Where you choose your origin doesn't change the answer to the question, but choosing an origin can make a problem easier to solve (even if only a bit). Usually it is nice if the majority of the quantities you are given and the quantity you are trying to solve for take positive values relative to your chosen origin. Given this goal, what location for the origin of the coordinate system would make this problem easiest?

Follow these directions and answer the questions. 1. shine a pencil-thin beam of light on a mirror perpendicular to its surface. (if you don't have a laser light as suggested in the video, you can make a narrow beam from a flashlight by making a cone from black construction paper and taping it over the face of the flashlight.) how does the light reflect? how does the relationship of incident to reflected ray relate to the reflection of water waves moving perpendicular to a barrier? 2. shine a pencil-thin beam of light on a mirror standing on a sheet of paper on the table (or floor) so that you can mark the incident ray and reflected ray. (you can support the mirror from the back by taping it to a wooden block.) 3. mark a line on the paper representing the reflective surface. (the reflective surface of a mirror is usually the back edge.) 4. draw a dashed line perpendicular to the mirror surface at a point where the incident and reflected ray meet. this perpendicular is called a normal to the surface. 5. measure the angles between the rays and the normal. the angle of incidence is the angle formed by the incident ray and the normal to the surface. the angle formed by the reflected ray and normal is called the angle of reflection (r). what is the angle of incidence? what is the angle of reflection? 6. repeat for several different angles. (see report sheet for details.) what appears to be the relationship between the angle of incidence and angle of reflection? in science 1204, what was the relationship for these two angles made by the reflection of waves in a ripple tank? 7. roll a ball bearing so that it hits a fixed, hard surface (a metal plate) at several angles (including head-on). observe the way in which the ball bearing reflects. what generalization can you make about how a ball bearing reflects from a wall? have you proved that light can only behave like a wave?

Consider an ordinary, helium-filled party balloon with a volume of 2.2 ft3. the lifting force on the balloon due to the outside air is the net resultant of the pressure distribution exerted on the exterior surface of the balloon. using this fact, we can derive archimedes’ principle, namely that the upward force on the balloon is equal to the weight of the air displaced by the balloon. assuming that the balloon is at sea level, where the air density is 0.002377 slug/ft3, calculate the maximum weight that can be lifted by the balloon. note: the molecular weight of air is 28.8 and that of helium is 4.

You will be galileo perform the experiment to determine if objects with different mass fall at the same, or different, rates in the air and in a vacuum. (refer to the walk-through video to locate the online lab within the online textbook).