Luboš Motl, a physicist who lives and works in the Czech city of Plzeň (or Pilsen: yes, the home of the original Pilsner Beer), reports very exciting news on his blog, The Reference Frame. A Pakistani scientist has apparently constructed a water-powered Suzuki motorcycle. This was made possible by Allah who, ever thinking globally and acting locally, had countermanded the inconvenient truth of the First Law of Thermodynamics.
There is great excitement in Pakistan over this, and the Pakistani government has promised financial support for the water engine program. But there are skeptics, too, although these are already being accused of “undermining the invention” and similar ideological misdeeds. As Motl points out, after perusing the responses to the announcement of this invention, people are apparently expected to “admire” the invention, at least for “God’s sake,” and if they don’t admire the crackpot engineer – or anyone who screams “Allah”, for that matter – they must absorb [a large dose of] “shame on them.” (Of note, soon they may also have to absorb large doses of 7.62 mm rounds.)
Shades of Obama’s idea of the “rightful place of science” as an instrument of ideology, not knowledge. Pearls from Obama’s inaugural address: “We will restore science to its rightful place and wield technology’s wonders to raise healthcare’s quality and lower its costs…” and “…each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet,” and, under his administration, the US “will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.”
Amazing that the Speechifier-in-Chief forgot to mention water.
Oy…
