The Feline Conservation of Weight Principle

[bellinghman]

It's about time I wrote this down. Since I'd just formulated this in a reply in mizkit's journal, I thought I'd repeat it here:

sounding like a million cats in army boots.

I have this theory. OK, perhaps only a hypothesis, since nothing is falsifiable when cats are around.

It's called the Feline Conservation of Weight Principle, and it goes like this:

Cats are averagely proportioned small animals, with a weight according to the physical principles of size, density and local gravitational field. However, they are exceptional hunters, extremely light on their feet when stalking, and so on.

It is obvious to an observer that a cat weighs less when stalking. We know this is not due to the gravitational field changing, since the prey don't suddenly also develop strange lightness, so it must be that the cat now has less mass. This is obviously contrary to the normal laws of physics, particularly the law of conservation of mass. Except that the conservation laws are actually slightly bendable - for instance, a subatomic particle may come into existence from nowhere for a suitably brief period, just so long as it disappears again - and this is one of those cases. So long as the average weight of the cat is constant over the longer term, it may vary up and down. When stalking, some of its weight is 'postponed' to the future.

The 'cats in army boots' phenomenon is merely the time that the extra weight comes into effect to rebalance the average.

(Slight editing of the original applied.)

Comments

[oldbloke.livejournal.com]

Newton invented the catflap

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Another detail that I'd missed. But yes, it's all making terrible sense.

If you don't here from me again, you'll know why.

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

Really!

My contribution was going to be that all cats are linked via an etheric field and therefore can share weight out between the whole tribe as opposed to just who eats the food.

And it's ALL ended up with my Java. (Which is ok as she doesn't exactly hunt for her supper :)

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Hah.

Now we have more than one hypothesis, we can attempt to test the differences between them. If yours is correct, then the total weight of all cats together will be constant.

OK ...

All we need is a terribly precise set of scales that we can get all the cats in existence on at the same time. We let one hunt while still on the scales and ensure that the weight doesn't change. Then we take that cat of the scales, check the new weight registered, and let that cat hunt. If the measured weight increases by an amount between zero and the weight of the hunter, then we have evidence consistent with your version. If we get a result outside that range, then the etheric field hypothesis will have been disproved.

I like it.

Anyone got a large set of scales? I'll get busy with the cat herding.

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

Best chuckle of the day.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Glad to have kept you amused.

[beckyl.livejournal.com]

Does hunting things other than food make a difference? Our cats hunt such varied things as toes, each other, bits of string, invisible, cat-eating ghosts...

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Now that's a question.

I think there's a PhD thesis in here. Who can I get to sponsor it, I wonder.

(And are non-graduates allowed to do PhDs?)