Curious
Times No. 322
November
10, 2005
GET
YOUR ASS KICKED AND YOUR INTELLECT HUMILIATED
Tihomir
“Tigertad” Titschko from Bulgaria has been crowned Europe’s
Chess Boxing champion after winning the 1st European Championship
in Chess Boxing in Berlin on Oct. 1. So what the heck is Chess
Boxing? It’s exactly what it sounds like. A battle of body
and mind in which competitors engage in alternating rounds of
chess and boxing. According to the official rules at the World
Chess Boxing Organization website (www.wcbo.org)
a full contest consists of 11 rounds -- six four-minute rounds
of chess and five two-minute rounds of boxing. A match can be
won by checkmate or knockout, or by outscoring your opponent in
boxing if the chess match results in a stalemate.
LAW 6: YOU ARE HOPELESSLY OUTNUMBERED
If you aren’t too stupid to comprehend it, there’s a
brilliant article by Professor Carlo M. Cipolla of the University
of California in which he explains “The Basic Laws of Human
Stupidity.” Law No. 1: Everyone underestimates the number
of stupid individuals in circulation. Law No. 2: The probability
that a certain person be stupid is independent of any other characteristic
of that person. Cipolla explains that “one is stupid in the
same way one is red-haired; one belongs to the stupid set as one
belongs to a blood group. A stupid man is born a stupid man by
an act of Providence.” Law No. 3: A stupid person is a person
who caused losses to another person or to a group of persons while
himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses. This
one is obvious: “Our daily life is mostly made of cases in
which we lose money and/or time and/or energy and/or appetite,
cheerfulness and good health because of the improbable action
of some preposterous creature who has nothing to gain and indeed
gains nothing from causing us embarrassment, difficulties or harm.”
Law No. 4: Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging
power of stupid individuals. And last but certainly not least,
Law No. 5, which states that “A stupid person is the most
dangerous type of person.” Read the entire lengthy thesis
at www.ecotopia.com/webpress/stupidity
GHOSTS ARE AN EXPENSIVE PET
Two brothers in India have been fined for keeping a “pet
ghost” which supposedly brought disease to a village in West
Bengal. According to an exorcist who was summoned for his expert
opinion, the brothers had kept the ghost of one of their wives
after she died, and this ghost was “responsible for a recent
outbreak of disease in the locality”. The word of the exorcist
was good enough for the village elders, who sentenced the brothers
to pay a fine of over $700. (Ananova)
OBSOLESCENCE
IS THE MOTHER OF INVENTION
Now that VCR’s are going the way of the cassette recorder,
you might want to find a more useful chore for your once-mighty
machine. Like inventor James Larsson, who rigged up his old VCR
to become an automatic cat feeder using the VCR’s timer to
dispense food to his cat on a regular schedule. “When a VCR
becomes redundant or becomes faulty, it’s usually the case
that the system that runs timing and motor control are the last
to die,” Larsson said. “Mostly, people junk their VCRs
because the picture is becoming a bit weird, but there’s
usually a lot of life left in a junked VCR, and I wanted to take
advantage of that.” (CNET
News)
I’M LOSING WEIGHT BUT I CAN’T GET RID OF THIS ERECTION
Having successfully earned billions by creating drugs which can
give a man a woody, pharmaceutical companies are now looking to
an even hungrier market -- fat people who want to lose weight.
Scientists are getting closer to developing drugs which will fool
your brain into believing that your stomach is full, thereby suppressing
your appetite and helping you lose weight. Recent research in
mice has found some success by killing off brain neurons which
cause excessive overeating and stimulating the growth of neurons
which seem to suppress hunger. They don’t have a clue why
or how it works, but if you don’t mind having your brain
rearranged you too will soon be able to pop a pill and lose a
few pounds. (BBC)
LET’S STICK TOGETHER
If you’re planning on dumping someone in the near future,
try to make sure there isn’t any Krazy Glue lying around
the house. Failure to heed this advice could leave you in the
same bind as Ken Slaby of Pittsburgh, who woke up one day to find
that his ex-girlfriend had glued his penis to his stomach, glued
his testicle to his leg, and glued his buttcheeks together. During
the civil trial -- where Slaby asked for about $30,000 in damages
-- his ex’s lawyer argued that the actions where part of
routine sexual activity between the couple which Slaby agreed
to. (The
Pittsburgh Channel)
BIG BREASTS, BIG DONATIONS
From the always amusing “Tell Us Something We Don’t
Already Know” wing of scientific research comes an experiment
which came to the blindingly obvious conclusion that men give
more money to charities when the person asking for money is a
beautiful woman. Shock! (www.nber.org/)
MY GOD CAN BEAT UP YOUR GOD
Still worshipping God? Maybe you should ask him/her/it to help
you win 25,000 Yen in the “Can You Prove Religious Superiority”
competition hosted by the creator hof Huge-Entity.com. The ¥25,000
will go to “anyone who can give any reason whatsoever for
believing in one specific religion over any other.” Simple.
(huge-entity.com)
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