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The Heretofore Unpublished Letters of Ernest Glitch
Roger Curry writes "Letters to Michael Faraday in 1856 from previously unknown victorian experimentalist Ernest Glitch have recently been discovered. The history of science may need to be revised. His letters, and accounts of his work, would appear to indicate the observation of laser action in air, a Victorian Nitrogen Laser, more than a century before Maiman first demonstrated his ruby laser. Also, in a letter dated 8th July 1856 he notes the crystallisation of the fullerene C60 some 150 years before Kroto. Amazingly, there are also accounts of a Liquid-Fuel Rocket Engine detailing the use of hypergolic propellants and deLaval nozzles, a Victorian Tesla Coil, with reference to a possible medieval Coil, and Manned Flight achieved long before the Wright Bros., using Multiple Valve-less Pulse Jets."
hoax? Get it, get it, the "It's Funny, Laugh" icon should be a hint. The guy's name is "Glitch" for crying out loud.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
If Jules Verne or H.G. Wells had written comedy we probably would have gotten something like this
When life gives you crap, Make Crapade.
Sluggy Freelance.
Just too funny though - very well done.
Poor Hodges.
This isn't even a good hoax. The letters sound like they were writen by the same guy who wrote the dialog for Resident Evil 1.
Barry, you saved me!
NAAAAAGGHHH
It turns out that Aristotle pioneered the use of hyperthreading in x86 microprocessors way back in ancient Greece. Only problem was he couldn't get any decent uptime, what with the lack of electricity and all...
"In a 32-bit world, you're a 2-bit user. You've got your own newsgroup, alt.total.loser." -Weird Al
... when I see it. I am an American!
It might be devoid of meaning, but it's full of funny! Some people just don't recognize humor, I suppose. Did you even read the articles?
The do a sthick like this in "Rozencrantz and Gildenstern are Dead", a fantastic movie with Gary Oldman based on the Top Stoppard favorite.
One of them keeps discovering advanced concepts of physics (the movie is set in the time of Hamlet) playing with potted plants and bowling balls and feathers, but is never able to fully expand on them as he is repeatedly distracted by plot advancement.
Its pretty funny, and this kinda reminded me of that.
"Old man yells at systemd"
Kroto wasn't the first to see crystals of C60, Huffman was. Kroto only saw C60 as a peak in a mass spectrometer.
the ernestglitch machine which was rediscovered by one Mr. Turing.
Poor Glitch also forgot to patent a device in later incarnation called paladin or palladium something.
On the home page:
Experimenting with Weapons-Grade Fissile Material in the Home.
A Method of Electro-Plating Lizards
Atomic Hydrogen Blowtorch.
Any they just keep geting better
http://www.lateralscience.co.uk/
Can't wait for the Victorian Cyclotron
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
the secret journals of Phineas J. Magnetron
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I received these unusual documents from my uncle who -- perhaps inadvertently -- willed them to me along with an attic full of junk and dusty memorabilia. There were twenty-four books in all, every one of them labeled with a year on the spine and front cover. What captured my attention -- besides the mysterious code -- was that the years began with 1877.
nicely done.Magnetron's books appeared to be a journal of some kind, as each entry was preceded by a date written in a bold block lettering. Below each date were as many as 4,408 small numbers and letters, packed 64 characters per square inch with no spaces or identifiable punctuation. The only characters used were the numerals 0 through 9 and the letters A through F, leading the cryptographers to deduce that the code utilized a hexadecimal, or base 16 numbering system.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
He writes:
Indian hemp? Become a scientist NOW! :-)
42. Easy. What is 32 + 8 + 2?
What I don't understand is why anyone would complain about this if it were real news.
I mean, this would be an earth-shattering change to the history of science -- the biggest ever! But you say "ho hum, who cares, why are boring stories getting posted"????!!!
That's much sadder than merely missing that it's humor.
Professional Wild-Eyed Visionary
It is in memorium of him that we have the phrase "a glitch in the system". ;-)
-psy
Remarkable! I see clear parallels between this pioneering Victorian scientist and the much later experiments chronicled in the televised documentaries of Dr. Bunsen Honeydew and his faithful assistant Beaker.
This is one of the great hoaxes put on the American people, and it's gained a life of its own. Gore correctly took credit - in a casual comment in an interview - for taking the initiative in Congress in creating what we consider to be the Internet (increasing funding and taking it from a military to a commercial and academic network). Some weeks later, Republicans started using the false "invented" claim.
I never would have wanted to be THIS guy's assistant! First he makes him sick from inhaling quicksilver (Mercury) vapor (very poisonous), then he fries (electrocutes) his hand so bad that he can't use his arm for a month, then the poor guy loses his sight in one eye thanks to the discovery of the laser. How does this guy reward his assistant for giving (literally) so much of himself? He CANS him! And we thought that our employers were assholes! Jeesh!
Yes, it's almost as bad as the distortion that Bush was "appointed" President.
That is not a distortion. It is a fact. Florida's own laws regarding election recounts were broken in order to assure Bush's "victory." Kathleen Harris, Florida's then Secretary of State, was G.W. Bush's Campaign Chairman in Florida. Jeb, as we all know, is the President's brother. Both of them should have recused themselves from the debacle. Instead, Harris ordered a stop to the recounts in order to assure victory for her candidate.
Jeb did stay out of the issue. Don't let the facts get in the way of your arguments, however; I find it so amusing!
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Of course it's a hoax, the whole thing reads like a comedy of errors where the poor servant Hodges is subjected to various nasty injuries as a result of Glitch's experiments.