It doesn't, the 2 human eyes do. The reversed light rays are focussed as an image behind the mirror.
Or could it be that the puzzle has a false premise? A mirror does not really reverse left and right at all; instead, it reverses front and back along an axis perpendicular to the mirror. We merely "find it convenient" to call our image left/right reversed because we happen to be bilaterally symmetric.
This may or may not work. Bear with me.
Picture the light waves as a collection of biros, nibs forward, in the shape of, I don't know, Barbara Windsor. Now move this rather odd sculpture towards a mirror, so that all the pens leave a mark. The far left side of Babs' face will come into contact with a point on the mirror which will PHYSICALLY still be on the left of the silhouette which has been left on the glass, but which the brain tries to READ as the right because it is trying to interpret the image before it as a face like any other. Similarly the pens on the right side have left their mark on the right side of the silhouette, but your brain will automatically read the right side of anything facing you as being its left side � which would begin to make sense if the mirror image were to turn away and come and stand next to you. (Then again, all kinds of things would probably seem to make sense at that point.)
However the pens at the top of Barbara's bouffant hair would still leave marks at the top of the silhouette, and the pens at the bottom of her face would still leave marks at the bottom.
... And now, thinking about it, I'm not sure why...
Shit.
oh for chrissakes
>We merely "find it convenient" to call our image left/right reversed because we happen to be bilaterally symmetric.
Um... surely someone with half their face blown off would still find that their image was reversed? And I'm not entirely convinced about this "perpendicular axis"... Then again, it's been a while since I was at school, busy not listening to any of this.
>oh for chrissakes
That's it, RHC. You tell it like it... Hold on, won't you have to start revising stuff like this soon? You should be taking notes, not whingeing and tossing your hair.
(I'm guessing about the hair part, incidentally. But I've seen enough 15-year-old girls in my time to know the drill.)
The key to the mirror puzzle would seem to lie in some subtle disanalogy between left/right and up/down. Both of these pairs of directions are relative to the orientation of the body (unlike, say, east/west and skyward/earthward). But as any child (including the Radiator Head one) will attest, left/right is much harder to master than up/down. The human body displays no gross asymmetries between its two sides. (There is, of course, the heart, but that is hidden.) So "left" and "right" have to be defined in terms of "front" and "head": Your left hand is the one that is to the west when you stand on the ground and face north. This would remain true even if a surgeon cut off your two hands and sewed them onto the opposite arms.
Aah, but I'm not a hair tosser.
Hang on that's not right...
(And I already know this stuff am taking triple award GCSE science thank you very much! I just don't see it's relevency in this site, or the point in discussing it)
Aah but RHC, surely television is a 'true' mirror which reverses not?
It's because we have two eyes spaced horizontally. If our eyes were one above the other up and down would be reversed.
Then why don't we see any change in a mirror when we lie on our sides...?
Left/right is logically parasitic on front/back, whereas up/down is not. And a mirror, everyone agrees, reverses front and back. That must be why it also reverses left and right.
Right. Well, thanks for answering your own question. Join us next week for another baffling edition of "What The Fuck?".
A mirror does not reverse left/right. It keeps it the same.
If your identical twin stands opposite facing you, then left and right are reversed. What you are doing is mentally assuming that the "you" in the mirror has gone through a similar rotation.
So the up/down and left/right are treated the same - neither are reversed.
Sorry I think Mogwai's comment was to stop.
Now.
Exactly. If you stand in a rectangular room, with a mirror on wall, and face the mirror directly then point towards the wall to your left, the image of you in the mirror will be pointing in the same direction towards the same wall.
Your mirror image isn't a version of you standing in front of you who has turned 180 degrees to face you but a version of you standing in front of you who has had every molecule of their face sucked backwards through their head, in order to disorient you and scare you shitless. That's something to ponder next time you find yourself staring in the mirror on one of those trips to the bathroom that seem to last for weeks when you're stoned to buggery*.
(*so I'm told)
Or just put cocaine up your backside and don't bother with the mirror.
Sorry, the "exactly" was in response to Peter O's post, not RHC's. I'll stop now.
How do microwaves work?
>Left/right is logically parasitic on front/back, whereas up/down is not.
In that case, doesn't this whole question actually hinge on WHY up/down is logically not affected by reflection, while left/right is? In which case surely we're moving into the realm of pure logic, and away from bathroom cabinets.
>Or just put cocaine up your backside and don't bother with the mirror.
I love the way this forum helps me plan my weekends.
Actually, they should write the "choice" column in Radio Times like that: "There's bugger all worth watching on tonight, so why not try..."
>Sorry I think Mogwai's comment was to stop.
>Now.
Well, to be fair, it wasn't exactly an enforceable command. More an expression of bewilderment.
>How do microwaves work?
Switch them on at the wall.
NEXT!
Oh dear dear dear.
Boothby Graffoe naked and smeared in honey.
Right, that's distracted RHC's attention: anyway, back to mirrors...
lol
You there! Stop lolling about and get on with your homework.
No, too distracted...
>Boothby Graffoe naked and smeared in honey.
The place, not the person. Aaaaahh!
>>Boothby Graffoe naked and smeared in honey.
>
>The place, not the person. Aaaaahh!
Now I'M distracted...
exactly what i was thinking about, heh hem...
bored and horny, what a fun weekend this is gonna be...
>bored and horny, what a fun weekend this is gonna be...
No good just quoting the forum motto back at us, Rade.
>>>Boothby Graffoe naked and smeared in honey.
No message I just like saying it.
Does anyone agree that RHC's character has changed over the last day or two? Her postings have become more assertive, more sexually confident and, well, more adult. What's happened in your life, RHC?
I've been throwing up for two days, I'm probably just delirious
No doubt your convoluted academic postulating on this thread has provided a metaphorical grinder on which to sharpen her intellect, thus bringing her one step closer to womanhood. You must find teenagers blossoming into maturity all over the shop whenever you start threads like this, with your "perpendicular axes" and "subtle disanalogies", you sly old professorial dog.
And you can tell it's all been too much for her - the poor girl's sick with the effort of it all. You must use your powers wisely, Lusk. Not just to make young girls vomit.
Don't stop now!
The mirror image of a mirror is the same orientation as you are.
Boothby Graffoe compered my third ever gig.
I was dodgey but well intentioned.
He was smeared in honey.
[Hey, it was at Up The Creek]
I hate you Janet.
(In a jealous way)
LOL
z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.is someone taking the mick?.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.it's all an artifical thing reality created by computerszz.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.boothby.z.z.z.z.honey.z.z.z.z.RHC.z.z.z.z.z.2001 copyz.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.z.golf.z.z.z.z.z.z.
I deny that! <malfunction> Boothby is mine!
identify< boothby> radiator head child<affirmative> just checkingidentify <janet>
sorry, distracted again (did you see the first bit of The Stand Up Show?)
No, I was too distracted gazing at the honey in my kitchen cupboard. Was it good?
How can naked Boothby be bad?
If it started reversing up and down, then it would have to start on diagonals as well, and then we'd all be fucked. That's what I think.
When he's holding a gun to ya mothers head demanding money?
That would be bad.
Still be cute though, and talented, and fit and...
...covered in honey.
You read my mind.
Don't tell anyone what you saw!