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Conference thebay::joyoflex

Title:The Joy of Lex
Notice:A Notes File even your grammar could love
Moderator:THEBAY::SYSTEM
Created:Fri Feb 28 1986
Last Modified:Mon Jun 02 1997
Last Successful Update:Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:1192
Total number of notes:42769

1011.0. "Scientific joke and limerick contest" by COOKIE::EGGERS (Anybody can fly with an engine.) Fri Oct 16 1992 16:11

    From the NEW SCIENTIST Feedback column, 3 October 1992:

    That's the end of the Feedback summer competition ["for incredibly
    useful inventions that unfortunately haven't been invented yet"]. But
    despair not.  Feedback, like the country's retail industry, is already
    looking forward to Christmas, and in the run-up to the festive season,
    we announce another competition.

    Readers are asked simply to send in their favourite scientific joke or
    limerick. You may send in as many entries as you wish.  Please indicate
    if the entry is original or, if not, its source.

    Winning entries will be published in the magazine and their authors
    will receive a suitably glamorous prize.  Where there are duplicate
    entries, the winning entry will be drawn from a hat.  The editor's
    decision on the winners is final. Entries must reach us no later than 1
    November.


    New Science Publications
    Holborn Publishing Group
    King's Reach Tower,
    Stamford Street
    London SE1 9LS

    FAX: 071 261 6464
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1011.1This would winULYSSE::WADEMon Oct 26 1992 04:2051
 	I can't be bothered to send it in, but the best scientific joke is
        proven to be as follows:

                There was recently an international meeting at which
                the finest scientists from all countries met to agree
                which was the most significant invention or discovery.

                One by one, they presented their arguments.  Quarks,
                chips, lasers, fuels, genes, and and and ...  But they 
		were all waiting for <insert name>, the eccentric
		<insert nationality> scientist.  They knew that _he_ 
		would have the definitive answer to the question of which 
		invention or discovery was the most significant.

		Finally <insert name> mounted the podium.  The silence 
		was broken only by the slight shuffling of his notes.
		He spoke.  "Ladies and gentlemen, it is evident to me
		that the most significant invention _ever_ in the whole 
		history of humankind is ....".  {All the delegates held 
		their breaths and strained to hear}  " ... without a doubt
		the thermos flask!".

		Pandemonium!  What was this?  A joke?  Impossible!  It 
		took a full five minutes before <i.n.> could speak again.  

		"Ladies and gentlemen!  Please, hear me out.  I anticipated 
		this reaction.  But, please, let me tell you that after 
		years of research at <insert city> University, the finest 
		scientists and philosphers have reached this conclusion; that 
		the thermos flask is far and away more significant than any 
		other invention of the 19th or 20th centuries!

		"Why, you ask!  I will tell you.  Imagine such a flask,
		ladies and gentlemen.  Imagine a very hot liquid being 
		poured into it and the cap being tightened.  What happens?
		Exactly!  The liquid remains hot.  Imagine if you will 
		that very same flask.  This time we shall fill it with iced 
		water and again seal it.  And the result?  Yes, my friends, 
		that liquid will remain cold!

		"Which brings me to the core, the nub, the very heart of our 
		deliberations ......




		... how does it KNOW?".

		:-)


1011.2or here's the other winner...PAOIS::HILLAn immigrant in ParisMon Oct 26 1992 05:0924
    The three reconstructive surgeons were discussing their respective
    greatest successes.
    
    The <insert nationality> surgeon told how they had received a head and
    torso into the Accident and Emergency department at his hospital. 
    After labouring through the night to fit the necessary prosthetes the
    patient made a full recovery.  "In fact," he said "he is now so
    productive that he has made five of his colleagues surplus to
    requirement and they are out of work."
    
    The next surgeon, from <insert nation>, described how all he had had to
    work on was a finger tip.  But after suitable reconstructive surgery
    the re-built person had such enhanced capabilities that two hundred
    people had lost their jobs.
    
    The third surgeon was from the UK.  He told how the only thing saved of
    their accident victim was an emmission of bodily gases, which had been
    caught in a plastic bag.  Starting from this nebulous remains they had
    constructed a middle aged man, admittedly somewhat overweight and grey
    haired, but a man nevertheless.  They had called him <name your
    politician> and he had put the whole country out of work.
    
    
    Nick
1011.3COOKIE::EGGERSAnybody can fly with an engine.Tue Oct 27 1992 15:546
    The 17 October issue of New Scientist has a reminder for the
    scientific-joke and limerick contest.
    
    "Winning entries will be published in the magazine and their authors
    will receive a miniature pack of the Classic Malt collection--six of
    Scotland's finest single malt whiskies."