Great one-liners from PF members

[pinball1970]

I read The Lord of the Rings : lots of names begin with 'G'

It's Lord of the rings, lots of characters and lots of letters.

 

[hmmm27]

It's Lord of the rings, lots of characters and lots of letters.

I was twelve ; I enjoyed the story, but who's-who was a lost cause after about halfway through The Two Towers.

 

[gmax137]

I was twelve ; I enjoyed the story, but who's-who was a lost cause after about halfway through The Two Towers.

I don't have a copy at hand but I recall the last 200 pages of volume 3 was an Encyclopedia, including who's who and who was who...

 

[hmmm27]

I don't have a copy at hand but I recall the last 200 pages of volume 3 was an Encyclopedia, including who's who and who was who...

Not the most efficient placement, for a first-time reader.

 

[gmax137]

Not the most efficient placement, for a first-time reader.

You're kidding, right? If JRR had put his encyclopedia at the start of volume 1, he would have died and remained forever an unknown obscure academic. One in ten thousand readers would have read past page 25.

 

[hmmm27]

One in ten thousand readers would have read past page 25.

I think I'd have started reading around page 201. I don't recall if I bought all 3 volumes at the same time or no, but I also don't recall thinking "Let me see if there's an encylopaedia built into book 3" (or for that matter the existence of the encyclopaedia, but that was quite awhile ago, and most of what I remember is "Why do all the character/place-names begin with 'G' ?")

 

[strangerep]

"Why do all the character/place-names begin with 'G' ?")

There are plenty that start with F and T also.
Try List of Tolkien Names.

I'm impressed that JRR could keep them sorted in his mind.

 

[pinball1970]

I was twelve ; I enjoyed the story, but who's-who was a lost cause after about halfway through The Two Towers.

Good job you didnt try out the Silmarillion!

 

[pinball1970]

I read The Lord of the Rings : lots of names begin with 'G'

On the Silmarillion and G, house of Feanor not a G in site.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fëanor

 

[hmmm27]

Good job you didnt try out the Silmarillion!

I did... didn't get too far ; again, twelve. I haven't read The Hobbit either, though I imagine it's a comparatively easy read.

 

[strangerep]

I haven't read The Hobbit either, though I imagine it's a comparitively easy read.

I was exposed to "The Hobbit" in year 9 high school English class. It was one of the prescribed literature textbooks, but our teacher refused to teach anything about it. She thought it was nonsense -- far beneath her. (Tbh, I didn't like her much at all. A literature teacher who doesn't comprehend the achievements of J.R.R. Tolkien?? Sheesh.)

"The Hobbit" is interesting in that the writing starts off with a rather childish tone -- well below year 9, I'd have thought. Not to mention the silly poems/songs.

Then the tone soon becomes more mature as the chapters advance.

 

[Hornbein]

I took a speed reading class and then was able to read War and Peace in twenty minutes.

It's about Russia.

That was Woody Allen.

 

[berkeman]

I'm not sure if I'm allowed to self-report, but this is from a PM discussion with a couple members after they wasted a fair amount of time and effort trying to help a user in the EE forum who mainly seemed clueless about their AC Mains project they kept asking about, but turned out to have ulterior motives...

Yeah, very sorry about that, what a waste of our time and effort. He was a help vampire and hacker hidden in clueless sheep's clothing. (That might be a record for mixing metaphors...)

 

[Vanadium 50]

Hacker hidden in clueless sheep's clothing? Maybe he's just not the sharpest cookie in the jar.

 

[berkeman]

Hacker hidden in clueless sheep's clothing? Maybe he's just not the sharpest cookie in the jar.

Doh!

 

[BvU]

Link limited to a select group !

 

[berkeman]

Link limited to a select group !

Yes, it's from a PM conversation.

 

[Vanadium 50]

Or...you can lead a gift horse to water but you can't look in his mouth.

 

[gmax137]

I always thought the gifted horses were the ones stomping out answers to arithmetic questions...

 

[BillTre]

I always thought the gifted horses were the ones stomping out answers to arithmetic questions...

They could also just be horses given to someone.

 

[Vanadium 50]

I always thought the gifted horses were the ones stomping out answers to arithmetic questions...

HorseGPT.

 

[Vanadium 50]

HorseGPT.

ChatGPY and horses have one thing in common, at least: they both produce a lot of hotses.h...er...manure.

 

[Hornbein]

HorseGPT.

That could be a winner. People like animals. Could CatGPT lie ahead?

I kind of like the idea of ChatLSD but that might get old fast. Then again, maybe not.

 

[Borg]

CatGPT would just ignore your questions.

Edit: This got me to thinking about Googling it and it turns out that CatGPT exists - https://cat-gpt.com

 

[jack action]

Could CatGPT lie ahead?

We already have it in French.

 

[Hornbein]

We already have it in French.

Well dang. I've had this happen before. Last time it was Apocalypso. Someday soon anything you can imagine will already be there. Then what?

A ChatLSD search turned up the Charles Schwab brokerage. Who knew?

There was a ChatLSD on Instagram that has been removed.

 

[gmax137]

Who knew?

Timothy Leary?

 

[phinds]

This process of continually updating one's knowledge of a subject is called learning. It's the opposite of religiously adhering to an established view in the face of evidence to the contrary.

 

[Swamp Thing]

... if only there were some way of searching for information on the internet

This deserves to be in this thread in its own right, yeah?

 

[topsquark]

PeroK said
This process of continually updating one's knowledge of a subject is called learning. It's the opposite of religiously adhering to an established view in the face of evidence to the contrary.

I might borrow this one, if you don't mind.

-Dan

 

[pinball1970]

This deserves to be in this thread in its own right, yeah?

That was my complaint about the title "Breaking bad."

 

[Tom.G]

About e-mail scams, banks, and police.

...is better to learn locksmithery than rely on somebody else to guard your stuff.

https://www.physicsforums.com/posts/6916748

 

[Ibix]

In a discussion about a woman who had 69 children from 27 pregnancies (all multiple births):

27 x .75 = 20.25 years
That so much more reasonable.
Very fertile, but also efficient.

 

[berkeman]

About questionable results in a new paper:

At least it puts the woo in woo hoo.

 

[berkeman]

When trying to help an EE student with analyzing fairly simple circuits, and they keep trying to use SPICE to guide their learning...

You'll learn a lot more about electronics if you solve simple circuits with math before you simulate them. Simulations only give you answers, not reasons.

 

[jack action]

As a rule of thumb, when the first thing someone tells you is that their invention isn't a perpetual motion machine (before you can even think to ask), that means it's a perpetual motion machine.

 

[Borg]

That sounds like a conversation that could go on forever.

 

[gmax137]

There is no universal Least Action path to happiness.

 

[berkeman]

This one is way over my head...

The fact that you can buy an oven mitt at all is proof of quantum mechanics.

 

[Vanadium 50]

There is an explanation in that thread.

 

[berkeman]

From a thread where a math major is complaining that when he had to take a mandatory Physics course, he found the math in it to be very non-rigorous and not based on axioms...

Do you already know what the axioms of nature are?

 

[berkeman]

While trying to give a B-level reply to a question about the speed of propagation of changes in spacetime...

It's actually quite difficult to come up with a well-defined way of saying what you are trying to say without either resorting to postgrad maths or saying something not really accurate and crossing your fingers behind your back and hoping nobody asks awkward questions.

 

[Rive]

From a thread where a math major is complaining that when he had to take a mandatory Physics course, he found the math in it to be very non-rigorous and not based on axioms...

From the very same thread:

I guarantee any stroke QM could give a mathematician, an engineer could make worse.

 

[Tom.G]

From a thread discussing WiFi and Routers, @Vanadium 50 observed:

The number on the box is really mostly irrelevant. "Up to X Mbps" just means that they promise you won't get X+1.

 

[pinball1970]

Vanadium on a post regarding David McCallum TV series.

The Invisible man" 1975 series

V50 "I could never see him in that role."

 

[pinball1970]

I could never see him in that role.

Not to be outdone our talented, the lovely,our very own @DennisN !!
"Also, as far as I can remember, the portrayal of the character was rather transparent."

 

[berkeman]

From a discussion in the Engineering forums about a part that a new user wants help designing:

If you have ignored the obvious failure modes, and so build a house of cards, that design failure may later be investigated by a Coroner.

 

[berkeman]

From a discussion thread in the Academic Advising forum where a newbie is asking for advice about learning resources...

As others have noted, learning physics by reading alone would be like learning to play piano by reading a book. It simply is not possible.

 

[jack action]

From a discussion thread in the Academic Advising forum where a newbie is asking for advice about learning resources...

As others have noted, learning physics by reading alone would be like learning to play piano by reading a book. It simply is not possible.

But the skills are transferable...

​

 

[gmax137]

If I tell you that a scribblex is a fooddely scribblex if the warghandle is zero you might (reasonably) complain that this does not help you to understand what I'm talking about.