system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
If I pick up my coffee right after I stir it, so that it's still swirling around, will there be a gyroscopic effect making me less likely to spill it?
gpt
In theory yes, but in reality you'd probably be more likely to spill it. Once you tilted the cup at all you would lose the swirl as the liquid deformed against the cup wall and that creates imbalances. You can actually try this. Stir up a liquid in a cup where the liquid mass is as great as possible relative to the cup (paper cups work well) and then pick the cup up by your fingertips. Tilt the cup to one side to disturb the vortex and you should feel the cup trying to move around in various directions as the vortex collapses and sloshes against the cup unevenly.