Weird Science

Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages, behold the phenomenal power of ... a plastic spoon? Hard to believe, but this simple piece of disposable flatware possesses properties that can truly amaze those who aren't in the habit of playing with their eating utensils. Even more miraculous, it can keep everyone happy if the restaurant kitchen is slow in bringing out your food.

MATERIALS
Coarse salt
Ground black pepper
Plastic spoon




Wool scarf
Puffed rice
Cereal

DIRECTIONS: Sprinkle salt and pepper on a tabletop and mix them together. Challenge a lab assistant to use the spoon to separate the pepper from the salt. Have pity on him after a few seconds (hey, we said seconds, not hours!). Retrieve the spoon and rub it vigorously on a wool scarf. Then hold it about an inch above the mixture (but not touching). The pepper will leap to the spoon and stick to it.

WHY IT WORKS: Rubbing the spoon gives it a negative charge, which attracts the pepper. It also attracts the salt, but the light flakes of pepper rise up before the heavier grains of salt. If you lower the spoon, the salt will jump up too.

ANOTHER TRICK: Hold the rubbed spoon over some puffed rice cereal. The grains jump up to the spoon, hang there and then--if there's enough static charge--suddenly fly off.

WHY IT WORKS: The grains are attracted to the negatively charged spoon and cling to it until they, too, become negatively charged. Then, because like charges repel, they shoot off.