Chapter 32 Chapter 8 A Golden Comet

After a quarter of an hour, everyone returned to the hall in the cave and began to calculate according to Professor Rosset's ideas. According to Professor Rosset's order, Ben-Zov has removed all the things on the long table and tidied them up.The two hundred and thirty franc silver coins borrowed from Isaac the Jew were also placed on the table in stacks according to their different values. "Gentlemen," said Professor Rosset beaming, "when the earth collided with the comet, since you didn't think of bringing a ruler and a kilogram from the earth, I had to come up with an expedient plan to solve the problem. A problem to calculate the gravity, mass and density of my comet."

Just like all confident orators who always think that their speech can deeply impress the audience, Professor Rosset's opening speech is quite long.Captain Selvadak, Count Ironmashev, and Second Officer Prokop didn't take to heart his harshness towards them, but were bitter about him.They were used to his irascible nature. "Gentlemen," said the professor again, "I have specially selected these new silver coins from Isaac, and they fully meet our requirements. Now, let's use these silver coins to see how long a meter is on the earth." .” Before he finished speaking, Servadac and the others understood what he meant.Not so Ben-Zoff.In his opinion, Professor Rosset is almost like a magician who shows off his skills in downtown Montmartre.

Now let's take a look at how Professor Rosset used these silver coins to obtain the length of one meter on the earth.The idea came to him suddenly when he heard the sound of silver coins on the Hansa. As we all know, French coins are all decimal, from one centime to one hundred francs.Among them, 1) one, two, five, and ten centimes are copper; 2) twenty, fifty centimes and one, two, and five francs are silver; 3) five, ten, twenty, fifty, A hundred francs are gold. The diameters of these coins—this is what Professor Rosset first emphasized—are strictly regulated by law, and cannot be minted with a slight difference.Take the silver five-franc, two-franc, and fifty centimes. A five-franc piece is thirty-seven millimeters in diameter, a two-franc twenty-seven millimeters, and a fifty centimes eighteen millimeters.

Therefore, if these silver coins of different values ​​are placed together and connected in a straight line, can't we accurately obtain the length of one meter on the earth? Of course you can, Professor Rosset is well aware of this.So he picked out of the silver pieces ten five francs, ten two francs, and twenty fifty centimes. He first calculated on a piece of paper and added the diameters of these silver coins together to arrive at the following figures: 10 pieces of five franc silver coins with a diameter of 0.037 meters = 0.37 meters 10 pieces of two franc silver coins with a diameter of 0.027 meters = 0.27 meters

Z0 pieces of fifty centimes silver coins with a diameter of 0.018 meters = 0.36 meters 1 meter in total Afterwards, he handed over the calculation results to everyone for a look. "Very good, dear teacher." Servadac said, "Now we put these forty silver coins side by side and keep their center points in a straight line, and we can get the length of one meter on the earth. gone." "It's really interesting, it's not easy to be a scholar." Ben Yizoff praised. "What's so great about that?" Professor Rosset shrugged. Next, he laid ten five-franc silver coins flat on the table one by one, keeping their center points in a straight line, and then connected ten two-franc silver coins and twenty fifty centimes silver coins one after another in the same way. put it down.Finally, he marked both ends of the long silver coin on the table, and said to everyone:

"Gentlemen, this is the length of a meter on Earth." Then, he used a compass to divide the length of the meter into ten equal parts.Each equalization is one decimeter.He cut a wooden strip according to the length of this decimeter, and handed the wooden strip to the technician on the Dobrina. Technicians are very smart.He has already laid a stone on the volcano according to Professor Rosset's instructions, and now he has carved the four sides of the stone into a decimeter length based on this wooden strip, and it is a stone of one cubic decimeter. The ruler issue has been resolved.The question now is how to find an object that weighs one kilogram on Earth.

This matter is easier to handle. French coins not only have strict regulations on diameter, but also on weight. For example, the standard weight of each five-franc silver coin is 25 grams, and the standard weight of one franc is 5 grams. Putting forty five-franc pieces together, therefore, gives a kilogram. Selvadak and others immediately thought of this. "My fellow!" said Ben-Zoff, "to do this, you must not only be knowledgeable, but also..." "What else?" Selvadak asked. "There is still money." His words elicited a roar of laughter. A few hours later, the technician had carefully considered a one cubic decimeter stone and handed it to the professor.

Everything is ready, Professor Rosset can now start to calculate the gravity, mass and density of his comet. "Gentlemen," said he, "in case you have forgotten or are ignorant, I would like to remind you first of all of Newton's famous law: gravitation is proportional to mass and inversely proportional to the square of distance. I hope you will keep it in mind." this point." The professor seemed to be giving lectures to the students from the podium.And how disciplined and studious the students are now! "You see, there are forty five-franc silver coins in this bag in my hand, and the weight is one kilogram on the earth. In other words, if I put this bag on the scale and weigh it on the earth, the result should be It's one kilogram, understand?"

Palmierian Rosette kept looking at Ben-Zoff as he spoke.He did the same thing as Arago.Arago always looked at a student he thought was the dumbest when he gave experiments to students.Only when he feels that the student has fully understood does he consider his lecture to be clear. The orderly in Selvadak wasn't really stupid.The problem is that he knows so little.Of course, the result was the same anyway. Seeing that Ben-Zoff seemed to understand, the teacher went on to say: "Gentlemen, I will now use this scale to weigh these forty pieces of silver. We are now on the planet Gallia, so we can see at once how much these forty pieces of silver weigh here."

After the silver coin was hung on the hook of the scale, the pointer swung back and forth on the scale plate of the spring scale a few times, and finally stopped, pointing at 133 grams. "In this way," said Professor Rosset, "what weighs one kilogram on Earth is only 133 grams on Galia, which is one-seventh of that on Earth. Do you understand?" Ben-Zoff nodded, and the professor continued: "But if I use a balance scale, the result will not be noticeable at all, because the weight will be reduced equally at both ends of the scale. Understand?" "Understood," Ben-Zoff said.

"Since the weight of the object is only one-seventh of that on the earth, it can also be considered that the surface gravity of Galia is only one-seventh of that on the earth's surface." The professor added. "Great!" Captain Servadak exclaimed excitedly, "This problem has been solved, now let's count the quality!" "No, let's solve the density problem first." Professor Rosset said. "Yes," said Prokop, "we already know the volume of Gallia, and if we figure out the density, the problem of mass will be solved." Second officer Prokop's analysis was quite correct. I saw Professor Rosset picked up the one cubic decimeter rock and said to everyone: "Gentlemen, this rock is composed of an unknown substance, exactly as you have seen everywhere in Gallia when you sailed around the world. It seems that my comet is composed entirely of this rock. Whatever Whether it is on the coast, on land, or on volcanoes, no matter in the north or south, there are such things all over the place. Due to your limited geological knowledge, you have not yet been able to identify what kind of rock it is." "Yes. We would very much like to know what it is made of," said Captain Servadak. "Therefore," Professor Rosset continued, "we can fully assume that the whole of Gallia, from its surface to its depths, is composed of this material. The rock in my hand would weigh as much as it does on Earth. What? Multiply its weight in Gallia by 7, and you get its weight on Earth. For, I repeat, the gravitational force of Galia is one-seventh that of the Earth." With that, he asked Ben-Zoff: "You keep staring at me with big eyes, do you understand?" "No." Ben-Zoff replied. "Everyone else understands. I can't waste time on your own now," said Rosette. "This man is a brute," Ben-Zov murmured to himself. "We will now use it to weigh the stone," said Rosset. After the stone was hung on the scale hook, the pointer pointed to a place of 1430 grams. "One thousand four hundred and thirty," said Rosette, "multiply this number by 7, and the product obtained is not more than ten kilograms. The density of the earth is five, and the density of Gallia is ten, which is larger than the earth. double. If the density of Gallia had not been so great, its surface gravity would not be one seventh of that of the earth, but one fifteenth." Professor Rosset had a smug look on his face.Although the volume of the earth is much larger than his comet, its density is far less than that of the comet.If someone offered to trade the earth for his comet, he would not agree at all. The diameter, circumference, area, volume, and density of Gallia are all known, and now only the mass, that is, the weight, remains to be solved. This problem is not difficult to solve.It is now known that one cubic decimeter of Gallian matter weighs ten kilograms.Multiply this number by Gallia's volume (calculated in cubic decimeters) to get Gallia's weight.And we know that the volume of Galia is 211,433,460 cubic kilometers, or 211,433,460 trillion cubic decimeters .Multiplying this number by ten gives Galia's mass or weight in kilograms on Earth. Calia's weight is obviously less than 5,8738.6 billion billion kg than the earth. "How heavy is the earth?" Ben-Zoff asked, confused by the astronomical figures. "Five thousand eight hundred and seventy-five trillion billion kilograms." Prokjin said, "a total of twenty-five digits." "Where's the moon?" "Seventy-two trillion trillion kilograms." "That's all!" said Ben-Zoff. "Where's the sun?" "Two trillion trillion trillion kilograms. That's thirty-one numbers." "Therefore," concluded Servadac, "any object on Gallia would weigh only one-seventh as much as on Earth." "Yes." Professor Rosset said, "At the same time, our physical strength has also increased sixfold. If a person can carry a hundred kilograms on Earth, he can carry seven hundred kilograms on Galia." "The height of our jump has also increased by six times, which is probably the same reason." Ben Yizoff said. "Of course," said Prokop, "if Gallia's mass had been smaller, you would have jumped higher." "You can even fly over the Montmartre Heights!" Professor Rosset smiled at Ben-Zoff with narrowed eyes, which made him very annoyed. "What is the surface gravity of other planets?" asked Servadak. "Why did you forget?" Professor Rosset said, "Ah: it's no wonder, you are not a very hardworking student." "I'm ashamed," Servadak said sheepishly. "This problem is very simple. If the gravity of the earth is taken as 1, the gravity of the moon is 0.16, the gravity of Jupiter is 2.45, the gravity of Mars is 0.5, the gravity of Mercury is 1.15, and the gravity of Venus is 0.92, almost the same as the earth. The gravitational force of the sun is 28. An object weighing 1 kilogram on the earth can weigh 28 kilograms on the sun." "So," Prokop said, "if people like us go to the sun, it will be very difficult for us to stand up if we accidentally fall down. A shell can only hit a few tens of meters away." "It's a good place for a coward to fight in such a place," said Ben-Zoff. "On the contrary," said Servadac, "those cowards can't run at all if they want to." "Since the smaller the planet, the greater our physical strength, and the higher we can jump, it would be great if Galia was a little smaller." Ben-Zov said. Professor Rosset has always believed that Galia planet is his personal.Hearing this, he found it very offensive, so he sneered at Ben-Zov: "Look! His head is getting lighter too. You have to be careful. Maybe someday a gust of wind will blow it away." "That's all right!" said Ben-Zoff, "I'll hold it tightly with both hands." Rosset felt that he would not take much advantage of playing with a man like Ben-Zoff.He was about to get up and leave when the captain suddenly gestured to him and asked: "I'm sorry, dear teacher. I have another question. Do you know what this substance on Planet Gallia is?" "The ... density of this substance is ... ten times. I dare say ..." said Rosette. "Ah! If this is true, Ben-Zov will be even more embarrassed! Let's see if he dares." Compare his Montmartre with my comet!" "Then what do you think...?" Selvadak asked. "I think," said Professor Rosset, "that it is a kind of telluride . . . " "What? Hooves..." cried Ben-Zoff. "Gold telluride. This compound is commonly found on Earth. In this telluride, if hooves make up seventy percent, gold will make up thirty percent." "Thirty percent!" Selvadak exclaimed. "These two elements are very heavy. Added together, a cubic decimeter is ten kilograms, which is equal to the density of Gallia." "Then this star is made of gold!" Servadac exclaimed again. "The famous scholar Maupert believes that such a planet is possible. The existence of Gallia also proves that his view is correct." "In this way," said Count Ironmashf, "if Gallia falls on a batch of balls, it will change the proportion of metals on the earth. Because the current circulation of gold on the earth is only 29.4 billion francs." .” "Yes." Professor Rosset said, "Since this gold telluride comet weighs 2114.3 billion kilograms, if it falls on the earth, it will bring 710 billion kilograms to the earth. billions of kilograms of gold. If a kilogram of gold is worth three thousand five hundred francs, the total will be worth two hundred and forty-six trillion trillion francs." "On that day," said Servadac, "gold will be worthless, and it will be reduced from a precious metal to a base metal." The professor didn't hear the words.He has gone out with solemn strides. "Then why did this eccentric scholar go to such lengths to calculate these gigantic figures?" asked Ben-Zoff. "No reason," said Servadac. "It's his pleasure."