Egg balancing
Egg balancing is a
Folklore holds that eggs can only be balanced in this way at a particular time of year: the lunar new year in China, the Dragon Boat Festival in Taiwan,[2] or the vernal equinox in the United States. It is also said that eggs can be balanced on the heads of nails at the equator.[3] In reality, eggs will balance anywhere at any time of year, and the practice has no connection to the gravitational force of the moon or sun.
History
Lichun egg
Egg balancing has been connected with
United States
A 1945
Science
The balancing of most eggs on their broad ends is not particularly difficult at any time of the year.
In 1947, after Japanese newspapers picked up the story, the physicist Ukichiro Nakaya verified experimentally that eggs can be balanced with ease at any time of the year. He noticed that an eggshell usually has many small bumps and dimples so that, by turning the egg in different directions, it can be made to touch a flat surface on three points at the same time in many ways. It is not hard to find an orientation such that the egg's center of mass is contained within the triangle spanned by the three contact points, which is the condition for balancing any object.[1] His findings were replicated by astronomer Frank D. Ghigo of the University of Minnesota in 1984.[8][9]
Writing on the subject, Martin Gardner speculated that the folk beliefs inspired people to "try a little harder, be more patient, and use steadier hands" and possibly even to subconsciously sabotage attempts on other days. He compared the self-reinforcing delusion to a "ouija-board phenomenon ".[6]
See also
- Egg of Columbus (mechanical puzzle)
- Egg of Columbus
- Easter egg
- Superegg
- "The West Wingfeaturing the American vernal equinox tradition
References
- ^ a b c Ukichiro Nakaya (February 2001) [1947]. "Egg of Li Chun". Essays (in Japanese). Vol. 5. Iwanami Shoten.
- ISBN 957351205X.
- ^ "Busted! Top 3 equator line tricks debunked". 26 September 2016.
- ^ Huang, Ottavia. Hmmm, This Is What I Think: "Dragon Boat Festival: Time to Balance an Egg". 24 June 2012. Accessed 3 November 2013.
- ^ Annalee Jacoby (March 19, 1945). "Eggs Stand on End in Chungking". Life. pp. 36–37.
- ^ a b Martin Gardner (May–June 1996). "The great egg-balancing mystery". Skeptical Inquirer. 20 (3). Archived from the original on 2007-02-21.
- ^ The New Yorker. 1983-04-04.
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(help) - ^ Schmid, Randolph. "Equinox Returns and Eggs Keep Balancing". Associated Press, 20 September 1987. Accessed 3 November 2013.
- ^ Mikkelson, David & al. Snopes.com: "Infernal Egguinox". 2012. Accessed 3 November 2013.