Before you are two balls, one solid and one hollow. They are to all appearences completely identical: same size, same weight, same outer material (though one might assume, correctly, that the hollow ball would need a higher-density material on the inside to make it the same weight).

Without breaking either of the balls, how can you easily determine which is hollow?

Assume that the material is solid enough that a hitting the side of the hollow ball will not result in any noticeable echo or vibrations.

(In reply to re: No Subject by Hugo)

Your experiments are doomed to failure.  This is because you're assumption that buttered bread "wants" to fall butter side down is not only erroneous, it's ridiculous.  Actually it is the butter that "wants" to maximize the stress and frustration of the human, presumably because humans stole milk from a cow and then beat the liquid without mercy until butter was formed.

Therefore no matter what the bread:butter:cat ratio is, the experiments will lead to spurious results because as you increase the butter component, the butter's desire for the human to get angry will win out.

Also, although I'm only a theoretical member of PETA (that's People Eating Tasty Animals), I'm also a cat lover.  So we must all remember to only use theoretical cats in these experiments, no matter what the cost.  A less expensive way would be to use gedanken cats, often found in the vicinity of Einstein's bagel shops.

Posted by Larry on 2005-03-25 21:14:27