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I must admit...
I get great delight from reading your column and your answers to questions. It makes me laugh.
To make sure I'm asking a question, Why is it that a fan turns in a clockwise direction?
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Want to answer more questions in the Miscellaneous category?
Maybe give some free advice about: Random Weirdos?
Thank you for reading my column--I've read advice columns for years and always thought of lovely sardonic answers I would have given, but it's that old scenario where someone yells at you and you find yourself speechless... then think up the PERFECT retort hours later. So THERE! ... sucks.
Aha, but THIS way I can ponder as long as I like and respond to the prompt without having to be... well, prompt.
Sorry about the pun. They've been attacking me lately. It's the exam stress.
As to your fan question, it's simple physics, really. Fans, as you of course are aware, pull the air from the center of the room to the walls, suck it into the blades, then propel it downward again to the center of the room. This is why they feel so damn good when you're right in front of them. You are also aware that the earth's currents and weather patterns are created by wind, which is caused by the heat of the sun and rising and falling pressure. I hope you're having a white Yule, because here it's 46 degrees and brown. This is all due to wind.
Now, the wind created by the sun would quickly die out if it weren't for fans of every shape and size, from those little touristy handheld ones to Japanese geisha fans to ceiling fans to window fans. In large cities the wind tends to slam down between tall buildings precisely because of the concentration of window fans in every apartment complex. Those fans are sucking the wind toward them and making weather. This is all well and good, and there is wind.
Now conversely, if the fans turned in the opposite direction, that is to say anticlockwise, the fans would not be pushing air out the front, would they? They would be SUCKING air into the front and expelling it out the back, but only if the blades were reversed. Fanblades are tilted to make them pull in air. If you spun them in the opposite direction, air would be pulled in the front and then dispelled in all directions from the sides, back and front--drastically cutting down the speed and efficiency of the fan. In short, it would be like trying to spin a bunch of lumpy boxes. No go.
Let's theorize that every fan in the world were spun backwards, with the blades as they are. The sun goes on shining and creating baby wind on the ocean, and it attempts to travel to land, but when it reaches the coastal cities in Mexico and France, the fans there suck it in and then shoot it in all directions. The power of the wind is churned into complete turmoil.
One of two things will happen here. The wind will be confused and pull or push itself away from the coast, creating a little weather-rich blob over the sea (thus a hurricane) or it will churn more and more over these coastal cities, making a chaotic storm spawning thousands of malicious little tornados. Destruction ensues. Little fishing villages die, the fish market collapses; Japan, who is rather dependant on sea foods, falls to the hand of the storms; the rest of the world, who is rather dependant on electronics, computers, Playstation games, little cars, sushi and anime, also falls to the horror of Japan-deprivation and their own storm centers.
As you can see, it is very imperative that fans turn clockwise. Of course, if the blades were also reversed, the fan would just blow UPWARD and make you very annoyed at having a cool ceiling and a hot room. But I am certain you will now have a thorough understanding of why fans must, I repeat, MUST continue to turn in the direction they do. The weather of the world depends on it!
Have a very jolly weekend!
~Koshii
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