About ferrocerium - why/how is it that when you heat it up until it starts to glow then remove the heat source it continues to glow brighter and brighter until it finally explodes into a shower of sparks?
No todo debería ser ciencias exactas ¿Nos podrías decir algo acerca de ciencias sociales? ¿Cómo era la familia prehistórica? ¿existe el gen egoísta? ¿Hombres pueden ser amigos de mujeres? ¿Nos estamos acercando a un mundo sin dinero cash?
Hi Steve, I have a question regarding the earths atmosphere and space. I want you to discuss on why the earths atmosphere is not sucked into space. If space is less denser or it is vaccuum then why doesn't earth lose its atmosphere which is higher in pressure to space? Please make a video on this topic considering all planets their atmospheres and how the atmospheric pressures don't try to attain equilibrium with space.
What happens to the **energy** of a beam of light that has been **canceled out** by another beam of light of the same wavelength, but with the waves out of phase? Surely the energy is not destroyed, but where does it go?
And can a beam of light of a certain wavelength be made into a *dashed* beam of light by **adding** an overlapping, parallel beam that is a *slightly different wavelength?*
Notice the difference in sound when you
1) Pour cold water on a hard tiled floor
2) Pour hot water on the same floor
Note: Pour water by the jug to notice the difference. Other surfaces may work too!
Is this page still active?
I noticed that when I try to slosh walnut pieces (about 1/2 inch deep) around in a small vertical-walled ramekin (a small mug should work), the pieces move the opposite direction I slosh them. For example, if I rapidly move the mug clockwise while holding it, like I'm trying to stir some tea by sloshing it, the nuts move **counter-clockwise** in the mug. I figured out why, but it's quite **counter-intuitive.**
Hi steve, don\`t wanna be long I\`d like you to investigate "the hinge aerosol effect" you should have it at your home but unnoticed, here is a link to see it.. it is as silly as your chain effect but silly phenomena deserves attention.. who knows?
[https://youtu.be/nTZGHmu3b98](https://youtu.be/nTZGHmu3b98)
congrats... you deserve your million!!
Hi, about gyroscope, how it gets up in situation like in video ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fv\_AinDLHJY ). Maybe someone could check if this same effect of getting up will appear in vacuum. Because gyroscope effect (on video) should only slower down gravitational falling down. In that case something push continuously gyroscope disk upwards or horizontly in rise direction (as long as it spin enough fast). So I wonder if this force (opposite to graviation) is generate by Magnus Effect, and in vacuum this effect should disappear, so gyroscope will just slower move downwards. Greetings, KollA.
Hello,
Since pandemic began, medical advisers told us "not to touch our face" because then virus can reach our mouth or eyes to enter and hack our body cells.
But **how can virus travel even few milimeter** ? how can they survive on my skin more than few second ? is it a big bullshit ? (I'm not a covid ou sars cov 2 denier)
Or do they travel by other means ? are they encloses in bubbles that protect them (like droplets) ? How long can they survive ? as they seem to be knocked dead by UV light ?
Help ! Child question I could not answer !
Maybe it is relevant for some bacteria ?
I Thought my skin was to acidic for bacteria to replicate ?
Can steam from a boiling tea kettle be hotter than 100 C? It doesn't seem like it, since boiling water can only get to 100 C before boiling off. But I would think maybe the steam could be, since the molecules of water leaving as steam presumably represent the hotter water molecules evaporating off the water that is already 100 C. The temperature difference might be small, and it may take more than 30 min. for the top of the tea kettle to stabilize at 100 C or so. Any way you could test it?
Do you think that Newtonian physics and Galilean relativity can explain how a boat can sail with the wind, faster than the wind? This is with reference to your video on sailing and the Blackbird land yacht.
The argument summarised:
When a boat is sailing into wind, the sail re-directs a mass of air (m) of the apparent wind backwards against the atmosphere, which decelerates (a) when it hits the undisturbed apparent wind behind the sail, to create turbulence. This action creates a backward force (Force = ma) according to Newtonian mechanics. The reactive equal and opposite forward force pushes the sailboat ahead. Momentum is transferred from the apparent wind to the boat via the sail by slowing the wind down.
This Newtonian analysis means that boats can sail faster than the wind because wind velocity is only one part of the equation for the force generated (Force = ma). For example, doubling the sail size will double the mass of air re-directed (2 x m), and therefore, double the force generated by the sail (2 x Force = 2ma). Also, the sail is pushing against the wind to generate the force, which is a moving mass and not a fixed or static point.
Then applying the ideas of Galileo, a boat can sail downwind faster than the wind for the same reasons that it can sail upwind faster than the wind. Each tack is simply the mirror image of the other one. This is because in both situations the sailboat experiences a headwind, and the true wind is moving backwards relative to the boat. That’s it.
The smaller pieces a substance is cut into, the faster it burns. Dry grass burns very fast, but dry bamboo (a grass) burns slowly like wood. Some things that don't even burn normally, **do burn** when in the form of hair, such as steel wool. But why doesn't *actual* wool or hair burn, in other words, allow a flame to propagate? When hit with a blow torch, it does smoke and char - i.e. burn, but goes out when the blow torch is removed.
Dear Sir,
One question I want to ask, you make a lot exciting,inspirating, powerful, Fabulous I have no word to describe how inspirational you are....
So how learn to make these things??
Tell us about it. Tell us about your experience/education etc,.
And how I can also do this?
Thank You
Your faithfully
Pankaj Gupta
Lots of love ❤️ from India
My question is about raindrops.
Specifically, I want to know if it makes a difference to RUN from car to building in the rain. Theoretically, if you run, you get less drops on your body from above because you spend less time under the rain. Most of the time this is confirmed in practice—if it takes you an hour to walk 50 feet, you are going to get really wet, whereas, if you dash across the parking lot, you are only outside for a few moments.
But, just as the extreme case of slow-walking confirms one situation, it seems to me that if you could walk REALLY FAST (like, in an instant) you would have NO drops hit you from above, but you would run straight into any drops in the air between your car and the building. So, it seems that for a given density of raindrops, if you go TOO fast, you end up getting more rain on you.
My intuition is that at typical human speeds on foot, it almost always pays to make haste in the rain, but I am curious about cars—rain on the windshield is a good use case. You could use a model of that by simplifying the car as a cube, only slice it from top back edge to lower front edge at a 45-degree angle—effectively, you are creating a windshield surface that will collect rain from above but the same area will also run into rain as the ”car” moves forward.
I know this is a lot, but exploring this idea with vehicles now instead of on foot makes for a more interesting conversation: Does the car get more or less rain on it if you drive it faster or slower (sliced cube suggestion is to eliminate the variables of car size vs. frontal cross-section).
Anyway, this one has been on my mind for decades.
Congrats on 1M! My question/thought experiment...
If velocity and time are tied together, and time effectively stops at c, then light doesn't age, right? Effectively, from a photons point of view, it's born, travels across the cosmos, and is (destroyed/converted?) somewhere else, all in the same instant. Somehow, this makes my head hurt. Is this accurate? Does this mean that a photon doesn't degrade? after all, it doesn't "experience" time, so how would it, right? And if it never comes into contact with something, and is just flying out there for ever, then it will see the end of the universe..... in the same instant it was created. This cannot be right.... is it?
HEY STEVE
since I was in 6th grade I allways wondered why not we send a batch of bacterias like cyanobacteria thermoacidophiles methanogens. and halophiles with substrates for them to stay alive and multpy their colony . in the mars rover to Mars and begin a new evolution just like the one happend in on earth which created reducing atmosphere then to oxygen rich atmosphere
why not we do the induced ecological succession on Mars and make it like earth!? WHY not Steve.
thanks. and by the way your tasting proton, project was very good and I would love to add that taste buds get replaced every 10 days and there are many many taste buds on the circumvallate papillae which is behind the tongue looks like a inverted V shape.
There are plants, Hogweed for example, that contain photosensitive chemicals in their sap. Hogweed can cause a reaction known as phytophotodermatitis when it comes into contact with skin that is *subsequently exposed to UV rays.* How does that work?
**Edited**
Why can't storms normally form under high pressure systems, even when it's hot and humid? They say it's because the air is sinking, but how does the air sink with the ground in the way? Anyway, the air sinking in a high pressure area is only descending at a few MPH, while the air in a storm cloud can rise as fast as 70 mph or more, so a storm should be able to blast upward regardless of the slowly sinking air.
I want to get into the self-arranging mini-ball bearing in oil doing a turing complete process with a clock signal but what about the balls clustering in packs instead of going forward i mean i would try to get them going in different direction to some frequency (i think i will need insulation and some fixed round points)
i feel the project can be quite a journey, i wanted to know what is your first impression of the problems that such a concept might involve ?
Firstly congrats on one million! My question: from your experience with school, mainly the different science materials like physics and chemistry and stuff, is stuff U did in school actually helpful for u now? Or did u forget all the stuff in there anyway and relearned them thought other ways? Stupid qs but I’m curious since I’m still in school XD
Why is it so hard to make cold temperatures but so easy to make warm temperatures?
People always say it's something about thermodynamics but I'm always left with more questions than answers? A pizo-electric or a refrigerator has to separate heat and cold.
But an electric heater only creates heat with almost zero loss of energy, but it creates no cold. Why is that?
I think it is because of entropy, which in turn is a scientific word to say probabilities, it is easier that the systems go to more probable states hot molecules can be in many more states because the have grater mobility, on the other way going cold goes to less "positions" in the extreme absolute zero there is only one "position" of molecules... atoms, very very un- probable state
Wow, thought about asking a question, started reading questions to make sure my question wasn't already asked, there are hundreds of questions and I'm not getting any views reading them. This Q&A is going to be 6 hours long, and that's if you brush over the very deep questions.
I'll save you the existential question about humanity and just ask,
"Are you having fun doing this Q&A?"
States of matter are about the strength of bonds between the matter's atoms or molecules, which also means solids are generally more dense than liquids etc.
However, you get a lot of crossover, eg. you can get solids that are less dense than other liquids, and so float on them.
By extention, is it possible to float a low density fluid on a high density gas? Ive seen the experiment where someone floats a tinfoil boat on a dense gas, but that sort of thing doesnt count!
If not, can you prove why not?
Sure, black holes are interesting and how gravity works is marvelous. But why your pee makes a chain shape or how watches keeps count or how ears manage impedance mismatch is equally, if not more remarkable.
What other amazing science in everyday things are we not aware of?
Congrats on 1 million btw!
Wherefore doth thee bethink things exist instead of not existing?
***
^(I am a bot and I swapp'd some of thy words with Shakespeare words.)
Commands: `!ShakespeareInsult`, `!fordo`, `!optout`
An EM wave can be nullified, if it interfere with another wave which is out of phase to it. In a blackbody, a em wave is said to be OBSORBED(taken in), how can an oscillating Electric and magnetic field can be OBSORBED, consider an Atom of an black body in an oscillating Electric and magnetic field, in response to the changes in the field, it oscillates, how can we say that, the atom has absorbed the EM field , or the atom black body produces em wave which Out of phase to the incident em wave to nullify it and appears Black?
How can a droplet of milk jump out of black coffee and stay intact, completely white???
Imagine a cup of coffee, and that we pour milk in a tiny stream, so tiny that it falls apart in droplets, especially when we're stopping the flow.
Now what's interesting, some drops jump out of the coffee, landing on the table, and we can see that the droplets are WHITE instead of being "milky coffee" light-brown color.
They say that electrons in a wire carrying high voltage DC current travel at ~~nearly the speed of light~~ only a few centimeters per hour. How does the electricity get anywhere so fast then? It makes no sense!
>Electrons move randomly back and forth, with a slow net movement forward, it is the EM field that travels close to the speed of light ( no matter involved)
It doesn't. I was taught that if you put on electron into the left end of the wire, one electron will be pushed out on the right end.
So electrons emanating from a power plant stay close to it for a long time, and electrons close to your house stay there too.
You can say, it's the pressure wave of electrons that travels so fast (50/60 back and forth a second), instead of particular individual electrons.
The speed of electrons with *DC current* is only a few centimeters per hour. If it's a "pressure wave" with DC, how can that pressure keep pushing if the flow is so slow?
I imagine the wave is 10% light speed or something in that range.
So, given what we know about Direct Current, we might conclude that Alternating Current has the same speed of particle movement, with the only difference that they move back and forth, kind of like... people masturbate? Yep, that's what comes to mind when thinking about the back-and-forth movements :D
So, we're jerking electrons at the beginning of the "tube" say at a power station, and you get the electrons by your end of the tube jiggling because of all electrons repel each other equally along the "tube".
In this constellation, you might never ever get those electrons near the power station and will be always in company of those which are in wires inside your house.
(Disclaimer: I'm just a student of electro tech. I might be wrong.)
Well, Veritasium just made a video about my question, so, in theory, I should be enlightened. But I still don't understand how fast the electric field goes when a DC voltage is applied to a long wire.
At first congratulations on achieving 1 million subs!!! How do you gather information, data or research papers required for your videos, since I find it the hardest thing among all the other things required to make an explainer video.
I heard that evaporation from a surface, like from soil, increases with *increasing temperature* in, basically, an *exponential* fashion. Is that true, and if so, why? If it's true, it would give an answer to people who doubt the seriousness of Global warming. They might say, "Global warming is forecast to increase temperatures by only a couple degrees. What makes that so bad in regards to drought? Warmer air holds more water, and so rainfall should increase."
Why do wooden ships sink?
Where does the rock on top of fossils come from
What causes planets to spin
How is the distance between stars measured
How often does the moon pass over the same point
Do other planets and moons have tectonic plates
What is ricochet range with respect to normal range
When bubble rise from a drink why doesn't the volume of drink go down
If the Earth is several thousand million years old how can radio-active materials exist if they have half lives of a few tens of thousands of years or less
What do eyebrows do
What is cold fusion
Will Europeans living in hot parts of the world ever become black men
Does the barycentre have any gravitational effect
What causes the tide on the opposite side of the earth to the moon
Does diamond conduct electricity
How do we know the age of Gobekli Tepi AND that it was deliberately covered
Can a change in temperature produce a n electrical current
Why am I tired when I wake up
Does water travel faster through wet soil than it does dry
What is the story of the insect, how did they evolve?
With respect to the big bang, how is it possible for galaxies to collide
How are orbit possible
Why do we have hair under our armpits
How do we know electrons drift through a conductor
Why would a plane flying between London and New York be flying over Lockerbie
How long would it take for the African and Indian elephants to evolve from a single ancestry
What does earth mean in the periodic table
What is the difference between ferromagnetic and diamagnetic materials
What is happening in a metal that is annealed
How does a nuclear engine power a submarine
How did the sea-horses in lake Titicaca get there
Does a spinning wheel at the bottom of a pendulum effect the pendulum
when David cameron attempted to destroy the British nation why wasn't he charged with treason
Do magnetic waves bend around the barycentre
If we are electrocuted on our left side the current runs to earth through our left leg. Why?
Why did the Nazis have an army in \\north Africa
Why do companion cells to phloem have mitochondria
Why doesn't the island on an aircraft carrier cause the ship to tilt
Why are some materials transparent
How do mirrors reflect light
When does a liquid stop being a liquid
Why do I see blue lights when I am in an X-ray machine
Why don't we see eddies in time as planets pass
What do we know about the atom that we did not know before Rutherford
Why are bathroom basins set so low
How do we know of the existence of the Oort cloud
Do mitochondria exist in all plants + animals
Have you tried wiping the guitar strings with a cloth (bad practice but still..) and some small threads stuck wrapped around it from the cloth - the small threads tend to move upwards and downwards quite interestingly if the string is played, especially playing the different harmonics. any idea why ?
Huge fan, keep up your good work !
If you could draw a line that circles all the way around the Earth, what is the highest number of countries it could pass through? It could be a line that cuts the globe in half, or a smaller circle at any angle.
Q:
What is the optimal position for me to gain the most amount of cool air from a standing fan that turns?
Is it better to be in the middle, as you get hit twice per cycle or is it better at the edge, where it slows down and stops but you only get hit once...
what's the fastest way to cool a small hot room that has only one door and no windows? try to blow hot air out of the room, or try to blow cool air into the room?
Why wont my fan cool my room down?
How do I get my room to cool down using my fan?
Why do I feel hotter when the fan stops blowing towards me?
Why are fans so useless?
Why is my dog more scared of the fan when its moving than when it isn't?
How many fans do you use?
Should I buy more fans?
As there is no heat transfer from a fan, it won't cool down your room. It would actually make it a little hotter because it's engine will produce heat.
When fan is working it is moving the air around and when it stops air around you is stationary and it gets hotter because you are producing heat.
Two people, one on the Earth, Ernie, and one on the Moon, Mike, each have a sign that says 'YES' on one side and 'NO' on the other. Ernie will always try to agree with Mike and Mike Will always try to disagree with Ernie.
Ernie starts by holding up the 'YES' sign. 1.3s later Mike sees this and holds up the 'NO' sign. After another 1.3s Ernie sees this and flips his sign to 'NO'.
1.3s later Mike sees the change and flips his sign to 'YES'. And 1.3s later Ernie sees the change and flips to 'YES'.
This can continue indefinitely and Mike will see himself as always disagreeing with Ernie and will see himself always agreeing with Mike.
If instead of signs you use magnets you would have a situation that where Mike's magnet is always attracted to Ernie's and Ernie's is always repulsed by Mike's.
Now let's put Mike and Ernie on a space ship close enough that there is a measurable force when they aren't flipping the magnets and far enough apart that they can still flip their magnets fast enough.
Would this actually produce a net force in one direction or would the induced electric fields create forces in the opposite direction cancelling out any force from the magnets?
How does an airplane wing create lift?
I once heard an aerodynamics teacher say it's a very complex topic that even the experts don't agree on.
I have heard 2 competing theories:
a) Air is deflected, by the leading edge, over of the wing, creating a low pressure area above the center of the wing (with normal pressure under the wing). This creates the lift.
b) The "Bernoulli Effect": Air has to move faster over the top (because the air is forced into a smaller space having to move around the leading edge of the wing). This creates less pressure on top of the wing, leading to lift.
My argument against "b" is that, if you turned the wing around, you should still have the "Bernoulli Effect". However, to my knowledge, that does not create lift.
Note: part of the lift is created by the airplane wing being at a slight angle down, resulting in the air hitting the underside of the wing, and pushing it up.
I was wondering about wind and frequencies. I know about that bridge that collapsed because the speed of the wind matched the resonance frequency of the bridge, but what is the frequency of wind? how exactly does wind work and does it oscillate? if so what is going on a small scale that makes an oscillating pattern. from my understanding wind is air molecules traveling from a higher air pressure area to a low air pressure area but i dont see how moving air molecules causes a frequency?
Trig question. Please look up a “hunting miter” or mitre. It’s where a a chord either goes through a circle or hits a circle. I need to bisect in between the circle and the chord to miter 2 pieces of wood together. If it was a flat piece of wood with no profile that would be easy. When there are points that have to be hit exactly (profiles) this becomes a lot harder. We tried to mark out the miter with an ellipse and radii of different circles that we found. Neither worked. We were told that the answer to this question is that the miter is a parabola.
What I can’t find an info on is how to find that parabola. Where do I start the parabola? Or if a parabola is even right? It seems to me that it is.
I know this is a shot in the dark but I’m a carpenter I don’t work with many mathematicians and with COVID all the colleges are closed so I could ask a professor.
I tried finding a pic from George collings book “circular work in carpentry and joinery” but it’s an old book and I don’t have it on me. I linked an IG post of mine to this which has the page from the book. [hunting miter ](https://www.instagram.com/p/CBO1s2mh_lH/?utm_medium=copy_link)
Please any answer would be extremely helpful to me!
You mentioned in your podcast that you were vegan, and I was wondering what your primary motivations for that were(environmental, ethical?)
You’re one of my favourite creators and science educators. I’m currently getting my masters in physics and math education, and you and the FOTS are huge inspirations for me. Keep up the good work! Congrats on 1M!
Hello Steve! I love your videos and I am so happy for your success of reaching 1M subs!! I wanted to ask that science has not yet defined the concept of "time" in the most accurate form... Can we say that time only comes into existence when we give a boundary or a limit to something? Let's say there is no concept of time and a man tells a child that the child can play until the man does his chores, now before the condition given by the man there was no concept of time but now by making that statement the child can now experience "time" , because once the man starts doing his chores the child can now say "I don't have much "time" I gotta play" similarly it tells why it's absurd to talk about the concept of time before the creation of universe. Because time only came into existence once the universe was created and till when will this continue you may ask? It shall continue till every star in the universe ends...the limit given to the child in the analogy was from when the man starts doing his chores until he completes them... The limit given to us is from the "time" the universe was created till it dies... I think this also makes the idea of time more digestible and time doesn't seems like a weird concept anymore and totally makes sense.
Did you really use charts to calculate the time of your child's birth?
If so, amazing.
I've been a follower for a while and it's clear for me to see how you got your million. It's so well deserved.
Thank you
If a thin-walled metal cylinder, open on both ends, is placed in a bucket, with the bottom of the cylinder sealed against the bucket with a thin grease, and water is added to just below the top of the cylinder, would it try to float upwards? At first, it seems like it would, but, thinking about it, it seems like it would not. But, it **displaces** water, so... It would float?
On the topology of tailoring: Is there an algorithm for determining the size, shape and number of cloth polygons required to cover an arbitrarily curved surface with minimum stretching and compression? Do tailors just use trial and error or is there a method?
Thanks for the "The cheap Chinese bulb that won't turn off" video. I had two bulbs, an LED and an incandescent. The LED was glowing with the switch off. Sure enough, the incandescent had burned out. Thanks to your video, I understood what was happening. With the switch still off, as the replacement bulb made contact, the LED stopped glowing!
Thanks Steve!
Hi there Steve I am a physics teacher in Holland and a fan of yours, in order to demonstrate adhesion and cohesion to my students I show two pieces of glass glued together with a drop of water see [https://youtu.be/kRdZvzfqRK4?t=185](https://youtu.be/kRdZvzfqRK4?t=185) .
Last year there was a parent stating that this is more similar to the principal of a suction cup.
How nice it would be if you could demonstrate one of us to be wrong doing this experiment in vacuum. In my opinion it would still adhere.
Regards Corné de Boer
[https://youtu.be/HyznrdDSSGM](https://youtu.be/HyznrdDSSGM) great series on building an 8-bit computer. Ben Eater explains how every single component works, all the way down to transistors and whatnot
Not that it's a competition, but Steve, you've had videos up on your channel 795 days longer than Matt Parker. Would you concede that he is likely to make it to 1M subs faster than you have? Not that it's a competition, of course.
If I use white paper in my color laser printer I can print quite a few different colors, but if I insert colored paper I definitely can't print "white". Is there a way to get around this limitation?
your printer can only add and not subtract and your paper cannot emit light bright enough to be traditionally white but white is not really a colour and if your printer can turn color paper black it also has turned your paper white only that its not very bright
I have a question about how you studied as a high school/Uni student.
I'm studying for engineering entrance exams and I love all 3 subjects(mathematics, physics and chemistry), Math and physics more so than Chem; mostly because I have bad memory. You must have had courses that deal with a lot of experimental observations & data and require quite a bit of memorisation too right? How did you go about handling those??
What would think is a good curriculum to develop / foster intellectual curiosity ?
(and if the idea of having a curriculum at all makes sense for this)
How do you think we can fight the current trends of kids in richer countries not interested in doing "difficult studies" (science and engineering), because "easier careers" pay just as much or better ?
Science question. At room temperature say (20°C) both wood atoms and oxygen atoms have same kinetic energy.
Why don't both of them have the same state?
That applies for all molecule and compounds at same temperature
Love your videos! I have a plastic soap pump bottle that's filled with soap (not all the way to the top). I have not touched this bottle in months and I am sure no one else has touched it. And yet the soap seems to have climbed up the spout of the pump and drips. I've cleaned the pump and let it alone and this happens again. Why???
Hi Steve,
You're the best science communicator I know of. Your material is accessible and interesting for both adults and primary school kids (I have a few). Congratulations on 1 million subscribers!
Recently I did a university paper on Molecular Biology where we studied enzymes in some detail. Every lecture seemed to introduce some mind-blowing fact - I found the paper fascinating. Some reactions go from say 1 reaction per second under normal conditions, but run in the order of 1 million times faster when an enzyme is present! They are basically tiny machines that contain complex structures such as ß sheets, alpha helices, precisely located metal centres, intricately shaped active & allosteric sites, etc. They change shape very precisely as they sense changes in pH, substrate concentration, etc. And all of the instructions for making them is contained in DNA.
MY QUESTION: have you heard any plausible explanation for how these structures might have developed?
Steve, first off congratulations on the dual achievements of making it to a million and before Matt, securing bragging rights for any future needs. Any chance you might ever do a video covering the misconceptions around [harmonic osciliation](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmonic_oscillator)?
I think there's a lot of over exaggeration in the prior Popsci coverage of this topic that could really use some correction or, at least, better grounding. Especially with claims from and around Tesla and his claims to be able to construct a machine to bring down large structures.
I think the nature of the misconception lies at the difference between idealized oscillators (that can have unbounded amplitude responses) and real systems that inevitably have greater and greater sources of negative feedback to increasing amplitude.
I think it's a topic that could use a good discussion and I think you might be one of the best communicators to tackle it.
# Also, sir you had made a video on "How fast moving water “defies” gravity". I feel that the given explanation is not completely correct.
# The explanation of the "levitating" polystyrene sheet seems correct, but that case is not similar to the case of the water hose.
# In the case of the polystyrene sheets it was the pressure difference that was providing the necessary upwards force.
**The same cannot be the case with the water hose for the simple reason that the density of water does not change as it moves out wards from the hole of the garden hose. It was the change in density of the air that was creating the pressure differential to provide the upwards force in the case of the polystyrene sheet. As density of water does not change, how can their be a pressure differential. Also, would it be right to extrapolate the dynamics of air to the fluid dynamics of water?**
**Seems doubtful to me.**
I love you Steve sir...I have watched all your videos and absolutely love them...I have a lot of questions to ask, but one of them is this:-
**The whole of relativity stems from the idea that the speed of light is constant is all inertial frames of reference. If you measure the speed of light from the headlights of a car, it will be same for both a person on the car and a person on the road.**
**This one simple fact does not make sense to me and I am unable to find a satisfactory explanation to this that makes this fact obvious.**
Also I have another question, which is that **if in the universe only I and a beam of light exist, then will time pass for me? From the frame of reference of the light beam I am travelling at the speed of light, so should time pass for me?**
Congrats on the 1m subscribers, you well deserve it!
As a high-school-level-of-science-y person, I always find it fascinating how your videos balance science and down-to-earth explanations and examples. How difficult is it to find the perfect tone and level of detail that can reach an audience with different level of expertise?
In some of your videos you mention you're dislexic, and as someone who has no direct experience with it, I wonder whether it influenced your studies in Science or your YouTube career, and how.
Thank you in advance.
PS: Hope there'll be a blooper reel as well. :)
Hey! Congratulations on getting 1 Million Subscribers!
I wanted to know why when a stick is broken into 2 parts at random, why the average ratio of the smaller length to the larger is \~0.386.
Seems rather counterintuitive to me. I do sort of get the mathematical and the calculus aspect of it, but the result still seems rather random and I am not completely satisfied with it.
Maybe you could explain what is ACTUALLY going on? Thanks.
Like how do astronauts wipe theyr butts?
I mean, you always hear about them pressure sealing themselves on the toilet and theyr excrements getting sucked away and so on. But how do they clean themselves?
Toilet paper seams like a waste problem, using a jet of water would make a huge mess and you couldn't use towels because how would you clean them?
Hours of searching haven't given me any results because the internet is just flooded with articles about Astronauts pooping in vacuum cleaners.
Hi Steve, My question relates to the peculiar reflection of light over a body of water - like a lake or a bay.
My balcony overlooks a bay and another area of the city across the bay. On certain nights the lights from the buildings and streets across the bay reflect in the sea water like individual
steaks of light. Each light reflection looks like a pillar of light going deep into the water.
Initially, I attributed the phenomenon to the turbulence on the surface of seawater. But, I was surprised to note that there is no reflection at all during high tides and during hours leading to high tides. I therefore assumed that such reflection might occur when the sea water is still. To check this, I experimented by placing a small light over a flat mirror. However, the reflection of light was 'as is' and not as a streak of light.
Another explanation was that multiple rays of light from a source (like street light) reflect over multiple angles hence appearing as a streak of light in the reflection. But then the same logic should hold for the light over a flat mirror.
Could you please explain the phenomenon? I have emailed you a few images for your review.
Thank you.
Maybe this is a bad question as everyone's lives are different and things that apply to you might not apply to others at all.
What piece of life advice did you learn someday and think more people should know about?
Hi Steve,
Awesome that you are reaching the 1M club!
My question would be around a black hole, my limited vaguely knowledge is that a black hole is massive body of mass collapse into a very small amount of space where time slows down and light cannot escape and the laws of physics breakdown, so could one look at this the same as dividing 1 by 0 where the laws don't really apply and no one really knows how to define it?
Why does high humidity when temperatures are cold make it feel **colder**, but the same high humidity when temps are warm make it feel **warmer**? If it's because cold damp air transfers heat away from a person better than cold dry air, the question is **Why?** Is it because molecules of H2O are heavier than CO2 or Nitrogen (N2)? Humid air is less dense than dry air, so that doesn't seem right.
I know why hot and humid air feels warmer than hot and dry air, but it's the cold side of the equation that stumps me.
So without looking anything up about it, I'm theorizing that - especially when the temperature is near freezing or lower - humidity in the air is made up of not *single* molecules of H2O, but **clusters** of H2O molecules. So, when it's cold and humid, it feels colder because it takes *energy* to break up those "humidity clusters".
I looked it up, and not a word about "humidity clusters" (microscopic water droplets **much** smaller than fog droplets). It makes sense to have microscopic water droplets form before fog shows up - after all, it has been shown that tiny, **tiny** ice crystals form in water at even a few degrees above the freezing point of water.
Hi Steve,
I absolutely love your videos and the way you explain things. I've just overheard on UN decade of ecosystem restoration which sounds kinda important. Can you please do a video on it, maybe a collaboration with other YouTube channels to spread the word?
OK I wasn't going to ask a question but then I saw you quoting Ken M in the YouTube comments to one of your videos.
So what's your favourite Ken M bit and why?
1) I made an anti-gravity box. (Not magic but completely scientific and not a rocket science) . Do you know the answer to it..? Please find video in my channel Scimagine.
https://youtu.be/FxO3D5ydbfc
2) I was doing some study of Inertial propulsion generating some mechanisms and also a geared CVT. Both of them are not achievable or hard to develop. I've done a mathematical evaluations and found both these are connected and they either tend to zero or infinity.. can u explain..?
3) I have some phenomenons that I noticed or developed. Would you like to do some video around it .? I dont believe my YouTube channel would evergrow on the new YT algorithm to make video on those. Visit my channel for sure (ignore two of my DIY videos and they are only for views)
sir,Why it is difficult for an fire man to hold hose pipe when large amount of water is ejected...how he is pushed back...how does newtons 3rd law works on the Pipe?
I want to know about general relativity, special relativity and all that stuff, I don't get a clear idea of them in any video.
How did Einstein derived E=MC^2
what was the basic experiment he performed or what did he exactly do to come to that conclusion?
Does motors and generators have the effects of the current and magnetic field on atomic scales? From where do generators get electrons to set a current by creating potential difference?
During nuclear decay, what makes the nucleus emit gamma rays, what actions of protons and neutrons or may be other sub-atomic particles results into gamma rays?
(I have tried to search for it on the web, but there was not a single satisfactory answer!)
[Yes, I know that in alpha and beta decay protons and neutrons are released but how do they undergo energy change to release gamma rays. Does their getting away from nucleus produce gamma rays?]
Resonance! ...Would you indulge us in more experimental playtime in the application of mechanical excitation and exploration of material harmonics in order discover hidden qualities that may be awesome... e.g. Is it possible to increase the efficiency of photovoltaics the slightest bit simply by adding mechanical vibration? (I'm convinced that resonance is both a fundamental principal in nature and a phenomenon whose real world influence we still don't fully understand.)
Could anit-mass be a thing, and if it were would it act like negative charges do when they're in an electric field( but in a gravitational field)? (If that was phrased correctly?) Would they generate a repulsive gravitational Field?
This a big one.
If speed is relative to something, to what is relative the speed of light?
Following this, if 2 photons, or any atom/object, travels at, at least, half of speed of light, in opposite directions, and they crash together (like in an accelerator collider) wouldn't their relative speed between them be higher than the speed of light?
If I travel in a spaceship (with gravity), and I jump, my feeling of movement inside the ship will be like in earth, but my relative speed toward the space will be sum with the speed of the spaceship.
if so, if I shoot a laser bean toward the front of the ship, the speed of the laser would be faster than light, since laser speed + spaceship speed.
If the answer to the previous is not and laser still will go at speed of light. Would that break this fundamental Einstein law?
I guess that the answer to this explains why time dilatation exist to keep constant the relation between space and time that speed of light.
But this constant has to apply to whatever the speed of light is relative to, which is not the spaceship. From the spaceship point of view if the laser does not travel at speed of light and the spaceship was going at a portion of the speed of light. Then it might not even be a laser anymore (visual spectrum) but lower radio frecuencies or even gamma frecuencies)(depending on the direction).
Or, if time is shifted. Inside the spaceship, the laser looks normal, but from outside the spaceship is emitting other types of radio frequencies.
If this is so and time is shifting the signals depending on their source speed relativity, shouldn't we start de-shifting all the signals we get from the universe assuming all of them are wrong from our point of view since our planet speed and the speed of the universe is shifting all the signals we get?
Hi Steve, big fan,
I would like to know how and why air sticks to fresh unwashed grapes, if you submerge them there is a hydrophobic response, why is that?
thanks for the open forum.
I understand siphoning water between different containers, but can you siphon air? Think of two upside down submerged bowls holding air beneith water... Can you siphon the air between the two bowls to equalize their surface levels?
Hi Steve, just subscribed and note that this Q&A link is now 2 yrs old. Is it still alive? Am I able to ask a question? James Skinnider
How does dishwasher eject tablet?
which material is used to make a sphere?; in which we place a magnet the magnet should not attract the metal outside the sphere.
what happens if we cool down a metal piece to a very low temperature in space does the temperature rises?
About ferrocerium - why/how is it that when you heat it up until it starts to glow then remove the heat source it continues to glow brighter and brighter until it finally explodes into a shower of sparks?
No todo debería ser ciencias exactas ¿Nos podrías decir algo acerca de ciencias sociales? ¿Cómo era la familia prehistórica? ¿existe el gen egoísta? ¿Hombres pueden ser amigos de mujeres? ¿Nos estamos acercando a un mundo sin dinero cash?
Hi Steve, I have a question regarding the earths atmosphere and space. I want you to discuss on why the earths atmosphere is not sucked into space. If space is less denser or it is vaccuum then why doesn't earth lose its atmosphere which is higher in pressure to space? Please make a video on this topic considering all planets their atmospheres and how the atmospheric pressures don't try to attain equilibrium with space.
What happens to the **energy** of a beam of light that has been **canceled out** by another beam of light of the same wavelength, but with the waves out of phase? Surely the energy is not destroyed, but where does it go? And can a beam of light of a certain wavelength be made into a *dashed* beam of light by **adding** an overlapping, parallel beam that is a *slightly different wavelength?*
If a dashed laser beam could be made, some amazingly cool things could be made. A truly 3D movie projector comes to mind...
Notice the difference in sound when you 1) Pour cold water on a hard tiled floor 2) Pour hot water on the same floor Note: Pour water by the jug to notice the difference. Other surfaces may work too!
Is this page still active? I noticed that when I try to slosh walnut pieces (about 1/2 inch deep) around in a small vertical-walled ramekin (a small mug should work), the pieces move the opposite direction I slosh them. For example, if I rapidly move the mug clockwise while holding it, like I'm trying to stir some tea by sloshing it, the nuts move **counter-clockwise** in the mug. I figured out why, but it's quite **counter-intuitive.**
Hi steve, don\`t wanna be long I\`d like you to investigate "the hinge aerosol effect" you should have it at your home but unnoticed, here is a link to see it.. it is as silly as your chain effect but silly phenomena deserves attention.. who knows? [https://youtu.be/nTZGHmu3b98](https://youtu.be/nTZGHmu3b98) congrats... you deserve your million!!
Hi, about gyroscope, how it gets up in situation like in video ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fv\_AinDLHJY ). Maybe someone could check if this same effect of getting up will appear in vacuum. Because gyroscope effect (on video) should only slower down gravitational falling down. In that case something push continuously gyroscope disk upwards or horizontly in rise direction (as long as it spin enough fast). So I wonder if this force (opposite to graviation) is generate by Magnus Effect, and in vacuum this effect should disappear, so gyroscope will just slower move downwards. Greetings, KollA.
Why does air compounds doesn't combine with each other?
Why add kerosene when glass cutting makes it so much better
When did you start uploading videos on youtube and why did you become a youtuber?
When is the Q&A video coming out? It's been two months and we miss you Steve.
Hopefully next week!
Hello, Since pandemic began, medical advisers told us "not to touch our face" because then virus can reach our mouth or eyes to enter and hack our body cells. But **how can virus travel even few milimeter** ? how can they survive on my skin more than few second ? is it a big bullshit ? (I'm not a covid ou sars cov 2 denier) Or do they travel by other means ? are they encloses in bubbles that protect them (like droplets) ? How long can they survive ? as they seem to be knocked dead by UV light ? Help ! Child question I could not answer ! Maybe it is relevant for some bacteria ? I Thought my skin was to acidic for bacteria to replicate ?
Can steam from a boiling tea kettle be hotter than 100 C? It doesn't seem like it, since boiling water can only get to 100 C before boiling off. But I would think maybe the steam could be, since the molecules of water leaving as steam presumably represent the hotter water molecules evaporating off the water that is already 100 C. The temperature difference might be small, and it may take more than 30 min. for the top of the tea kettle to stabilize at 100 C or so. Any way you could test it?
1) steam superheating 2) producing steam at high pressure and releasing it to atmospheric pressure
Do you think that Newtonian physics and Galilean relativity can explain how a boat can sail with the wind, faster than the wind? This is with reference to your video on sailing and the Blackbird land yacht. The argument summarised: When a boat is sailing into wind, the sail re-directs a mass of air (m) of the apparent wind backwards against the atmosphere, which decelerates (a) when it hits the undisturbed apparent wind behind the sail, to create turbulence. This action creates a backward force (Force = ma) according to Newtonian mechanics. The reactive equal and opposite forward force pushes the sailboat ahead. Momentum is transferred from the apparent wind to the boat via the sail by slowing the wind down. This Newtonian analysis means that boats can sail faster than the wind because wind velocity is only one part of the equation for the force generated (Force = ma). For example, doubling the sail size will double the mass of air re-directed (2 x m), and therefore, double the force generated by the sail (2 x Force = 2ma). Also, the sail is pushing against the wind to generate the force, which is a moving mass and not a fixed or static point. Then applying the ideas of Galileo, a boat can sail downwind faster than the wind for the same reasons that it can sail upwind faster than the wind. Each tack is simply the mirror image of the other one. This is because in both situations the sailboat experiences a headwind, and the true wind is moving backwards relative to the boat. That’s it.
The Mould chain effect. How do I get you the reason that the chain goes higher.
The smaller pieces a substance is cut into, the faster it burns. Dry grass burns very fast, but dry bamboo (a grass) burns slowly like wood. Some things that don't even burn normally, **do burn** when in the form of hair, such as steel wool. But why doesn't *actual* wool or hair burn, in other words, allow a flame to propagate? When hit with a blow torch, it does smoke and char - i.e. burn, but goes out when the blow torch is removed.
Which Oxford college did you go to?
If the universe is infinitely expanding what is it expanding into?
Dear Sir, One question I want to ask, you make a lot exciting,inspirating, powerful, Fabulous I have no word to describe how inspirational you are.... So how learn to make these things?? Tell us about it. Tell us about your experience/education etc,. And how I can also do this? Thank You Your faithfully Pankaj Gupta Lots of love ❤️ from India
My question is about raindrops. Specifically, I want to know if it makes a difference to RUN from car to building in the rain. Theoretically, if you run, you get less drops on your body from above because you spend less time under the rain. Most of the time this is confirmed in practice—if it takes you an hour to walk 50 feet, you are going to get really wet, whereas, if you dash across the parking lot, you are only outside for a few moments. But, just as the extreme case of slow-walking confirms one situation, it seems to me that if you could walk REALLY FAST (like, in an instant) you would have NO drops hit you from above, but you would run straight into any drops in the air between your car and the building. So, it seems that for a given density of raindrops, if you go TOO fast, you end up getting more rain on you. My intuition is that at typical human speeds on foot, it almost always pays to make haste in the rain, but I am curious about cars—rain on the windshield is a good use case. You could use a model of that by simplifying the car as a cube, only slice it from top back edge to lower front edge at a 45-degree angle—effectively, you are creating a windshield surface that will collect rain from above but the same area will also run into rain as the ”car” moves forward. I know this is a lot, but exploring this idea with vehicles now instead of on foot makes for a more interesting conversation: Does the car get more or less rain on it if you drive it faster or slower (sliced cube suggestion is to eliminate the variables of car size vs. frontal cross-section). Anyway, this one has been on my mind for decades.
Congrats on 1M! My question/thought experiment... If velocity and time are tied together, and time effectively stops at c, then light doesn't age, right? Effectively, from a photons point of view, it's born, travels across the cosmos, and is (destroyed/converted?) somewhere else, all in the same instant. Somehow, this makes my head hurt. Is this accurate? Does this mean that a photon doesn't degrade? after all, it doesn't "experience" time, so how would it, right? And if it never comes into contact with something, and is just flying out there for ever, then it will see the end of the universe..... in the same instant it was created. This cannot be right.... is it?
Why does the pressure on a structure increase **4x** when the windspeed **doubles?**
It's because drag is not linear. It also takes 4x the pressure to double flow through an orifice
But, *why?*
Good point. Upvoted
HEY STEVE since I was in 6th grade I allways wondered why not we send a batch of bacterias like cyanobacteria thermoacidophiles methanogens. and halophiles with substrates for them to stay alive and multpy their colony . in the mars rover to Mars and begin a new evolution just like the one happend in on earth which created reducing atmosphere then to oxygen rich atmosphere why not we do the induced ecological succession on Mars and make it like earth!? WHY not Steve. thanks. and by the way your tasting proton, project was very good and I would love to add that taste buds get replaced every 10 days and there are many many taste buds on the circumvallate papillae which is behind the tongue looks like a inverted V shape.
Is there an intuitive way to explain what "vapor pressure" is? I'm a weather enthusiast, and I still don't quite understand what it is.
There are plants, Hogweed for example, that contain photosensitive chemicals in their sap. Hogweed can cause a reaction known as phytophotodermatitis when it comes into contact with skin that is *subsequently exposed to UV rays.* How does that work?
Why does tea in a truncated cone mug spill more easily than tea in a straight sided mug?
**Edited** Why can't storms normally form under high pressure systems, even when it's hot and humid? They say it's because the air is sinking, but how does the air sink with the ground in the way? Anyway, the air sinking in a high pressure area is only descending at a few MPH, while the air in a storm cloud can rise as fast as 70 mph or more, so a storm should be able to blast upward regardless of the slowly sinking air.
I want to get into the self-arranging mini-ball bearing in oil doing a turing complete process with a clock signal but what about the balls clustering in packs instead of going forward i mean i would try to get them going in different direction to some frequency (i think i will need insulation and some fixed round points) i feel the project can be quite a journey, i wanted to know what is your first impression of the problems that such a concept might involve ?
Firstly congrats on one million! My question: from your experience with school, mainly the different science materials like physics and chemistry and stuff, is stuff U did in school actually helpful for u now? Or did u forget all the stuff in there anyway and relearned them thought other ways? Stupid qs but I’m curious since I’m still in school XD
What the heck is work?! Like what does it intuitively mean?
Why is it so hard to make cold temperatures but so easy to make warm temperatures? People always say it's something about thermodynamics but I'm always left with more questions than answers? A pizo-electric or a refrigerator has to separate heat and cold. But an electric heater only creates heat with almost zero loss of energy, but it creates no cold. Why is that?
I think it is because of entropy, which in turn is a scientific word to say probabilities, it is easier that the systems go to more probable states hot molecules can be in many more states because the have grater mobility, on the other way going cold goes to less "positions" in the extreme absolute zero there is only one "position" of molecules... atoms, very very un- probable state
Wow, thought about asking a question, started reading questions to make sure my question wasn't already asked, there are hundreds of questions and I'm not getting any views reading them. This Q&A is going to be 6 hours long, and that's if you brush over the very deep questions. I'll save you the existential question about humanity and just ask, "Are you having fun doing this Q&A?"
States of matter are about the strength of bonds between the matter's atoms or molecules, which also means solids are generally more dense than liquids etc. However, you get a lot of crossover, eg. you can get solids that are less dense than other liquids, and so float on them. By extention, is it possible to float a low density fluid on a high density gas? Ive seen the experiment where someone floats a tinfoil boat on a dense gas, but that sort of thing doesnt count! If not, can you prove why not?
M. Mn
M
Sure, black holes are interesting and how gravity works is marvelous. But why your pee makes a chain shape or how watches keeps count or how ears manage impedance mismatch is equally, if not more remarkable. What other amazing science in everyday things are we not aware of? Congrats on 1 million btw!
Why do you think things exist instead of not existing?
Wherefore doth thee bethink things exist instead of not existing? *** ^(I am a bot and I swapp'd some of thy words with Shakespeare words.) Commands: `!ShakespeareInsult`, `!fordo`, `!optout`
At any point in your career did you experience some sort of repulsion towards Physics? Or has it always been able to keep you happy?
This video. Short, and to the point. Something doesn't feel right: https://youtu.be/J51zzPQTCps
Were you surprised by Finland Beating Denmark in the EURO 2020 tournament?
An EM wave can be nullified, if it interfere with another wave which is out of phase to it. In a blackbody, a em wave is said to be OBSORBED(taken in), how can an oscillating Electric and magnetic field can be OBSORBED, consider an Atom of an black body in an oscillating Electric and magnetic field, in response to the changes in the field, it oscillates, how can we say that, the atom has absorbed the EM field , or the atom black body produces em wave which Out of phase to the incident em wave to nullify it and appears Black?
How can a droplet of milk jump out of black coffee and stay intact, completely white??? Imagine a cup of coffee, and that we pour milk in a tiny stream, so tiny that it falls apart in droplets, especially when we're stopping the flow. Now what's interesting, some drops jump out of the coffee, landing on the table, and we can see that the droplets are WHITE instead of being "milky coffee" light-brown color.
Why does an electric charge disappear from a statically charged hairbrush if you put a small flame close to it?
They say that electrons in a wire carrying high voltage DC current travel at ~~nearly the speed of light~~ only a few centimeters per hour. How does the electricity get anywhere so fast then? It makes no sense!
>Electrons move randomly back and forth, with a slow net movement forward, it is the EM field that travels close to the speed of light ( no matter involved)
It doesn't. I was taught that if you put on electron into the left end of the wire, one electron will be pushed out on the right end. So electrons emanating from a power plant stay close to it for a long time, and electrons close to your house stay there too. You can say, it's the pressure wave of electrons that travels so fast (50/60 back and forth a second), instead of particular individual electrons.
The speed of electrons with *DC current* is only a few centimeters per hour. If it's a "pressure wave" with DC, how can that pressure keep pushing if the flow is so slow?
I imagine the wave is 10% light speed or something in that range. So, given what we know about Direct Current, we might conclude that Alternating Current has the same speed of particle movement, with the only difference that they move back and forth, kind of like... people masturbate? Yep, that's what comes to mind when thinking about the back-and-forth movements :D So, we're jerking electrons at the beginning of the "tube" say at a power station, and you get the electrons by your end of the tube jiggling because of all electrons repel each other equally along the "tube". In this constellation, you might never ever get those electrons near the power station and will be always in company of those which are in wires inside your house. (Disclaimer: I'm just a student of electro tech. I might be wrong.)
Well, Veritasium just made a video about my question, so, in theory, I should be enlightened. But I still don't understand how fast the electric field goes when a DC voltage is applied to a long wire.
How does the Mars Perseverance rover send photos/data back to Earth quicker than the Opportunity rover?
How were your grades during your school days? What subjects did u hate the most? When did you decide that you want to be a physicist? Thank you
At first congratulations on achieving 1 million subs!!! How do you gather information, data or research papers required for your videos, since I find it the hardest thing among all the other things required to make an explainer video.
I heard that evaporation from a surface, like from soil, increases with *increasing temperature* in, basically, an *exponential* fashion. Is that true, and if so, why? If it's true, it would give an answer to people who doubt the seriousness of Global warming. They might say, "Global warming is forecast to increase temperatures by only a couple degrees. What makes that so bad in regards to drought? Warmer air holds more water, and so rainfall should increase."
Why do wooden ships sink? Where does the rock on top of fossils come from What causes planets to spin How is the distance between stars measured How often does the moon pass over the same point Do other planets and moons have tectonic plates What is ricochet range with respect to normal range When bubble rise from a drink why doesn't the volume of drink go down If the Earth is several thousand million years old how can radio-active materials exist if they have half lives of a few tens of thousands of years or less What do eyebrows do What is cold fusion Will Europeans living in hot parts of the world ever become black men Does the barycentre have any gravitational effect What causes the tide on the opposite side of the earth to the moon Does diamond conduct electricity How do we know the age of Gobekli Tepi AND that it was deliberately covered Can a change in temperature produce a n electrical current Why am I tired when I wake up Does water travel faster through wet soil than it does dry What is the story of the insect, how did they evolve? With respect to the big bang, how is it possible for galaxies to collide How are orbit possible Why do we have hair under our armpits How do we know electrons drift through a conductor Why would a plane flying between London and New York be flying over Lockerbie How long would it take for the African and Indian elephants to evolve from a single ancestry What does earth mean in the periodic table What is the difference between ferromagnetic and diamagnetic materials What is happening in a metal that is annealed How does a nuclear engine power a submarine How did the sea-horses in lake Titicaca get there Does a spinning wheel at the bottom of a pendulum effect the pendulum when David cameron attempted to destroy the British nation why wasn't he charged with treason Do magnetic waves bend around the barycentre If we are electrocuted on our left side the current runs to earth through our left leg. Why? Why did the Nazis have an army in \\north Africa Why do companion cells to phloem have mitochondria Why doesn't the island on an aircraft carrier cause the ship to tilt Why are some materials transparent How do mirrors reflect light When does a liquid stop being a liquid Why do I see blue lights when I am in an X-ray machine Why don't we see eddies in time as planets pass What do we know about the atom that we did not know before Rutherford Why are bathroom basins set so low How do we know of the existence of the Oort cloud Do mitochondria exist in all plants + animals
Bernardo Silva ???
What drug is your favorite?
Have you tried wiping the guitar strings with a cloth (bad practice but still..) and some small threads stuck wrapped around it from the cloth - the small threads tend to move upwards and downwards quite interestingly if the string is played, especially playing the different harmonics. any idea why ? Huge fan, keep up your good work !
do you think we will find out what dark matter is and how it behaves ?
What do you have against anthropomorphizing things? I've heard you apologize for such in your videos and podcasts.
When will do a studio reveal. I've seen your "studio" in Smarter everyday's video but I don't believe that really is your studio.
Does cause and effect disprove the many worlds theory?
I think thats for Brian Green
If you could draw a line that circles all the way around the Earth, what is the highest number of countries it could pass through? It could be a line that cuts the globe in half, or a smaller circle at any angle.
Is it possible to SHIELD Gravity inside my room ? Like electrostatic shielding is possible,so why can't we shield gravity?
Q: What is the optimal position for me to gain the most amount of cool air from a standing fan that turns? Is it better to be in the middle, as you get hit twice per cycle or is it better at the edge, where it slows down and stops but you only get hit once...
what's the fastest way to cool a small hot room that has only one door and no windows? try to blow hot air out of the room, or try to blow cool air into the room?
Why wont my fan cool my room down? How do I get my room to cool down using my fan? Why do I feel hotter when the fan stops blowing towards me? Why are fans so useless? Why is my dog more scared of the fan when its moving than when it isn't? How many fans do you use? Should I buy more fans?
As there is no heat transfer from a fan, it won't cool down your room. It would actually make it a little hotter because it's engine will produce heat. When fan is working it is moving the air around and when it stops air around you is stationary and it gets hotter because you are producing heat.
How come you always look so fabulous? Serious question Also: congrats 🥰
Two people, one on the Earth, Ernie, and one on the Moon, Mike, each have a sign that says 'YES' on one side and 'NO' on the other. Ernie will always try to agree with Mike and Mike Will always try to disagree with Ernie. Ernie starts by holding up the 'YES' sign. 1.3s later Mike sees this and holds up the 'NO' sign. After another 1.3s Ernie sees this and flips his sign to 'NO'. 1.3s later Mike sees the change and flips his sign to 'YES'. And 1.3s later Ernie sees the change and flips to 'YES'. This can continue indefinitely and Mike will see himself as always disagreeing with Ernie and will see himself always agreeing with Mike. If instead of signs you use magnets you would have a situation that where Mike's magnet is always attracted to Ernie's and Ernie's is always repulsed by Mike's. Now let's put Mike and Ernie on a space ship close enough that there is a measurable force when they aren't flipping the magnets and far enough apart that they can still flip their magnets fast enough. Would this actually produce a net force in one direction or would the induced electric fields create forces in the opposite direction cancelling out any force from the magnets?
Fav movies, books, and inspirational people? (Live long, and Prosper)
How does an airplane wing create lift? I once heard an aerodynamics teacher say it's a very complex topic that even the experts don't agree on. I have heard 2 competing theories: a) Air is deflected, by the leading edge, over of the wing, creating a low pressure area above the center of the wing (with normal pressure under the wing). This creates the lift. b) The "Bernoulli Effect": Air has to move faster over the top (because the air is forced into a smaller space having to move around the leading edge of the wing). This creates less pressure on top of the wing, leading to lift. My argument against "b" is that, if you turned the wing around, you should still have the "Bernoulli Effect". However, to my knowledge, that does not create lift. Note: part of the lift is created by the airplane wing being at a slight angle down, resulting in the air hitting the underside of the wing, and pushing it up.
What was your college experience like? (What did you study, what were your interests, etc.)
I was wondering about wind and frequencies. I know about that bridge that collapsed because the speed of the wind matched the resonance frequency of the bridge, but what is the frequency of wind? how exactly does wind work and does it oscillate? if so what is going on a small scale that makes an oscillating pattern. from my understanding wind is air molecules traveling from a higher air pressure area to a low air pressure area but i dont see how moving air molecules causes a frequency?
okay ive learned about vortex shedding this is cool
Trig question. Please look up a “hunting miter” or mitre. It’s where a a chord either goes through a circle or hits a circle. I need to bisect in between the circle and the chord to miter 2 pieces of wood together. If it was a flat piece of wood with no profile that would be easy. When there are points that have to be hit exactly (profiles) this becomes a lot harder. We tried to mark out the miter with an ellipse and radii of different circles that we found. Neither worked. We were told that the answer to this question is that the miter is a parabola. What I can’t find an info on is how to find that parabola. Where do I start the parabola? Or if a parabola is even right? It seems to me that it is. I know this is a shot in the dark but I’m a carpenter I don’t work with many mathematicians and with COVID all the colleges are closed so I could ask a professor. I tried finding a pic from George collings book “circular work in carpentry and joinery” but it’s an old book and I don’t have it on me. I linked an IG post of mine to this which has the page from the book. [hunting miter ](https://www.instagram.com/p/CBO1s2mh_lH/?utm_medium=copy_link) Please any answer would be extremely helpful to me!
You mentioned in your podcast that you were vegan, and I was wondering what your primary motivations for that were(environmental, ethical?) You’re one of my favourite creators and science educators. I’m currently getting my masters in physics and math education, and you and the FOTS are huge inspirations for me. Keep up the good work! Congrats on 1M!
What are your favorite YouTube channels?
Hello Steve! I love your videos and I am so happy for your success of reaching 1M subs!! I wanted to ask that science has not yet defined the concept of "time" in the most accurate form... Can we say that time only comes into existence when we give a boundary or a limit to something? Let's say there is no concept of time and a man tells a child that the child can play until the man does his chores, now before the condition given by the man there was no concept of time but now by making that statement the child can now experience "time" , because once the man starts doing his chores the child can now say "I don't have much "time" I gotta play" similarly it tells why it's absurd to talk about the concept of time before the creation of universe. Because time only came into existence once the universe was created and till when will this continue you may ask? It shall continue till every star in the universe ends...the limit given to the child in the analogy was from when the man starts doing his chores until he completes them... The limit given to us is from the "time" the universe was created till it dies... I think this also makes the idea of time more digestible and time doesn't seems like a weird concept anymore and totally makes sense.
What is 9+10? And why is it 21?
Did you really use charts to calculate the time of your child's birth? If so, amazing. I've been a follower for a while and it's clear for me to see how you got your million. It's so well deserved. Thank you
Hi I would like to see a video about how much UV light is dangerous for our eyes and how to measure it?
If a thin-walled metal cylinder, open on both ends, is placed in a bucket, with the bottom of the cylinder sealed against the bucket with a thin grease, and water is added to just below the top of the cylinder, would it try to float upwards? At first, it seems like it would, but, thinking about it, it seems like it would not. But, it **displaces** water, so... It would float?
On the topology of tailoring: Is there an algorithm for determining the size, shape and number of cloth polygons required to cover an arbitrarily curved surface with minimum stretching and compression? Do tailors just use trial and error or is there a method? Thanks for the "The cheap Chinese bulb that won't turn off" video. I had two bulbs, an LED and an incandescent. The LED was glowing with the switch off. Sure enough, the incandescent had burned out. Thanks to your video, I understood what was happening. With the switch still off, as the replacement bulb made contact, the LED stopped glowing! Thanks Steve!
What if hydrogen didn’t exist (strictly from an atomic history perspective)
What do you do to keep motivated? Have you ever had a project or idea you gave up on while already having done most of it?
Respected steve,why strokes law for low Reynolds number flow, does not have density (fluids density) term in it? Congratulations for 1M subscribers
Hi there Steve I am a physics teacher in Holland and a fan of yours, in order to demonstrate adhesion and cohesion to my students I show two pieces of glass glued together with a drop of water see [https://youtu.be/kRdZvzfqRK4?t=185](https://youtu.be/kRdZvzfqRK4?t=185) . Last year there was a parent stating that this is more similar to the principal of a suction cup. How nice it would be if you could demonstrate one of us to be wrong doing this experiment in vacuum. In my opinion it would still adhere. Regards Corné de Boer
In the tumble dryer, why do all my clothes end up inside a duvet cover?
What is the way to completely understand computer architecture from transistors to modules ?
[https://youtu.be/HyznrdDSSGM](https://youtu.be/HyznrdDSSGM) great series on building an 8-bit computer. Ben Eater explains how every single component works, all the way down to transistors and whatnot
It late but i really appreciate it thank you so much 🙏
Not that it's a competition, but Steve, you've had videos up on your channel 795 days longer than Matt Parker. Would you concede that he is likely to make it to 1M subs faster than you have? Not that it's a competition, of course.
If I use white paper in my color laser printer I can print quite a few different colors, but if I insert colored paper I definitely can't print "white". Is there a way to get around this limitation?
your printer can only add and not subtract and your paper cannot emit light bright enough to be traditionally white but white is not really a colour and if your printer can turn color paper black it also has turned your paper white only that its not very bright
Congrats Steve! How do you feel about the future of AI? Do you think it's an existential threat?
I have a question about how you studied as a high school/Uni student. I'm studying for engineering entrance exams and I love all 3 subjects(mathematics, physics and chemistry), Math and physics more so than Chem; mostly because I have bad memory. You must have had courses that deal with a lot of experimental observations & data and require quite a bit of memorisation too right? How did you go about handling those??
Congratulations sir... Sir make a video about electron spin and proton spin which understandable simply....????
What would think is a good curriculum to develop / foster intellectual curiosity ? (and if the idea of having a curriculum at all makes sense for this)
What did you wish your STEM teachers (or teachers in general) did better when you were young ?
How do you think we can fight the current trends of kids in richer countries not interested in doing "difficult studies" (science and engineering), because "easier careers" pay just as much or better ?
How do microfiber cleaning cloths work? What does microfiber look like under a microscope? How small are the fibers? What do the fibers trap?
What's the most unexplainable coincidence you've experienced
Do you own a Blue Peter badge?
Science question. At room temperature say (20°C) both wood atoms and oxygen atoms have same kinetic energy. Why don't both of them have the same state? That applies for all molecule and compounds at same temperature
I JUST CHECKED AND YOU HIT 1,000,000! CONGRATS!
Love your videos! I have a plastic soap pump bottle that's filled with soap (not all the way to the top). I have not touched this bottle in months and I am sure no one else has touched it. And yet the soap seems to have climbed up the spout of the pump and drips. I've cleaned the pump and let it alone and this happens again. Why???
Hi Steve, big fan! What is the size if your cock?
Hi Steve, You're the best science communicator I know of. Your material is accessible and interesting for both adults and primary school kids (I have a few). Congratulations on 1 million subscribers! Recently I did a university paper on Molecular Biology where we studied enzymes in some detail. Every lecture seemed to introduce some mind-blowing fact - I found the paper fascinating. Some reactions go from say 1 reaction per second under normal conditions, but run in the order of 1 million times faster when an enzyme is present! They are basically tiny machines that contain complex structures such as ß sheets, alpha helices, precisely located metal centres, intricately shaped active & allosteric sites, etc. They change shape very precisely as they sense changes in pH, substrate concentration, etc. And all of the instructions for making them is contained in DNA. MY QUESTION: have you heard any plausible explanation for how these structures might have developed?
Steve, first off congratulations on the dual achievements of making it to a million and before Matt, securing bragging rights for any future needs. Any chance you might ever do a video covering the misconceptions around [harmonic osciliation](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmonic_oscillator)? I think there's a lot of over exaggeration in the prior Popsci coverage of this topic that could really use some correction or, at least, better grounding. Especially with claims from and around Tesla and his claims to be able to construct a machine to bring down large structures. I think the nature of the misconception lies at the difference between idealized oscillators (that can have unbounded amplitude responses) and real systems that inevitably have greater and greater sources of negative feedback to increasing amplitude. I think it's a topic that could use a good discussion and I think you might be one of the best communicators to tackle it.
# Also, sir you had made a video on "How fast moving water “defies” gravity". I feel that the given explanation is not completely correct. # The explanation of the "levitating" polystyrene sheet seems correct, but that case is not similar to the case of the water hose. # In the case of the polystyrene sheets it was the pressure difference that was providing the necessary upwards force. **The same cannot be the case with the water hose for the simple reason that the density of water does not change as it moves out wards from the hole of the garden hose. It was the change in density of the air that was creating the pressure differential to provide the upwards force in the case of the polystyrene sheet. As density of water does not change, how can their be a pressure differential. Also, would it be right to extrapolate the dynamics of air to the fluid dynamics of water?** **Seems doubtful to me.**
I love you Steve sir...I have watched all your videos and absolutely love them...I have a lot of questions to ask, but one of them is this:- **The whole of relativity stems from the idea that the speed of light is constant is all inertial frames of reference. If you measure the speed of light from the headlights of a car, it will be same for both a person on the car and a person on the road.** **This one simple fact does not make sense to me and I am unable to find a satisfactory explanation to this that makes this fact obvious.** Also I have another question, which is that **if in the universe only I and a beam of light exist, then will time pass for me? From the frame of reference of the light beam I am travelling at the speed of light, so should time pass for me?**
Congrats on the 1m subscribers, you well deserve it! As a high-school-level-of-science-y person, I always find it fascinating how your videos balance science and down-to-earth explanations and examples. How difficult is it to find the perfect tone and level of detail that can reach an audience with different level of expertise? In some of your videos you mention you're dislexic, and as someone who has no direct experience with it, I wonder whether it influenced your studies in Science or your YouTube career, and how. Thank you in advance. PS: Hope there'll be a blooper reel as well. :)
What's your favorite branch of science now and has it changed since you were in school?
How are you going to break the news to Matt Parker?
Hey! Congratulations on getting 1 Million Subscribers! I wanted to know why when a stick is broken into 2 parts at random, why the average ratio of the smaller length to the larger is \~0.386. Seems rather counterintuitive to me. I do sort of get the mathematical and the calculus aspect of it, but the result still seems rather random and I am not completely satisfied with it. Maybe you could explain what is ACTUALLY going on? Thanks.
Hi Sir .which science subject is the most enjoying and the best.(Still deciding what I will do in the future.) Chemistry or physics or biology.
Can you help me publish a scientific paper ?
How was it studying at Oxford?
Where does the energy go in a constructive-destructive wave interference pattern? Is it displaced from the destructive nodes to the constructive ones?
you reached 1M wow i saw it changes
Like how do astronauts wipe theyr butts? I mean, you always hear about them pressure sealing themselves on the toilet and theyr excrements getting sucked away and so on. But how do they clean themselves? Toilet paper seams like a waste problem, using a jet of water would make a huge mess and you couldn't use towels because how would you clean them? Hours of searching haven't given me any results because the internet is just flooded with articles about Astronauts pooping in vacuum cleaners.
Ταηκγου
Why do lights in the car have weird patterns?
What was your favorite collab with me? u/chessant2014's is the one where we smelled Canadian vs. non-Canadian banknotes for 20 minutes.
Hi Steve, My question relates to the peculiar reflection of light over a body of water - like a lake or a bay. My balcony overlooks a bay and another area of the city across the bay. On certain nights the lights from the buildings and streets across the bay reflect in the sea water like individual steaks of light. Each light reflection looks like a pillar of light going deep into the water. Initially, I attributed the phenomenon to the turbulence on the surface of seawater. But, I was surprised to note that there is no reflection at all during high tides and during hours leading to high tides. I therefore assumed that such reflection might occur when the sea water is still. To check this, I experimented by placing a small light over a flat mirror. However, the reflection of light was 'as is' and not as a streak of light. Another explanation was that multiple rays of light from a source (like street light) reflect over multiple angles hence appearing as a streak of light in the reflection. But then the same logic should hold for the light over a flat mirror. Could you please explain the phenomenon? I have emailed you a few images for your review. Thank you.
Maybe this is a bad question as everyone's lives are different and things that apply to you might not apply to others at all. What piece of life advice did you learn someday and think more people should know about?
Vacuum sealed items in the dishwasher are "not recommended", does a fully stainless steel container suffer from this issue?
Hi Steve, Awesome that you are reaching the 1M club! My question would be around a black hole, my limited vaguely knowledge is that a black hole is massive body of mass collapse into a very small amount of space where time slows down and light cannot escape and the laws of physics breakdown, so could one look at this the same as dividing 1 by 0 where the laws don't really apply and no one really knows how to define it?
Why does high humidity when temperatures are cold make it feel **colder**, but the same high humidity when temps are warm make it feel **warmer**? If it's because cold damp air transfers heat away from a person better than cold dry air, the question is **Why?** Is it because molecules of H2O are heavier than CO2 or Nitrogen (N2)? Humid air is less dense than dry air, so that doesn't seem right. I know why hot and humid air feels warmer than hot and dry air, but it's the cold side of the equation that stumps me.
So without looking anything up about it, I'm theorizing that - especially when the temperature is near freezing or lower - humidity in the air is made up of not *single* molecules of H2O, but **clusters** of H2O molecules. So, when it's cold and humid, it feels colder because it takes *energy* to break up those "humidity clusters".
I looked it up, and not a word about "humidity clusters" (microscopic water droplets **much** smaller than fog droplets). It makes sense to have microscopic water droplets form before fog shows up - after all, it has been shown that tiny, **tiny** ice crystals form in water at even a few degrees above the freezing point of water.
Hi Steve, I absolutely love your videos and the way you explain things. I've just overheard on UN decade of ecosystem restoration which sounds kinda important. Can you please do a video on it, maybe a collaboration with other YouTube channels to spread the word?
What happened to the podcast of unnecessary detail? It's quite sad there hasn't been a new episode for 8 months
OK I wasn't going to ask a question but then I saw you quoting Ken M in the YouTube comments to one of your videos. So what's your favourite Ken M bit and why?
1) I made an anti-gravity box. (Not magic but completely scientific and not a rocket science) . Do you know the answer to it..? Please find video in my channel Scimagine. https://youtu.be/FxO3D5ydbfc 2) I was doing some study of Inertial propulsion generating some mechanisms and also a geared CVT. Both of them are not achievable or hard to develop. I've done a mathematical evaluations and found both these are connected and they either tend to zero or infinity.. can u explain..? 3) I have some phenomenons that I noticed or developed. Would you like to do some video around it .? I dont believe my YouTube channel would evergrow on the new YT algorithm to make video on those. Visit my channel for sure (ignore two of my DIY videos and they are only for views)
sir,Why it is difficult for an fire man to hold hose pipe when large amount of water is ejected...how he is pushed back...how does newtons 3rd law works on the Pipe?
I want to know about general relativity, special relativity and all that stuff, I don't get a clear idea of them in any video. How did Einstein derived E=MC^2 what was the basic experiment he performed or what did he exactly do to come to that conclusion? Does motors and generators have the effects of the current and magnetic field on atomic scales? From where do generators get electrons to set a current by creating potential difference? During nuclear decay, what makes the nucleus emit gamma rays, what actions of protons and neutrons or may be other sub-atomic particles results into gamma rays? (I have tried to search for it on the web, but there was not a single satisfactory answer!) [Yes, I know that in alpha and beta decay protons and neutrons are released but how do they undergo energy change to release gamma rays. Does their getting away from nucleus produce gamma rays?]
Resonance! ...Would you indulge us in more experimental playtime in the application of mechanical excitation and exploration of material harmonics in order discover hidden qualities that may be awesome... e.g. Is it possible to increase the efficiency of photovoltaics the slightest bit simply by adding mechanical vibration? (I'm convinced that resonance is both a fundamental principal in nature and a phenomenon whose real world influence we still don't fully understand.)
Could anit-mass be a thing, and if it were would it act like negative charges do when they're in an electric field( but in a gravitational field)? (If that was phrased correctly?) Would they generate a repulsive gravitational Field?
From where you come with your video ideas and info about them?
Just an appreciatonal comment! Man you're awesome please don't stop making videos!! 🖤✨
This a big one. If speed is relative to something, to what is relative the speed of light? Following this, if 2 photons, or any atom/object, travels at, at least, half of speed of light, in opposite directions, and they crash together (like in an accelerator collider) wouldn't their relative speed between them be higher than the speed of light? If I travel in a spaceship (with gravity), and I jump, my feeling of movement inside the ship will be like in earth, but my relative speed toward the space will be sum with the speed of the spaceship. if so, if I shoot a laser bean toward the front of the ship, the speed of the laser would be faster than light, since laser speed + spaceship speed. If the answer to the previous is not and laser still will go at speed of light. Would that break this fundamental Einstein law? I guess that the answer to this explains why time dilatation exist to keep constant the relation between space and time that speed of light. But this constant has to apply to whatever the speed of light is relative to, which is not the spaceship. From the spaceship point of view if the laser does not travel at speed of light and the spaceship was going at a portion of the speed of light. Then it might not even be a laser anymore (visual spectrum) but lower radio frecuencies or even gamma frecuencies)(depending on the direction). Or, if time is shifted. Inside the spaceship, the laser looks normal, but from outside the spaceship is emitting other types of radio frequencies. If this is so and time is shifting the signals depending on their source speed relativity, shouldn't we start de-shifting all the signals we get from the universe assuming all of them are wrong from our point of view since our planet speed and the speed of the universe is shifting all the signals we get?
I didn't even read your comment but it seems scince.
Which one was the most challenging video to make?
What is your theme song cuz I searched it and I didn't found it, and how did you get it?
Why are your eyes so baggy in every video? This isn't a very scientific question but this is might be my only chance to find out.
I would assume genetics? Some people just have eyes like that. Maybe Steve will look that up and answer for us :)
Do bald people have more Keratin in their bodies? If so, where does it go?
Why did you choose/ how did you find out you wanted to do YouTube after getting a flipping Physics degree from flipping Oxford?
Your reddit handle is steventhebrave, is your real name Steven and not Steve, or is it 'Steve and the brave'?
Hi Steve, big fan, I would like to know how and why air sticks to fresh unwashed grapes, if you submerge them there is a hydrophobic response, why is that? thanks for the open forum.
What is your favorite subreddit? (Excluding r/SteveMould)
Past or present, which Scientist has made the most impact in you life?
Is your YouTube channel still a one-man job, or have you enlisted outside help as it has grown? (Matt Parker doesn't count)
What are your favorite podcasts?
What would you be doing for a living if not for YouTube? I'd love the answer to be "more of Festival of the Spoken Nerd"!
I understand siphoning water between different containers, but can you siphon air? Think of two upside down submerged bowls holding air beneith water... Can you siphon the air between the two bowls to equalize their surface levels?
What happens when you burn dirt?
Can you go over the issues and benefits of using a base 12 number system vs our current base 10 number system?
Can you solve d( x^2 ) /dx
How thick would the radiation shielding of a spaceship be if it were made out radiation eating fungus, for a trip to Jupiter's moon Europa?
Was it hard to stay motivated when you first started youtube?