Last week, on Halloween day, I came to work dressed in a costume...
As you can possibly tell, I was dressed up as a free-body-diagram. All the forces acting on me were identified by force vectors (large red arrows) at their respective points of application.
I had the gravitational force, mg, acting at my center of mass, and then a reaction load at each foot. In the picture above, I also posed with a reaction coming from the wall I was leaning against. Hanging around my neck is a list of assumptions (this costume is valid under the following conditions...).
So, there you have it. If you were wondering if I'm a nerd, you now have your answer. I think even my physics teacher colleagues found it slightly nerdy - that speaks volumes.
I got some nice reactions from my students that day, though as I walked through the halls, non-science folks gave me some strange looks. I spared my family any embarrassment by removing my costume before I returned home.
Learning science is one of the hardest things a person can do. It often forces us to shift the way in which we see the world. The process is demanding, but is ultimately rewarding, because it allows us to interact with nature in a deeper, more meaningful way. If we continue down this road, we become empowered with the means to shape our environment - we become engineers.
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2 comments:
I think that posting this picture on the internet for EVERYONE to see whenever they want cancels out you "sparing" your family's 30 seconds of embarrassment in the privacy of their own home.
LOL JG, at least they aren't standing next to me in the picture
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