Attention: stupid dead academics!

[moragmacpherson]

Okay, all of you guys from the 19th century and earlier writing commentaries on Aristotelian physics: could you please define the symbols you're using for physical constants?  If I don't know what alpha stands for then it's really hard for me to follow your discussion of the faults of "v α F/R; F>0; R=0". 

I'm pretty sure v is velocity, F is force and R is resistance, but I have absolutely no clue on alpha, and none of the modern uses of alpha make any sense.  And no, there's no decent prose statement of the law either.

(Yes, I know Aristotle's dividing by zero there, which is problematic, but the formula has to do with the motion of celestial spheres, which he believed was infinite, and while I always thought dividing by zero = does not exist, Roomie assures me that the result of dividing by zero could also be termed infinite)

Comments

[13chapters.livejournal.com]

lol, I took this econ class a couple years ago and for some reason we had to divide by zero in a calculation and everyone in the class was baffled and we were all sure we were doing it wrong. When it came up in discussion section, the TA said "okay, we divide by zero, which is infinity..." and we all went "WHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?" It was a totally audible sound of disbelief and confusion. Then we all cracked up because no one should be that infuriated by division. But he had turned our whole world upside down!

In conclusion, that class was fucked up.

[moragmacpherson.livejournal.com]

This is my feeling about economics in general.

[naatz.livejournal.com]

Alpha obviously stands for 'idiots', and this equation checks how far idiots will get if they're thrown into space before they spontaneously explode. This theory is enforced by how R=0, because idiots' resistance is, y'know. Zero.

|Meduza|