The classic scams with banknotes They are well known and the truth is that they are no longer as typical as before.
It is very strange to find someone on the street doing the scam of the stamp, possibly because it is already so well known that no one got stung, but the scammers do not rest and perhaps they could start using a different one, using science as a sidekick.
For example, if you ever see someone offering you a ticket fifty euros In exchange for paying five and catching it on the fly with two fingers, automatically say no. Doing so is biological, physical, andmathematically impossible, as they explain to us in a video of the Youtube channel Numberphile. And in case you don’t feel like watching it in video, we join the explanation, also using as an example a fifty-euro bill.
What is the reaction time?
To begin with, the first culprit that we cannot take the ticket on the flight is our reaction time, which revolves around the 02 seconds in most Humans.
This value refers to the time that our brain It takes time to perceive what is happening and act accordingly. As you can see, it is a very small value, so we are quite capable of capture objects as they fall but in the case of the ticket mathematics and physics tell us what it is practically impossible.
Why can’t you hold a dollar with two fingers?
Although in the video they use a banknote a dollarIf you want you can try it at home with one of fifty euros, which has one similar measure.
Basically, the game is to select a person you want to rage, ask them to open their index and middle fingers, place the ticket right on top of it and drop it, inviting them to close your fingers and hunt it on the fly.
The frustrating situation that will take place later can be explained thanks to a simple physics operation.
If you remember when you studied at school, thanks to a phenomenon known as each free, in no friction we can calculate for a given time the distance a dropped object without applying any driving force.
For them, just use the formula d = gt, where d is the distance, t is the time and g is the acceleration of gravity, which for the Earth is approximately 98m / s, although in the video they round it to 10.
Well, according to that, if we calculate the distance traveled in 02 seconds, we will get the following:
d = .10.02
d = 02m = 20cm
Knowing this, if we measure a fifty euro bill, we will check that it reaches 14 centimeters in length (The one dollar is 155 cm), so when we are able to react it will already have dropped six centimeters more than its own length and it will be impossible to reach it.
Are you ready to beat mathematics and your brain and try to capture the ticket? We encourage you to try it, but if they ask you on the street, do not be scammed.
