NationStates Jolt Archive

I have been looking at this over and over and I can't figure out what is wrong with this...

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/trigrid.gif

Thats fucking bizzare.

I've figured it out though.

I know the answer. *** SPOILER WARNING ***


























Nope, won't tell ya.

It's easy enough to figure out if you stare at it long enough, just a bit strange if you think of it as one object.

Whoever figures it out, please explain it to me (preferably in the spoiler deal).

I'm too stupid to answer it right.

Edit: Answer hidden in Opal's spoiler...

Whoever figures it out, please explain it to me (preferably in the spoiler deal).

How do you setup those spoiler things anyway

I used mspaint to move the pieces form the second triangle to repossision them in to the config of the frist and it work out prefectly.

Click the quote button to see the bracketed stuff.

It's an optical illusion.

See, a 2x5 right triangle does not have the exact same angle of inflection as a 3x8 right triangle. They only look like they do in that picture.

If you add up the areas of all four pieces in each picture, they will be the same: 32 square units.

Whereas, you cannot measure the entire block as a right triangle with 5x13 dimensions because it ISN'T a right triangle. It only seems to be one.

*Real spoiler alert*

Okay, I've changed nothing in this picture but to fill the black borders in blue.

http://www.imagepilot.com/img.dll?x=20040828_23:31:34_Blue_border..JPG

Now, observe what happens when I take off "draw opaque" and overlay the top one onto the bottom one.

http://www.imagepilot.com/img.dll?x=20040828_23:31:00_Overlay.JPG

A thin sliver of blue, all the way along, adds up to exactly one square, showing that the first triangle is subtly smaller than the second.

Here I've just higlighted some of the points where you can see that it isn't the same triangle, the triangle's border crosses the grid at different points.

http://www.imagepilot.com/img.dll?x=20040828_23:37:07_Highlight.JPG