Plane Stupidity: There is a particularly annoying "puzzle" floating around the web, making appearances in various blogs. I would like to answer it for you ahead of time.

The question is posed: If there was a treadmill large enough that could hold a jet plane, would the plane be able to take off?

If you are lucky enough to stumble across this on a fairly active blog that allows comments, you will be privy to all sorts of moronic "explanations" as to why the plane would take off. They are wrong, it wouldn't.

Most people get this wrong because they assume that the jet engines are what cause the plane to take off. That is false. The engines provide thrust, but a plane flys because of lift, which comes about because the plane's wings are designed so that the pressure from the air under them is much higher than the pressure of the air above them. I believe this is also called the coriolis effect. To generate that air pressure you need speed; you need to be moving forward very fast. If you believe you are moving forward on a treadmill, you need to get to the gym more often. On a treadmill the thrust from the engines does not result in any air pressure on the wings; the plane will not leave the ground.

This explanation will not mollify the idiots you encounter in these blogs. They will continue to believe in their own theories, however asswitted they may be. That can be frustrating at first, but then you realize that it gives you an excuse to mercilessly flame their profound lack of intellect and their suspect genetic heritage. Which is nice.