[472] in Humor
HUMOR(long): The Best of the Oracle
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Andrew A. Bennett)
Mon Oct 3 11:02:03 1994
To: humor@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 03 Oct 1994 10:56:42 EDT
From: "Andrew A. Bennett" <abennett@MIT.EDU>
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 1994 10:27:02 -0700
From: cate3@netcom.com (Henry Cate)
The following are selections from rec.humor.oracle
To find out all about the Usenet Oracle, including how to participate,
send mail to oracle@cs.indiana.edu with the word "help" in the subject line.
- ----------------------------------------------------
Selected-By: David Sewell <dsew@lion.ccit.arizona.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Oh Oracle, whose ideas bounce around the universe like some wonderful
> vulcanized ball of knowledge, please tell me:
>
> These new celluar phones - are they alive? The name sounds like those
> single-celled amoebas and protazoas and planetariums that they made us
> learn about in Biology.
>
> If they are alive, what do they eat? Also, when I get mine, what are
> the most popluar names?
>
> Love, Gloria
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Ah, Gloria, in English class they should have taught you about
} names like protozoa and planaria. Anyway, my love, I am disappointed
} that you are getting a cellular phone. You see, "cellular" refers
} not to single-celled animals, but rather to animals with a single
} brain cell, like lawyers and stock brokers.
}
} P.S. We have to stop meeting like this - Lisa is getting suspicious.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: nolan@helios.unl.edu (Harold the Foot)
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Can you explain the mysterious popularity of Billy Joel?? Could he be
> the Anti-Christ??
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} No, because there's only one Antichrist, and Bill Gates has applied for
} the post. It's really obvious. Whenever you install a M$ product on a
} computer, all the speed goes straight to hell.
}
} You owe the Oracle a harder question.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: bc70007@bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu (Otis Viles)
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Super, scrumptious, sublimely, sedacious Oracle of the widespread
> Usenet, please narrate unto me the amount of Oracles it takes to
> change a lightbulb?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} As all omnipotent beings, the Oracle is one and only one being (but
} what a being!). However, the Oracle of course has multitasking
} abilities, and can therefore create an unlimited number of virtual
} Oracles that can do the same things that it does (albeit a bit slower).
} So, the amounts of Oracles needed to change a lightbulb is therefore
} dependant of the time that is allotted to the task. A typical virtual
} Oracle can perform at about 12.2 Mbulbs/sec, so if you want to change a
} lightbulb on, say 6 usecs, it would require 2 virtual Oracles. This
} time/performance relationship is valid up until 26 virtual Oracles,
} when the overhead gets to big, everbody coredumps and WWIII breaks out
} (that usually happens when omnipotent beings coredump). So don't try to
} push that lightbulb change!
}
} You owe the Oracle a stopwatch and 8 Gb of swapspace
- --------------------------
Selected-By: Steve Kinzler <kinzler@cs.indiana.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> O Orakel, please tell me:
>
> Why is it that on our megaexpensive VAX/PC/Mac network, it is
> impossible to print a simple ascii file?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} The answer to your question, my child, is really quite simple.
}
} The different computers simply don't like each other.
}
} Consider how they must feel about it:
}
} Vax: Thinks the world runs on DecNet. Primary users are college
} hackers and computer geeks. Motto: Give us LAT protocol, or
} give us death!, which explains why Dec's profit margins are falling
} like a rock
}
} PC: MS-DOS was really part of Dante's seventh ring of Hell, we
} just forgot to tell you about it.
}
} MAC: Let's play a game of "Hide the operating system from the user"!
} The infamous "Apple Bomb" icon really represents what they should
} do to the designers of this soon-to-become-a-boat-anchor.
}
} So, is it really any wonder why things don't print? The Vax gets the
} data and says "Not a Vax, it simply doesn't count!" and discards it.
} The PC gets the data, and says "I simply cannot understand the
} complexity of this issue, since I'm a single-task processor", and
} dumps the data. The Mac says "Ding!", shows you a bomb icon, and
} sends it down the Appletalk pipeline, where it vanishes into a black
} hole.
}
} You owe the Oracle a Coleco Adam "Home Computer", and a line printer.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: Carole Susan Fungaroli <csf7m@faraday.clas.virginia.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> O' Wise and Cool Oracle, Please Answer this simple question for me:
>
> How can I overcome my writers' block?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Consider. Writer's block is the psycholinguistic analogue of
} constipation. To treat constipation, what do you do? Consume a
} diet high in fiber: crude, indigestible material which in itself
} provides nothing of nutritional value but which facilitates peristaltic
} action. Now, what would be the linguistic equivalent of non-nutritive
} fiber?
}
} Legal documents, of course.
}
} So the cure is for you to enroll in law school. In short time your
} writer's block will be cured, and you will be producing voluminous
} quantities of prose on a regular basis. Analogous in shape, texture,
} odor, and social utility to the product of peristaltic action--but then
} you DID want to be unblocked.
}
} You owe the Oracle your first-born child.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: RICH MCGEE <MCGEE@nic.CSU.net>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Dear Oracle, master of all knowledge, what does UNIX stand for?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Ken Thompson claims that UNIX is "a weak pun on Multics," but this is
} a lie. UNIX is a weak pun on eunuch. Look around you. Are any of
} your male peers ever going to reproduce? And if their significant
} others DO become pregnant-- will you not doubt the identity of the
} father?
}
} UNIX is not all that impressive an operating system. Why, then, is it
} so popular? *UNIX is addictive!* And, just like heroin, the UNIX
} drive quickly displaces the sex drive. (Oh, sure, computer geeks talk
} a lot about wanting to get laid... but do they ever *do* anything
} about it?)
}
} Yet terrible as UNIX addiction is, there are worse fates. If UNIX is
} the heroin of operating systems, then VMS is barbiturate addiction,
} the Mac is MDMA, and MS-DOS is sniffing glue. (Windows is filling
} your sinuses with lucite and letting it set.)
}
} You owe the Oracle a twelve step program.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: David Sewell <dsew@lion.ccit.arizona.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Tell me the answer to this question oh great oracle,
> for I must be enlightened.
>
> If I can't do, I can teach
> If I can't teach, I can teach gym
> If I can't teach gym, what can I do?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Answer oracularities.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: RICH MCGEE <MCGEE@nic.CSU.net>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Dear Mighty Oracle, who doesn't need to be Faster Than a Speeding
> Bullet because he's smart enough to be on the other side of the gun --
>
> Please explain this slang to me: people waffle on issues, get
> toasted by the boss, earn bread, and bring home the dough. Isn't this
> backwards?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} What, you think they should take the dough to work, pay out all their
} bread, butter up the boss, and cook the books on the issues? Be
} serious!
- --------------------------
Selected-By: Carole Susan Fungaroli <csf7m@faraday.clas.virginia.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Dear Oracle who cares when no one else does:
>
> Why do birds sing?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Singing in birds, long thought to be a voluntary action is now known to
} be a vital survival mechanism. Birds need to sing or else they will
} float off into space. It's like this.
} In order to make a bird's body lighter than air and , therefore able to
} fly. The bird's body consitently produces hydrogen gas from the seeds
} and berries it has digested. This is a constant process that produces
} large amounts of gas, if the bird were to keep this gas inside, it
} would surely float away in a matter of minutes, so birds evolved
} singing as a way of releasing the gas and warning other creatures not
} to use open flames or cigarettes nearby in case of igniting the gas.
} Many cases of so-called spontaneous combustion reported by such media
} heavyweights as the National Enquirer, are actually ignitions of bird
} gas. You'll also notice that you never see a bird sing while flying,
} this is because they need to conserve their gas while flying or they
} will begin to plummet which is far less graceful and bird-like.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: David Sewell <dsew@lion.ccit.arizona.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> tell me:
>
> Why is it that in this country the criminals are treated
> better than college students?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Think of it this way: Suppose you were in a room with two people, one
} of whom was a psychotic axe murderer overflowing with hatred for
} society and well versed in brutal methods of inflicting pain, and the
} other of whom was a misty-minded English major overflowing with
} hormones and highly trained in literary deconstructionism; which one
} would YOU want to placate?
}
} You owe the Oracle a better alternative appropriate to a civilized
} nation.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: nolan@helios.unl.edu (Harold the Foot)
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Oracle, who causes the wind to blow and the rivers to flow, please tell
> me:
>
> Just because I think everyone is secretly plotting against me, that
> doesn't mean I'm paranoid right?
>
> Love, Gloria
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Completely correct, Gloria. On the other hand, if you *knew* rather
} just *thought* everyone was out to get you, *then* you'd be paranoid.
}
} (wispering voices ... "now tell her that it's okay to go home, she has
} nothing to fear")
}
} It's okay for you to go home now, Gloria, you have nothing to fear.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: bc70007@bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu (Otis Viles)
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Tell me, Oracle old chappie,
>
> When one goes flying one is always a little concerned that the old
> aeroplane might just choose to drop out of the sky.
>
> So, is there any way one can get a ticket for the black box flight
> recorder as they always seem to survive?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Of course, my insolent young chippie off the old blockie...
}
} There is almost always availability in the black box section of the
} airplane. However, few moral humans have ever found a way to use their
} tickets. The All-knowing, All-seeing, All-alling Oracle has no
} difficulty getting into the 1/4" x 1/4" inch seat. Then again, I'm
} never particularly worried about crashing. I'm just there to <ZOT> any
} foolish and insolent inquisitors. Flying is in fact safer than driving,
} statistically, but if you want to know you can get tickets in the glove
} compartment of a car, too. Same seating restrictions apply. Tough.
}
} You owe me five good reasons not to <ZOT> you. 47-53 words each. By
} Wednesday. Typed.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: RICH MCGEE <MCGEE@nic.CSU.net>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} I'll answer if you feed me.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: nolan@helios.unl.edu (Harold the Foot)
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> | |
> | |
> ______|_____|______
> | |
> | X |
> ______|_____|______
> | |
> | |
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} | |
} 0 | 0 | 0
} ______|_____|______
} | |
} 0 | X | 0
} ______|_____|______
} | |
} 0 | 0 | 0
} | |
}
} I am the Oracle after all.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: Dr. Noe <noe@sal.cs.uiuc.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> What day will the 19th of May fall on in the year 3056?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} It has not yet been decided whether the year 3056 will take place.
} There is some pressure to abandon this experiment, which has turned
} into a bit of a mess, and start again.
}
} It looks as if 3056 will actually be 1062 of the new era. There will be
} some place a bit like Earth, but the bipeds there will not have
} appendices, the fifth month will have 47 days, and be called
} Wooooooooo.
}
} I might have given a bit too much away here.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: davis@licre.ludwig.edu.au
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Aha! I finally have proof that you're a man, not a woman, no matter
> which incarnation you are. You see, every time I think about sending
> you a letter, I type "mail oracle," certainly not, "femail oracle."
> How can you get out of this one, O Wise Mail One?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} I am neither male nor female, but email.
- --------------------------
Selected-By: David Sewell <dsew@lion.ccit.arizona.edu>
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> Dear Oracle, whose wisdom exceeds that of the wisest of the Ancients,
> please tell me, is it better to incorporate a small business, or to
> run it as a sole proprietorship?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} Well, both God and the Devil seem to prefer running as a soul
} proprietorship. Make of that what you will.
}
} You owe the Usenet Oracle a mediator.
- --------------------------
>From: Usenet Oracle <oracle-vote@cs.indiana.edu>
Subject: Usenet Oracularity #622-06
Selected-By: asbestos@nwu.edu (Michael A. Atkinson)
The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply.
Your question was:
> O is for Oracle, you big brain with hips.
> R is for Random Access Memory Chips.
> A is for All of the Questions you answer.
> C is for Comet, Cupid, Dasher and Prancer.
> L is for Long-Range ESP Clarivoyance.
> E is Eternal, which describes your annoyance.
>
> Put 'em all together and whattaya got?
> Oracle! Oracle! Oracle.... (you know what).
>
> Anyways, my question is this:
> OK, I'm using an Xterminal on a DECstation 5000/25, and my darn window
> keeps blinking out! It'll just dissapear on me in the middle of a
> letter or something. It's really getting annoying. Do you know how to
> fix it, or how to reach a DEC technical assistant who charge me $200 an
> hour?
And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
} DECstations are best repaired by means of a small animal sacrifice,
} coupled with the burning of the incense of your choice (just make
} certain it's expensive) and prayer to the Great God Zarquon. Actually,
} the Great God Zarquon isn't specifically a retainer of DECSystems, but
} he is a great pal of the Oracle's and doesn't have much to do these
} days, and will probably be glad at least to entertain your request for
} his intercession. Hiring a DEC technical assistant wouldn't do you much
} good, I'm afraid; he would only do all the things I have described
} above, and charge you the $200 anyway. The key seems to be in the
} combination of the choice of incense and the choice of small animal;
} try sandalwood with a lamb, and if your DEC remains recalcitrant,
} progress to jasmine with a calf or colt.
}
} You owe the Oracle a Grateful Dead CD.
