Breaking the Laws of Physics (I shudder to think!)

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Several years ago, I posted a very short piece on Fanfiction.net. Captain Kirk comes up against impossible tech in the Enterprise because it violates the laws of physics.

Interestingly, when I posted the piece (Ye Canna Break the Laws of Physics, Cap’n) here on BCTS, it ended up getting the most comments of anything I’ve ever written. (I think The Final Rescue is number 2).

Being the opportunist that I am (rolling eyes) I wondered if there was any way to cash in on that?

Now, I’ve been told that many of the things I called impossible in the Star Trek story are not, but what if I were to write something about Road Runner and Wiley Coyote? Say, Wiley Coyote paints a tunnel on the side of a hill, and Road Runner runs into the hole, only to find himself buried in solid rock? Or he simply hits the “not there hole” and falls backward to where the coyote is sitting, napkin tied around his neck, knife and fork in his hands, ready to dig in to the road runner who falls perfectly onto his plate?

We’ll ignore that somehow the coyote got this table ready in time to catch the road runner as he fell backward.

Or how about the fact that roadrunners make about 25 MPH, while a coyote actually has a top speed much faster? Are there any other laws of physics that Road Runner breaks, or rather broke on a regular basis? Certainly not that a pinnacle of rock, hanging over a canyon will stay in place while the rest of the plateau falls at speeds only obtainable by two black holes orbiting each other.

Or the fact that a coyote generally doesn’t fall 10,000 feet off a cliff face, hit the ground below, and walk away at the approximate height of a manhole cover.

Is it my imagination, or do Looney Toons have much less of a good relationship with physics than Star Trek?

Comments

It's toon physics

Sammi's picture

for Wile E Coyote gravity works properly and in the words of Nuuan from the story Coyote

Wiley Proceeded to hold the pencil straight up in the air then place the eraser on the tip of his nose and begin balancing it on his nose, Within a few seconds the coyote was pedaling his feet faster and faster back and forth trying to keep the pencil from falling until the coyote ran off the edge of the table. The coyote hung there in midair for a good ten seconds after the pencil fell before it looked down then reached behind its back producing a sign that read, “YIKES”, then fell.

“It can levitate?”

Angela giggled, “Gravity doesn't work until you look down.”


"REMEMBER, No matter where you go, There you are."

Sammi xxx

True! We all know, to learn

Rose's picture

True! We all know, to learn how to fly, a person just needs to learn how to fall and miss the ground.

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Hugs!
Rosemary

That's a...

Daphne Xu's picture

straight-forward physics problem. All you have to do is go about five miles/second.

You probably have to be rather high above the ground where air resistance is very small.

-- Daphne Xu

As Roger Rabbit explained it

laika's picture

the likelihood of a breach of the normal laws of Newtonian physics occurring in a cartoon is related to whether or not the point in time at which it might occur is "comically opportune", and whether the breach itself would be funny; Which brings a strange subjectivity to what can or can't happen in a 'toon universe. And once cartoon characters realize they're in a cartoon all bets are off about what's possible or not, as demonstrated in this 1950's Heckle + Jeckle cartoon The Power of Thought: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIpTVU3Ddlo
~hugs, Veronica

oh my god...

Andrea Lena's picture

not the dip.........

  

To be alive is to be vulnerable. Madeleine L'Engle
Love, Andrea Lena

You must be older than I am

Patricia Marie Allen's picture

It was always "six bits" when I was growing up.

Hugs
Patricia

Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt

Curious...

...I learned it as "six bits" also, but if you believe the search engines, "two bits" is almost universal.

And it may never have actually represented the price of the combination. Sources suggest that it was an improvised phrase for that rhythmic pattern, either via Morse Code or as the stereotypical coda of musical compositions at some time and place. Didn't find an explanation as to why those words were chosen or became popular, though.

Eric