At a conference in Dublin, Stephen Hawking revealed a bet he had made with an American physicist, John Preskill, who had never accepted the British scientist’s contention that information could not be lost from black holes. Yesterday Professor Hawking admitted he had changed his mind.
The loser was to provide the winner with an encyclopedia of his choice, Professor Hawking explained, and Professor Preskill wanted a baseball encyclopedia. “I had great difficulty in finding one, so I offered him an encyclopedia of cricket, but John wouldn’t be persuaded of the superiority of cricket.” [size=1](Independent.co.uk)[/size]
So, if you were in Professor Preskill’s shoes (you were able to win the bet by proving Stephen Hawking incorrect), which encylopedia would you have picked?
I would probably have picked any enclopedia dealing with insects. I can’t stand insects (I have a can of RAID nearby in case I get attacked), but I wouldn’t mind reading about them or watching them on TV all day
I would have picked a general encyclopedia, to add to my encyclopedia collection. I have infant-type encyclopedias and kindegarten-to-2nd-grade type encyclopedias and high-school encyclopedias and general encyclopedias (Encyclopedia Britannica and Compton’s).
So now all I need is a genius type encyclopedia. I’ll probably never understand anything it says, but it’s good to have anyway.
I guess I would choose some general encyclopedia like hifi said, or a (rock) music encyclopedia
…or an encyclopedia about literature (not that I would ever read in it, but I could show it to some people and tell them “look people, I’ve got an encyclopedia about literature, respect my opinion, I’m erudite!” )
