Thursday, April 10, 2008

A world without terminal velocity

I often (not really but it sounds cooler) wonder what our world would be like if there was no terminal velocity.

Terminal velocity is a phenomena when the upward drag caused by a falling object moving through the air would counter the downward force of gravity to a point where the object simply cannot go any faster.

In a world without terminal velocity, raindrops would be like bullets (or perhaps the curved nature of the droplet form would help dissipate the impact more than I would have thought). A sneeze from a skyscraper could land you in jail for 'intent to cause grievous hurt' or 'terrorism'. Killer litter would seriously be killer litter.

Then I realised, I'm talking about life on the moon. Having no atmosphere, the moon is unable to slow down extra-lunar material to it's terminal velocity because it has no terminal velocity in zero atmosphere.

So I sit back, imagine I'm on the moon and stare towards the sun, picturing Osama in front of me.

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