this post was submitted on 07 Nov 2024
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Science Memes

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[–] ThePyroPython@lemmy.world 80 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Yep. Ghosts in Machines are real.

I have witnessed it first hand multiple times.

At university there was an old 1st gen Makerbot 3D printer and if you took away one of it's prints that were displayed around it, all of your prints would fail, even if you replaced it the printer held a grudge. And never EVER say a 100% certainty statement that the print would succeed like "it is printing ok, it will be finished in an hour". Only say things like "the print is doing ok so far".

The electronics lab was throwing out five old Cathode Ray Oscilloscopes so our little maker group took them in and two were working fine. The other three weren't displaying the trace on the screen. One of our members, a chap from Romania who in his youth spent his time fixing old TVs in his home country, said to let him have a look. I swear down he plugged them in, leant his ear against it, said to the scopes "shh it's ok, we'll look after you", and gave them gentle taps on top just behind the screen, and all three jumped back into life in perfect calibration.

And finally, my girlfriend at the time had a 1st gen iPod that would, at the most inopportune moments randomly wake itself up, play a few seconds of a random song, then shut itself down.

[–] DarkenLM@kbin.earth 38 points 1 day ago (3 children)

The Machine Spirit requires the utmost respect. Failure to do so is heresy of the highest order.

[–] orvorn@slrpnk.net 15 points 1 day ago

I can verify that Makerbots are both fussy and haunted.

[–] Kowowow@lemmy.ca 33 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Thought emporium said that microbiologists are the most super stitisous and that if it took sacrificing a goat to get better results they would

[–] Contramuffin@lemmy.world 33 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Just yesterday I had a CO2 valve close on me during an experiment while I was away for a moment. It takes effort to turn the valve so it couldn't have just shaken closed or something. The valve was in the corner of the room and was blocked off by boxes, so nobody could have accidentally bumped it. And, besides, nobody was in the room anyways. Before the experiment I made damn sure that the CO2 valve was open, and even looking through the computer records (which records the CO2) says that the CO2 valve was open until I walked away.

I still have no idea how the valve could have closed on its own. Now, I'm not saying it's a ghost, but I am saying that I cannot think of a single non-paranormal explanation. I've clearly angered the science gods and I would do well to sacrifice some more cells to the science gods to appease them

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[–] Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

isn't that what fetal bovine serum is for?

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[–] qjkxbmwvz@startrek.website 14 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Whatever you do, do not touch that one BNC cable. Just trust me on this.

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[–] propter_hog@hexbear.net 10 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Can verify: I work at a research laboratory and I can't tell you how many Trump stickers I have seen on bumpers. These are people who mostly have either an engineering masters or a science PhD, and they still believe in fairy tales like voting works.

[–] somename@hexbear.net 3 points 1 day ago

Engineering is the most chud of all academic fields. Beyond the engineering stemlord aspect, there’s a lot of military money floating around.

There’s some similar things with bio fields and pharmaceutical/bioengineering money.

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[–] LaunchesKayaks@lemmy.world 8 points 11 hours ago (2 children)

I work at an MSP and we all have little shrines of random shit on our desks that we've collected. The one guy has a mini filing cabinet under his desk of tech shit that's nearly as old as I am (I'm 27).

If we are ever told that we can't have our shrines, we'll all be devastated.

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[–] AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net 8 points 9 hours ago

My PI: "Oh, we don't use that microcentrifuge, it will ruin your results" Me: "Oh damn, how long has it been broken for?" PI: "No, it's not broken. It's cursed "

I thought this was just exasperated hyperbole, but nah, there's a lot of superstition here.

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