I wouldn’t say is wrong that they push longer, but how much longer is a stretch.I see that the question is poorly stated. Is it wrong for the second guy to push longer than the first? The time taken by each sledder can be different, right? I understand the answers doesn't make sense.
I see that the question is poorly stated. Is it wrong for the second guy to push longer than the first? The time taken by each sledder can be different, right? I understand the answers
I don't know why teachers create such difficult problems; they are unrealistic, to be sure. I'm happy that you and @haruspex were able to identify the problem within the problem.I wouldn’t say is wrong that they push longer, but how much longer is a stretch.
Physiologically, the last guy is outputting some pretty high wattage, for a pretty long time, not to mention how much distance they cover before getting into the sled…the real guys are in under 5 seconds (total elapsed time).
The real problem here is the solution does not match the problem statement.
I guess so. It's really odd. The problem statement for a different question I posed in the forum yesterday was also discovered to be incorrect. Thanks to @jbriggs444 who gave a detailed explanation of what's wrong with the question and how it is inconsistent with the answer sheet provided. Thank you very much, Erobz and Haruspex. I'm learning a lot in this forum.I guess they are just trying to keep it interesting, and someone (may not have been the instructor) didn't give it the thought it deserved.
I'm not an academic, but I don't see the prof. solving every problem they pull from a new textbook. They probably let statistics sort it out...enough people bring up an issue, they give it a check.