absquatulate
v. to leave abruptly
Author: Greg Ross
The Paradox of Self-Deception
If ever a person A deceives a person B into believing that something, p, is true, A knows or truly believes that p is false while causing B to believe that p is true. So when A deceives A (i.e., himself) into believing that p is true, he knows or truly believes that p is false while causing himself to believe that p is true. Thus, A must simultaneously believe that p is false and believe that p is true. But how is this possible?
— Alfred R. Mele, “Two Paradoxes of Self-Deception,” in Self-Deception and Paradoxes of Rationality, 1998
A New Man
In 1944, a San Francisco judge refused to let Tharnmidsbe Lurgy Praghustspondgifcem change his name.
He’d asked to change it to Miswaldpornghuestficset Balstemdrigneshofwintpluasjof Wrandvaistplondqeskycrufemgeish.
The man, whose given name was Edward L. Hayes, had requested the first change in order “to do better in my business and economic affairs.” Evidently he felt he hadn’t gone far enough.
(From Elsdon Smith’s Treasury of Name Lore, 1967.)
Three Cheers
In 1900 Edward Elgar invited three ladies, teachers of English, French, and German, to a rehearsal of The Dream of Gerontius at a Birmingham school. They sent him this letter of thanks:
My cher Herr!
We sommes so full de Dankbarkeit and débordante Entzücken and sentons so weak et demütig that la Kraft of une Sprache seems insuffisante auszüdrücken our sentiments. Deshalb we unissons unsere powers et versuchen to express en Englisch, French, and Allemand das for que wir feel n’importe quelle Sprache to be insuffisante. Wie can nous beschreiben our accablante Freude and surprise! Wir do pas wissen which nous schützen most: notre Vergnügen to-morrow, ou die fact, que von all gens Sie thought à uns.
We sommes alle three fières und happy, et danken you de ganz our cœur.
Elgar passed it on to the Musical Times, which published it, calling its form of expression “somewhat Tower of Babelish.”
Express Delivery
Why spend money on cat food when there’s a more immediate solution? Leo Voelker’s 1979 invention simultaneously curbs the local sparrow population and keeps the local cats occupied.
The birds enter the housing at the top but can escape only through the mesh cage at the bottom, which serves as a kind of self-serve food dispenser for neighborhood cats.
“The cat feeder by its design is self-cleaning since the cat quickly learns to remove the sparrow from the cage.”
Rest Stop
A gold miner lives at point A, 3 miles north of the river and 5 miles upstream from the gold mine at point B, which is 2 miles north of the river. On the way to work he must stop at the river to give his burro a drink. At what point on the river should he stop in order to minimize the length of the trip?
“Money and a Friend”
— I.J. Reeve, The Wild Garland, 1865
Word and Numbers
Think of a number, write down its name, and add up the values of the letters (A=1, B=2, etc.). For example:
4 -> FOUR -> F(6) + O(15) + U(21) + R(18) -> 60
80 is the smallest number that is diminished by this procedure:
80 -> EIGHTY -> E(5) + I(9) + G(7) + H(8) + T(20) + Y(25) -> 74
Curiously, it’s also the smallest such number in Spanish:
80 -> OCHENTA -> O(16) + C(3) + H(8) + E(5) + N(14) + T(21) + A(1) = 68
(Remember that Spanish uses 27 letters, with ñ in the 15th position.)
(Thanks, Claudio.)
Curious Company
In his autobiography, mathematician Norbert Wiener describes three particular dons he came to know at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1914:
“It is impossible to describe Bertrand Russell except by saying that he looks like the Mad Hatter. … [J.M.E.] McTaggart … with his pudgy hands, his innocent, sleepy air, and his sidelong walk, could only be the Dormouse. The third, G.E. Moore, was a perfect March Hare. His gown was always covered with chalk, his cap was in rags or missing, and his hair was a tangle which had never known the brush within man’s memory.”
The three together became known as the Mad Tea Party of Trinity. Though they appeared 50 years after their fictional counterparts, Wiener wrote, “the caricature of Tenniel almost argues an anticipation on the part of the artist.”
“Good and Bad”
If I was as bad as they say I am,
And you were as good as you look,
I wonder which one would feel the worse
If each for the other was took?
— George Barr Baker
Anthologist Carolyn Wells explains: “This remark was made by a bad, bold convict to his vain, virtuous visiting chaplain. Your personal answer to the question is an indication of your character.”