Today, we look at a fun little party trick based on physics that appeared in an episode of All in the Family.
Knowledge Waits is a feature where I just share some bit of pop culture history that interests me that doesn’t quite fit into the other features.
In the fifth episode of , “Judging Books by Covers,” there is a surprising sort of party trick (in the days before excessive commercials, TV shows used to have some extra time to do bits that had nothing to do with the main plot) where Gloria and Mike show Archie a trick involving lifting a chair…
In case you’re curious about the science of it all, there is a debate based on what it is specifically, but in general, it has to do with the fact that men typically have bigger feet and longer gaits, so taking three steps backwards means the the wall is further away from the typical man than the typical woman, so either
A. your center of gravity is affected or
B. simply, the woman is leaning forward while the man is leaning backwards.
Here‘s an article where two scientists differ on the reasoning.
Cool thing to learn from an episode of a sitcom!
Okay, if anyone has a suggestion for a future Knowledge Waits (basically, interesting pieces of pop culture history), drop me a line at brian@popculturereferences.com.
