Many of us remember Archimedes from school. It was the one who said, “Eureka!”, After he entered the bath and noticed that the water level had risen. This led him to understand: the volume of displaced water should be equal to the volume of the immersed object.
Golden Crown of Hieron
There once lived a king named Hieron. The country he ruled was rather small, but it was for this reason that he wanted to wear the largest crown in the world. Its manufacture was entrusted to the famous skilled jeweler, giving him ten pounds of pure gold. The master undertook to complete the work in 90 days. After this time, the jeweler brought the crown. It was a wonderful job, and everyone who saw her said that she was second to none in the world.
When King Hieron put the crown on his head, he even felt a little awkward, his headdress was so beautiful. Enough of admiring, he decided to weigh it on his scales. The crown weighed
10 pounds, as ordered. The king was pleased, but still decided to show it to a very wise man, whose name was Archimedes. He turned a skillfully made headdress in his hands and carefully examined it, after which he suggested that an unclean jeweler could steal some of the gold, and to save copper or silver to keep the mass of the item.
Worried Hieron asked Archimedes to provide him with evidence of fraud in case the master was dishonest. The scientist did not know how to do this, but he was not the person who recognized something impossible. He enthusiastically dealt with solving the most complex problems, and when a question puzzled him, he did not stop until he found an answer to it. So, day after day, he thought about gold and tried to find a way by which to check the fraud without harming the crown.
Great discoveries happen by chance
One morning, Archimedes, thinking about the king’s crown, was preparing for a bath. The large bathtub was full to the brim when he entered it, and some water flowed out onto the stone floor. Something similar has happened many times already, but for the first time the scientist seriously thought about it. “How much water will I squeeze out when I enter the bath?” He asked himself. “There were just as many fluids as there were me. A man of half my size will displace half as much. The same thing will happen if a crown is put in the bath. ”
Who said "Eureka!"
Gold is much heavier due to specific gravity than silver. And ten pounds of pure gold cannot displace as much water as they displace seven pounds of gold mixed with three pounds of silver. Silver will have larger sizes, therefore, it will displace more water than pure gold. Hooray finally! Found! So that's who said "Eureka!" It was Archimedes. Forgetting everything in the world, he jumped out of the bath and, not stopping to dress himself, he ran down the streets to the royal palace, shouting: “Eureka! Eureka! Eureka!" Translated from ancient Greek, it means “I found! I found! I found!"
The crown has been tested. As a result, the jeweler’s guilt was proven beyond doubt. Whether he was punished or not, history is silent, it basically does not matter. The important thing is that the one who said “Eureka!” Made a big discovery in the bath, which is more significant than the crown of Hieron.
The concept of "eureka"
The word itself is associated with heuristics, a branch of knowledge that refers to experience and intuition in solving problems, in the process of learning and making discoveries. This exclamation is connected with the scientist Archimedes, who said “eureka” after he came up with a solution to the problem that worried him at that time. This story about the golden crown first appeared in writing in the book of Vitruvius, two centuries after what happened.
Some scientists doubted the accuracy of this story, saying that this method requires more accurate measurements, which would be difficult to do at that time. Galileo Galilei dealt with a similar problem, proposing a design for hydrostatic balance, which could be used to compare the weight of a dry object with the mass of the same object, only immersed in water.
Limitless ingenuity
One of the oldest and well-known tales revolves around the legendary Archimedes. Who said: "Eureka!"? And why is it interesting that many great discoveries are made during everyday and routine events - in the bathroom, in a dream, under a tree? Archimedes continued to make an important contribution to the development of science. The famous Greek mathematician, physicist and astronomer was born in 287 BC in Syracuse, a Greek colony in Sicily, and died in 212 BC. e. during the invasion of the Romans. His law is passed at school, and he is still considered one of the greatest scientists of all time.
Principle of Archimedes
This famous principle, accompanied by an interesting story, states: the weight of the same substance should occupy the same volume, regardless of shape. Who said Eureka? And what does it mean? It was a joyful exclamation during an important discovery. In physics, the principle of Archimedes is described as follows: when a body is immersed in a liquid, a buoyant force equal to the weight of the displaced liquid begins to act on it.
Why are some objects floating and others not? This is due to the phenomenon of buoyancy. For example, a ball of steel will sink, but steel of the same weight but in the shape of a bowl will float, because the weight is distributed over a larger area, and the density of the steel becomes less than the density of water. An example would be large ships that weigh several thousand tons and sail in the ocean.