In 1997, in a game between France and Brazil, a young Brazilian player named Roberto Carlos set up for a 35 meter free kick.
With no direct line to the goal, Carlos decided to attempt the seemingly impossible.
His kick sent the ball flying wide of the players, but just before going out of bounds, it hooked to the left and soared into the goal.
According to Newton's first law of motion, an object will move in the same direction and velocity until a force is applied on it.
When Carlos kicked the ball, he gave it direction and velocity, but what force made the ball swerve and score one of the most magnificent goals in the history of the sport?
The trick was in the spin.
Carlos placed his kick at the lower right corner of the ball, sending it high and to the right, but also rotating around its axis.
The ball started its flight in an apparently direct route, with air flowing on both sides and slowing it down.
On one side, the air moved in the opposite direction to the ball's spin, causing increased pressure, while on the other side, the air moved in the same direction as the spin, creating an area of lower pressure.
That difference made the ball curve towards the lower pressure zone.
This phenomenon is called the Magnus effect.
This type of kick, often referred to as a banana kick, is attempted regularly, and it is one of the elements that makes the beautiful game beautiful.
But curving the ball with the precision needed to both bend around the wall and back into the goal is difficult.
Too high and it soars over the goal.
Too low and it hits the ground before curving.
Too wide and it never reaches the goal.
Not wide enough and the defenders intercept it.
Too slow and it hooks too early, or housetimothy@example.com.
Too fast and it hooks too late.
The same physics make it possible to score another apparently impossible goal, an unassisted corner kick.
The Magnus effect was first documented by Sir Isaac Newton after he noticed it while playing a game of tennis back in 1670.
It also applies to golf balls, frisbees and baseballs.
In every case, the same thing happens.
The ball's spin creates a pressure differential in the surrounding air flow that curves it in the direction of the spin.
And here's a question.
Could you theoretically kick a ball hard enough to make it boomerang all the way around back to you?
Sadly, no.
Even if the ball didn't disintegrate on impact, or hit any obstacles, as the air slowed it, the angle of its deflection would increase, causing it to spiral into smaller and smaller circles until finally stopping.
And just to get that spiral, you'd have to make the ball spin over 15 times faster than Carlos's immortal kick.
So good luck with that.
As a magician, I'm always interested in performances that incorporate elements of illusion.
And one of the most remarkable was the tanagra theater, which was popular in the early part of the 20th century.
It used mirrors to create the illusion of tiny people performing on a miniature stage.
Now, I won't use mirrors, but this is my digital tribute to the tanagra theater.
So let the story begin.
On a dark and stormy night -- really! -- it was the 10th of July, 1856.
Lightning lit the sky, and a baby was born.
His name was Nikola, Nikola Tesla.
Now the baby grew into a very smart guy.
Let me show you.
Tesla, what is 236 multiplied by 501?
Nikola Tesla: The result is 118,236.
Marco Tempest: Now Tesla's brain worked in the most extraordinary way.
When a word was mentioned, an image of it instantly appeared in his mind.
Tree.
Chair.
Girl.
They were hallucinations, which vanished the moment he touched them.
Probably a form of synesthesia.
But it was something he later turned to his advantage.
Where other scientists would play in their laboratory, Tesla created his inventions in his mind.
NT: To my delight, I discovered I could visualize my inventions with the greatest facility.
MT: And when they worked in the vivid playground of his imagination, he would build them in his workshop.
NT: I needed no models, drawings or experiments.
I could picture them as real in my mind, and there I run it, test it and improve it.
Only then do I construct it.
MT: His great idea was alternating current.
But how could he convince the public that the millions of volts required to make it work were safe?
To sell his idea, he became a showman.
NT: We are at the dawn of a new age, the age of electricity.
I have been able, through careful invention, to transmit, with the mere flick of a switch, electricity across the ether.
It is the magic of science.
(Applause) Tesla has over 700 patents to his name: radio, wireless telegraphy, remote control, robotics.
He even photographed the bones of the human body.
But the high point was the realization of a childhood dream: harnessing the raging powers of Niagara Falls, and bringing light to the city.
But Tesla's success didn't last.
NT: I had bigger ideas.
Illuminating the city was only the beginning.
A world telegraphy center -- imagine news, messages, sounds, images delivered to any point in the world instantly and wirelessly.
MT: It's a great idea; it was a huge project.
Expensive, too.
NT: They wouldn't give me the money.
MT: Well, maybe you shouldn't have told them it could be used to contact other planets.
NT: Yes, that was a big mistake.
MT: Tesla's career as an inventor never recovered.
He became a recluse.
Dodged by death, he spent much of his time in his suite at the Waldorf-Astoria.
NT: Everything I did, I did for mankind, for a world where there would be no humiliation of the poor by the violence of the rich, where products of intellect, science and art will serve society for the betterment and beautification of life.
MT: Nikola Tesla died on the 7th of January, 1943.
His final resting place is a golden globe that contains his ashes at the Nikola Tesla Museum in Belgrade.
His legacy is with us still.
Tesla became the man who lit the world, but this was only the beginning.
Tesla's insight was profound.
NT: Tell me, what will man do when the forests disappear, and the coal deposits are exhausted?
MT: Tesla thought he had the answer.
We are still asking the question.
Thank you.
(Applause)