In the world of cinematic science fiction one of the most appealing themes involves a universe brimming over with intelligent life. In this imagined future (or past) humans interact with alien friend and foe because they've at last hammered down the ability to travel to distant stars and galaxies, and, yes, "to boldly go where no man has gone before.” Having grown up on the original Star Trek series, observed the effect of the Star Wars movies on the zeitgeist of movie-going generations and enjoyed sci-fi soap operas like Battlestar Galactica, I have to admit I wish we could make it happen; no matter the odds.

Has the law of gravity suddenly taken a vacation? Au contraire. Is the trickster in this video using sleight of hand? Nope. Can you use this trick to pick up women at cocktail parties? Possibly. Let’s analyze just what's going on here.

This video provides a beautiful illustration of Newton’s Second Law in both its linear and angular form. The discombobulated newscaster experiences a linear acceleration in a backward direction, and a clockwiseangular acceleration that gets him spinning, all as a result of the force of the sled’s impact.

Tic, the unfortunate hamster in this video, loses his footing while getting some exercise and gets pulled into the spin cycle, completing nearly 12 revolutions in about four seconds before ignominiously dropping out of the wheel. However, while Tic may be bewildered by what happened during his morning training session, we need not be.

Why does he get pulled into the spin? How does he remain in orbit for 12 rotations before falling off of the wheel? How does he finally escape? These are the questions we will address “for Tic’s sake.”

The counterintuitive demonstration in the video is a beautiful example of the concept of center of gravity. It sure looks like the fork and spoon should immediately teeter off of the glass and crash onto the table. And it’s even more dramatic when half of the matchstick burns away but the contraption still balances on the edge of the glass. But it’s all physics.

Spiderman, Batman, the Fantastic Four, Ironman—seems like every time we go to the movies, there's some guy in a unitard saving the world with acts of unnatural physics. We realize that these are works of fantasy, so we don't get too upset when the science portrayed in them comes from some alternative universe.