Welcome to Doctor Smoke's Basement Laboratory
Hi, my name is Dr Smoke and my good friend Moosejaw has
kindly loaned me the use of his basement to conduct weird
experiments and discuss science out on the edge. All I ask is you keep an open mind...drugs may help. But careful people, the Net is a drug: addictive, expensive and leads to the loss of all your RL friends.
Parallel Universes
Some theories postulate that each time a decision is made
an alternative universe is brought into existence where
the different answers to the decision are played out. If
this is true we could have some fun.
Say one day you decide not to do your college assignment.
When the lecturer asks you to hand it in you can truthfully
say that while, in this universe, you haven't done it, in a
parallel universe you did. Unfortunately, due to the way
time bifurcates, it is no longer possible to get the completed
assignment back. When questioned protest loudly that you already did the damn work and its unfair to ask you to do it again.
Chaos Theory
Apart from giving us mind-blowing fractals, chaos theory also
teaches that a small perturbation in a system can lead to a
catastrophic disruption of that system. The classic example is
of the butterfly in China which flaps its wings and causes a
storm in New York. So, advance apologies for the bad weather you're experiencing, but I just had to wave my arms.
Evolution
You hear a lot of arguments against Darwinian evolution from people who cannot reconcile its tenets with the world they see. Live and let live, that's what I say....no matter if it evolved or was created.
Artificial Life
How do you define life. Anything we can say is limited to the
organic lifeforms of Earth. Without encountering other types
of life we can never adequately define what life is. My (loose) definition is life exists when something is more than the sum of its parts. So why shouldn't a computer program be alive? After all, its really just a string of ones and zeros but it does so much more!
Time Travel (and Aliens)
Is time travel possible? Aficionados of the Roswell incident will recall
what looked like the word "video" on the alleged wreckage. To me,
this can lead to only one conclusion: aliens are really people
from the future! Current theories suggest that by using a large
enough energy source it is possible to travel in time. Have our
descendents discovered how to do it? If so, why do they conduct
invasive surgery on their victims? Could it be to study our
"primitive" physiology so future biological disasters can be
averted? If you talk to any aliens, let us know.
The Quantum World
When you think about it logically, it should be possible to know both the position and momentum of an object. Well, in the quantum world, logic takes a back seat...eats popcorn and watches the movie. When it comes to anything quantum, I think I'll take a back seat too.
Politicians
Just who the hell votes for these guys? Why? And what do these voters expect to gain? Sadly, there are some things even the most brilliant scientists will never understand.
If this is all way too heavy, head on back to Moosejaw's House and rest there awhile. If you should want to discuss weird science with me, you can e-mail Moosejaw and he'll pass your message on...unless he finds the mess I left his basement in.