mmar@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP (Mitchell Marks) (12/31/85)
[Naw, I don't really believe there's a line-eater.] really believe there's a line-eater. > From: colonel@sunybcs.UUCP (Col. G. L. Sicherman) > Message-ID: <2667@sunybcs.UUCP> > Here's a new one: a practical joker tampered with the Great Explorer's > gyrocompass, so it points 45 degrees off. The Great Explorer thinks > he's going due north on his way to the North Pole, but he's really going > due northwest! > > Will he reach the North Pole anyway? (Geographers keep out of this one!) Yes he will, and after travelling only a finite distance. However, while spiralling in towards the Pole, he will go around it an infinite number of times. (All this assumes we've shrunk him to a point, a sad fate for a Great Explorer.) -- -- Mitch Marks @ UChicago ...ihnp4!gargoyle!sphinx!mmar
hes@ecsvax.UUCP (Henry Schaffer) (01/03/86)
> > > From: colonel@sunybcs.UUCP (Col. G. L. Sicherman) > > Message-ID: <2667@sunybcs.UUCP> > > Here's a new one: a practical joker tampered with the Great Explorer's > > gyrocompass, so it points 45 degrees off. The Great Explorer thinks > > he's going due north on his way to the North Pole, but he's really going > > due northwest! > > > > Will he reach the North Pole anyway? (Geographers keep out of this one!) > > Yes he will, and after travelling only a finite distance. However, while > spiralling in towards the Pole, he will go around it an infinite number > of times. (All this assumes we've shrunk him to a point, a sad fate > for a Great Explorer.) > -- > -- Mitch Marks @ UChicago The Great Explorer is just following a gyrocompas which (initially) is pointing NW. What it is labeled shouldn't matter to the gyrocompass at all. If he follows the initial arc (which may not be due NW after a while) he will traverse a circle, not necessarily a great circle, which will not touch the North Pole. My assumption is that the gyrocompass will point along the same arc on the globe - and also that it doesn't care about the curvature in the globe, only about not wavering in the left-right direction. I don't see how it would lead to a spiral (but then again I don't understand precession, and how the rotation of the earth as well as movement around the curvature of the earth might affect the precession.) After we all flounder around, would someone not only supply the answer but also explain it well. --henry schaffer (Good Grief! I just realized that this sort of stuff is *out of place* in this newsgroup! It should go into net.physics!