Lab Purpose:
To take the theory that distance is proportional to time, formed by Galileo, and test it through the use of technology and the creative use of equipment.
History:
As the legend goes it was Galileo Galilei who sought to prove that a falling object would fall at a constant rate no matter the weight of the object (of course disregarding air resistance), and thus he set off to prove his theory. The legend continues as it describes Galileo dropping objects off the top of the leaning tower of Pisa and thus concluding his theory correct. While there are many who believe this legend it is very unlikely that it actually happened. The actual experiment conducted by Galileo was one where he utilized inclined planes to simulate acceleration due to gravity, but at a slower rate. He then used a water clock to calculate the time it took to travel down the inclined plan, and thus he was able to conclude that all falling objects travel at a uniform acceleration.
Ideas behind Motion:
What is motion? Motion is something that we as humans experience everyday. We experience motion when we drive to school, we experience motion when we walk our dogs, while these are things that we do everyday it is sometimes necessary to look at motion on a deeper level. In regards to physics motion is the change of position of one object in regards to time. A change in position occurs when an object is being acted upon by another force, causing it to break from equilibrium, or a position where its forces are equal and there is no movement. To help understand how forces act on an object in regards to physics one must understand Newton’s three laws of Motion.
1. Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it.
2. The relationship between an object's mass m, its acceleration a, and the applied force F is F = ma. Acceleration and force are vectors (as indicated by their symbols being displayed in slant bold font); in this law the direction of the force vector is the same as the direction of the acceleration vector.
3. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
Hypothesis:
Before our experiment our group concluded that the longer the time the larger the distance, thus concluding that distance is in fact proportional to time.
Materials that we used:
1. One ball
2. One aluminum ramp
3. One measuring stick
4. One Nathan acting as a stop watch
Materials Galileo may have used:
1. One cannon ball
2. One wooden ramp with lots of splinters
3. One Measuring Stick
4. One Nathan to read the water clock
How we did it:
We first took the aluminum ramp and set it on a text book in order to create a acute angle so that the bearing would in fact roll. Then once at that angle we marked off 5 different distances along the ramp ranging from 10 cm, up to a max of 80 cm. Once we had everything marked off, we rolled the bearing from each of the 5 distances and used our “Nathan” (stopwatch) to accurately record the time it the bearing to roll the marked distance, thus giving us our data. We measured each distance at least 10 times in order to account for the errors that Nathan would undoubtedly make.
Data:
Here is the data we collected. Each column is each distance we measured, and each row is the time it took for each trial.
Distance: | 10 cm | 28.33 cm | 42.5 cm | 56.66 cm | 85 cm | |
Trial # | 1 | 1.351 | 1.866 | 2.319 | 2.641 | 3.112 |
2 | 1.257 | 1.993 | 2.39 | 2.719 | 3.256 | |
3 | 1.209 | 1.962 | 2.351 | 2.762 | 3.214 | |
4 | 1.283 | 2.061 | 2.266 | 2.577 | 3.086 | |
5 | 1.299 | 2.132 | 2.37 | 2.714 | 3.101 | |
6 | 1.224 | 2.023 | 2.349 | 2.716 | 3.116 | |
7 | 1.269 | 1.957 | 2.399 | 2.56 | 3.297 | |
8 | 1.137 | 2.015 | 2.387 | 2.724 | 3.288 | |
9 | 1.301 | 1.952 | 2.411 | 2.58 | 3.365 | |
Average: | 1.258889 | 1.995667 | 2.360222 | 2.665889 | 3.203889 | |
Here are the average time for each distance.
Distance | Average Time | |
10 | 1.258889 | |
28.33 | ||
42.5 | 2.360222 | |
56.66 | 2.665889 | |
85 | 3.203889 | |
Conclusion:
After reviewing our data we can conclude that in fact distance is proportional to time. Thus our hypothesis was correct, the longer the distance the more time it takes the bearing to travel that distance.
Sources:
- Trubin, Julian. "Galileo Galilei: The Falling Bodies Experiment." The Orchid Grower: A Juvenile Science Adventure Novel. 5 Jan. 2011. Web. 08 Sept. 2011. http://www.juliantrubin.com/bigten/galileofallingbodies.html.
- "Motion (physics)." Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, 6 Sept. 2011. Web. 08 Sept. 2011. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_(physics).
- Louviere, Georgia. "Newton's 3 Laws of Motion." CEEE GirlTECH Home Page. 24 May 2006. Web. 08 Sept. 2011. http://teachertech.rice.edu/Participants/louviere/Newton/.
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