A bird sitting on a tree by the side of a pond of water ,is being watched by a fish under water.?

Question

Is the apparent height of the bird more,less or equal than its real height for the fish???????????????

Answer 1

OBJECTS IN THE MIRROR ARE LARGER THAN THEY APPEAR

SO THE BIRD'S AT A HIGHER ALTITUDE

Answer 2

More.

Recall that when light moves from one medium to another medium with lower refractive index, it bends away from the normal (and if the second medium has higher refractive index, it bends towards the normal).

A diagram makes the application of this principle to the problem beautifully clear, but I can't supply one. So imagine the following diagram...

Draw the situation out - make sure there is a fair horizontal separation between the bird and the fish, and make sure the fish is a reasonable distance below the water. This is just to have enough room to see what happens.

Draw a line up from the fish that bends outwards towards the bird when it hits the air. Something, hopefully, like this (ignoring the dots which are just there to supply some spacing):

Bird
*
....*
........*
............*
~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~
..................*
....................*
......................*
....................Fish

This represents the path of the light ray that the fish sees.

Now draw a dotted line from the surface of the water upwards, continuing on at the original angle (no refraction) until it reaches the same horizontal position as the bird. (I'm not going to try to replicate this in text, so you'll have to manage.) This represents the apparent path of the light ray that the fish sees. You should see that this will give a greater height for the apparent position of the bird (which is basically going to be the same distance along the dotted line that the original light ray travelled along the first line).

Answer 3

I think the birds height appears larger than it actually is based on the fact that the fish is looking up at the bird AND the water's refraction would amplify what above the surface. I'm just taking a shot in the dark, am I right?

Answer 4

If a fish inside water is to see the bird on the tree, a ray from the bird must reach the fish’s eye.

A ray from the bird falling at angle of incidence i on the surface of water is refracted at angle of refraction r. We know, r < i.


I f there is no refraction, the fish will see the bird at angle (90 - i) from the horizontal line.

Now due to refraction it sees the fish at angle (90 - r).

(90-r) is greater than (90-i) since r is less than i.

The angle of elevation (90-r) is greater than the angle of elevation (90-i).

Therefore, the fish will see the bird at a height higher than the height in the absence of refraction.

Answer 5

The bird is going to look higher than it actually is. It's just the opposite from the other perspective. from the bird's point of view, the fish looks it's closer to the surface than it actually is.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks3bitesize/science/physics/light_4.shtml

Answer 6

no dear fish can see. It is because of full reflection.