science: physics

I used to believe…

in second grade our teacher taught us that the earth spins. for the longest time i thought that if you jumped really high (like 5 feet) and landed you would land a mile from where you originally jumped.

I used to believe…

After they thaught me which was the righthand side and which was the left, I was convinced that I could also always tell were the North is. I thought everyone had some sort of a mental GPS that kept track of every turn you made. Compasses were only usefull to point it out more exactly. I admit still thinking na�vely that I�m good at gessing where the North lays.

I used to think that if a spaceship went through "hyper space", it would take a temporary toll on the crews' brains, thus making then scream, panic, go into hysterics, and slam against things. When hyper space was over, everything was fine.

Hyper space sounded pretty fun.

I used to believe…

when i was little i always wondered why hot food would get cold if you left it out too long, and cold food would get hot. when i was about 12 i realized it was food turning to room temperature.

I used to believe…

As a bit of backstory, my Dad, as a child, skipped Kindergarten. Until around 46, my dad thought that the primary colors were just a myth, and you could mix something like green and orange to get red. We still tease him about this.

I used to believe that the tiny flashes you sometimes see when you have your eyes closed were neutrinos passing through your eyes.

I used to watch the clouds blowing across the sky and think I was seeing evidence of the earth's rotation.

I used to believe…

When I was kid, I read a lot of physics books, and then, this one time, I saw a program on the big bang, and I thought there was no way the whole universe was made with one big bang. The universe was too big. There must have been a lot of big bangs all over the place to account for the size.

I used to believe…

It was back in 1994, I was 7 yo and when summer vacation was, every morning I watched educational cartoon for kids. One of episodes explained had does electricity works. I took their explanation of running electrons too literally, and for next few years I believed that when you switch on the trigger on the wall, line of little guys starts running through the inside of wire and gets crashed within the bulb, emiting lot of warm and making light!

I used to believe…

When I was 5 or 6, someone told me that the Earth was spinning. I couldn't believe, so I performed an experiment: I drew a sign on the floor and went to sleep. The next morning I found the sign in the same place I had drawn it, so I thought that the Earth hadn't moved.

I used to believe that Electricity was chiped overseas in large thick rubber boxes on ships.

I spent many frustrating hours believing that if i tried hard enough I could lift myself off the ground with no means of support. I also thought if a lift was plummeting down a shaft you would be perfectly alright if you gave a little jump just before it hit the floor.

I used to believe that the sun moved up and down in space and that's how we got seasons... then I discovered the tilt of the earth. I also believed that the North and South poles of the earth were due to a giant bar magnet with hte red end sticking out of the North pole and the blue end sticking out of the South pole.

I used to believe…

When I was smaller I always thought that instead of the water filling the glass from the bottom up, it would fill from the top down.

I always thought that Marie Curie was so called because she invented the Cure for Cancer. It never crossed my mind that she would have always had that name, and only later in life would have started finding cures for things.

I used to believe…

My older brother told me when I was 3 or 4 that the reason ships float is because they are so light. In fact, they are so light I could lift an ocean liner with my little finger. I figured out the truth by the time I became an adult.