Fun

On either side of the Kennedy spacecraft, there are two engines, each 5 feet wide. The spacecraft designers would like to make these engines even wider, but they couldn't. Why? The reason is that these engines were delivered by rail, which runs through a narrow tunnel. The distance between the rails is standard: 4 feet 8.5 inches, so the designers could only make the engines 5 feet wide. This raises the question: why is the distance between the rails 4 feet 8.5 inches? Where did this figure come from? It turns out that the railway in the United States was made the same as in England, and in England, railway cars were made on the same principle as trams, and the first trams were produced in England, modeled after horse-drawn trams. And the length of the axle of a horse-drawn tram was exactly 4 feet 8.5 inches! But why? Because horse-drawn trams were made so that their axles would fit into the ruts on English roads, so that the wheels would wear down less, and the distance between the ruts in England was exactly 4 feet 8.5 inches! Why is that? Because the roads in Great Britain were built by the Romans, aligning them with the size of their war chariots, and the length of the axle of a standard Roman chariot was equal to... that's right, 4 feet 8.5 inches! Now we've found out where this size came from, but why did the Romans decide to make their chariots with axles of exactly that length? And here's why: a chariot was usually pulled by two horses. And 4 feet 8.5 inches was exactly the size of two horses' hindquarters! It would be inconvenient to make the chariot axle longer, as this would disrupt the balance of the chariot. Therefore, here is the answer to the very first question: even now, when humans have gone into space, their highest technological achievements directly depend on the SIZE OF A HORSE'S BUTT TWO THOUSAND YEARS AGO. --------------------------- Around the same time, our scientists and the Americans were puzzling over the same problem: they were growing crystals from some kind of melt. A sample is taken, and under certain conditions, crystals appear throughout its volume. The task: to calculate the volume of crystals in relation to the volume of the melt. 1. The sample is cut into a huge number of layers (several thousand). 2. The layers are photographed. 3. The crystals are visible in the photos. You need to calculate the area they occupy in relation to the melt. 4. Convert the area to volume - there are formulas for this. HOW THEY SOLVE POINT 3 AMERICANS. A team of qualified programmers and graphics specialists is created. A powerful program for a SUPERCOMPUTER (!) is written to recognize patterns, tested, and debugged (and this was all no later than the mid-80s, or even earlier. Imagine how they felt!)... All the photos are scanned. Then, for several days, the supercomputer thinks - and the result is ready. OURS. A team is created from everyone who can hold scissors (including janitors). Crystals are cut out of the photos with scissors. Everything that was cut out is WEIGHED on scales. The cut-out photographs are also weighed. THAT'S IT!!! I'll add that our team managed it in 5 working days, while the Americans took a year. SO, WHY DO WE NEED COMPUTERS? ----------------------------------- 10 programmers 0A programmers decided to make a product, One asked, "Where's the money?", and there were 9 left. 9 programmers stood before the boss, One of them didn't know FoxPro, and there were 8 left. 8 programmers bought an IBM, One said, "Mac is better!", and there were 7 left. 7 programmers wanted to read the help, One had a hard drive failure, and there were 6 left. 6 programmers tried to understand the code, One of them went crazy, and there were 5 left. 5 programmers bought a CD-ROM, One brought a Chinese disc - there were 4 left. 4 programmers worked on C, One of them praised Pascal, and there were 3 left. 3 programmers played DOOM on the network, One hesitated a bit, and the count became 2. 2 programmers typed together: "win" One got tired of waiting for the loading - only 1 remained. 1 programmer took everything under his control, But he met with the customer, and there were 0 left. 0 programmers were scolded by an angry boss, Then he fired one, and there were FF.