Electrons follow the path of least resistance. In the same way that copper is a better conductor than rubber, you are a better conductor than wool carpet. So the electrons in the carpet are more likely to glom onto you than stay put.
But I am not a better conductor than Leonard Bernstein, who had (supposedly) a pretty good grasp of both the circle of fifths, and 7/8 time signature. I’m not sure how electrons figure into the whole thing.
You should have seen Lenny in a thunderstorm. He would attract enough lightning to power a small country.
Certain materials can hold onto a charge (positive or negative) intrinsically better than others. This is called the Triboelectric Series. Here’s a list of common things, in which the higher in the list they are, the easier they give up electrons if rubbed together, with the one on top becoming positively charged, and the lower one, negatively charged (electrons are always negative):
TRIBOELECTRIC SERIES
your hand
glass
your hair
nylon
wool
fur
silk
paper
cotton
hard rubber
polyester
polyvinylchloride plastic
This is also why rubbing a balloon on your hair makes it stick to the wall. Your hair gives up electrons really easily, so, the balloon becomes negatively charged, and is attracted by all those protons that make up the wall, even if it’s neutral.
So, if the carpet is made of nylon, and you’re wearing wool, cotton or polyester socks, the nylon’s going to fork over its electrons to you clothes (and disperse across your body, remaining static, until you interact with something conductive, to drain your negative charge).
Next time you have a balloon, rub it on your hair, then move the balloon across the hair on your arms. You know that feeling. The hairs will raise, because the balloon is now negatively charged, and your hair less-so, so they attract.
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3
(Atoms with more or less electrons than protons are called ions. Specifically, an ion with more electrons are called anions, and an ion with less electrons are called cations. So see? Cats are a very positive thing.)
All this talk of electricity and physics is making a humming noise in my head as my eyes glaze over.
Though I can calculate your mortgage for you and do it to a beat you can dance to.
I’ve rubbed balloons on my head and seen Van de Graaff generators (including the largest (air insulated) in the world). There are always explanations of transferring electrons, but not why they should go from one material to another. This thread just reminded me that I’ve always wanted to ask that.
So when I rub my feet on carpet, there will be a tendency for electrons to transfer from the carpet to my feet. Now, there is also a tendency for electrical charge to evenly distribute itself (I think I remember something like that from Physics); once my feet start to pick up a negative charge, it would transfer back to the carpet. Obviously, the Triboelectric Series defines a stronger effect, since my body does retain the negative charge.
Is the triboelectric effect quantifiable? Is there an equilibrium at which the electron transfer from floor-to-foot and from foot-to-floor balances out, at which I have the maximum negative charge (as determined by the two rubbing surfaces)?
For me it’s wireless stuff: radio, tv, bluetooth, infrared
I never manage to understand for long how data can be flying through the air.
It might as well be all magical.
This is where we start wandering into the more complex areas of chemistry. Stuff like electron shells (more accurately probability clouds), and how each shell can carry only so many electrons. Also how different atoms bond with each other according to their valence electrons (the electrons in the outer shell), so an atom of oxygen, eight protons and electrons would have 2 electrons in its inner most shell, because that’s as much energy that orbital can hold. This leaves six valence electrons to form several kinds of chemical bonds and reactions with others, of certain atoms that make good matches according to the electron’s orbitals and energy levels. Or something.
You could also delve into the physics side, but a chemist and physicist I am not. Perhaps someone can simplify this area much better than I, on why electrons do what they do when it comes to charges, current, etc.
On the macro level, essentially, electrons love to flow, but are also just trying to keep the peace. They don’t like an imbalance of charge and seek to neutralize net charges.
Deal! I’ll make sure the electronics are all hooked up properly.
And I would add synchronis rotation to the list. The same side of the moon is facing the same side of the sun at all times. I don’t get it. My astro professor explained it to me in college. Still don’t get it.
Close. The near side of the moon always faces the earth (not the sun). This is because the moon’s sidereal rotation about its axis is exactly in sync with its orbital period around the earth (27.3 days).
So, Imagine a tennis ball, that you drew a smiley face on ( 
) to stand in for the moon. It orbits a soccer ball, standing in for the earth, in exactly one hour — as well as makes one rotation in one hour. So, the moon’s “year” and “day” are exactly the same, and from the little people living on the soccer ball, they’d always see the smiley face.
Another analogy would be if one day on earth were to last 365.25 days. One side of the earth would always be facing the sun, the other side always enshrouded in darkness. Real estate values would skyrocket along the terminator (eternal sunset, or sunrise)!
I took Chemistry and Physics in college. It’s been a while, but I haven’t forgotten all of it. But the Triboelectric Series never came up.
It’s interesting that you defined it as a series, but not a scale. It seems like if we rub two materials together, we know which one will gain electrons and pick up a negative charge. But do we know anything more about it? Can the amount of charge be predicted, either theoretically (as you seem to be discussing in the quoted post) or experimentally? Does the charge reach a maximum level, after which more rubbing is pointless, and if so, how quickly?
I’m not sure that om4’s un-grokked-ness is with the mechanics of synchronous rotation, or with the reason.
I do remember a professor working through the math in college, once. With a barbell in orbit, it turned out to have slightly less potential energy with one end pointed toward the Earth than with the bar parallel with the surface. So if the moon is at all irregular (some bits of it heavier than others), and there’s any damping force (and over 4.5 billion years, it wouldn’t take much) the moon will settle into its lowest energy state, with one side always facing Earth.
(I’ve always had a theory that might have explained it easier than what the professor did. Maybe this is a good reason to finally work out the math.)
:smack: See? See what I mean? Yes, of course you’re right. I think the “1/3” got into my head because I count it as “ONE two three ONE two three ONE two three…”
The real irony, of course, is that I was a singer/dancer in high school. And actually a decent one - won places at State a couple of times. I just did it all completely intuitively, with no real understanding of music theory that persisted more than an hour after class.
Yes yes yes! This exactly! Where are all these electrons/cats coming from? Is Com Ed pouring electrons into my wall outlet? Don’t electrons come attached to nuclei and make up atoms which make up matter? Or is this where the overly simplistic explanations of atomic structure in Chem101 messed me up?
I heart you.
Here’s the Wikipedia article on the triboelectric effect. Essentially, it’s the effect of friction on different materials and their tendency to build up charges (how easily their free electrons will flow from one to the other).
I’m not sure why it’s called a series as opposed to a scale, like the pH scale. Perhaps it’s not as straight forward.
It’s called Tidal locking. Earth’s gravity, over billions of years, has slightly elongated the moon’s shape toward the earth, distorting it into a subtle bulge. The mass differential over such time locks it into a synchronous rotation.
Wait till you see the D5100.
Or for that matter the new D3200. What the frack does one DO with 24Mp?
Err, the same side is facing the EARTH at all times. Easier to think it rotates just fast enough that the “day” is the same as the orbit.
I have qualms with this notion of a rotating Moon. I think the Moon is tidal locked with Earth, but not in the classic sense.
The Moon is receding and inch a year away from Earth, therefore making a much larger circle every orbit. So eventually, if it does spin on its axis, it should actually show a progression/regression over time, a slightly different face from 100 years ago than today.
But, it isn’t doing this.
So, how is the Moon’s revolution rate slowing down to account for the extra distance per orbit?
According to Newton. Something is acting upon it. What is it? :dubious:
When the Moon was much closer, it had to have a much faster revolution rate to account for the much smaller orbit, for the face to remain the same, since we have no pictures from 4 billion years ago, we don’t know for sure what was going on then.
…puts down the grokoolaid.
You’ve never heard of gravity, or am I being wooshed?
Also, even at the rate of the moon receding from earth at one inch every year, the time it would take to move one mile away would be around 63,000 years. The moon is about 250,000 miles away.