Scientists are a serious lot.. Sines and tangents, exponents and roots of radical equations, offer little in the way of humor, and scientific conclusions are rarely cheery. If you catch a fine fat mackerel, “Don’t eat it. It is loaded with mercury.” “Lobster tamale is pure poison.” ” The average global temperature is rising at an exponential rate.” However, once in a while, a scientist will crack a smile.
Two serious scientists sat in the cockpit of our Friendship sloop Eastward in Bucks Harbor on a pleasant July day. The sun was shining brightly, but these two scientists cast a cloud. They were discussing the hypothetical explosion of an atom bomb in the deepest part of the Pacific Ocean. Harvard physics professor, John Cole, owner and skipper of the elegant gaff-headed yawl, Quill II, declared such an explosion would split the world in half. Physics professor Ralph Holmes of the University of Vermont, owner and skipper of the sturdy gaff-headed yawl Electron II, maintained it would not. Both were professional compass adjusters frequently seen on the Maine coast from May to October. Discussion revolved around the compressibility of water, its vaporization under extreme pressures, the expansion coefficient of various rocks, all in mathematical language familiar to both professors. I was dazed and badly confused.
I was jerked back to the real world of Bucks Harbor by Ralph’s exclamation, “Well, if it does split the world in half, I want to be on the half with the coast of Maine.” I agree with Ralph.