Re: [Phys-l] Is something wrong here?????

["Christopher M. Gould" <gould@usc.edu>]

> At 12:22 PM -0800 2/14/12, Christopher M. Gould wrote:
> > Besides, does no one remember the old joke:
> >
> > 	"A man walks a mile north, a mile west, and a mile south,
> > 	and finds himself back in camp.  What color is the bear?"
> >
> > The answer, of coruse, is "white" because it's a polar bear.  The man
> > started from the South Pole where EVERY direction is north, and walking
> > west meant that he never got further than a mile from the South Pole
> > before turning south.

	Date: Tue, 14 Feb 2012 15:56:20 -0500
	From: chuck britton <cvbritton@mac.com>
	> There are no bears of ANY color near the South Pole.
	>
	> (In spite of a famous faked 'photo' commissioned and used by
	> the Nat. Geo. Soc.)
	>
	> The puzzle that you present has an infinite number of
	> solutions, all located 'near' the North Pole.

My mistake.  You are correct.  I was focussed on the problem of giving
points on a compass as directions and didn't think through the old joke.
The walking back to camp part has a solution at the South Pole, but it
fails the test of the bear.

At least I can admit my mistake.  I hope this diversion will distract
the list from wasting any more time on the original reporter's mistake.

_________________
Christopher M. Gould    213-740-1101    Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
gould@usc.edu                           Univ. of Southern California
http://physics.usc.edu/~gould/          Los Angeles, CA   90089-0484