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posted by
cmn32480
on Sunday May 08 2016, @11:49PM
from the I-can't-solve-DiffEq-with-a-computer dept.
from the I-can't-solve-DiffEq-with-a-computer dept.
This just in from the front lines of the War on the Unusual:
University of Pennsylvania economics professor Guido Menzio was solving a set of differential equations on a plane departing the Philadelphia airport when the woman next to him surreptitiously passed a note to a flight attendant telling them she thought he was a terrorist because of the strange things he was writing on a pad of paper. The plane returned to the gate where he was questioned. At least this time the pilot had enough sense not to kick him off the flight.
Remember folks, if you see something say something!
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UPenn Professor Solving DiffEQ on Scratchpad Causes Plane to Return to Gate
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Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Bot on Monday May 09 2016, @12:00AM
I am a terrorist.
Just boarded the plane.
Better alert the lady next to me of my intentions by scribbling arabic invocations on a pad.
Well done, lady.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 5, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 09 2016, @12:02AM
Obviously a member of Al Gebra.
(Score: 2) by CirclesInSand on Tuesday May 10 2016, @02:55AM
Did he have to take a different flight? I doubt a diff eq prof would mind making a completely impossible to understand substitution.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by sjames on Monday May 09 2016, @01:32AM
Yes, she screwed up, but she wasn't alone. She's not the one who delayed the flight and questioned the man.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Monday May 09 2016, @01:45AM
Came here to say the same thing.
What could you possibly write down on a note pad that would pose a risk?
Boom?
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by davester666 on Monday May 09 2016, @05:19AM
Well, if he had written "I have a bomb.", that she read, then yes, that would pose a risk to the flight.
But not being able to understand what a person is writing is not.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by q.kontinuum on Monday May 09 2016, @08:41AM
Well, if he had written "I have a bomb.", that she read, then yes, that would pose a risk to the flight.
How? I would assume the fact that someone writes a statement like this down is not, or if at all then negatively, correlated to the possibility of actually having a bomb. If I had a bomb, I'd never write it down before lift-off. On the other hand, if I haven't got any, I might write it down while working on a comic, a punch-line for a joke, fooling around, working on a plot for a novel, whatever. And lift-off would be the time to get inspiration about such topics.
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(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 09 2016, @12:58PM
> If I had a bomb, I'd never write it down before lift-off.
Because people with bombs are never looking for attention and are never conflicted about what they are doing.
(Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Monday May 09 2016, @03:22PM
Getting a bomb into an aircraft shouldn't be that simple nowadays; I guess it would at a minimum require some cold-blooded planning and execution. Not the type of person who loses the nerve just before lift-off. To get attention with a bomb-threat, no bomb is necessary at all.
That said, I acknowledge that some other people are probably better at guessing how lunatics "think", I have no experience in that way of thinking :-)
Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday May 09 2016, @05:02PM
(don't confront this guy)
Account abandoned.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Kilo110 on Monday May 09 2016, @05:04AM
The crew has to follow procedure. I don't blame them for not wanting to risk their jobs.
Although I wish thy kept the woman on the flight and forced her to bear all the dirty looks from every passenger.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Monday May 09 2016, @05:56AM
Someone etched that particularly stupid procedure into stone and so deserves ridicule for failing to take an obviously likely situation (a less than credible report of danger) into account. Abject stupidity on autopilot.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mhajicek on Monday May 09 2016, @07:30AM
It's all about CYA. No one in a position of authority can afford to not overreact if someone expresses concern over a possible danger. If they underreact they'll be lambasted and fired. If they overreact, well they were just being cautious. That's the stance that we need to change.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 4, Insightful) by sjames on Monday May 09 2016, @09:47AM
Agreed, and it's a hard problem. At one time as a society we looked down on cowardice, now we seem to have enshrined it.
(Score: 2) by captain_nifty on Monday May 09 2016, @02:58PM
The big problem is that we have as a society lost the concept of personal responsibility.
It's not seen as cowardice it's seen as just doing your job or following procedure, with the assumption that whoever wrote the procedure knew better, and the human cog in the machine cannot be responsible for making a decision.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 09 2016, @05:28PM
That started happening the moment "personal responsibility" lost all meaning except for victim-blaming. The only time I've heard anyone make any mention of "personal responsibility" in the past decade is when they were blaming a victim for being a victim.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by VLM on Monday May 09 2016, @03:41PM
Satire and Memes-of-mass-destruction?
I mean, what else is available with a proven track record?
Always respond in kind, rhetoric to rhetoric never cross the streams of rhetoric and dialectic, at least in weaponized form.
That woman needs to be made internet-famous...
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Monday May 09 2016, @05:59PM
Sounds good. If you do one up I'll spread it.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 3, Funny) by q.kontinuum on Monday May 09 2016, @08:26AM
Well... He did wield a weapon of maths-destruction, didn't he?
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