Question

The volume of a stone can be determined by the displacement method using a measuring cylinder. True or false.
(A) True
(B) False

Answer 1

Hint: A measuring cylinder is also known as a graduated cylinder. It is a common piece of laboratory experiment used to measure a fixed volume of a liquid. It has a narrow cylindrical shape and the markings on the cylinder are in millilitres.

Complete step by step answer:
To measure the volume of a stone, we begin by filling the graduated cylinder with enough water to completely immerse the stone in. Now the initial reading or the baseline reading must be noted down followed by the immersion of the stone into the cylinder. Once the stone is completely submerged, the final reading of the cylinder must be noted. The difference in the readings of the cylinder gives us the volume of the stone in millilitres. This value can be converted into other units of measurement if need be.
The displacement method is also known as submersion or dunking method. This method is based on Archimedes’ Principle that the amount of fluid displaced is equal in weight to the displacing object.
Hence, the displacement method can be used to determine the volume of stone.
The correct option is (A).

Note: Displacement method becomes very useful because we don’t have formulas to calculate the volume of irregular objects like we have formulas to calculate the volumes of spheres, cubes, etc. So the volume of the human body and other oddly shaped objects by measuring the volume of fluid displaced. Also, volumes of huge bodies such as ships whose density is not the same throughout and the mass are too large to be measured can also be measured using the displacement method.