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I remembered hearing that on QI, which was enough to turn up this[0]: > "The panel are shown a photo of a man and are asked how his bare bottom helped Britain

I remembered hearing that on QI, which was enough to turn up this[0]: > "The panel are shown a photo of a man and are asked how his bare bottom helped Britain win World War One. The man is William Lawrence Bragg, a physicist and the youngest ever Nobel laureate. In 1915, he was in Flanders trying to figure out a way of using sound to locate enemy artillery. One day, he was sitting on the latrine in the house where he was billeted, and noticed that when there was nearby gunfire his backside momentarily lifted off the seat, even if he didn't hear the explosion. Another physicist he was working with, William Tucker, was billeted in a tar paper hut, and noticed by his cot that there some little holes, and even on windless days little puffs of air were blowing through. The two compared notes, and concluded it was due to inaudible, low-frequency sounds of artillery. They thus began to build detectors, and by 1917 the Allies had really devastating advantage when locating and targeting enemy guns." Unfortunately, I think it's probably made up; I couldn't find a solid source for the story, which seems unlikely if it were true (given that it's a great story, Bragg was decently well known at the time, and 1915 is fairly recent [by "sources disappearing in the sands of time" standards, at least]) Edit: although I suppose the story would've been highly classified for years, so maybe it's plausible that there would be no solid sources. [0] https://www.comedy.co.uk/tv/qi/episodes/15/14 https://www.comedy.co.uk/tv/qi/episodes/15/14

dn3500 6y ago
The definitive source on the history of artillery sound ranging through WWII is Hercz, "Development of the Field Artillery Observation Battalions". He says: "The first officially recognized experiments in sound ranging started in September 1914, when a professor of astronomy from the Paris Observatory was given leave from service at the front to work on this new idea. In Paris he consulted with Lucien Bull of the Marey Physiological Institute... On November 17, 1914, various systems were tested at a base laid out at the Marey Institute. Two guns firing from 4 kilometers away were located within about 50 Meters." He also credits Ernest Esclangon of the Bordeaux Observatory with discovering that the microphones needed to filter out the high frequency sound of the shell in flight and listen only to the low frequency sound of the gun wave. And he adds, "The Germans expedited the work by conveniently moving the front lines to the suburbs of Paris, where the scientists could readily travel between the laboratories and the ultimate proving ground of combat areas."
lifeisstillgood 6y ago
Thanks - it was QI! But this reminds me of the "luck and the prepared mind" issue. We can all relate to the story because we can all imagine sitting on the loo. But we aren't Nobel Prize winning physicists, so we could not of the extra mile. It's similar for penicillin- I could easily leave a window open and have spores infect my petri dishes - it's just the Fleming also happened to be Britain's leading bacteriological researcher at the time. Happy accidents don't push science forward - happy accidents that occur to trained scientists who have been funded and supported for many years, pushes science forward.

dn3500 6y ago

The definitive source on the history of artillery sound ranging through WWII is Hercz, "Development of the Field Artillery Observation Battalions". He says: "The first officially recognized experiments in sound ranging started in September 1914, when a professor of astronomy from the Paris Observatory was given leave from service at the front to work on this new idea. In Paris he consulted with Lucien Bull of the Marey Physiological Institute... On November 17, 1914, various systems were tested at a base laid out at the Marey Institute. Two guns firing from 4 kilometers away were located within about 50 Meters." He also credits Ernest Esclangon of the Bordeaux Observatory with discovering that the microphones needed to filter out the high frequency sound of the shell in flight and listen only to the low frequency sound of the gun wave. And he adds, "The Germans expedited the work by conveniently moving the front lines to the suburbs of Paris, where the scientists could readily travel between the laboratories and the ultimate proving ground of combat areas."

lifeisstillgood 6y ago

Thanks - it was QI! But this reminds me of the "luck and the prepared mind" issue. We can all relate to the story because we can all imagine sitting on the loo. But we aren't Nobel Prize winning physicists, so we could not of the extra mile. It's similar for penicillin- I could easily leave a window open and have spores infect my petri dishes - it's just the Fleming also happened to be Britain's leading bacteriological researcher at the time. Happy accidents don't push science forward - happy accidents that occur to trained scientists who have been funded and supported for many years, pushes science forward.