Best quote:
... trapped black holes are so tiny, they could pass through a block of iron the distance from the Earth to the Moon and not hit anything. They would each take about 100 hours to gobble up one proton. At that rate ... "about 100 protons would be destroyed every year by such a black hole, so it would take much more than the age of universe to destroy even one milligram of Earth material,"[experimental physicist Greg] Landsberg concluded. "It's quite hard to destroy the Earth."Of course, the rest of the quote should end with ... "not that it will stop us trying. Mooohaahahahahaha." Christ, when you get around to thinking up a name for a Death Star-like planet destroying weapon of choice for 9 out of 10 mad scientists, it's going to be something like a Large Hadron Collider.
Anyone else having flashbacks to The Quiet Earth?
A Snopes a Day; or, Shit You Should Stop Believing:
Book Excerpt: How PR Sold the War in the Persian Gulf - scroll down to the section called "Suffer the Little Children". Goddamn bastards. I'm all for territorial integrity and not letting nations get away naked aggression, but that shit is cold.
CSI for skeptics:
Houdini's Impossible Demonstration
You-have-got-to-be-fucking-kidding-me time:
The Orgone Howitzer (link stolen from Mutopia). Normally I'm all for things ending in -howitzer, but this really takes the cake. And oh god read the testimonial. Makes a man wish for humble 'ol Black Helicopters.
4 comments:
My favourite quote from the story was:
But the chance of planetary annihilation by this means "is totally miniscule,"
Or, to translate:
"Are you going to destroy the Earth?"
"Probably not."
"What do you mean probably?"
"Anyone else having flashbacks to The Quiet Earth?"
Most days, yes...
Disappointing as it may be, you probably have more to worry about from the black helicopters than the large hadron collider.
Let me put it this way: Apparently, during the first nuclear bomb tests, the physicists were betting on whether or not it would actually ignite the Earth's atmosphere. Now, think about it - how the fuck do you collect on that bet if you went "yes."
Physicist's just like to imagine they're about to destroy the world because it makes for more interesting stories at parties than "Yeah, and then I spent another day sitting at my desk, doing maths."
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention - if you liked the orgone howitzer, you'll fucking love these guys:
http://educate-yourself.org
My word, reverse psychology spam - how PoMo is that!
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