Paphos People

ON REFLECTION

In physics the study of light refraction opens your eyes to simple yet vey intriguing facts about light and how it behaves in different situations. Things you see are not always what they appear to be. For instance if you look in a mirror, you will only see a reverse image of your face, not what other people see. So what are you going to do about it? Set up another mirror to reflect your backward image into another mirror to give you a true image. The result of this is to create thousands of images stretching into infinity mind blowing stuff. Luckily your brain has the ability to adjust your movements to accommodate the left or right hand actions without consciously thinking about it. So don’t bother!
The reflection of light is when the beam hits a smooth polished surface and it bounces back. If it strikes at ninety degrees it fires straight back that’s when you get a mirror image. If it strikes at any angle then it reacts at exactly the same angle that means you can see round corners. Periscopes enable submarines to see above the surface of the water without having to come up and expose themselves. Boring stuff this physics isn’t it!!
However, not so boring, most fairgrounds have an amusing stall called the hall of mirrors, containing many mirrors with ‘bends’ in them. This makes tall people look short, fat people look thin and vice versa. So if an abnormally short and fat person went in there, he or she should eventually be able to find a perfectly reflected body shape. That’s good fun.
What if our wonderful scientists were to mount huge mirrors on the surface of many satellites all locked in a perfect orbit around the Earth? That would reflect the sun’s rays at night time giving you a continuous twenty four hours of daylight. Think of the advantages to farming, crops and animals would grow twice as quickly and solve the world’s food shortages overnight. Come to think of it overnight would not exist anymore so street lights would not be necessary or any kind of lighting come to that. The same with heating, no more cold nights etc. saving billions in electrical power. Blimey I might have hit upon the solution of all the world’s problems. We could control the climate exactly to our needs. Wow!!
I’m off to the patents office before somebody else thinks of it. This time next year I could be a millionaire! However on reflection..............