Physicists
Teachers'
remarks that changed the history of physics
Archimedes, you are late again. Don't tell me that you were locked
again in the bathroom.
Copernicus, when will you understand that you are not the center of the
world?
Galileo, if you will drop stones from the top of the tower one more
time, you will be dismissed forever.
Kepler, till when will you stare at the sky?
Newton, will you please stop idling away under the apple tree?
Volta, I can see you have a lot of potential.
Ohm, must you resist Ampère's opinions on current events?
Nikola Tesla, I see that everyone is attracted to your magnetic
personality.
Einstein, a crocodile is greener or is it wider?
Schrödinger, stop abusing cats!
Heisenberg, when will you be sure of yourself?
After
Receiving an Invitation to a Physicists' Ball:
 Volta
was electrified and Archimedes was buoyant at the thought.
Ampère was worried he wasn't up on current research.
Ohm resisted the idea at first.
Boyle said he was under too much pressure.
Hertz promised that in the future he will attend with greater
frequency.
Henry begged off due to a low capacity for alcohol.
Pierre and Marie Curie were radiating enthusiasm.
Born thought the probability of enjoying himself is pretty high.
Einstein thought it would be relatively easy to attend.
Heisenberg was uncertain whether he could make it.
Schrödinger had to take his cat to the vet, or did he?
Hawking said he'd try to string enough time together to make a space in
his schedule.
Eight
ways to use a barometer to find the height of a building:
- Measure the
height of the barometer. Scale the side of the building, measuring its
height in barometer-units.
- Drop the
barometer from the top of the building. Measure the time until it hits
the street. Correcting for the mass/surface ratio of the instrument,
use basic acceleration equation to find the height.
- Tie string
to top of barometer. Lower from roof to almost ground. Swing. Period of
pendulum can be used to find distance from barometer's Center of
Gravity to top of building.
- Tie a long
cable to the barometer and lower it from the top of the building to the
ground, and then measure the length of the cable.
- Take the
barometer outside on a sunny day, measure its shadow and the buildings
shadow.
- Drop the
barometer from the top of the building. Measure how far was it shifted
by Corriolis force. The rest is trivial.
- Sell the
barometer. Purchase a tape measure long enough to measure the height of
the building.
- Find someone
who knows how tall the building is, and trade him the barometer for the
information.
See also 27 ways to use a barometer to find the height
of a building
Why
did the chicken cross the road?
Aristotle: It is
the nature of chickens to cross roads.
Issac Newton:
Chickens at rest tend to stay at rest, chickens in motion tend to cross
roads.
Albert Einstein:
Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road moved beneath the
chicken depends on your frame of reference.
Werner
Heisenberg: We are not sure which side of the road the chicken was on,
but it was moving very fast.
Wolfgang Pauli:
There already was a chicken on this side of the road.
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Physics
Revisited
 Gravity
was discovered by Sir Isaac Newton. It is chiefly noticeable in the
autumn, when the apples are falling off the trees.
You can listen to thunder after lightning and tell how close you came
to getting hit. If you don't hear it, you got hit, so never mind.
When people run around and around in circles, we say they are crazy.
When planets do it, we say they are orbitting.
The tides are a fight between the Earth and moon. All water tends
towards the moon, because there is no water in the moon, and nature
abhors a vacuum.
The moon is more useful than the sun, because the moon shines at night
when you want the light, whereas the sun shines during the day when you
don't need it.
 To
remove air from a flask, fill it with water, tip the water out, and put
the cork in quick before the air can get back in.
Isn't it meaningless to speak of a 45 degrees angle unless you specify
Fahrenheit or Celcius?
 An
object at rest will always be in the wrong place.
An object in motion will always be headed in the wrong direction.
For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism.
Doppler effect is the tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when you
come at them rapidly.
How
physicists do it...
 Physicists
do it a quantum at a time.
Physicists do it at the speed of light.
Cosmologists do it in the first three minutes.
Mathematical physicists understand the theory of how to do it, but have
difficulty obtaining practical results.
Quantum physicists can either know how fast they do it, or where they
do it, but not both.
Particle physicists do it energetically.
Particle physicists to it with charm.
Aerodynamicists do it in drag.
Astrophysicists do it with a Big Bang.
Astronomers do it all night.
Astronomers do it in clusters.
Astronomers do it on mountain tops.
Astronomers do it with white dwarfs and red giants.
You Might Be a Physicist if...
the
water in your kettle is boiling at 373 Kelvin.
you
know that the speed of light is 299,792.5 km/sec.
you
know the direction the water swirls when you flush.
you've
already calculated how much you earn per second.
you
are sure that differential equations are a very useful tool.
you
are at an air show and know how fast the skydivers are falling.
you
know the size of the elctron, but don't know your own shirt size.
when
you break a vase you blame the second law of thermodynamics.
you
try to explain entropy to strangers at your table during casual dinner
conversation.
you
avoid stirring your coffee because you don't want to increase the
entropy of the universe.
your
three year old son asks why the sky is blue and you try to explain
atmospheric absorption theory.
you're
at a wine tasting event and find yourself paying more attention to the
cork screws than the Chardonnay.
you
carry on a one-hour debate over the expected results of an experiment
that actually takes five minutes to run.
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How many
physicists does it take to change a light bulb?
 Eleven.
One to do it and ten to co-author the paper.
How many
astronomers does it take to change a light bulb?
 None,
astronomers prefer the dark.
How many radio
astronomers does it take to change a light bulb?
 None.
They are not interested in that short wave stuff.
How many general
relativists does it take to change a light bulb?
 Two.
One holds the bulb, while the other rotates the universe.
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