The Science of Santa 223
Hugh Pickens writes writes "For decades, mystified scientists have chalked up Santa's power to the inexplicable wonder of magic, but North Carolina State University aerospace engineer Larry Silverberg, team leader on a first-of-its-kind visiting scholars program at Santa's Workshop-North Pole Labs (NPL), says that Santa is, in fact, a scientific genius and that Silverberg looks forward to Christmas each year, so he can ponder the remarkable accomplishments of one of the greatest pioneers in his field. 'Santa is not just a jolly old elf,' says Silverberg. 'He really has an understanding of engineering, technology, science that's far beyond our own.' It all starts at the North Pole where Santa has an elaborate technical setup that rivals the nerve center of the CIA including an underground antenna that listens to children's thoughts. 'He takes those signals and finds out whether the child has been naughty or nice, and ultimately, what present the child wants.' Santa's mastery of nanotechnology allows Santa to grow presents on the spot eschewing the necessity of carrying them on the sleigh which would be prohibitive because of the weight. Then there's Santa's sleigh itself, an advanced aerodynamic structure equipped with laser sensors to find the optimal path, and covered by a nanostructured 'skin' that is porous and contains its own low-pressure system, which holds the air flowing around the airborne sled onto the body, reducing drag by as much as 90 percent. Finally there's Santa's greatest invention, the relativity cloud, that bends time and space to allow for his round-the-world Christmas journey and explains why Santa is so seldom seen. 'Relativity clouds are controllable domains – rips in time – that allow him months to deliver presents while only a few minutes pass on Earth. The presents are truly delivered in a wink of an eye.'"
Santa of course is not an effin elf. (Score:5, Insightful)
In line with the person it was derived from, santa claus is not an elf himself - he is a magic person (human). Elf 'helpers' were added in recent centuries through influence of celtic/anglosakson folklore.
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You say that like the tea partiers that havent noticed the new gop2.0 tea party. Tp 2007 != tp 2008.5+.
Santa in 2011 is a meme to drive materialism and consumerism. Some still apprecate family and friends by proxy, but the santa of old is nothing like the tool for chinese manufactured goods he has become.
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That was as true in 2001 as it is now. Except then we all thought we were entitled to fast cars, big houses and snorting coke off of dead hookers. Were not. Thats why the world economy crashed and is still looking for a ladder back up.
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It was just as true in 1955, except the toys were made in the US.
Thats why the world economy crashed and is still looking for a ladder back up.
The world economy crashed because of greed and incompetence of the rich and powerful.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Santa of course is not an effin elf. (Score:4, Funny)
Wait......
Are you saying Santa used to hand out shrooms? No wonder people looked forward to the celebration, saw elves, flying reindeer, live snowmen, etc.
All we give him is cookies and milk in return.
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+1 Funny
also reminded of how Dad suggests putting Scotch out for Santa Clause instead of the milk.
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the Christianity cult
Posted on the second holiest day for Christians, on Christmas of all days. Damn, you get troll of the year, asshole.
As to Santa Clause, he's responsible for more atheists than Richard Dawkins is (Richard? Is that you?). The kiddies find they've been lied to about Santa Cause and the Easter Bunny and the tooth fairy and figure the grownups are lying about Jesus.
I pity you for your ignorance and hate. Now fuck off, troll.
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Im sure youre a riot at family gatherings. Way to celebrate "goodwill towards all men".
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Our society created it, its no more a fantasy day than Thanksgiving. You should tell all your family and friends how Thanksgiving is really a celebration of the subjugation of a native people; im sure that would make you the life of the party.
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the Christianity cult
Posted on the second holiest day for Christians, on Christmas of all days. Damn, you get troll of the year, asshole.
By any reasonable definition, early Christianity was a cult; they just managed to get some followers in key positions (like Emperors) and it snowballed from there. Then what Christianity morphed into got some money behind it and wanted to expand its influence, and borrowing from existing popular celebrations made it easier to snarf converts. I don't have a lot of respect for a lot of institutional christianity from about the 3rd-20th centuries.
That said, if Jesus of Nazareth was alive today, he'd be involve
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I can see how the early Christians appropriated the timing/rituals for marketing purposes, but perhaps it was also a way to dodge persecutors that would be occupied with their own celebrations? (think of Romans busy with drunken orgies, perhaps)
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Christmas was celebrated in Germany with a Christmas tree in the 1500s, and earlier in other parts. The celebration of Christmas itself goes much further back, with references in the 11th century, and even as far back as the 4th century. You are right that Christmas is a semi-new arrival on the scene-- in the last 1500 years or so-- but you should qualify what you mean when you say "a very late hijacking" when "very late" refers to the "within the last 2 millenia or so".
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St. Nicholas was the Bishop of Myra in the mid 300s.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11063b.htm [newadvent.org]
His best known legend is that there was a young girl in his parish who wanted to marry but had no dowry. One evening while walking by he anonymously tossed a bag of gold through her window. This alleged event is where he derives the "gift-giving" persona from.
The elf thing only dates back to "Twas the Night before Christmas", which refers to him as "a right jolly old elf". Whether this was meant literally or famili
Re:Santa of course is not an effin elf. (Score:4, Informative)
Oops, I'm stupid. Sinterklaas is a person, St. Nick to be precise. But part of Santa Claus comes from a Nordic legend about a gift-giving elf.
Re:Santa of course is not an effin elf. (Score:5, Insightful)
Santa knows what you need, a heavy dose of lighten the fuck up
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Actually, it's already disproven (Score:3)
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Because they're the government, so they are lying to you. Duh! That's a given.
And where is your tin foil hat?
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LOL, yesterday my 27 year old daughter was on NORAD's site tracking Santa [dailymail.co.uk] on her new notebook all day!
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Re:Santa of course is not an effin elf. (Score:5, Insightful)
I love the vague terminology - God touched you? Explain exactly what that means. I'll believe something to do with gods the same way I'll believe anything else - give me enough proof to make it the most likely explanation. I'm not saying there is no posibility of a God, I'm saying that beleiving in one is like believing there is an elephant in my bathtub - It's highly unlikely, and if someone told me it was true, I wouldn't take them at their word.
You say there is no proof you can show me, then why should you expect me to believe it? I'm sure you'd think anyone getting an email from nigerian royalty promising lots of money and beleiving it was stupid, but an old book and promising eternal life? It's different how?
I'm open to the idea - If I'm wrong, you should be able to tell me why I'm wrong, and I'll take that on board. If you expect me to treat it differently because it's religion, or suspend logic for no reason, then no. Logic applies universally, you can't just choose where to apply it or not.
Re:Santa of course is not an effin elf. (Score:4, Insightful)
Shhh... You're screwing with the religious zealots. They'll start quoting fire and brimstone passages out of their holy books. Then they'll flip through the peaceful and loving parts, and find reasons to kill you in very uncomfortable ways.
You and I know perfectly well that there is no invisible friend running the universe, and the only kind of divine intervention that happens is choreographed and executed by a flesh and blood humans.
Some of these people actually believe it. Most of their holy books say that by doubting them, you are their evil, and you must be punished. ... and you may say you have an elephant in your bathtub, but I have an undetectable transdimensional leprechaun in a box. Don't ever try to open the box, or he'll immediately move to another dimension. Once you believe in him, I'll introduce you to the invisible dragon in the garage. My girlfriend told me that he's there. He sucks the life out of car batteries, and changes my preset radio stations when I'm out of town.
Re:Santa of course is not an effin elf. (Score:4, Insightful)
To be fair to them, I agree with Penn Jillette that if someone does believe in a religion, it's equally insane not to expect them to be verbal about it. The example he gives is that if I'm stood in front of you on train tracks, and you hear a train coming - but I tell you that the train doesn't exist, you are still going to push me off the tracks (presuming that you are not too scared of getting sued, enjoy seeing people die, etc...). If someone believes I am going to burn in hell for eternity because I don't beleive in God, then I can understand them trying to change my viewpoint.
Doesn't stop them being illogical mind.
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You're probably right.
I just have a hard time reconciling the fact that there are over 10,000 religions on this planet, and the cultists in each believe that they are right, and want you to convert to their way. No matter what, it's a lose-lose situation. If you don't believe their way, you're wrong. If you do finally accept their way, that means you are wrong in the minds of the thousands of others groups.
I guess that's part of why holy wars work. Unless o
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I just have a hard time reconciling the fact that there are over 10,000 religions on this planet, and the cultists in each believe that they are right, and want you to convert to their way.
Then you have a problem, because there are 10,001 different beliefs (one being that all of them are wrong), and no matter what you will have to choose among them. The one thing you cannot choose is not to believe in anything including the correctness or incorrectness of other beliefs (unless you wanted to go all nihilist-- thats belief # 10,002).
This is a fake argument you have created. Just because Joe says Sally is lying, and Sally says Jeff is lying, and Jeff says Joe is lying, doesnt mean that ONE of
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Well, you're right. Someone could be right. None of them have any solid evidence. There are *over* 10,000, but we'll go with your lowered number of just 10,002. That means, I have a 1 in 10,002 chance of picking the right one, should I decide to do so.
Lack of evidence does not make a deity real. Evidence would.
There is no inher
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The difference is that there is evidence of a train; there is none of any gods or hell.
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Shhh... You're screwing with the religious zealots. They'll start quoting fire and brimstone passages out of their holy books. Then they'll flip through the peaceful and loving parts, and find reasons to kill you in very uncomfortable ways.
Guess its "Strawman and Ridicule" hour. Gather around folks, this is what it looks like.
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Prove it, then. Is your faith any better than theirs?
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There is no way to prove a lack of it. I'm not the one who made up any sort of religion. The burden of proof is with the anyone making the assertion that things exist.
Here's an example that may be easier to understand. You can't prove there is no such things as Big Foot. If someone makes the assertion that Big Foot exists, it is up to them to prove that their assertion is true. If, one day, someone brings forward positive evidence that can be peer reviewed, that shows Big F
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Aside from my utter bewilderment why parent got a troll moderation (you may think hes crazy and disagree with him, but thats certainly not a troll post), Ill respond, courteously, since you were courteous.
Believing in God does not require intellectual suicide, nor does it require a suspension of logic. There are, if you cared to read up on it, countless philosophers who came from the church-- for example, one of my favorites, Pascal, was very probably either Protestant or Catholic. He isnt exactly someone
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You say that philosiphers beleiving in god proves that a lack of logic isn't required - that's simply not true. Just because a person is smart, says great things, is great in any regard, does not mean that they are perfect, or always think logically. I can think of someone as great, and still think they were wrong. Someone smart beleiving something does not make it true. In fact, Pascal is a terrible example - he was very clearly logically flawed - Pascal's Wager is an argument for religion - that beleiving
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You say that philosiphers beleiving in god proves that a lack of logic isn't required - that's simply not true. Just because a person is smart, says great things, is great in any regard, does not mean that they are perfect, or always think logically.
Once again, lacking logic is not something one would usually blame Descartes, Pascal, Aquinas, Lewis, Kierkegaard, etc of. The first two were mathematical thinkers in their own right, Im sure they are well acquainted with logical thinking and fallacies. They may have made errors in their thought, there is no doubt of that, but their arguments are nevertheless based on logic.
Pascal is a terrible example - he was very clearly logically flawed - Pascal's Wager is an argument for religion - that beleiving in a religion is worth it 'just in case' - this argument is terrible
That is a misconception, and is not what his wager states. You would have to read the full wager, which is longer (several pages, I
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Once again, lacking logic is not something one would usually blame Descartes, Pascal, Aquinas, Lewis, Kierkegaard, etc of. The first two were mathematical thinkers in their own right, Im sure they are well acquainted with logical thinking and fallacies. They may have made errors in their thought, there is no doubt of that, but their arguments are nevertheless based on logic.
It is not that I am saying they are impossible of logical thought - I'm saying that the logic that someone uses to give reason for beleiving in God is inevitably flawed. I have never heard an argument for it that isn't.
That is a misconception, and is not what his wager states. You would have to read the full wager, which is longer (several pages, I believe), but to summarize quickly he is saying that it is illogical not to give more weight to the issue of God's existence. His reasoning isnt quite that "you should believe just in case". I would recommend you read it for yourself.
And if you read his other Pensees, you see a man who not only has a firm grasp on logic, but on the sad state of humanity (for example, his Pensee talking about how "it is right that I kill you because you came from that side of the river, rather than mine; if you had come from my side, it would have been a terrible crime"; or his Pensee showing how most of our lives are spent running away from the terrible state of boredom, from the richest of us to the poorest-- how THAT is the prime motivator in our lives).
In which case, their is an easier proof that Pascal's wager is incorrect. One can simply invent a new god, which - as there is no proof for a Christian God's existance - is just as likely to exist, and say that the reward for beleiving in that one would be greater (I get to do extra stuff I w
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Unfortunately, your argument isn't valid - you say you beleive in a relgion because it made your life better? What you mean here is that you took the teachings of the religion, followed them, and then had a positive result - fair enough. All you have done there is prove that the teachings are good ideas (in your case). That doesn't mean that the religion is valid.
If someone came up to the door and told me that there was a flying spaghetti monster that ruled the world, and I should never eat spaghetti ever a
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Have you applied your own requirements to the belief that "the universe works by following a set coherent rules that can be understood by observation and logic"?
Not that I think the belief is wrong, just that it's a belief that can't be proven by logic alone; you would know if you had held it to your own standards. You should give more leeway to rational thinkers that happen to be religious.
Disclaimer - I'm an atheist, who happens to believe that emotion is a deeper motivator of human thought than reason, a
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Thanks for your comment, one of the greatest things that can happen to one of these conversations is when people can put aside biases for the moment and analyze a statement on its own merits, rather than the baggage our society has associated with it.
I do of course disagree with your belief that my ideals are acquired by family traditions, from personal evidence :)
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2000 years ago, no one knew what a star was or orbits or DNA.
But they certainly knew what stars werent, and were capable of predicting where they would appear in the skies; and im fairly certain that they had a firm grasp on breeding.
One of the more shameful errors I have seen is to assume a level of ignorance for people 2000 years ago (or more, or less) that is unfounded. It might astound you what the greeks, romans, egyptians, chinese, and phoenicians knew.
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Love is an emotion - it's an abstract label we have applied to someone wanting another person's company and caring about them - that's clearly observable in society, and in a product of evolution and natural selection - animals that look after their children do better than those that don't, as they avoid the young animals being killed off. It's observable.
As to the rest of what you say, it didn't really make too much sense, as far as I can gather you are saying that caring about another person is proof of a
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Our current concept of Santa and reindeer has a lot to do with the poem "the night before Christmas" written in 1823. The character is referred to as a 'right jolly old elf'. Also the sleigh is miniature. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Visit_from_St._Nicholas [wikipedia.org].
And current view of how Santa looks was created by Coca Cola for advertising.
To have a good look into the Santa Mythos, read Terry Pratchett's Hogfather - while a lot of humourous bits wound in, it provides some deep thinking. Crafty bugger, that Pratchett.
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read Terry Pratchett's Hogfather - while a lot of humourous bits wound in, it provides some deep thinking.
That's true of every Pratchett book I've read. And rather than "humorous parts" I'd say "damned hilarious."
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Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Scientific Inquiry into Santa Claus
As a result of an overwhelming lack of requests, and with research help
from that renown scientific journal SPY magazine (January, 1990) - I am
pleased to present the annual scientific inquiry into Santa Claus.
1) No known species of reindeer can fly. BUT there are 300,000 species of
living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects
and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only
Santa has ever seen.
2) There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world. BUT since
Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist
children, that reduces the workload to 15% of the total - 378 million
according to Population Reference Bureau. At an average (census) rate of
3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's
at least one good child in each.
3) Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75-1/2
time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west
(which seems logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This is
to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has
1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney,
fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat
whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the
sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8
million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we
know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept),
we are now talking about
million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least
once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc.
This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000
times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made
vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per
second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour.
4) The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming
that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (2 pounds),
the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably
described as overweight. On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more
than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see point #1) could
pull TEN TIMES the normal amount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even
nine. We need 214,200 reindeer. This increases the payload - not even
counting the weight of the sleigh - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison
- - - this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth.
5) 353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air
resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as
spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer
will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each. In short,
they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer
behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire
reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second. Santa,
meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater
than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be
pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.
In conclusion - If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's
dead now.
Re:Obligatory (Score:4, Funny)
My gawd, the poor woman !! I now understand why she so sparingly appears in public. Being so overweight must be horrible.
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I for one welcome our, ...oh wait, I don't have to do that nonsense!
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My gawd, the poor woman !! I now understand why she so sparingly appears in public. Being so overweight must be horrible.
The queen, she came to call on us
She wanted to see all of us
I'm glad she didn't fall on us
She's 57,558,600 stone...
Apologies to the late George Hodnett [wikipedia.org].
Re:Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
...would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force
No wonder my stocking had a big diamond in it this morning. It USED to be a hunk of coal.
This explains everything! (Score:3)
"Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second"
This explains why we've never been able to nail him with anti-aircraft fire...
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353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere.
It's a good thing he got that new pet conditioner. "Protects from heat, drying, and daily damage"!
Re:Obligatory (Score:4, Informative)
It can all be explained because The Dioctor helped him out!
This isn't original... Picked it up somewhere...
The Doctor had some left over TARDIS parts and built St. Nick a sleigh from them! Only it's time locked to Christmas Eve... So Santa behaves. That allows Santa to deliver presents all year round. Because the Sleigh is "bigger on the inside" there is plenty of room for gifts. (sadly, Santa didn't get a library or pool) that also accounts for the flying reindeer... But the might be a special breed from the future?
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The paradox would be low. Santa is always delivering between now and the next Christmas Eve. Because he is going to different houses every time he's not crossing his own timeline at all.
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Very good. For anyone else that wanted to find the source of this, this website: http://www.skypoint.com/members/camilian/humor/SantaAnalysis.shtml [skypoint.com] claims:
"This was sent via e-mail a couple years ago, circa 1996. Therefore the author's information is unknown."
If someone has more information on the source I'd like to hear it.
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There's a problem with the science in your comment above. It presumes all the boys and girls are Nice. We can scientifically prove that most of them are in fact Naughty. How many parents fake Santa's appearance to mask their children's Naughtiness?
As a result, Santa is mostly underfed, underworked. He's not as chubby as before since he has few morsels to eat every Christmas. He's home by 9PM PST. His elves were able to participate in this year's Occupy protests without any meaningful dent in productivity.
Because Noddy has been naughty (Score:2)
We can scientifically prove that most of them are in fact Naughty. How many parents fake Santa's appearance to mask their children's Naughtiness?
And this is why Santa doesn't visit Toy Town. For one thing, the viewpoint toy is in fact Noddy [wikipedia.org], and for another, Big-Ears does a good job of faking (a previous) Santa's appearance.
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Dude, RTFA. It clearly explains how he uses relativity clouds to achieve these feets.
Reindeer don't have feets, they has hoofz. As for relativity, the one at the front is called Rudolf the Red-shift Reindeer.
Meh ... (Score:4, Informative)
Kinda late. The Finns already made a documentary on that topic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_Exports [wikipedia.org]
Oh, thank god (Score:3)
He's got... (Score:5, Funny)
... an O(1) solution to the Traveling Salesman Problem, but he ain't sharing it. Which is a bummer, since that's all I wanted for Christmas.
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
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... an O(1) solution to the Traveling Salesman Problem, but he ain't sharing it. Which is a bummer, since that's all I wanted for Christmas.
How presumptuous. Why do you think he comes around once a year?
Because it takes 365 days to compute the route!
just say magic and don't milk it. (Score:2)
enough said.
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enough said.
Yes, Milk and Cookies, he needs to refuel his energy between stops.
Obligatory Occupy (Score:5, Funny)
Santa's mastery of nanotechnology allows Santa to grow presents on the spot
Thereby depriving all the elves of jobs! They did the right things, they followed the rules, they went to elf school, and got advanced degrees in craftsmanship, but they're getting screwed by Santa, who's just rewarding the children he thinks are "nice". You remember when you were a kid? Did the children who were actually nice get the best presents? No! It was always the kids of some corporate fat cat! We see who Santa's rewarding. Occupy the North Pole!
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The elf jobs are secure, who do you think maintains the complicated system that delivers raw material to the nano-replicator on the sleigh in flight?
Those gifts belong to Santa until he gives them. He can give them to whomever he chooses. You are just sour grapes because you only got a lump of non-environmentally friendly coal.
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Thereby depriving all the elves of jobs!
We've all been deprived of Jobs. Let us hold hands on this day when we celebrate crass commercialism coupled closely to conspicious consumption and remember Him...
Nanotech doesn't create mass (Score:2)
Don't worry, TFS is smokin' crack. Nanoassembly doesn't save weight - what does he thing, nanotech converts air into presents?
It might save space in the bag, if it's just filled with gray goo, but I don't think Santa has Trek replicators yet.
Magic? (Score:2)
It would appear that the only magic here is the disappearing funding for his department because they spend their government- and taxpayer-funded time doing stupid stuff like this.
Really? Because we're not in armed conflicts all over the globe and our space travel initiatives aren't completely fucked? Come on guys, serious problems - serious response. Let's dig ourselves out of this intellectual hole we've fallen in and get back to being pioneers of... well, anything but 100% outsourced capitalism.
The real mystery... (Score:4, Informative)
... is why the WTO hasn't gone after Santa for violating import/export & tariff laws, and why the AFL-CIO & the Teamsters haven't shut him down or made him disappear.
BTW, the house I grew-up in didn't have a fireplace, therefore we also didn't have a chimney. When I was a kid, I believed Santa came down our sewer system vent pipes.
As a parent (Score:5, Funny)
TFA was written by a non-parent.
The answer is much simpler. Since he only give presents to children who have been good all year long, Santa only makes a few brief stops in the coma wards of hospitals. The rest is just marketing.
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When I read this the first thing I thought of was that it is a good thing kids stop believing in Santa Claus not too long before they figure out how to beat off. Saves a lot on psychiatric treatment later.
no "scientific explanation" needed (Score:2)
CM: Yeah! And then, when they flied across da sky, they used ta come down to places like, oh, Chicago, L.A., Nueva York and Pacoima and all those places, y'know, and then land on top of people's roofs and then 'ol Santa Claus would make himself real small, y'know, like, a real small guy, and he'd come down da chimney and then he would give you all da stuff that he made, man. And...dig this, man...he did it all in
citation (Score:2)
New movie in the works (Score:2)
Sounds like they're gearing up for a gritty reboot.
So, this is what science is up to now? (Score:2)
What is next, justifying religion?
Santa is nothing but a training in bullshitting kids. When they are told there is no santa, they fill up that gap with zombie jesus.
Don't like to your kids. Tell them you love them very much and give them a gift, that's all they need. Fairy tales rot their little minds.
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Fairy tales rot their little minds.
Yes; yes and no. Teaching the defenseless little expenses that the two people who are tasked with keeping them alive and caring the most about them will lie to them about the basic nature of reality teaches them a good lesson: question authority. Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, God is the progression; most people only make it past the first three. And the kicker is, there might be a Protector, but it's not the way that God is described in the holy books. It's more a construct of science. And we
brane deer (Score:2)
Already covered by "Nature".
Alcohol... (Score:2)
Re:slow news day... (Score:5, Funny)
Google.
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At least it isn't April 1st. Slashdot turns into a flaming piece of shit for about 48 hours every year at that time. This is not even remotely as stupid as it gets on that day.
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Warehouse 13
Holiday World (Score:2)
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Occam's Razor can be used with sufficient enough certainty to show that there is no Santa and that the gifts are bought by the parents (or somebody else), and the fact that it says "made in China" only confirms this theory.
Oh joy. Scrooge has a Slashdot account.
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An atheist at that. Was Scrooge an atheist?
Re:How about Hannukah? (Score:4, Funny)
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