4 ms·
Why are some feathers blue? (2012)
- raldi 7y ago> like a sponge or a box of spaghetti In what way is a sponge like a box of spaghetti?
- matt-attack 7y agoLots of air pockets?
- zamadatix 7y ago"interspersed with air pockets, like a sponge or a box of spaghetti."
- raldi 7y agoIs a box of spaghetti more interspersed with air pockets than a box of just about anything else?
- Stratoscope 7y agoNo, and no one said it was. It was just one out of many possible examples of something with a lot of air pockets.
- lurquer 7y agoWhat type of pasta would be more appropriate for the analogy? Clearly, spaghetti is probably the worst... I suggest macherroni (i.e. the mac and cheese noodle) or, perhaps, cavatappi.
- harperlee 7y agoI think it is a good example because it is fundamentally different than a sponge. Spaghetti have air pockets moving in just one dimension, in a linear fashion, and of the same size; whereas a sponge has multisize 3d air pockets.
- Tempest1981 7y agoMaybe it's the uniform pattern of the air pockets?
- true_tuna 7y agoCool idea. The site is infuriating though. Auto play video bullshit.
- Causality1 7y ago>scientists theorized that birds look blue for the same reason the sky looks blue: Red and yellow wavelengths pass through the atmosphere, but shorter blue wavelengths bounce off of particles and scatter, emitting a blue glow in every direction. As XKCD has pointed out, there's a complicated physics reason behind every substance's color and the atmosphere isn't special or unusual in that regard. The sky is blue because air is blue.
- Timpy 7y agoRight, as I was reading this I was thinking "Isn't that just describing the way light and color normally works?" We haven't really answered the question "why is the sky blue," more like, "how does the sky get its blue color?"