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From: rpt@warwick.UUCP (Richard Tomlinson)
Newsgroups: net.physics
Subject: Re: Electric Brae
Message-ID: <405@snow.warwick.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 11-Feb-86 07:57:57 EST
Article-I.D.: snow.405
Posted: Tue Feb 11 07:57:57 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 13-Feb-86 19:44:01 EST
References: <736@brl-smoke.ARPA>
Reply-To: rpt@warwick.UUCP (Richard Tomlinson)
Distribution: net
Organization: Applied Maths, Maths Institute, University of Warwick, UK.
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In article <736@brl-smoke.ARPA> stratton@brl-smoke.UUCP writes:
>
>A friend of mine was in Scotland visiting relatives in December, on
>an island called Ayr.  They took her around sightseeing, and one of
>the interesting places they visited was what the locals referred to
>as "the Electric Brae".  Here's what she writes:
>
>   "My cousins took me to see this neat thing called the 'Electric Brae'.
>    Have you ever heard of it?  A brae is a hill, and this one has a
>    peculiar property: it defies gravity!  We got over the crest of the
>    hill, and cousin Tom put the car in neutral; now, it should have
>    rolled down the hill, right?  But no--the car coasted to a stop and
>    then started backing up the hill!  And my cousin's wife said if you're
>    riding a bike down the hill, you have to pedal; if you're on horseback
>    or even on foot, you have to exert extra effort; and if you pour water
>    on the road it runs up the hill! [Not all the way...but significantly!]
>    They said scientists from many places have come to study it, and no one
>    knows exactly how it works.  Anyway, I was duly impressed."

This was featured on a BBC TV programme about 4 years ago. Unfortunately
when I was in the area 3 years ago I did not have time to look myself.
The explanation offered on the TV programme was that it was all an optical
illusion due to there being a hill on the horizon. The horizon was at an
angle to the horizontal, but the human brain cannot handle that so turns
it horizontal. Everything gets turned, so water that flows down hill looks
as if it is going up hill. There is nothing strange about the Scottish hills,
it is just the brain playing tricks on people.
-- 

        ...!mcvax!ukc!warwick!rpt