In the opening scenes of the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones tries to remove a gold idol from a booby-trapped pedestal. He places the idol with a bag of sand of approximately the same volume. (Density of gold= 19.32 g/cm^3 and density of sand = 2 g/cm^3).
(a) Did he have a reasonable chance of not activating the booby trap? Explain.
(b) In a later scene, he and an unscrupulous guide play catch with the idol. Assume that the volume of the idol is about 1.0 L. If it were solid gold, what mass would the idol have? Do you think playing catch with it is plausible?