most massive stars, nuclear fusion continues until iron-56 is formed in the core. consider the net process, which is to take 56 hydrogen atoms and turn them into one iron atom. a, how much enegry is released per atom...
  34. P

    Troubleshooting Home-Made Hofmann Apparatus for Electrolysis

    Hi, i recently constructed a hofmann apparatus at home out of pvc and had some trouble with it. Basically, once it is set up, i only get gas from one electrode, the other does nothing. H2SO4 is used as the electrolyte, and the is 12 volts at 4 amps being put through it, DC. are there any simple...
  35. D

    Unraveling the Mystery of Concave Mirrors: Understanding Inverted Virtual Images

    ok my doubt is wen i look at a concave mirror(behind focus of mirror) i can see image of my face inverted inside the mirror,,,why does this hapen?? acc to mirror laws i shud get a real image tht too not inside the mirror but outside it! y do i observe an inverted virtual image in case of...
  36. snoopies622

    The Mystery of Red & Green Light Combinations

    Red light mixed with green light produces yellow light. Yet, a red photon and a green photon don't combine to make a yellow photon (or two of them). Can someone explain this?
  37. T

    Unveiling the Mystery of Crystal Babies

    Hi there, this is my first ever post in PF. Have you heard of crystal babies? They have been very popular among Taiwan students. And I have googled some information and some people said they consisted of "arcrylate polymers". They also said they are similar to Magic/Crystal Soil. Would...
  38. N

    I would love to hear your thoughts on this intriguing topic!

    0.999... = 1 ?? Hey, I was just reading about this and thought it was interesting. Apparently, from what I have read, 0.999... = 1 (where the 999... represent an infinite series of 9's) There were a few good arguments for this 'fact' and also a few arguments against it... What I...
  39. Astronuc

    Unravelling the Mystery of the Huns

    The origin of the Huns is a mystery and subject of much debate. They originated in the Steppes of Central Asia as did other groups. There is evidence that they are a Turkic or proto-Turkic group. The Chinese (Qin) referred to Hsiung-nu (Xiongnu), and some/many consider this an early reference...
  40. S

    Uncovering the Mystery of Thompson's Flying Ring

    Can anyone explain how flying ring works? like the demostration whith a magnetic coil connected to AC poer and an aluminum ring. the ring was placed on the top of the coil and althought aluminum is a non magnetic, the ring was thrown to the ceiling. can anyone tell me why there was force on...
  41. P

    Mystery of the Watery Road: A Puzzling Sight

    The other day, when I was traveling in the car, on a really, really, scorching, sunny day, in the distance I noticed that the road looked watery.Anyone knows why that happened? PS:There is no problems in my eyes.Even my Mom,Dad and brother noticed it.
  42. L

    What Is the Largest Integer in a Sum of 31 with Restrictions?

    Homework Statement The sum of 8 positive integers is 31. If no individual integer value can appear more than twice in the list of 8 integers, what is the greatest possible value that one of the integers can have? Homework Equations ? The Attempt at a Solution My answer is 16. I did a lot of...
  43. T

    The Mystery of the ARROW: Can Someone Explain?

    can someone explain to me how did it derived to the ARROW... I am not quite sure how that happened.thanks
  44. Mentz114

    Solving the Mystery of the Operator: $\partial^2$

    Has anyone come across this operator ? \frac{\partial^2}{\partial_x\partial_y} + \frac{\partial^2}{\partial_x\partial_z} + \frac{\partial^2}{\partial_z\partial_y} I've never seen it until it came up in a field theory context. What can it mean ?
  45. R

    Boiling Point Mystery for Ethyl Alcohol

    Hello everyone! I've encountered a small problem with one of our "special" assignments. Question: The normal boiling point for ethyl alcohol is 78.4 C, S for C2H5OH(g) is 282,7 J/mol*K. At what temperature is the vapor pressure of ethyl alcohol 357 mm Hg? Maybe I'm stupid, but I can't find...
  46. T

    What is the solution to the geodesic equation for a torus?

    Hi , everyone I have a problem with geodesic equation . I know the method of solving it , but I can't understand the solutions . When I tried to solve it for a torus I arrived at : \dot{u} = \frac{k} {{\left( {c + a\cos v} \right)^2 }} \] \[ \dot v = \pm \sqrt { - \frac{{k^2 }}...
  47. B

    Unravelling the Mystery of Cn: How to Find Convergent Sequences

    Sequences HELP! Homework Statement Show that the sequence Cn = [(-1)^n * 1/n!] Homework Equations The Attempt at a Solution This is an example in my book but I am not understanding it... It says to find 2 convergent sequences that can be related to the given sequence. 2 possibilities are...
  48. H

    Mystery of Candle Wax: Solving the Liquid to Solid Transition

    I was having a glass of wine over candlelight and I noticed that the liquid wax was completely transparent but turned opaque when when the wax solidified. Why does this happen? Clearly, when the molecules reorganize during the freezing phase transition they begin to interact with the light...
  49. L

    Seaweeds & Light: A Coloring Mystery

    1. Light at the blue end of the spectrum penetrates most easily underwater. Why are seaweeds often yellow-brown in colour? Does anyone know why this phenomena occurs? Thanks
  50. C

    Why do two point charges with one being zero still exhibit a Coulomb force?

    about coloumb? i wonder why two point charge whose magnitude 0 and +q(or smt different from zero charge) exert a coloumb force to one another .formula says there shoud be no force acting to each other(because of multiplication q1.q2=0) but there is an atraction between them . if this force...
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