You carefully drop a stone into a beaker full of water. The stone sinks to the bottom and water spills out. What can you say about the weight of the displaced water?

1 Answer
anor277
Mar 7, 2016

That (i) the volume of water displaced is EQUAL to the volume of the STONE, and (ii) that this volume has a mass less than the mass of the stone.

Explanation:

I can only say this with respect to water; because a #1# #g# mass of water has a VOLUME equal to #1# #mL# or #1# #cm^3# (i.e. #rho" density of water" = 1*g*cm^-3#.

There are other liquids available, for instance mercury metal. Given that #rho_(Hg)# #=# #13.55*g*mL^-1# (check on that value!), what would you predict with respect to the buoyancy of objects in liquid mercury? We float on water, would we float on mercury? What about an iron girder?

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