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Trinity College experiment succeeds after 69 years

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Re: Trinity College experiment succeeds after 69 years

#11

Post by ctdonath »

cupofjoakim wrote: post #4

Dude, I'm finding this hilarious. 69 years to prove that something is a fluid? I picture two really old scientists watching the tape, only to have one of the old geezers turning to the other to spill the sacred words: "Told you so".

How long are you willing to run a scientific experiment? People dream of projects that run decades or centuries or even millennia (see the Clock Of The Long Now); few manage to.

Re: Trinity College experiment succeeds after 69 years

#14

Post by willis77 »

peterkelly wrote: post #9

I bet the grad student involved is celebrating now that they can finally submit their thesis

Woah woah woah, not so fast, Doctorate McPhdsosoon. Science is repeatable. See you at lab meeting next Monday morning. Please come prepared with a roadmap for phase 2 trials. These grants don't write themselves, you know.

Re: Trinity College experiment succeeds after 69 years

#16

Post by sp332 »

cupofjoakim wrote: post #4

Dude, I'm finding this hilarious. 69 years to prove that something is a fluid? I picture two really old scientists watching the tape, only to have one of the old geezers turning to the other to spill the sacred words: "Told you so".

Well really they could have figured it out as soon as it started moving, which would have been a few months. The first drop fell after a few years and they could have called it quits then, but they wanted a human to observe the pitch drop. That's the only reason it took so long.

Re: Trinity College experiment succeeds after 69 years

#17

Post by jgreen10 »

digitalsushi wrote: post #5
cupofjoakim wrote: post #4

Dude, I'm finding this hilarious. 69 years to prove that something is a fluid? I picture two really old scientists watching the tape, only to have one of the old geezers turning to the other to spill the sacred words: "Told you so".

Science isn't about "told you so". It's about rigor, about completion. It may seem hilarious because of the length of time involved for the experiment to complete, but what if the results hadn't been what we assumed? Science is the only enlightenment we have, and to dismiss the outcome as obvious is to climb back into the dark ages.

Really? Scientists are people. Proving each other wrong is one of the biggest motivators to do years of painstaking, labour-intensive research. Of course, you can't prove someone wrong without being rigorous.

Re: Trinity College experiment succeeds after 69 years

#19

Post by albedoa »

cecilpl wrote: post #8
dalore wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How are they different? Both the article and the wikipedia link you gave mention they are similar experiments. It seems they are the same experiment to me.

They're similar, yes, but they're aren't one and the same. GP is pointing out that there are two experiments underway.

The Queensland experiment was mentioned in the article. The GP is confusing because it insinuates that something wasn't mentioned which should have been.

Re: Trinity College experiment succeeds after 69 years

#20

Post by jkn »

While I'm fond of this type of down-to-earth experiments, I'm curious about the scientific value of waiting for decades to observe the drop falling due to Earth's gravity, versus placing the apparatus in a centrifuge, which I imagine would dramatically accelerate the process. Maybe the higher forces would affect the way the drop is formed, in a way that was deemed undesirable?
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