Friday
"Jokes about polonium 210 will be half as funny 138 days from now"
True, true: however, if one were to refer to the 'Achilles racing the Tortoise" paradox, they will never be 100% un-funny!
Posted by Jim at December 8, 2006 02:30 PM
Will someone please explain to Mr Prescott that it won't become Polonium-105?
Posted by dearieme at December 8, 2006 02:33 PM
I wonder if it's Russia getting rid of the Chernobyl waste, one dissident at a time?
Posted by Julian Taylor at December 8, 2006 03:16 PM
Yes, but will the jokes about Polonium-210 decay into jokes about other smaller elements?
Posted by Midwesterner at December 8, 2006 05:20 PM
It must be something wrong with the html-code for this blog. When I visit this with Firefox there is just a wordline saying
"Jokes about polonium 210 will be half as funny 138 days from now"
And nothing else, no link or anything. Are we supposed to read thoughts or is it something just some persons understand or is it something that just work with Internet Explorer?
Not meaning to be unpolite, I am just curious and what to understand this post, because I use to visit this blog often.
Posted by Chade at December 8, 2006 09:36 PM
Kevin B,
Too bad, actually. I had been kinda hoping it would go over like a helium balloon. Minus the electrons, of course.
Posted by Midwesterner at December 8, 2006 09:46 PM
Chade... it is a joke... generally jokes do not need a link to explain them!
Posted by Albion at December 8, 2006 09:50 PM
Would it not in fact be more correct to state that half as many jokes about Polonium 210 will be funny in 138 days?
Posted by triticale at December 9, 2006 12:46 AM
Ah the british sence of humor or is that humour. I wouldn't say the joke was leaden it hasn't had enough time to decay that badly.
Posted by steph at December 9, 2006 01:55 AM
Obviously I don't have enough sense not to play word games.
Posted by steph at December 9, 2006 01:57 AM
I bet in some corners the element is known as Putinium-210.
Posted by Alan K. Henderson at December 9, 2006 09:27 AM
At the risk of appearing pedantic on a humour thread the Achilles/tortoise paradox is not relevant to radioactive decay. Nuclei being discrete objects and the Zenoic paradox being about the contiuum.
Seeing as it seems a cup of tea was the vector for the poison is it true that a spoonful of sugar helps the polonium go down?
Posted by Nick M at December 9, 2006 04:05 PM
And I thought a "polonium" was where riders on horses played a game that looks like a cross between croquet and soccer.
Posted by Midwesterner at December 9, 2006 09:11 PM
Anyone poisoned with polonium 210 should be given beryllium and sent back to the poisoner.
(Just a test of your nuclear physics.)
Posted by Freeman at December 10, 2006 11:51 PM
This thread never did quite reach critical mass, did it?
Posted by Brendan Halfweeg at December 11, 2006 04:36 PM
