Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Figure this one out Twist (it's a word problem, er... sort of)

I came across the following and some other ineresting things at Famous Problems in the history of Mathematics:

Paradox 1: The Motionless Runner
A runner wants to run a certain
distance - let us say 100 meters - in a finite time. But to reach the 100-meter
mark, the runner must first reach the 50-meter mark, and to reach that, the
runner must first run 25 meters. But to do that, he or she must first run 12.5
meters.
Since space is infinitely divisible, we can repeat these
'requirements' forever. Thus the runner has to reach an infinite number of
'midpoints' in a finite time. This is impossible, so the runner can never reach
his goal. In general, anyone who wants to move from one point to another must
meet these requirements, and so motion is impossible, and what we perceive as
motion is merely an illusion.

Don't think about it too hard or you'll get a nose bleed.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think my head just exploded...

Jonathan Scott said...

This proves what I've thought all along... this is all a giant computer program that keeps our minds active while machines feed on our bodies. Take the blue pill. (heh...that's not the first time that Twisted has heard that)

HUMN330 - Brown, K said...

Actually, what this proves is that it's useless to do PT...

Think about it :O)

Anonymous said...

Distance = speed * time
Time = distance / speed

Time and distance are both infinitely divisible.

This was called Zeno's Paradox. Modern calculus solved it with the formula above (Zeno was alive in ancient Greece).

Can you deal with THAT?!?!?!

Jonathan Scott said...

Underdog: Thinking, thinking

Twisted: Hah, I'm so smart! I love college.

HUMN330 - Brown, K said...

Twist: I'm confused by all the words in your answer. Could you explain that again in numbers?

Anonymous said...

Negatron, Batman. You asked a word problem, you get a word answer. HA!

Anonymous said...

By the way:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/paradox-zeno/#3

Awww SNAP!