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From: csdf@mit-vax.UUCP (Charles Forsythe)
Newsgroups: net.origins
Subject: Re: The Mathematics of Powerlifting and the case of the Ultrasaur
Message-ID: <769@mit-vax.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 5-Sep-85 19:56:05 EDT
Article-I.D.: mit-vax.769
Posted: Thu Sep  5 19:56:05 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 10-Sep-85 08:28:35 EDT
References: <387@imsvax.UUCP>
Reply-To: csdf@mit-vax.UUCP (Charles Forsythe)
Organization: MIT, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 78

Ted Holden proves his ignorance of science and math thus:

>                                                                 Scientists
>          studying dinosaurs in the  last century  determined that  the big
>          sauropods  could  not  stand  on  land, that they were simply too
>          heavy,  and  must  therefore  have  lived  in  water  where water
>          buoyancy would  help carry  their huge bodies. 

Scientists studying electro-magnetic radiation in that last century
determined that the "waves" traveled in a medium called "ether". They
were wrong, Ted.

>               1000 lbs = K * pie * (5 ** 2)
>
>          using the  old Fortran  notation in which  "*" means "times", and
>          "**" means "raised to the power of".  K will thus be taken  to be
>          12.74,  both  for  human  heavyweight  powerlifters,  and for the
>          ultrasaur.

I think we can all follow the notation, Ted. Thanks anyway. Also, I
don't know what the "pie" constant is, but you might want to use "pi"
which is a much more interesting one.

Another question. Why is "K" this same for men and Ultrasaurs. Why isn't
it half or something?

>	   Of course, the
>          ultrasaur didn't have access to  dianabol.

Of course. I suppose that because humans do not produce luminous
chemicals then neither do fireflyes?

>               This value for K is thus crude, but  it gives  the ultrasaur
>          two  large  benefits  of  doubts.   First,  the  ratio  would, in
>          reality, be higher for a maximally trained human athlete than for
>          any herbivore,  particularly a  laid-back one like an elephant or
>          sauropod which  wasn't  into  sprints  or  anything  amounting to
>          maximum efforts.

You mean the same "laid-back" elephants that stampede large trucks and
smash them? Be consistent, Ted! The value for K is crude. It is almost
completely made up. I'm glad you follow weight-lifting Ted, but your
comparing apes and lizards here. Also, I though the mighty ULTRASAUR was
a mean and nasty killer (who had to out-run his prey in the lighter
gravity).


>	   Secondly, we  are talking about what the human
>          can lift just once as a maximum total effort i.e. with  no margin
>          for error.   In reality,  if Kaz or one of his pals were shooting
>          for a squat of 800 lbs  at a  meet, a  practice might  consist of
>          four or  five repetitions  with 500 lbs, followed after a fifteen
>          minute rest by two or three reps with 650 or 700, followed by the
>          attempt for  a single  squat at 800.  That is to say, to have any
>          margin for error, you must subtract at least a hundred  and fifty
>          lbs. or so  from the  human athlete's  lift and  then compute the
>          ratio.  

Maybe the Ultrasaurs did Aerobics. (After all, wasn't Jane Fonda around
in the Velikoskian world?)

>               Stanley Friesen  and several  other commentators  on the net
>          have  replied   in  numerous  articles  that  they  don't  really
>          understand the reason why  a  hundred  foot  long,  three hundred
>          thousand pound  ultrasaur would  have any insurmountable problems
>          functioning in our gravity.  This article is dedicated to them.

This is no intuitive leap for anybody. We all realize that a creature
like that wouldn't last very long in the world. In fact, it might even
become extinct.
-- 
Charles Forsythe
CSDF@MIT-VAX
"We pray to Fred for the Hopelessly Normal
	Have they not suffered enough?"

from _The_Nth_Psalm_ in _The_Book_of_Fred_