Chapter 23, Problem 15Q

A child looks into a pool to see how deep it is. She then drops a small toy into the pool to help decide how deep the pool is. After this careful investigation, she decides it is safe to jump in—only to discover the water is over her head. What went wrong with her interpretation of her experiment?

To determine

What could have gone wrong even after a careful investigation, when a child decides it is safe to jump in a pool only to discover the water is over her head.

Answer to Problem 15Q

Solution:

Due to the phenomena of refraction, the toy and bottom of the pool both appear to be closer to the surface when viewed from outside the pool. By deciding the apparent depth of the toy, the child wrongly decides the depth of the pool to be less and jumps into it. But, the water is over her head. Hence the experiment done by the girl went wrong.

Explanation of Solution

A child looks into a pool and estimates the apparent depth of the pool and drops a small toy into the pool to estimate the depth.

The decision that the child has taken to jump into the pool which is found to be wrong after having taken the extensive analysis of the depth of the pool such as looks into a pool to see how deep it is and then drops a small toy into the pool to decide.

Due to the phenomena of refraction, the toy and bottom of the pool both appear to be closer to the surface when viewed from outside the pool. By deciding the apparent depth of the toy, the child wrongly deciding the depth of the pool to be less and jumps into it. But, the water is over her head. Hence the experiment done by the girl went wrong.