Showing posts with label notebook. Show all posts
Showing posts with label notebook. Show all posts

Saturday, May 16, 2015

Galileo Galilei Square Cube Law




Galileo Galilei Square Cube Law


Science is written in this great book: the Universe, which stands continually open to our gaze.
-Galileo


OK, I had to give my Geiger counter a break to recharge.

What we have here in my notebook is an awesome little thing Galileo wrote about: take a cube and dice it into smaller cubes: the total volume stays the same, but the surface area keeps growing the more cubes you dice. 

The volume of each little cube is 1/8 the big cube but is surface area is larger at 1/4 the big cube. Volume drops faster than surface area. Weight drops faster than surface area. Weight drops faster than aerodynamic drag (wind resistance). Thus dust floats.

It’s called Galileo’s “Square-Cube Law” and is found in his work “Two New Sciences”. I got my copy from a free book-bin at my local library. I guess they couldn’t find any takers for the .25cents they wanted at their booksale.








A1 = original surface area and A2 = new surface area.

V1 = original volume and V2 = new volume.

L1 = original length and L2 = new length.





Ugh, it was a short post but it got all mathy at the end. Meow.