One of my mates jokingly jabbed me in the arm with two paperclip-prongs, which seemed to be connected to a capacitor. There was a spark and it made me jump quite a bit.
After nearly trying to decapitate the twit, he explained that it was a very small capacitor (500pF I think) at very high voltage (several kilovolts). I told him that was completely dangerous but, rather annoyingly, what he then said made sense:
the capacitance of the human body is around 300-500pF, and static electric shocks are between 3000 and 50,000V - so really it's no different from a static shock.
Is this actually true, or am I really lucky to still be alive?
After nearly trying to decapitate the twit, he explained that it was a very small capacitor (500pF I think) at very high voltage (several kilovolts). I told him that was completely dangerous but, rather annoyingly, what he then said made sense:
the capacitance of the human body is around 300-500pF, and static electric shocks are between 3000 and 50,000V - so really it's no different from a static shock.
Is this actually true, or am I really lucky to still be alive?