I work with academics and can confirm: life is about papers, classes are getting bigger, hiding away on a mountain and making undergraduate sacrifices would be an honest holiday option.
It is time we did away with “publish or perish” and replace it with “publish and perish.” Nothing will be more blasphemous than writing a textbook that anyone can go out and buy. Those who commit such a crime will face expulsion and reprisals.
Hppasus, a Pythagorean, was executed by his fellows for publicly revealing the existence of irrational numbers.
(Okay, so it’s an apocryphal story, but since we don’t really know what happened, I choose to believe the more entertaining version.)
If it happenned, the fact that irrational numbers are problematic for Pythagorean religious teachings might have played a role — it’s not just a random discovery he let out, it’s a very inconvenient one.
I work with academics and can confirm: life is about papers, classes are getting bigger, hiding away on a mountain and making undergraduate sacrifices would be an honest holiday option.
Hppasus, a Pythagorean, was executed by his fellows for publicly revealing the existence of irrational numbers.
(Okay, so it’s an apocryphal story, but since we don’t really know what happened, I choose to believe the more entertaining version.)
If it happenned, the fact that irrational numbers are problematic for Pythagorean religious teachings might have played a role — it’s not just a random discovery he let out, it’s a very inconvenient one.
I hope the satire tag is appropriate for this post. Recommending it.. cautiously.
McSweeny’s is the most serious possible satire.
I don’t see how it could be. What is it satirising? ‘Sardonic’ or ‘bitter’ would be more appropriate.