penguins

it is commonly accepted that the shaker with fewer holes is reserved for pepper while the shaker with the greater number of holes should contain salt. the rationale here is that most people would use more salt than pepper. while it is certainly true that a salt shaker with three holes (for example), would dispense more salt per unit time than a shaker with two holes, should the salt necessarily be placed in the shaker which maximizes flow? do the natural properties of pepper suggest the need for a greater number of holes?

to address the question, i propose the following experiment:

we have obtained two ceramic penguin shakers: one with two holes, and one with three holes, which we will label p and s, respectively. shaker p has been determined to have a liquid volume of 90 ml while the volume of shaker s is 85ml. masking tape will cover the holes and shaker s will be filled completely with mccormick's ground black pepper and shaker p with morton's iodized table salt. the penguins will be individually suspended by their feet from a 4ft length of #38 nyton twine above a 4.5ft diameter wooden surface. the tape will be removed and the flow of substance will be measured. i hypothesize that the p penguin will empty completely while the s penguin will spill only a few flakes of pepper.

since the penguins are still wet from measuring volume, this experiment will be conducted at a later date.