"If you take a brick and drop it in a bath you're going to generate quite a big splash. But if you break the brick up into 10 pieces and drop them in one by one you're going to get 10 much smaller splashes."- Russell Wynn of the Southampton Oceanography Centre, contending that the threat of a mega-tsunami is vastly overstated.
(defun is-wondrous (n)
(do ((val n))
((eq val 1) t)
(if (evenp val)
(setf val (/ val 2))
(setf val (+ (* val 3) 1)))
(print val)))
WondrousPropertyTester class>>hasWondrousProperty: aNumber
|temp|
Transcript clear.
temp := aNumber.
Transcript print: temp; cr.
[temp > 1] whileTrue:
[
temp := (temp even)
ifTrue: [temp / 2]
ifFalse:[3 * temp + 1].
Transcript print: temp; cr.
].
[Transcript show: 'Yes'; cr]
...young lovers in Victorian England were often forbidden from publicly expressing their affection, and could not even communicate by letter in case their parents intercepted and read the contents. This resulted in lovers sending encrypted messages to each other via the personal columns of newspapers. ...On one occasion, Wheatstone deciphered a note in The Times from an Oxford student, suggesting to his true love that they elope. A few days later, Wheatstone inserted his own message, encrypted in the same cipher, advising the couple against this rebellious and rash action. Shortly afterwards there appeared a third message, this time unencrypted and from the lady in question: 'Dear Charlie, Write no more. Our cipher is discovered.'
And, finally, my favourite:So today we have as a result a theory of evolution in which "man" is ruthlessly controlled by the cause-and-effect laws of the universe while the particles of his body are not. ...the evil of disease which the doctor is absolutely morally committed to stop is not an evil at all within the germ's lower static pattern of morality. The germ is making a moral effort to stave off its own destruction by lower-level forces of inorganic evil. The intelligence of the mind can't think of any reason to live, but it goes on anyway, because the intelligence of the cells can't think of any reason to die. A scientist may argue rationally that the moral question, "Is it moral to murder your neighbor?" is not a scientific question. But can he argue that the moral question, "Is it alright to fake your scientific data?" is not a scientific question? No scientific instrument can be produced in court to show who is insane and who is sane.
A person isn't considered insane if there are a number of people who believe the same way. Insanity isn't supposed to be a communicable disease. If one other person starts to believe him, or maybe two or three, then it's a religion.
...the 27 November Edition of the Financial Times furnishes a telling account published in its letter-to-the-editor section. The writer, who just returned from a business trip to Vietnam, recalls how when a 7-year-old street urchin asked him for money, the child refused his offer of a dollar, instead specifying euros.Interesting...
Two of the sites being bombarded by data have been completely knocked offline. One other site has been responding to requests only intermittently as it struggles to cope with the traffic the screensaver is pointing its way.For some reason, I am siding with the spammers on this one, much as I hate spam. The plight of these poor sites being subjected to these attacks somehow doesn't feel right. My sympathy probably has more to do with my attaching anthropomorphic qualities to these web sites than anything else.
