Now suppose that we have Clay lean over the lower cosmic ray paddle and put the upper paddle on top of Clay, as seen in the photograph at the left below. We use Clay here because of his extraordinary upper torso muscle and bone mass, seen in the photograph at the right. Speculation has it that this might either absorb some of the cosmic ray muons or possibly provide additional material for interactions to create more cosmic ray muons.
Will the number of cosmic ray muon coincidences detected by our experimental apparatus with Clay between the paddles be more than, less than, or about the same as that when the paddles are held the same distance apart but without Clay between them?
Compared with nothing between the paddles, with Clay between the paddles the count rate will be:
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