

Shrink a quarter to the size of a dime - shard
http://intellectualventureslab.com/?p=71

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Tichy
I must admit I am a bit surprised: can you just change they way the atoms in
the coin are packed, so that they take up less space? Or is something being
squeezed out of the coin to make up for the lost space? Or is it actually the
same size as before, only now it is thicker and less wide?

I just didn't think that the packing of atoms could easily be changed -
wouldn't that be a completely new material?

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kmcgivney
OK, so I'm wondering how fast would the quarter have to travel to actually
shrink to the size of a dime, based on special relativity?

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kragen
The FitzGerald contraction would only shrink it in one dimension.

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Leon
What would happen if the quarter was rotated on its disk at relativistic
speeds?

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Leon
[http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SR/rigid_di...](http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SR/rigid_disk.html)

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ehrenfest_paradox>

Which is the best I could find for the question of shortening a quarter to the
size of a dime using relativity.

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cninja
I dont know if is the same person, but a guy sells these on ebay:
[http://cgi3.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&useri...](http://cgi3.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewUserPage&userid=berthickman)
I bought one as a Christmas present for my dad a couple years ago.

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billswift
Seeing the title I assumed they were talking about making a dime-sized coin
with the value of a quarter. It's probably more now, given the increase in
value of precious metals, but the last time I checked, about 3-4 years ago, a
silver dime was worth a quarter.

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jgamman
inflation from the credit crunch should achieve this for all quarters in the
US over the next decade... ;-)

