With four parameters I can fit an elephant, and with five I can make him wiggle his trunk.
Attributed to John von Neumann by Enrico Fermi, as quoted by Freeman Dyson in “A meeting with Enrico Fermi” in Nature 427 (22 January 2004) p. 297
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John von Neumann only had a very basic computer model. With today’s computing power we can make the elephant do anything – sun, snow, rain, lightning, anything !
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Off Topic (Steve, you need Tips and Notes or a posted email address)
Here’s another doozy from Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, Canada …
http://www.sfu.ca/pamr/media-releases/2012/study-predicts-imminent-irreversible-planetary-collapse.html
ROTFLMAO! You cannot make this stuff up. Parody is now an impossible task!
Funnier is SFU Strategic Vision that is “Simon Fraser University – Engaging the World”. On the basis of this report there’s not a lot of need really.
I particularly liked the line:
Once a threshold-induced planetary state shift occurs, there’s no going back.
No indeed! Not unless you’ve got a time machine.
How do you explain the big climate change that took place 12,000 years ago, before evil humans became a factor? Yes, maybe we should send them back 15,000 in a time machine so they can see mile thick ice sheets down to Chicago, without miserable humanity to blame.