r/theydidthemath • u/IWorkForDickJones • 1d ago
[Request] Tower is 650 meters tall. It takes 7 seconds to form one regret. How many things can you regret if you fall?
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u/Icehammr 1d ago
Since you have a little more than eleven and a half seconds left to form regrets, I would say you would have at least one fully formed regret.
How many partial regrets is left as an exercise to the reader.
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u/AidenPangborn 1d ago
Only 1. t= sqrt((2x650)/9.81)=11.5 seconds. The issue with this is that you have to realize what situation you are in before you can even comprehend the decision that you will regret. With all the adrenaline of falling, idk if you could even allow yourself to try to regret it.
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u/HAL9001-96 1d ago
negelcitng drag
this is actually kinda exactly on the line where neglecting drag is not a great approxiamtion anymore but assuming constant terminal velocity isn't eithe so you have to model the transition in between
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u/IWorkForDickJones 1d ago
This is the kind of shit I am here for!
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u/HAL9001-96 1d ago
that gets you pretty close to exactly 14 seconds but ti depends on your falling position
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u/IWorkForDickJones 1d ago
My falling position. Nuh unh. If I ever fall for 12 seconds it had better be into the arms of John Stamos.
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u/iangardner777 1d ago edited 1d ago
It depends on how you fall. If you try to spread out on your belly, let's say you reach a terminal velocity of ~55 m/s in ~5.5 seconds. You would travel ~150 meters in that time.
So, the final 500 meters would be a little over 9 seconds at a relatively constant velocity of ~55 m/s. Giving you a total of ~14.5 seconds. Probably enough for 2 regrets (hopefully at least one of them is going up the tower in the first place 🤣).
Lots of rounding, but probably not a huge factor as there are so many unknowns. If you did a swan or pencil dive the math would be closer to the idealized 11.5, probably at least shaving off enough seconds to lose your full second regret. 🖖
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u/iangardner777 1d ago edited 1d ago
Just another small thing to consider. It actually takes a fair bit longer than 5.5 seconds to reach terminal velocity. However, your rate of acceleration is going to be very close to 9.8 m/s² until you get to 80 or 90% of your terminal velocity and air resistance really starts to affect your acceleration. So, we could probably try to factor this in, however it's not going to affect the overall time all that much, maybe ~0.5 to 1.5 seconds more to the total (but that is just a total guess. 🖖)
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u/Funny-Part8085 1d ago
It takes a person 12 seconds to go 1500 feet and reach terminal velocity. So so if your 7 seconds figure is wrong you'd get 1 or .5 But some thoughts take half a second so you could have 6 thoughts total.
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u/Wockysense 1d ago
Well there would be the regret for not finding the right footing and there after realizing my harness isn't attached. Then it is just a Oh fuck, shock, dread, fear, me passing the tops of other buildings wondering if I could grab on to something, nope, annnnd that is it.
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u/SuperBatzen 28m ago
Every suicide surviver who tried killing himself from jumping states that the regret of letting go of the railling is instantaneous, so, i wonder, what do people think about in their remaining seconds?
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