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"Gravity may not seem like a weak force, but it is.
The simplest illustration of gravity's weakness is the old
'rub-a-balloon-on-your-hair-and-stick-it-to-the-ceiling'
trick. When you do that, the attractive force of maybe ten
billion extra electrons on the balloon is enough to hold it
up against the gravitational pull of the entire Earth pulling
on a billion trillion atoms in the balloon. Gravity is
preposterously weak compared to the electromagnetic force."
-- Chad Orzel,
2009-08-25 [
thanks to
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acroyear70
for quoting it earlier (and including the observation from a physics
prof that, "it takes gravity 30-something seconds to get you to
fall a certain number of stories from the roof of a building...and
electro-magnetism a fraction of a fraction of a second to stop
you."]
(no subject)
(no subject)
Argh!
Regional difference?
4 definitions found
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:
Storey \Sto"rey\, n.
See {Story}.
[1913 Webster]
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:
Story \Sto"ry\, n.; pl. {Stories}. [OF. estor['e], estor['e]e,
built, erected, p. p. of estorer to build, restore, to store.
See {Store}, v. t.]
A set of rooms on the same floor or level; a floor, or the
space between two floors. Also, a horizontal division of a
building's exterior considered architecturally, which need
not correspond exactly with the stories within. [Written also
{storey}.]
[1913 Webster]
Note: A story comprehends the distance from one floor to
another; as, a story of nine or ten feet elevation. The
spaces between floors are numbered in order, from below
upward; as, the lower, second, or third story; a house
of one story, of two stories, of five stories.
[1913 Webster]
{Story post} (Arch.), a vertical post used to support a floor
or superincumbent wall.
[1913 Webster]
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
storey
n : structure consisting of a room or set of rooms comprising a
single level of a multilevel building; "what level is the
office on?" [syn: {floor}, {level}, {story}]
From U.S. Gazetteer Counties (2000) [gaz-county]:
Storey -- U.S. County in Nevada
Population (2000): 3399
[...]
(I think I spell it 'storey'/'storeys' slightly more often than 'story'/'stories', but I definitely switch back and forth, and am influenced by which spelling I've seen most recently -- and leave either spelling intact when quoting, of course.)