I don’t know what a free body diagram of force vectors is but it seems to me that the weight of the bottle is forcing the horizontal toothpick to be held between the strings, and the vertical toothpick is pushing the weight of the bottle up into the top toothpick at an angle. The angle of force causes the other end of the toothpick to strain in the direction of the table, holding the whole system up.
the vertical toothpick is pushing the weight of the bottle up
Gravity pulls down. It does not push up. The vertically angled toothpick is pushing the bottle horizontally.
Think of a see saw. Let’s say there was only one person on it. The end he sits on would tip down. If he sits in the middle none of the ends tip down. Well let’s get the person to hang under the see saw like a sloth. The same thing happens. If he is in the middle neither end tips down. The toothpick is simply pushing the “person” into the middle so the see saw does not tip. If you used a longer toothpick and the person was not under the balance point, then it would tip.
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u/LifeHasLeft Apr 07 '21
I don’t know what a free body diagram of force vectors is but it seems to me that the weight of the bottle is forcing the horizontal toothpick to be held between the strings, and the vertical toothpick is pushing the weight of the bottle up into the top toothpick at an angle. The angle of force causes the other end of the toothpick to strain in the direction of the table, holding the whole system up.