We do not and can not "sit on" a chair

[Thomasnor1]

whoooooaaa! i am floaaating, man!

[TheHONKYLIPS]

i can sit on your moms face

[Bluedrake42]

um... what if sitting on the chair... means you're hovering over a chair... since when does "sitting" mean that you have to physically touch anything on a molecular level?

[Axiss360]

Does this mean I can't actually kiss my girlfriend? D:

[AraGuitar]

yes, but FOR ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES... :P

[JanPBtest]

He is not really incorrect but the way he says it he strongly suggests it's the electrostatic repulsion between electrons that does this. It does not, I think Dyson or Ulam calculated this precisely for the first time. What makes matter solid in this person-chair sense is the Pauli exclusion principle which the electrons obey (i.e. a purely quantum mechanical effect is responsible).

[josepinnaple]

Then why can we feel different textures? If i can feel the chair then I made contact with the chair. I think

[mexicano7771000]

@josepinnaple Because the they have textures, and we can feel it. The repulsion is just like a layer over the actual mass. So if the mass suddenly dips (Like a crack in wood) the layer of electrostatic repulsion goes along with it like a blanket. Hopefully that helps (:

[raydredX]

@josepinnaple You feel chairs too when you sit on them don't you? Even though you aren't exactly touching it you can feel it. But the term touching doesn't make much sense in the tiny tiny world. It makes stuff simple in the macro world.

Therefore I'll say that I am touching this chair even if I'm not.

[badjaeaux]

He's a Samurai

[angel951ism]

Thirds a tony little field around everything that is matter like a tiny shield or a invisible outline of matter, actually the only known person who actually touched matter was chuck.norris

[meandmyevo]

Chuck Norris can sit ON a chair.

[Fredkrug3]

You thought it was a person on the chair? Nope, chuck testa.

[Vonstuker4]

Ok, so let me go make a chair made out of razors and lets see if i dont get cut

[AlphaCrucis]

@Vonstuker4 You will get cut, but nonetheless, you still aren't really touching the chair

[Vonstuker4]

@AlphaCrucis what you say makes no sense, sorry

[NuovaCraft]

im 14 and i love physics. 

[Mengster13]

I thought this was gonna be blooper of Dr. Michio Kaku falling his chair.

[msam1970]

Like I said " GRAVITY IS UP"

[emporer15]

How can I feel the chair without touching it?

[Etrajbe]

@emporer15 u feel the repelling of the electrons. the force in between, sorta.

[AlphaCrucis]

@emporer15 The sensation of touch is due to the nerves in your body experiencing pressure. The chair, or more precisely, the electrons that comprise the chair repel the electrons that comprise your body so there is a force upon your nerves and you feel the chair.

[797ization]

News flash mutha fucka!

[greatwhitenorth112]

waaay too many non rational comments on informational videos

[PhysiologicAli]

this guy explains things so well and most importantly NOT BORING like so many professors.

[012333280]

Wow i will keep that in mind

[austinmlqst]

DDDDDDEEEEERRRRRRRPPPPPPPP!!!!­!!!!!

[MexicanJudge]

I KNEW IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My mom never believed me when I told her that we can't touch anything!! HAAAHAAHAAHHAAHAHHAAAHAHAAA

[brndn1705]

alright im gonna have to call bullshit.. you feel other pieces of matter because your making full contact with them. electrons might repel each other naturally but when you add a force agaisnt them they are not strong enough to maintain the gap between the objects. example being all of our asses on our chairs.

also if that was the case then friction would be nonexistent because things wouldnt be able to touch to create it. objects would just glide smoothly against all surfaces.. duhh micho kaku!

[Consorharley]

@brndn1705 Not really. You feel other pieces of matter because they exert a repelling electric force on you. It feels hard because the force is so sudden. Your body is electrically neutral, but the electrons and protons in your body are separated. Once the protons get close enough together, they'll repel each other before they can touch.

If the protons DID touch, you'd know it because you'd blow up. That's what nuclear fusion is =P.

[everlastingfrond]

@brndn1705 HAHAHAHAHAH Dear lord I love the internet. Did you just call BS on one of the (if not THE) greatest minds of our time? This is epic.

[koerund]

@brndn1705 you think u can argue with this super smarto? dont lemme laugh.

[TheJustinfernandez]

@MrGallowsAbomination

indeed i was wondering the same,

since i can feel the material of the table my arms are resting upon.

[TheAwesomeJunk]

Peoples brains aren't hardwired to understand this stuff!!!

[eminence18]

lol some of these comments are funny, especially since I'm sure most aren't physicists

[eminence18]

epic

[Johnathon394]

omg I'm floating!

[MrGallowsAbomination]

sensory perception is faulted then, to be microscopically near something is enough to "feel" it as we know "touching"

[hcvideoproductions]

Physics is so fucking fascinating, but at a horrible price, it is ridiculously difficult

[Etrajbe]

@hcvideoproductions We humans are unlike other animals, not only granted the beautiful gift of opening our eyes, but the ability to UNDERSTAND why they are open, not taking that ability to the fullest is stupidity :)

[Xephirox900]

@hcvideoproductions I can relate to that so well :(

[ZerkosXD]

@hcvideoproductions and also it may all be wrong. i mean it's all theory.

[hcvideoproductions]

@ZerkosXD But it's most likely true. One of the fascinating parts of Science is the journey into the unknown and finally finding new stuff, proposing new ideas, etc.

[AlphaCrucis]

@ZerkosXD It depends on what you mean by wrong. Newton's laws can be said to be correct as they accurately describe nature under everyday circumstances, yet they fail to accurately describe nature correctly under extreme cases such as in predicting the behavior of objects moving near the speed of light or in predicting the position of an electron near an atom.

[Nouri8885]

well I am sitting ont his chair because if i wasnt then how come my butt feels the chair against it, the chair is solid, and if the chair was away from my butt then my butt would just feel a different thing that wasnt a chair so therefore my butt is sitting on a chair

[vandread3555]

@Nouri8885 Not really, the electrons repel each-other in the "shape" of your butt, and the shape of the chair. Your Nerve cells feels "pressure" from the repel of the electrons, so your brain calculates that your butt, is "on" the chair.

[Pigroota]

So when I run my finger across 2 different surfaces, smooth and rough, the minute differences are perceived by my brain? Ie: is that to say it is impossible to actually touch something?

[TheWeirdcrap]

@Pigroota yeah, cause if you did, you would cause an nuclear chain reaction and BOOOM!!!!

xD

[n809n]

@Nouri8885 you dont get the man's point

[sk8rdman]

If you examine the structure of an atom, you'll find that a vast majority of all matter as we know it is actually absent space. Only a very small portion of the space in an atom is taken by it's nucleus, and an even smaller portion of that space is taken by it's electrons. All the rest is nothing, empty space, completely and utterly void. It's only through the mysteries of quantum physics that all matter as we know it doesn't dissemble and fly into an infinitely larger and unpredictable void.

[gredangeo]

Someone's been thinking too hard. :)

[G5ive1]

good question about the getting cut by certain objects, someone should elaborate scientfifcally as to this question.

[Typho0n86]

Your a minda

[tjpower9999]

not we don't come in contact..huh? then what happens when someone cuts themselves or burns thems?

[NSB0953]

You're thinking of matter in a different way. Nothing really comes in contact with anything (subatomically speaking). Doesn't mean that cutting yourself would be an illusion.

[mignik01]

@tjpower9999 i don know about cutting urself but u don't need to come in contact with anything to burn urself, the heat energy is enough.

[lars1122334455667788]

LOL:D. But well also obvious in some ways if you believe physics^^:P

[xXCptCharlesXx]

Bad-ass! Wow, PonderAbout you have some sweet videos on Youtube...

[colinrocks636]

hahah cool thing to think about.