A Ton of Crap (81 page)

Hebrew in Judaism
The Hebrew language has existed for over 2,000 years and little of the language has changed. Because of this fact, the language is deeply rooted in the Jewish religion, used for prayer and study, and the Torah, the Jewish bible, is written in Hebrew. Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Mizrahi relate to the different pronunciations of the language, and though Modern Hebrew is established, all of these pronunciations are still used in religious ceremonies and rituals.

THE WRIGHT BROTHERS

The First Manned Flight
In order for the
Flyer
to gain enough speed to launch, the Wright brothers created a movable downhill track. On December 13, 1903, after only two tries (one of which resulted in the
Flyer
crashing), Orville Wright flew the
Flyer
for twelve seconds. This was the first piloted and powered flight in history to ever be a success. On November 9, 1904, the
Flyer II
, this time flown by Wilbur, flew for over five minutes.

EDGAR ALLAN POE

Griswold’s Obituary
Rufus Wilmot Griswold was an anthologist, journalist, editor, and critic who worked with Poe and had a long-standing feud with the writer. When Poe died, Griswold wrote an obituary printed in the
New York
Daily Tribune
, signed with the pseudonym Ludwig. The obituary claimed Poe was a reckless drunk, friendless, and a madman, and that he would be missed by few. In 1850, Griswold claimed to be the literary executor of a posthumous biography of Poe. The book is famous for its terribly inaccurate depiction of Poe as a drug addict and madman, and much of it was fabricated.

PROBABILITY

Coin Probability
To solve problems regarding probability with a coin, you have to use tree diagrams. These are very simple, because they are a visual way of showing all of the possible outcomes.

If a coin is tossed 3 times, this is what it looks like:

STRING THEORY

Supersymmetry
There are two types of particles in the universe: fermions and bosons. In string theory, it is hypothesized that there is a connection between these two types of particles called supersymmetry, and that for one to exist, the other has to also exist. The idea of supersymmetry was actually discovered separate from string theory, and in the mid-1970s, it was incorporated into the theory, turning it into superstring theory. Supersymmetry is still a theoretical assumption, and scientists have yet to observe the particles. Scientists believe supersymmetry to be the case because of how much energy it takes to make the particles, and that as energy spread as a result of the big bang, the particles would have collapsed into lower energies.

HEBREW

Writing System
The Hebrew alphabet, which is written from right to left, is an abjad. It consists of twenty-two letters, all consonants. The script is a “square script,” and it is based on Aramaic script (or Ashurit). There is also a cursive version of the alphabet for writing. If vowels are necessary, diacritic marks are placed above or below the letters and sometimes consonants are used as vowels.

THE WRIGHT BROTHERS

The
Vin Fiz
On July 30, 1909, the United States government bought its first airplane. It was a Wright Brothers biplane, and it sold for $25,000 with an additional $5,000 because it had exceeded 40 miles per hour. In 1911, the Wright Brothers’
Vin Fiz
became the first airplane to travel coast to coast. Calbraith Perry Rogers purchased the plane from the Wright brothers and had only ninety minutes of training. The flight took a total of eighty-four days, stopped seventy times, and crash-landed so frequently that little of the original plane existed by the end of the journey.

EDGAR ALLAN POE

The Poe Toaster
Beginning in 1949, 100 years after the death of Edgar Allan Poe, a mysterious man dressed in black with a white scarf started bringing three roses, a bottle of French cognac, and sometimes a note to the tombstone of Edgar Allan Poe on Poe’s birthday. He did this every year until 1998, when it is believed he died and his son took over. Though there were attempts to discover the identity of the Poe Toaster, they never succeeded, and 2010 was the first year the Poe Toaster did not show up. He didn’t appear the following year either, and it is believed that he too has passed away, perhaps ending a sixty-year tradition.

PROBABILITY

Mutually Exclusive Events
If events cannot occur at the same time, that means they are mutually exclusive. For example, if you toss a coin and get heads, you cannot also have tails at the same time. If events are mutually exclusive, then the probability of having
A
or
B
is represented as P(
A
) + P(
B
).

For example:

What is the probability of rolling a die and getting a 3 or a 4?