One of my kids came home from school with this problem from her maths teacher, and I can't think of a way to explain it :
A train is going west to east at 100mph
A fly is flying east to west at 5mph
The fly hits the trains windscreen
The movement of the fly therefore changes from east-west to west-east (in effect it changes direction 180°)
So there must be a moment when the fly's velocity is zero
That moment comes when the fly hits the train
So if the fly's velocity is zero when it's touching the train, then so must be the train's velocity
So the fly has stopped the train
This reminds me of that one where if you shoot an arrow at a tortoise it will never hit it because by the time the arrow has got to where the tortoise was, the tortoise has moved on a bit. I can't explain that one either!
Please help me get back some Dad-cred by explaining what's going on!
2007-11-08
22:58:58
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16 answers
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asked by
Anonymous
in
Mathematics