A couple of Questions

Hi Atsers, this is my first post so be gentle please.

Question 1,
Imagine if you will, being in an indestructible elevator 150 floors high. The brakes fail and you start to drop at maximum speed.
Would you have a chance of surviving?

My theory is if you can jump at the last second before impact at the same speed of the falling elevator you would be in the air at time of impact, but taking into account the momentum, changes things abit, not to mention other aspects that may come into play.

Question 2,
If the universe is indeed expanding, does that mean it is stretching like a piece of rubber as I have heard it explained?

If so, does that not mean the planets are getting further apart? because if that is the case then wouldn't time itself change because it would take longer for earth to go around the sun let alone the moon to go around the earth, so 24 hours would be wrong unless time has also increased.

Question 3,
Knowing everything that you know now and without taking anything back with you, could you become a rich successful person in the past?

Have to be specific on this one. eg no sense in saying you would invent the 1st computer if you don't know how to make a silicon chip, or invent power if you don't know how it works, after all I know how to flick on a light switch but I couldn't create it.
I have realized that I know absolutely nothing that would make me rich in a past time period, I suppose I will have to be happy working in the mines lol

What are your thoughts about these things.

BazRaza7

Question 3,
Knowing everything that you know now and without taking anything back with you, could you become a rich successful person in the past?

Have to be specific on this one. eg no sense in saying you would invent the 1st computer if you don't know how to make a silicon chip, or invent power if you don't know how it works, after all I know how to flick on a light switch but I couldn't create it.

Oh yes. The secret of silicon chips is silicon purity, its accomplished by inserting a single silicon crystal into a vat of melted silicon, and slowly rotating it. Too lazy to find link, but that's correct.

Or I could just invest money in Apple or Microsoft before anyone heard of them. Making money in the past would be very, very easy.

Welcome to the site.

reply to post by BazRaza7


These sound like "homework" questions

In answer to question 3, I'd go back and invent Google, Facebook and Twitter

BazRaza7
Hi Atsers, this is my first post so be gentle please.

Question 1,
Imagine if you will, being in an indestructible elevator 150 floors high. The brakes fail and you start to drop at maximum speed.
Would you have a chance of surviving?

My theory is if you can jump at the last second before impact at the same speed of the falling elevator you would be in the air at time of impact, but taking into account the momentum, changes things abit, not to mention other aspects that may come into play.

Question 2,
If the universe is indeed expanding, does that mean it is stretching like a piece of rubber as I have heard it explained?

If so, does that not mean the planets are getting further apart? because if that is the case then wouldn't time itself change because it would take longer for earth to go around the sun let alone the moon to go around the earth, so 24 hours would be wrong unless time has also increased.

Question 3,
Knowing everything that you know now and without taking anything back with you, could you become a rich successful person in the past?

Have to be specific on this one. eg no sense in saying you would invent the 1st computer if you don't know how to make a silicon chip, or invent power if you don't know how it works, after all I know how to flick on a light switch but I couldn't create it.
I have realized that I know absolutely nothing that would make me rich in a past time period, I suppose I will have to be happy working in the mines lol

What are your thoughts about these things.

1\ you wouldn't know the right time to jump.
2\ no, time does not 'work' like that.
3\ there are so many variables...you may go back in time to invent electrical cables in 1530 but get burnt as a witch.

1. No

2. No

3. Yes

reply to post by BazRaza7

Question 3,
Knowing everything that you know now and without taking anything back with you, could you become a rich successful person in the past?

Oh yeah, go back to 1965 and have a party for 10 years. Then do whatever to earn some money and buy Microsoft and Google stock when they had their IPO. Piece of cake.

reply to post by BazRaza7

1. You would still be traveling at terminal velocity. DOA
2. Depends on which theory is right. Are time and space connected or are they separate? If connected then maybe time slows as the Universe expands... The older I get the faster it goes so that doesn't seem likely. I prefer the theory that time and space are separate and time is relative.
3. How far back? I'm a computer programmer so I would find Sergio and help him start Google then invest everything I make in Apple, Intel, Microsoft, etc. You could get rich in the market by knowing what companies are going to get big.

reply to post by BazRaza7


Hi...welcome.

I don't know about you - but , if I jumped in the last few seconds of an elevator crash... I would fracture my skull on the ceiling and break my neck and experience a few seconds of ultrapain , before being squashed like a bug on the floor .

As for going back in time to get rich - I'd avoid the insider trading for ethical reasons , and stick with good 'ol honest hard work.
California goldfields pre - 1849 , perhaps ?

magine if you will, being in an indestructible elevator 150 floors high. The brakes fail and you start to drop at maximum speed.
Would you have a chance of surviving?

My theory is if you can jump at the last second before impact at the same speed of the falling elevator you would be in the air at time of impact, but taking into account the momentum, changes things abit, not to mention other aspects that may come into play.

I had to chuckle after reading this first question. This reminded me when I was a kid watching the Road Runner cartoons. How many times I would watch Poor Wile E. Coyote run off a cliff and almost make it to the other side of another cliff until he looked down and than gravity took over. lol. Or the time where he would jump off a cliff with an umbrella and float down half way until the umbrella gave way. lol. (I tried this stunt when I was a kid jumping off the roof of our garage, didn't work. lol)

As far as your theory goes, it's something Wile E. Coyote would have done. lol. I hate to break your theory, but as your body is traveling down the shaft by the result of gravitation, that energy turns into kinetic energy. You wouldn't be able to jump with that much energy, so even if you could jump at the last minute, it wouldn't change the momentum that your body is traveling. You would still face an untimely death. Now if you were Wile E. Coyote, you would probably be banged up a bit, but still survive another day to chase the roadrunner.

reply to post by BazRaza7


On #1, I would say you would deck the halls...and walls...and ceiling..and bottom of the elevator shaft..and, well, you get the point. Think of Louisiana Gumbo in a beer can being crushed...err... Yup.. That captures it.

Mythbusters did that very experiment with their Buster crash dummy and it wasn't survivable from a much lower altitude.


On #3? Yup... I'd be a .com millionaire. I know what ideas worked and which ones didn't ...as well as why, for the critical part. So I know which ideas to pursue and what is 'before' they were properly invented. (AOL comes to mind, when it was just starting ..and many smaller versions which came and went from things more obvious in hindsight to avoid).

I also know which stocks won and which lost for which world events came to happen and when. Wars...for Aerospace stocks ..but before any hint of the war I'd know to the day, was coming.

All kinds of ways... I know at least a few of the Super Bowl and World Series scores by memory. That's worth a recharge of a nice stack of dough each time one comes up to quietly bet. I'd live very well on trivia known in advance, alone.

Alright, I will be gentle, lol. I actually know the answer to all of your questions, which is relatively rare for me, lol. As for the falling elevator, I think the height will make a difference. We know that momentum, p, equals mass, m, times velocity, v. p=mv. And we also know that force is proportional to a change in momentum. So the more speed you have when you hit the ground, the larger the force of the impact. And as I said, the higher you are when you start to fall, due to the fact that gravity will increase your velocity over time, the more force upon impact as well. So let's say you jump right before you hit the ground. You are only going to be changing your momentum slightly. So you should basically hit with the force of the falling elevator, MINUS the force of your jump...More or less anyway. I am pretty sure that I am correct, although someone can correct me if I'm wrong.

Next question, the expansion of the universe. Space is expanding, although the planets themselves are not getting further apart. Why? Because they are all expanding together. At least you wouldn't notice a difference. It is not like the earth would start moving faster than the moon, throwing everything out of whack. But some body in a galaxy far, far away could be expanding faster than our milky way galaxy. And if I am not mistaken, space-time is created with the expansion of the universe. So I suppose there would be a portion, outside the edges of the universe, where time ceases to exist, as there is not any fabric of space-time. I have no idea how right I am, but it seems intuitive to me, lol.


I probably could figure out a way to get rich in the past. Remember "Hot Tub Time Machine?" I would invent Loogle.

BazRaza7
Question 1,
Imagine if you will, being in an indestructible elevator 150 floors high. The brakes fail and you start to drop at maximum speed.
Would you have a chance of surviving?

My theory is if you can jump at the last second before impact at the same speed of the falling elevator you would be in the air at time of impact, but taking into account the momentum, changes things abit, not to mention other aspects that may come into play.

Not even close. You and the elevator have the same momentum. Jumping up doesn't stop your momentum, it merely adds a little to the elevator and takes a little off you. You'd still be going at an incredible speed, and would plough into the elevator floor and die a horrible horrible death.

I see, they were all really good answers, then what about if there was no ceiling on the elevator and it was made of indestructible glass so you could see the ground approching you, if it was indeed possible to jump a faster speed than the falling speed, at the very last second would you not break through the momentum gravity.

question 3

How about the same question but set in the start of the industrial age, maybe even about 1800s

BazRaza7
I see, they were all really good answers, then what about if there was no ceiling on the elevator and it was made of indestructible glass so you could see the ground approching you, if it was indeed possible to jump a faster speed than the falling speed, at the very last second would you not break through the momentum gravity.

question 3

How about the same question but set in the start of the industrial age, maybe even about 1800s

Put it this way . If you fired a pistol straight up from your ceilingless elevator , the bullet would travel only slightly slower. Slower due to the speed of the elevator in the opposite direction , and due to the slightly less recoil effect. You're dead...however - the bullet analogy indicates that your problem is ' theoretically ' possible. I could imagine how strange the study of a tail - gunner 's ballistics could get .

Early 1800 's ? Bet on Napoleon at Austerlitz ( but , not at Waterloo ).

reply to post by BazRaza7


Question 3... Darling you have everything you need to know right at your fingertips, to become rich in the past. Find out who won events like the Kentucky Derby in the year you plan to venture to. Then bet at tremendous odds. Go to the next event, rinse, repeat. While you're at it, play the stock market. You'll know what's about to take off, and what's about to tank.

Good luck, and wave at us from the other side!

reply to post by BazRaza7

Hum...Ive often wondered why if you jump up in the aisle of an airplane...that you don't slam into the back of the cabin by the bathroom!

PS (I know the answer)

1. Im sure you would jump and be ok for a fraction of a second before being splattered inside the wreckage.

2. No idea

3. yes. I would start by gambling on sporting events to raise investment money for the big 5

BazRaza7
I see, they were all really good answers, then what about if there was no ceiling on the elevator and it was made of indestructible glass so you could see the ground approching you, if it was indeed possible to jump a faster speed than the falling speed, at the very last second would you not break through the momentum gravity.

question 3

How about the same question but set in the start of the industrial age, maybe even about 1800s

no matter the make of the elevator, its just not possible to jump hard enough to counter the speed in which you are falling.

in the 1800s i would make it rich with oil whether invested in or "discovered"

To all of you who had investment to make it rich, first of all you need money to invest, then say you laboured for a couple of years
saving all your pennies, how are you going to decide what stock to place it on?

To all of you who thought about gambling in order to get rich, after working for a couple of years to make money, are you sure that you really want to risk it all on a bet that you are not 100% in the knowing, exsp around the 1800s.

That plane idea was quite interesting from one of the posts, I have to wonder is it because you are in a cocoon and all the air around you is travelling at the same speed in an air tight cabin but how would that same principle work in a elevator with no top, as the air is not in a cocoon and you are just working with gravity. duno, its all quite confusing, isnt their a max speed something can fall unaided, just using pure gravity and if the speed of a plane is greater than the speed of the fall then why doesn't someone end up at the back of a plane after jumping? there must be so many viable to take in to account when working all of them out, Sorry just thinking out loud.