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springs

  • Springs operate according to the principle of Hooke's Law. (Wikimedia Commons)
    Springs In The Cafeteria
    Walker Rhea
    You're in a line at a cafeteria. You take a plate off the top of a stack of plates. The other plates in the stack rise from below just far enough to present the next plate at the same height as the one you just took. This system reflects a general principle of springs: if you put twice as much force on a spring, it compresses, or stretches, twice as far.