Q1.
While you are sitting on the moving merry-go-round, look around you. Do the objects around you appear to be moving? In which direction do they appear to be moving?
Answer
Yes, everything around you appears to move — and it appears to move in the direction opposite to your own turning.
You are sitting facing outwards while a friend turns the merry-go-round slowly in the anti-clockwise direction. The benches, the trees, the school building and the sky all seem to sweep past you in the clockwise direction.
| Merry-go-round turns | Surroundings appear to turn | What is really moving |
|---|---|---|
| Anti-clockwise | Clockwise | You (with the merry-go-round) |
| Clockwise | Anti-clockwise | You (with the merry-go-round) |
Why it happens: your eyes cannot see your own turning; they only register that the direction in which each object lies keeps changing. The brain reads that change as "the object moved". The apparent motion is always in the opposite sense to the real motion of the observer.