Wacky news that makes you go "wtf?"

[kladner]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...ef=mostpopular

The Wichita Eagle reports that two brothers were partying together to celebrate a $75,000 winning lottery ticket, when they accidentally blew up their Wichita home.

One of the brothers went to the kitchen to refuel the butane torches they planned to use to light their bongs. He emptied a couple of large cans of butane lighter fluid, leaking butane into the air.

"The butane vapor reached the pilot light in the furnace, and as you might expect, ka-boom,” Wichita Police Sgt. Bruce Watts said at a press conference.

[Uncwilly]

Originally Posted by kladner

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...ef=mostpopular

They don't qualify for the Darwin Award:

Nominees significantly improve the gene pool by eliminating themselves from the human race in an obviously stupid way. They are self-selected examples of the dangers inherent in a lack of common sense, and all human races, cultures, and socioeconomic groups are eligible to compete. Actual winners must meet the following criteria:

Reproduction
Out of the gene pool: dead or sterile.

[kladner]

Oh well. I guess they would have had to blow their balls off to qualify. Children were mentioned, too, but no details as to their parentage.

[c10ck3r]

Originally Posted by kladner

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...ef=mostpopular

50 miles south of where I live. I was actually in the same town the day it happened.

[Batalov]

"Columbia University says it's reviewing a science class in which a professor stripped to his underwear and showed 9/11 video footage during a lecture on quantum mechanics."

[only_human]

Originally Posted by kladner

Children were mentioned, too, but no details as to their parentage.

The children’s mother is the girlfriend of the brother who was burned

http://www.kansas.com/2013/02/19/268...k=omni_popular

[Nick]

A new amazing story from Retraction Watch about a paper that should never have been published:
http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com...ogy-retracted/

[LaurV]

Wonderful! Thanks for that link, long time I did not laugh so hard. I clicked a ling from that article and found this. Articles retracted because they made no sense mathematically. You have to read the comments, especially the one with Nobel Prize in Physics, with the link to the published papers. I don't know what was in their heads ROFL to publish that.... How to find dark matter experimentally, bhwaa haaaa! I will die laughing...

[Dubslow]

"the discovery of magnetic monopoles in 2009"...


Wowzers, that was a major fsck up by many people.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by Dubslow

"the discovery of magnetic monopoles in 2009"...


Wowzers, that was a major fsck up by many people.

I need to look into it again but I definitely remember a report of about that date in which magnetic monopoles had indeed been discovered.

Of course, they weren't a type of fundamental particle. They were collective behaviours of charge carriers in a semiconductor (if I remember correctly) where the aggregate formed a magnetic dipole, each pole of which could be manipulated pretty much independently. A solid state version of a magnetic monopole / anti magnetic monopole pair in other words. If it helps to picture what's going on, think of it as the magnetic analogue of a positronium atom.

[only_human]

Thousands of litres of whisky flushed down drain in Dumbarton

It is understood the mix-up happened at Chivas Brothers during the night shift on Tuesday while equipment was being cleaned.

Instead of draining away waste water, the workers on duty somehow flushed out thousands of litres of bulk whisky.