Scott is an intelligent boy who, among other things, is fully au fait with basic theories of Physics. His younger brother Gavin, however is vain and idle, who whiles away his time practising his fake magical powers. Gavin also believes himself superior to Scott in intelligence.
Accordingly, Gavin challenges Scott to a little competition whereby, the first to get 5 ounces of water to freeze will be declared the most intelligent guy at their residence. They set up some rules as follows:
- Each of them can only use normal water that comes out of their stainless steel faucet.
- They both must use identical containers.
- They both must use the same freezer at the same time.
Now, it is a do-or-die situation for Scott as his prowess in Physics has been called into question.
How will Scott have the best chance of winning over Gavin?
One way is for Scott to use the Mpemba effect - that is, where hot water is said to freeze faster than cold water under identical conditions. However, there is a LOT of literature on this effect, and while this has been sometimes replicated, it seems the exact initial conditions, container size and type, can change the answer. See Wikipedia on Mpemba effect. SO unless Scoot could really control the initial conditions, this might fail.
Barring the above, one way would be for Scott to pre-freeze his container. While his container would be physically identical in size, shape, material etc. Placing the container in the freezer for a good while prior to the contest would give a small but scientifically sound advantage to Scott - there will be less mass to cool down, and a frozen container will help cool the water by both convection and conduction. One might call this cheating, but then I would argue that using a different temperature water is cheating too.
I am interested to see if there are any mother methods that will be proposed.
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Posted by Kenny M
on 2022-04-10 07:33:44 |
Possible Solutions
