• @aerowave@feddit.uk
    link
    fedilink
    English
    35
    edit-2
    11 months ago

    Speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out

    E: I was just quoting GladOS… Not really thinking about the actual physics!

    • @Kaosmace@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      1211 months ago

      Yeah but the thing isn’t moving the portal is, and the energy has to come from somewhere if the portal makes the thing go fast.

      • @Duamerthrax@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        13
        edit-2
        11 months ago

        The energy would come from the trolley. The people would launch out at approximately the same speed as the trolley interacts with them and the trolley would slow down in response to how much kinetic energy was transferred to the people.

        • @mctoasterson@reddthat.com
          link
          fedilink
          1511 months ago

          This is correct. The motion of the people is relative to the Portal. It doesn’t matter if the trolley is accelerating the Portal towards them or something is accelerating them towards the Portal. Therefore they accelerate out of the other side with some retained momentum. Technically it probably resembles something in between pictures A and B.

          This reminds me of the experiment about whether an airplane could take off from a treadmill.

          • @hemko@lemmy.dbzer0.com
            cake
            link
            fedilink
            English
            811 months ago

            Only if you assume the people will experience friction against the portal.

            If they would accelerate to the speed of the train within the time it takes them to go through it, they’d experience very high pressure change against the due to one part of body accelerating faster than the other. This would cause the bodies to explode out the portal

            • @Natanael@slrpnk.net
              link
              fedilink
              111 months ago

              Yes, as I noted elsewhere in the thread, the part of the body exiting the portal will experience inertia as it enters into the space outside the second portal and it will be forcefully pushed by the next part of the body heading into the first portal and thus imparting momentum to the parts ahead.

              If this momentum has to be taken from anywhere its from the portal itself and by extension the train.

        • @unfnknblvbl@beehaw.org
          link
          fedilink
          011 months ago

          The energy would come from the trolley.

          Has the trolley come to a complete halt, or even showed down? If not, then either no energy has been transferred to the people and they just flop out, or we’ve just invented perpetual motion.

      • VCTRN
        link
        fedilink
        English
        211 months ago

        This guy is thinking with portals!

      • @Natanael@slrpnk.net
        link
        fedilink
        311 months ago

        Then they can’t enter at all and have to be flattened by the portal, because they must have motion too exit the other portal