Yippee! The Book has made its way down south to the Land of the Long Weekend! (That's Australia, in case you hadn't worked it out...)

I just wanted to comment about eggs standing on their ends on the equinox. The funny thing is that I'd never heard of this until I visited this site, and didn't know of the background until I read the book.

A good comparison for the belief is Thanksgiving Day, a day which appears to be a big issue for Americans, but not for anyone else in the world. You'd think that if there was anything to it, people outside the USA would've heard of it.

Incidentally, in Australia, the seasons start on the first of the month, not on the solstice or equinox. So if there was anything to this belief, when would our eggs stand up?

(Oh yeah, and the design of Australian toilets seems to be quite different from that of American toilets. What's this about the direction water flows when you flush a toilet?)

Actually, meteorological seasons start on the first of the month as well. Meteorlogical winter is December 1st to February 28 (or 29th), spring March to the end of May, summer June to the end of August, and fall September to the end of November.

Oh, and this is for the northern hemisphere obviously [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

Rob

Here in Japan, I've found quite a few people know of American Thanksgiving, probably from movies and other media, or contact with Americans, but of course almost noone knows anything about it, time, season, or purpose. And that's understandable.

For those of you who don't know, it's one of the biggest holidays in the U.S., falling near the end of November. It originated in a single event in U.S. history and as such, it it is a peculiarly American holiday (Canada has it's own version falling on a different day though). It's a time of feasting and celebrating the successes of the year with your loved ones.

It's very important to most Americans, but we tend to forget that it doesn't reach out beyond our borders, so we often assume everyone else knows all about it (we do that a lot, you know). But then again I'm sure we can find similar examples in most countries of the world.

As for the egg thing, I guess it's another American invention, one that became pretty popular here, but hasn't infected everyone in the world yet. I guess you Aussies just got lucky.

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...And that, my liege, is how we know the Earth to be banana-shaped. --Sir Bedevere

Actually, I'm an all-American boy and I, too, had never heard of the egg-balancing thing until I ran across it on the BA site. I wonder if it could be a regional thing?

In any case, non-Americans should not get the idea that it's all that big a deal, even here. Certainly not as big as, say, Thanksgiving.

By the way, although American Thanksgiving commemorates a particular event (the first harvest by the Pilgrim invad... uh, settlers), does it not have its roots in much more ancient harvest festivals?

Thanksgiving is that very special time of year when many Americans are forced by guilt to visit distant relatives who they don't actually like, so they can sit around talking awkwardly and trying to outdo each other on how great their lives are. Thanksgiving is also the day when shopping malls mark the middle of the Christmas shopping season; and when Bart destroys Lisa's centerpiece.

When I first heard of it, around thirty years ago, the newspaper article I read said it had been borrowed from some eastern european custom, I believe.

For the MID LATITUDES of the northern hemisphere. And even then, especially in coastal locations, this doesn't always hold true.

CJSF

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"Be very, very careful what you put into that head, because you will never,
ever get it out."
--Thomas Cardinal Wolsey (1471-1530)


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Christopher Ferro on 2002-04-22 14:47 ]</font>

Well, just one day after I make the sweeping statement that the egg business is basically unknown here in Australia, what d'you think happened?

Someone asked about it on the Self Service Science Forum (www2b.abc.net.au/science/k2/stn/).

Oh well, it gave me a chance to plug this site and the book... [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

curiuse, if this was true (ands it not so dont say) if the gravity made the egg able to stand only on one day would this gravuty not affect othert things? (i.e italy tower of piza?)

its spring! quick! get away from the tower

(tower falls down)

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<marquee> the guy that has come from mars, for no reason (no reason, or you think for no reason......) </Marquee>

... tourists arrive in flocks to see the Lying Tower of Pisa ...

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Garlic Bread?!?!

. . . and The Large Pile of Rubble, that it Made, When it Landed on a Nearby Building, Killing Dozens!

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If you Ignore YOUR Rights, they Will go away.

Exactly. Florida for example has two 'real' seasons. Spring from November to March-ish and the too dang hot Summer from March-ish until November. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

Kizarvexis

Actually, the Leaning Tower of Pisa has been buttressed against falling over, permitting tourists once more to climb to the top. It was once a great spot for testing the dropping of objects of different weights to demonstrate that they both would land simultaneously (although I am not certain that Galileo actually dropped anything from the Pisa tower).

If one reads a lot, one will find references to balancing eggs on the date of the Vernal Equinox. Then again, almost any silly explanation can be found to substantiate almost any silly notion. I suggest that everybody should make up his/her own stupid fake idea and announce it to the world via the media (which would seem to be eager for any silly notion to announce on the evening news). Somebody is bound to pick it up and run with it, and a new flapdoodle idea will germinate from it. Of course, this will necessitate that new books be written to show the errors involved -- and so on, ad infinitum...

ljbrs [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_rolleyes.gif[/img] [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_confused.gif[/img] [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif[/img]

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"There is in the universe neither center nor circumference." Giordano Bruno Born 1548. Torched 1600.

I'm currently reading Dava Sobel's "Galileo's Daughter" and he apparently did drop stones from the tower. It should be noted that the stones were of different size (of course) and were affected differently by air resistance. The stones did not land at the same time. Thus to the staunch Aristotle dogmatists, proving Aristotle. Yes, Galileo was only slightly wrong and Aristotle was really wrong, but guess who they sided with. [img]/phpBB/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

I actually heard about the egg balancing on the local radio station last spring when a school student phoned in to the breakfast show and said how she had been doing the egg balancing experiment at the exact moment of the equinox. Apparently her high school science teacher had been discussing it in their lessons:-(

The incidence of Egg Balancing BA may not be as common in Australia as it is in the USA but it is here none the less.

With regards to the beginning of seasons in Australia being on 1 December, 1 March, 1 June and 1 September my understanding that this "tradition" dates back to when Australia was a colony under British military rule. Apparently the soldiers and officers had to change from summer uniform to winter uniform on 1 June and back again on 1 December. Thus officially defining winter and summer. I assume the other seasons were added to provide an appropriate balance.

I suppose that bureaucratic simplicity was more important than scientific fact.

I first heard about egg-balancing in elementary school, from a teacher who introduced the myth so he could debunk it. I guess I was pretty lucky back then.

After I read the egg section in the site I immediatly tried it. To my surprise I accomplished this task with relative ease. Then I showed my sister and she didn't believe that it was standing all by itself. She insisted that it was being supported by salt. So she lifted it up and said "Oh, so it was standing there by itself... OOPS!" Then I tried to do it again for the rest of the day and the other day too without success. I guess im jinxed?

if you dropped an egg from the tower of pisa on the equinox, would it smoosh on end?

no, seriously, there are so many people (warning: national-centricsm ahead) coming to the US all the time, there's no real way to tell where every little smart aleck idea comes from.

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None to speak of

Good example of a holiday unknown outside of its own home- Guy Fawkes Night, AKA Bonfire Night, AKA Fireworks Night, in the UK, a time to celebrate the fortunately foiled attempt (or damn good attempt, depending on your point of view) by Guy Fawkes to blow up Parliment.

We set off tonnes of fireworks a la 4th of July. And burn stuff. Unlike Independence Day, which I imagine is quite warm, we celebrate this on November the 5th, when it's freezing cold and/or raining, and exactly the wrong time to be out at night trying to get fireworks to work.

We don't get time off, but I couldn't think of anything else...

Do people have Boxing Day (extra day off after Christmas) in the US? I think I heard it happens in Canada...

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No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?

Yep, we have it, but I'm not sure if you get off of work for it. Doesn't apply to schools, you get two weeks holiday at Christmas anyway...

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Quaeso quousque humi defixa tua mens erit? Nonne aspicis, quae in templa veneris?

nope. not in the US. the day after Christmas here is the day after Christmas. we do have Thanksgiving though, the last Thursday of November. and the day after that is the biggest shopping day of the year. not exactly a holiday...but nice to have off none-the-less.

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None to speak of