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xkcd #3084: Unstoppable Force and Immovable Object (imgs.xkcd.com)
submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by xkcdbot@lemmy.world to c/xkcd@lemmy.world
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Title text:

Unstoppable force-carrying particles can't interact with immovable matter by definition.

Transcript:

[An arrow pointing to the right and a trapezoid are labeled as 'Unstoppable Force' and 'Immovable Object' respectively.]
[The arrow is shown as entering the trapezoid from the left and the part of it in said trapezoid is coloured gray.]
[The arrow is shown as leaving the trapezoid to the right and is coloured black.]
[Caption below the panel:] I don't see why people find this scenario to be tricky.

Source: https://xkcd.com/3084/

explainxkcd for #3084

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[-] AmidFuror@fedia.io 28 points 7 months ago

The expression as I heard included "an irresistible force."

[-] SGG@lemmy.world 28 points 7 months ago

That's on the nsfw version of xkcd

[-] Randelung@lemmy.world 3 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

xkcd after dark, or xkcdad. But not pronounced xkc-dad.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 7 months ago

Yeah, irresistible force is the version I know. Now I'm wondering if there are even more versions. Are they regional deviations?

[-] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago

Well I'm from Utica and I've never heard the term "irresistible force"

[-] Tyoda@lemm.ee 1 points 7 months ago

Not in Utica, no. It's an Albany expression.

[-] Get_Off_My_WLAN@fedia.io 2 points 7 months ago

While not what you're asking for, but fun fact, in Asia, this sort of paradox is represented by the story of the all-piercing spear and the unpierceable shield in Chinese philosophy. So in Chinese and Japanese, the word for 'paradox' or 'contradiction' literally means 'spear-shield' (矛盾).

[-] Goretantath@lemm.ee 15 points 7 months ago

Facepalm Man i'm dumb, this is a great answer to that thought experiment.

[-] Piafraus@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago

Force is not a thing that moves. Force is what is applied to an object. In this "answer" whatever is shown and depicted as force is not force.

[-] AA5B@lemmy.world 0 points 7 months ago

Then reverse the assumptions. Maybe it’s the immovable object that can’t be interacted with. Apply all the force you want and meet nothibg

[-] Piafraus@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

If you applied the unstoppable force and the object of application did not move - then this force was not unstoppable

[-] ech@lemm.ee 1 points 7 months ago

Eh, it's just redefining the assumed meaning. "Intangible" does mean "unstoppable" in a way, but that's not really what's intended.

[-] ianhclark510@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 points 7 months ago

"What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?" that image doesn't show a force meeting an object

[-] BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org 54 points 7 months ago

They met, they just didn’t interact. Kinda like me at a work party.

[-] wreckedcarzz@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

"where's the food and booze?"

[-] Successful_Try543@feddit.org 1 points 7 months ago

There is no force without interaction, just linear momentum.

[-] InnerScientist@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

That just moves the problem, what happens if I put a piece of paper between them? Unless they don't interact with anything they still face the same problem.

[-] Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz 4 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Maybe the universe will crash due to division by zero, floating-point error, integer overflow and segmentation fault, all of them occurring simultaneously. The objects will experience infinite velocity and infinite forces, there will be rounding errors, the system will run out of RAM and storage space. The universal CPU will max out all threads, and run out of cooling capacity. The hardware catches fire, the entire universe immediately collapses into a singularity, resulting in a new big bang as the system reboots. Oh, and the log files are corrupted, so good luck troubleshooting that one.

[-] gnufuu@infosec.pub 2 points 7 months ago

A popup will appear asking you to buy the "Extended Physics" DLC

[-] Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz 1 points 7 months ago

First billion years free. After that it’s 17.99 per millennia.

[-] lud@lemm.ee 1 points 7 months ago

What currency?

I doubt the universe accepts Euro or whatever.

[-] noxonad@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

It's just 17.99. Take it or leave it.

[-] starman2112@sh.itjust.works 1 points 7 months ago

That's actually how black holes are made

[-] Zwrt@lemmy.sdf.org -2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Division by zero is just zero.

Just think about it. You have 4 slices of pie and 0 people to eat any.

How much pie did each of those no people eat. Clearly the answer is just 0.

Education took us for absolute fools.

[-] Hamartiogonic@sopuli.xyz 3 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

This one is a bit counterintuitive. My maths teacher explained it like this. Take a look at this graph. If you approach zero from the positive side, it looks like the line goes to infinity. If you approach zero from the negative side, it appears to go to negative infinity instead.

Is it both, is it zero, is it all the values? The canonical answer is “undefined”. The value of y at x=0 doesn’t have a meaningful answer.

[-] WolfLink@sh.itjust.works 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

It’s just as true a statement to say each of those 0 people at a billion slices of pie.

However, with these types of word problems, there’s usually the implication that the pie is now gone. There’s kind of a problem figuring out where the pie went when nobody ate any pie.

[-] jecxjo@midwest.social 2 points 7 months ago

i think I've made that game engine before.

[-] Cochise@lemmy.eco.br 1 points 7 months ago

This is soo politically charged that can't be seen as political anymore.

[-] Charlxmagne@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

Pretty sure none of these exist so idk why it bothered any1 in the first place.

[-] Smokeydope@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

There are some pretty close physical analogs that are fun to think about. You cant move a black hole by exerting physical force on it in the normal way so practically infinite gravity wells are like a immovable "object", though if you're sufficently nerdy enough you can cook some fun ways to harness its gravitational rotation into a kind of engine, or throw another black hole at it to create a big explosion and some gravitational waves which are like a kind of unstoppable force moving at the speed of light.

[-] turtlesareneat@discuss.online 1 points 7 months ago

Relevant username

You can attract a black hole using gravity tho

[-] Harvey656@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

You clearly haven't met my mother.

[-] lugal@sopuli.xyz 0 points 7 months ago

Is the an unstoppable force or an immovable object or a little bit of both?

[-] Harvey656@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

Both.

[-] pyre@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

if people only bothered to think about things that exist (especially things that they think exist) we would probably go the way of the dodo. funnily enough that would prevent the dodos from going that way but whatever.

I highly recommend watching the Vsauce video on supertasks—it's a great video as expected from Vsauce but also ends on a great note about people and their tendency to think about things like this.

[-] LovableSidekick@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Noooooo! You're violating my binary thinking! Either A or B has to win!

[-] SkunkWorkz@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago

So neutrinos?

[-] billwashere@lemmy.world 0 points 7 months ago

🤯

[-] iAvicenna@lemmy.world 0 points 7 months ago

so if god creates rock so heavy that it can't lift it, its hand just passes through the rock? makes sense.

[-] PlexSheep@infosec.pub 0 points 7 months ago

No that doesn't make sense. The thing you're alluring at is a classical thought experiment showing contradiction in allmightiness.

P1: God is Almighty, meaning he can do anything

Therefore he must be able to create a stone he can't lift. But then there is something he can't do: Either he can not lift the super stone, or he can not create a super stone that he can't lift.

[-] iAvicenna@lemmy.world 0 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

lol I am not alluring to anything I am just giving a xkcd twist to this well known paradox

[-] traceur301@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 7 months ago

.. it's 'alluding', y'all

[-] Tippon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 7 months ago

I don't know, heavy things attract other things, so maybe it is alluring ;)

[-] Dasus@lemmy.world 0 points 7 months ago

I create an immovable basketball hoop.

You have an unstoppable basketball.

What's the issue?

[-] Shardikprime@lemmy.world -1 points 7 months ago

I like to jam, but sometimes I also like to slam

this post was submitted on 02 May 2025
209 points (98.6% liked)

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