Wacky news that makes you go "wtf?"

[cmd]

http://tgsc.ru/__HRB__.html

http://tgsc.ru/http://mersenneforum.org/showt.html

[davieddy]

Originally Posted by __HRB__

Perchance, Dr. Wilson, but I certainly do coke and play the vicodin.

I shall provisionally put "Dr Wilson" down to a typo, since I
can't think that googling will help in this case.

OTOH
http://www.bakerstreetdozen.com/coca.html

and assuming vicodin is some type of medicine:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_47QrDUneD0

Dr Feelgood

[__HRB__]

Originally Posted by davieddy

I shall provisionally put "Dr Wilson" down to a typo, since I can't think that googling will help in this case.

Two ounces of google are approximately worth ounces of theory:

http://www.google.com/search?q=dr.+wilson
http://www.google.com/search?q=dr+wilson

Hint: House Homes and Holmes are homophones.

Originally Posted by ckdo

Hmmm... Lupus?

It's never Lupus.

[schickel]

http://www.fitsnews.com/2010/02/04/t...tary-of-state/

[retina]

Research findings discover the plainly obvious.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by retina

Research findings discover the plainly obvious.

In the history of science there have been many "plainly obvious" phenomena[1] which on investigation have been found either not to be obvious or just plain wrong. Distinguishing between the plainly obvious and the misleadingly plainly obvious requires either experiment or observation.

In other words, the report appears to be sound science to me. Perhaps not particularly fundamental science, but good science nonetheless.


Paul

[1] It is plainly obvious, for instance, that heavy things such as stones fall faster than light things such as feathers.

[retina]

Originally Posted by xilman

It is plainly obvious, for instance, that heavy things such as stones fall faster than light things such as feathers.

Well I am perfectly happy to bet with you, for the affections of a beautiful lady observer, that my rock will hit the ground before your feather. We both stand atop some high place, no higher than say 300m above the Earth's surface (like for example the Leaning Tower of Pisa), with standard apparatus (a rock for me, and a feather for you) with no alteration to their normal weight, shape or composition. We both drop at the same time. Who will win? Unless you somehow manage to strip away all of the atmosphere in the local vicinity, then you don't stand a chance :p

[xilman]

Originally Posted by retina

Well I am perfectly happy to bet with you, for the affections of a beautiful lady observer, that my rock will hit the ground before your feather. We both stand atop some high place, no higher than say 300m above the Earth's surface (like for example the Leaning Tower of Pisa), with standard apparatus (a rock for me, and a feather for you) with no alteration to their normal weight, shape or composition. We both drop at the same time. Who will win? Unless you somehow manage to strip away all of the atmosphere in the local vicinity, then you don't stand a chance :p

Let us, rather, perform this experiment more scientifically. In particular, we should carry out a double blind trial. Let an assistant put a rock into one sealed box and put a feather into another visually identical box. The boxes are required to be markedly heavier than the objects they contain so that we can not determine by feel which contains which object. Let another assistant, one who is unaware of which box contains which object, bring the boxes to us. We will then each choose a box and proceed to the top of the tower. We should repeat this exercise several times in order to detect any systematic errors, such as inadvertent imparting of an upward or downward velocity to the boxes imediately before release.

Which will win?


Paul

[retina]

Originally Posted by xilman

Let us, rather, perform this experiment more scientifically. In particular, we should carry out a double blind trial. Let an assistant put a rock into one sealed box and put a feather into another visually identical box. The boxes are required to be markedly heavier than the objects they contain so that we can not determine by feel which contains which object. Let another assistant, one who is unaware of which box contains which object, bring the boxes to us. We will then each choose a box and proceed to the top of the tower. We should repeat this exercise several times in order to detect any systematic errors, such as inadvertent imparting of an upward or downward velocity to the boxes imediately before release.

Which will win?

I like my version best, so I am prepared to sweeten the odds in your favour. I will let you throw your feather towards the ground, with your own arm(s) only, as hard as you please AND give you a 30 second head-start AND I will throw my rock upwards at the 30 second mark. All assuming we conduct the test from atop the LToP as mentioned above.

Anyhow, since when has science impressed beautiful lady observers? She would run away from all the geeky science nerds doing boring tests with boring boxes.

[xilman]

You didn't answer my question. According to you, it should be plainly obvious which would win. So, which is it?


Paul

[retina]

Originally Posted by xilman

You didn't answer my question. According to you, it should be plainly obvious which would win. So, which is it?

Well it was so obvious I didn't bother to answer. But since you don't seem to know I will let you off the hook. The rock will win. The box with the rock will have a higher density and will be less affected by atmospheric drag. And since you wanted to repeat the test numerous times this aids in my proof. Even if it was only 0.1% more dense then with enough trials the difference will become clear and obvious. But with your test, being double blind and whatnot, how is the beautiful lady observer going to know who won? You also didn't answer my question!