FILMS IN COLLEGE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22723, 8 November 1935, Page 13

FILMS IN COLLEGE

CAT AS STAR ACTOR

LANDING ON FOUR FEET

(From Oub Own Correspondent) SYDNEY, October 29. With the house cat as one of the principal actors, slow motion films are being used at Xavier College, Melbourne, to illustrate fundamental principles of physics and science. The pictures were taken on a movie camera by the science master and projected on a screen in the laboratory as part of the normal class lessons.

One film demonstrates the principle known to science as the principle of angular momentum, or to the layman as the reason why a cat, dropped from any height, always manages to fall on its feet. For this, the aid of the house cat was enlisted in the cause of science, and while the science master operated the camera, the cat was dropped back downwards and feet pointing to the sky, and all of its muscular movements were recorded. The result was a film which, when reproduced in slow motion, showed the student exactly what the text books meant by the explanation:— • “ The cat first pulls in its forelegs and turns its forepart round. It pulls in its hind legs, extends its 'forelegs at right angles and rotates its hind part in the opposite sense to that in which it was last rotated. This will result in the forepart being rotated back again, but by a lesser amount than before. So the cat is permanently slightly rotated, both fore and aft, in the direction of the original rotation, and, given time (that is, distance), repetitions of the cycle continue until the rotation is ISO degrees.” The manner in which the cat uses ‘its hind legs in turning over

is identical with the movements in what is known as the “ roll method ” in high jumping by athletes. During the experiments with the house cat, which is a general favourite at Xavier, precautions were taken to ensure that' it was in no way in jured. The second film illustrated Gallileo’s principle that bodies fall with equal velocities irrespective of weight. Two weights, one of 101 b and one of 21b, were dropped from a given height, and their flight was photographed. The slow motion picture shows them striking the ground at the same instant. The science master explained that other scientific truths, including the laws of magnetic induction and the lonic theory, could be illustrated by slow motion films. Film classes have been in progress.at Xavier College for about three months, and are extremely popular among the boys.

No cessation of the persecution of Jews in Germany was noticed ‘by Mr Gerald Morrison, of Christchurch, during a recent visit to that country. Mr Morrison said in an interview with the Press, that anti-Jewish riots were going on all the time he was in the country, and the Jews were subjected to all sorts of restrictions, even to the using of telephone booths. “The Jews won’t leave the country because they cannot take their money with them,” he said. “ More Jews would go if they could, but Hitler sees to it that they don’t take any money with them. AH people when they get to the border are searched to see that they are not taking money out of the country illegally.” «