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The "Useless Information" Thread

I can't disprove your reasoning but in order to fold a piece of paper 51 times the area of the paper to start with would have be larger than the surface of our planet.

I would have to agree with that. However, I'm reminded of the Mythbusters episode where they were able to fold a football field-sized piece of paper 11 times but no further folds could be accomplished. So, I think it's safe to say that folding a piece of paper 51 times is not possible given our current resources.
 
Regardless of the size of paper used, and ignoring the fact that it is impossible to fold a piece of paper more than 11 times (I thought it was 8, but I'll live with 11 for the purposes of this thought experiment), the thickness of a sheet of 80 gram paper folded 51 times would be 159,928,964 miles. The distance from the earth to the sun is 93,000,000 miles, so the distance is easily passed.

Here is the math.

Folding increases the thickness by a power of two. The thickness of a sheet of 80 gram paper is around 0.0045 inches. There are 63360 inches to one mile.

(0.0045x(2^51))/63360=159,928,964

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KevinJS said:
Regardless of the size of paper used, and ignoring the fact that it is impossible to fold a piece of paper more than 11 times (I thought it was 8, but I'll live with 11 for the purposes of this thought experiment), the thickness of a sheet of 80 gram paper folded 51 times would be 159,928,964 miles. The distance from the earth to the sun is 93,000,000 miles, so the distance is easily passed.

Here is the math.

Folding increases the thickness by a power of two. The thickness of a sheet of 80 gram paper is around 0.0045 inches. There are 63360 inches to one mile.

(0.0045x(2^51))/63360=159,928,964

Sent from my iPhone using iPF

I calculated a slightly different mileage Kevin, a little more than you due to humidity causing the paper to swell slightly. I suppose the dry vacuum of space would negate that allowance to I will bow to your number with overwhelming humility. (and the fact that my calculator only goes to 8 digits) ;)
 
150,000 gallons per second. That's not the fuel consumption of a Hummer. That is how much water flows over Niagara Falls. Did you know that Canada and the US have an agreement not to divert water from the Falls for hydro generation during the tourist season and then, only at night which causes the flow rate over the Falls to drop by about 50%.
 
Last edited:
Regardless of the size of paper used, and ignoring the fact that it is impossible to fold a piece of paper more than 11 times (I thought it was 8, but I'll live with 11 for the purposes of this thought experiment), the thickness of a sheet of 80 gram paper folded 51 times would be 159,928,964 miles. The distance from the earth to the sun is 93,000,000 miles, so the distance is easily passed.

Here is the math.

Folding increases the thickness by a power of two. The thickness of a sheet of 80 gram paper is around 0.0045 inches. There are 63360 inches to one mile.

(0.0045x(2^51))/63360=159,928,964

Sent from my iPhone using iPF

The myth was that it was impossible to fold a piece of paper more than 7 times, but the Mythbusters team busted that myth when they achieved 11 folds.

According to your math, a standard piece of paper would become invisible to the naked eye before it reached the moon. So, it appears the math has proven me wrong. In practice, however, I refuse to believe it's possible given the force needed beyond 12 folds.
 
ardchoille said:
The myth was that it was impossible to fold a piece of paper more than 7 times, but the Mythbusters team busted that myth when they achieved 11 folds.

According to your math, a standard piece of paper would become invisible to the naked eye before it reached the moon. So, it appears the math has proven me wrong. In practice, however, I refuse to believe it's possible.

That's the beauty of thought experiment. You can start with an impossibly large sheet of paper, and ignore the fact that the paper would be crushed by its own weight.

The only substance that would have any chance of not collapsing under it's own weight would be diamond, and that's another story. Arthur C Clarke's "space elevator" springs to mind here.

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KevinJS said:
That's the beauty of thought experiment. You can start with an impossibly large sheet of paper, and ignore the fact that the paper would be crushed by its own weight.

The only substance that would have any chance of not collapsing under it's own weight would be diamond, and that's another story. Arthur C Clarke's "space elevator" springs to mind here.

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Of course F(g) = g*(m1m2)/r^2 and the paper doesn't actually gain mass giving a lighter overall gravitational force as you fold it higher. r gets bigger so F(g) gets smaller, plus as r(m) gets smaller (closer to the moon therefore moon gravitational force is larger) lowers the force towards the earth...

Oops sorry, my inner geek took over for a moment
 
KevinJS said:
That's the beauty of thought experiment. You can start with an impossibly large sheet of paper, and ignore the fact that the paper would be crushed by its own weight.

The only substance that would have any chance of not collapsing under it's own weight would be diamond, and that's another story. Arthur C Clarke's "space elevator" springs to mind here.

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Of course, the space elevator would be under immense tension, not compression, due to centrifugal force acting on the cable and top end facility.
 
Underground is the only word in the English language that begins and ends with the letters "und".

AA

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AdmiralAdama said:
Which goes to show - never trust a book of lists.

AA

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The publisher probably underfunded the research to save money,;)
 

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