The buttered toast phenomenon is an observation that buttered toast tends to land butter-side down after it falls. It is used as an idiom representing pessimistic outlooks. [1] Various people have attempted to determine whether there is an actual tendency for bread to fall in this fashion, with varying results.
The phenomenon is said[ by whom? ] to be an old proverb from "the north country". Written accounts can be traced to the mid-19th century. The phenomenon is often attributed to a parodic poem of James Payn from 1884: [2] [3]
I never had a slice of bread,
Particularly large and wide,
That did not fall upon the floor,
And always on the buttered side!
In the past, this has often been considered just a pessimistic belief. A 1991 study by the BBC's television series Q.E.D. found that when toast is tossed into the air, it lands butter-side down just one-half of the time (as would be predicted by chance). [4] However, several scientific studies have found that when toast is dropped from a table (as opposed to being thrown in the air), it more often falls butter-side down. [5] [6] [7] A study on this subject by Robert Matthews won the Ig Nobel Prize for physics in 1996. [8] [9]
When toast falls out of one's hand, it does so at an angle causing the toast to rotate. Given that tables are usually between two and six feet (0.7 to 1.83 meters), there is enough time for the toast to rotate about one-half of a turn, and thus lands upside down relative to its original position. Since the original position is usually butter-side up, the toast lands butter-side down. [10] However, if the table is over 10 feet (3.0 meters) tall, the toast will rotate a full 360 degrees, and land butter-side up. [11] Also, if the toast travels horizontally at over 3.6 miles per hour (1.6 m/s), the toast will not rotate enough to land butter-side down. [4] In fact, the phenomenon is caused by fundamental physical constants. [8]
The added weight of the butter has an effect on the falling process, [12] since the butter spreads throughout the slice. [4] A piece of toast has inertia as it flips towards the floor, preventing its spin from stopping easily; it is usually only stopped by hitting the floor. This moment of inertia is determined by the speed at which the toast is flipping, combined with the size and mass of the toast. Because most toast is relatively uniform, they often land in a similar manner. [13]
Sometimes the toast falls butter up. The Wise Man of Chelm figured the reason for this long time ago:
A young housewife living in the town of Chełm had a very strange occurrence. One morning, after buttering a piece of bread she accidentally dropped it on the floor. To her amazement, it fell buttered side up. As everyone knows, whenever a buttered piece of bread is dropped on the floor, it always falls buttered side down; this is like a law of physics. But on this occasion it had fallen buttered side up, and this was a great mystery which had to be solved. So all the Rabbis and elders and wise men of Chełm were summoned together and they spent three days in the synagogue fasting and praying and debating this marvelous event among themselves. After those three days they returned to the young housewife with this answer: "Madam, the problem is that you have buttered the wrong side of the bread." [14]
Precession is a change in the orientation of the rotational axis of a rotating body. In an appropriate reference frame it can be defined as a change in the first Euler angle, whereas the third Euler angle defines the rotation itself. In other words, if the axis of rotation of a body is itself rotating about a second axis, that body is said to be precessing about the second axis. A motion in which the second Euler angle changes is called nutation. In physics, there are two types of precession: torque-free and torque-induced.
Murphy's law is an adage or epigram that is typically stated as: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong." In some formulations, it is extended to "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong, and at the worst possible time."
Newton's laws of motion are three laws that describe the relationship between the motion of an object and the forces acting on it. These laws, which provide the basis for Newtonian mechanics, can be paraphrased as follows:
Sod's law, a British culture axiom, states that "if something can go wrong, it will". The law sometimes has a corollary: that the misfortune will happen at "the worst possible time". The term is commonly used in the United Kingdom.
French toast is a dish of sliced bread soaked in beaten eggs and often milk or cream, then pan-fried. Alternative names and variants include eggy bread, Bombay toast, gypsy toast, and poor knights (of Windsor).
A toaster is a small electric appliance that uses radiant heat to brown sliced bread into toast. It typically consists of one or more slots into which bread is inserted, and heating elements, often made of nichrome wire, to generate heat and toast the bread to the desired level of crispiness.
Cha chaan teng, often called a Hong Kong-style cafe or diner in English, is a type of restaurant that originated in Hong Kong. Cha chaan teng are commonly found in Hong Kong, Macau, and parts of Guangdong. Due to the waves of mass migrations from Hong Kong in the 1980s, they are now established in major Chinese communities in Western countries such as Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Likened to a greasy spoon cafe or an American diner, cha chaan tengs are known for eclectic and affordable menus, which include dishes from Hong Kong cuisine and Hong Kong-style Western cuisine. They draw comparisons to Western cafés due to their casual settings, as well as menus revolving around coffee and tea.
The ladder paradox is a thought experiment in special relativity. It involves a ladder, parallel to the ground, travelling horizontally at relativistic speed and therefore undergoing a Lorentz length contraction. The ladder is imagined passing through the open front and rear doors of a garage or barn which is shorter than its rest length, so if the ladder was not moving it would not be able to fit inside. To a stationary observer, due to the contraction, the moving ladder is able to fit entirely inside the building as it passes through. On the other hand, from the point of view of an observer moving with the ladder, the ladder will not be contracted, and it is the building which will be Lorentz contracted to an even smaller length. Therefore, the ladder will not be able to fit inside the building as it passes through. This poses an apparent discrepancy between the realities of both observers.
Toast Hawaii is an open sandwich consisting of a slice of toast with ham and cheese, and a maraschino cherry in the middle of a pineapple slice, baked so that the cheese starts to melt. It was made popular by the West German TV cook Clemens Wilmenrod in the 1950s. It is likely that it was adapted from the "Grilled Spamwich" found in a 1939 Spam cookbook and brought to West Germany by American G.I.s. Spam was not available in Germany's grocery stores so Wilmenrod replaced it with a slice of cooked ham.
The Butter Battle Book is a children's book written by Dr. Seuss and published by Random House on January 12, 1984. It is an anti-war story: specifically, a parable about arms races in general, mutually assured destruction and nuclear weapons in particular. The Butter Battle Book was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year.
Bell's spaceship paradox is a thought experiment in special relativity. It was first described by E. Dewan and M. Beran in 1959 but became more widely known after John Stewart Bell elaborated the idea further in 1976. A delicate thread hangs between two spaceships headed in the same direction. They start accelerating simultaneously and equally as measured in the inertial frame S, thus having the same velocity at all times as viewed from S. Therefore, they are all subject to the same Lorentz contraction, so the entire assembly seems to be equally contracted in the S frame with respect to the length at the start. At first sight, it might appear that the thread will not break during acceleration.
Table manners are the rules of etiquette used while eating, which may also include the use of utensils. Different cultures observe different rules for table manners. Each family or group sets its own standards for how strictly these rules are to be followed.
In German cuisine, Butterbrot is a slice of bread topped with butter. It is still considered Butterbrot even if additional toppings such as cheese, spreads, or lunch meats are added, as long as it begins with a slice of bread with butter.
The cat righting reflex is a cat's innate ability to orient itself as it falls in order to land on its feet. The righting reflex begins to appear at 3–4 weeks of age, and is perfected at 6–9 weeks. Cats are able to do this because they have an unusually flexible backbone and no functional clavicle (collarbone). The tail seems to help but cats without a tail also have this ability, since a cat mostly turns by moving its legs and twisting its spine in a certain sequence.
The buttered cat paradox is a common joke based on the combination of two adages:
Robert A. J. Matthews, is a British physicist and science writer.
A Wilberforce pendulum, invented by British physicist Lionel Robert Wilberforce around 1896, consists of a mass suspended by a long helical spring and free to turn on its vertical axis, twisting the spring. It is an example of a coupled mechanical oscillator, often used as a demonstration in physics education. The mass can both bob up and down on the spring, and rotate back and forth about its vertical axis with torsional vibrations. When correctly adjusted and set in motion, it exhibits a curious motion in which periods of purely rotational oscillation gradually alternate with periods of purely up and down oscillation. The energy stored in the device shifts slowly back and forth between the translational 'up and down' oscillation mode and the torsional 'clockwise and counterclockwise' oscillation mode, until the motion eventually dies away.
Toast is sliced bread that has been browned by radiant heat. The browning is the result of a Maillard reaction altering the flavor of the bread and making it firmer. The firm surface is easier to spread toppings on and the warmth can help butter reach its melting point. Toasting is a common method of making stale bread more palatable. Bread is commonly toasted using a toaster or a toaster oven. Toast may contain acrylamide caused by the browning process, which is suspected to be a carcinogen. However, claims that acrylamide in burnt toast causes cancer have not been proven.
Bottle flipping was a trend that involved throwing a plastic bottle, typically partially full of liquid, into the air so that it rotates, in an attempt to land it upright on its base or cap. It became an international trend in the summer of 2016 with numerous videos of people attempting the activity being posted online. With its popularity, the repetitive thuds of multiple attempts have been criticized as a distraction and a public nuisance. Parents and teachers have expressed frustration at the practice, resulting in water bottle flipping being banned at several schools around the world, as well as many people calling for the practice to only be performed in private.
The Wise Men of Chelm are dumb Jewish residents of the Polish city of Chełm, a butt of Jewish jokes, similar to other towns of fools: the English Wise Men of Gotham, German Schildbürger, Greek residents of Abdera, or Finnish residents of the fictional town of Hymylä. Since at least 14th century Chełm had a considerable population of Jews.
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