President Obama Defeats Archimedes Death Ray
In an exclusive interview with CBS News’ Bill Plante, Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman from “MythBusters” talk about President Obama’s appearance on the popular Discovery Channel show on December 8.
In the episode the two myth-busting men are summoned to the White House and receive a directive from the President himself to put the myth of “Archimedes death ray” to rest once and for all by using a full scale re-enactment.
The myth goes something like this. Archimedes is said to have ordered 500 soldiers to harness the power of the sun to reflect rays off of polished shields pointed at oncoming Roman ships. The myth indicates that the tactic worked and the Roman ships caught fire.
Mythbusters will use an old cruise ship lifeboat, outfitted to look like a Roman ship and sail it toward a mob of shield-wielding middle and high school students standing on the shore of San Francisco Bay.
Is the sun powerful enough to start a fire? You bet. But is the formation of shields into one, big reflecting mirror enough to scuttle a ship? You’ll have to watch and find out.
Leave a Reply
