Children under the ages of 16 must have adult supervision.
On episode 16 of MythBusters, the hosts of the show, Jamie and Adam, were unable to recreate the Archimedes Death Ray and thus considered the myth “busted.” A class of MIT students was not thwarted by their feeble attempts and realized that it could have been a real possibility by doing a little math.
Like many crazy deprived MIT students, they took up the challenge and created a prototype Archimedes Death Ray.
By using an array of mirrors, they were able to focus enough sunlight on a targeted faux ship to set it on fire.
The course instructor, David Wallace, even put together a pretty cool FAQ about the feasibility of such a weapon.
October 13th, 2005 on 7:08 am
When I was little we used to do this to ants on the sidewalk, using a magnifying glass. Blech.