[LINK] OT: Speed, acceleration or something else? [WAS] Mobile phone use set to be banned in vehicles - nanny state??

David Boxall david.boxall at hunterlink.net.au
Fri Feb 11 11:30:24 AEDT 2011


On 10/02/2011 5:09 PM, Kim Holburn wrote:
>
> On 2011/Feb/10, at 4:12 PM, Paul Brooks wrote:
>
>> On 10/02/2011 3:33 PM, Kim Holburn wrote:
>>>
>>> But it's still true like I said: it's not the speed it's the acceleration that kills.
>>>
>> Falling off a building doesn't kill - its the sudden stop at the end.
>
> Yes.  Both are acceleration.  Acceleration that's imposed on every particle in your body like gravity is not felt.  Acceleration that's applied to the outside of you body causes stresses.  The sudden stop at the end can apply accelerations of hundreds of Gs which causes huge stresses between the parts of your body that have already stopped and the parts that are still going.
>
>
Is it really speed or acceleration? Isn't it more that, when other 
things change, we don't? Isn't it more accurate to say that inertia kills?

-- 
David Boxall                         | ignorance more frequently
                                     | begets confidence than does
http://david.boxall.id.au            | knowledge
                                     | --Charles Darwin (introduction
                                     |  to 'The Descent of Man' 1871)



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