7 Science Phenomena That Are Basically Magic

5. The Anti-Gravity Levitating Wheel

In this video, Veritasium's Derek Muller appears to defy gravity by lifting a 42lb weight at the end of a rod above his head like it's no big deal. Usually it would be practically impossible to do this unless you were literally Thor, but, when the circular weight at the end of the rod is rotated very quickly, it just alters the forces that are acting on it.

The weight isn't floating, it feels apparently lighter due to a phenomenon called gyroscopic precession. When the weight at the end of the rod is spinning, it has angular momentum. Gyroscopic movement is pretty mind-bending stuff, and their nature is often still up for debate amongst scientists but, basically, if you apply torque (i.e. you push) a gyroscope in a particular direction, the motion of the spinning object is actually at 90 degrees from the direction of torque. It's momentum will make it "feel" lighter, despite the mass remaining the same.

Still confused? Watch the video below of Muller's explanation.