Friday, December 07, 2007

Asinine Discoveries:

Stupid people worry me. I seem to be running into a lot of them lately which worries me even more. Here is a list of the top idiots from this week:

  • The two townies who were in an argument about whose kid was better at middle school football. In Clouse's lounge. Really. Highlights include:
    • "Well, my kid didn't even WANT to be on the football team. I told him he had to be cause I didn't want him ending up like one these here homos. (gestures at the music building) Now he is the star quarterback."
    • "Well, sounds to me like North has got a homo for a quarterback then. My son leaves and breathes football like a real man. Shouldn't have to convince a boy to play football!"
  • Stupid vocal majors in my early music history class. A few of today's best moments:
    • (In the middle of the lecture in a bitchy tone) "Ummm... excuse me, can we actually get some real information about what is going to be on the final? I'm feeling like you aren't covering this very well and I'm getting overwhelmed."
    • (During the open question session. . .) "Is the test going to be as long as the last one? You see, I think that it's total bullshit that the last test was longer than the first two. The test before you could take 30.5 seconds per question - but in our last test, there was only 20 seconds available per question - I didn't even get halfway done!
      • (Teacher's response) - "There were the exact same number of responses on each test - 110. If you didn't get done, this is entirely your own fault for not preparing properly." CLOWN.

5 comments:

  1. freestyle tacet11:20 PM

    There seems to be a definite disconnect in that article between the author and the scientists he's quoting.

    I especially like the way he implies that the Schrödinger's Cat thought-experiment was, like, actually performed somewhere.

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  2. John Shanks1:23 AM

    I've only read the first few sentences, and this is crap.

    "The quantum state of the universe" is bunk. How does something comprised of, as is currently estimated, between 10^72 and 10^87 particles have one definable quantum state when "quantum" refers to each of those individual particles individually?



    But actually - observation DOES affect results. This is real, provable quantum science. Schroedinger's cat is a thought exercise, of course - the cat is a macro-object made up of trillions of particles - but for a quantum-level particles, yes indeed you better believe observation affects results.

    Particles can exist in many places at once, so long as they're not observed being in any one place.

    Hell - it can be reproduced in university science labs the world over. Look at the double-slit experiment. The interaction of the observer and the experiment makes no sense classically, but IS part of quantum mechanics.

    I love this shit. It makes so little and yet so much sense. :-P

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  3. John Shanks1:33 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  4. John Shanks1:34 AM

    This is the same comment as I left above - it seemed to have cut off the "m" at the end of "htm" in the first link. If it's still not there, you can add it. :-P


    some links:


    Observer effect on second page:
    http://physics.about.com/od/lightoptics/a/doubleslit.htm

    Here's a fairly accurate, yet condescending cartoon!
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEzRdZGYNvA



    This has been a known effect since the early-mid 20th century, reproduced countless times. It's not trees falling, but it's creepily close.

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  5. Anonymous3:19 AM

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