Triple Epiphany

 

A  priest -- an imam -- and a penguin:
walk into a bar.

 

(Let us pause, while we contemplate that.)

 

Each has vowed to order a drink that will challenge his faith head-on.

 

~

 

The priest orders a plain glass of water -- even though this is a bar.

After a moment of silent prayer, 

he raises the glass.

 

And just before the liquid hits his lips,

the Holy Spirit intervenes,

changing the water to wine.

 

The priest sighs and gives thanks.

 

~

 

 

The imam, biting his lip, goes ahead and orders a glass of wine.

His hand trembles as he lifts it -- but then, remembering his faith,
grows calm:  and in iron resignation,
drinks.

 

But again, that same saining spirit, that erst intervened,

now changes -- ere the drop upon the lip --

the wine into water:  thus sparing him sin.

 

The imam heaves a sigh and gives thanks.

 

~

 

The penguin orders a glass of orange juice.

He lifts it in the “To your health” gesture  to his companions,

then downs it in a draft:

 

and sits back;  sighs, in refreshed contentment.

 

The priest and the imam  exchange puzzled glances.

“But -- what -- did the orange juice change into?” they ask.

 

The penguin shrugs contentedly. 
“Just orange juice,” he says.

“I take the things of this world as they come,

exactly as God hath made them.”

 

 

Personal Penguins

Upon suffering some tummy-trouble:

“It must have been that caviar,” he was thinking.  “That beastly caviar.”  He violently hated caviar.  Every sturgeon in the Black Sea  was his personal enemy.

-- Aldous Huxley, Point Counter Point (1928), p.  67

There is something reverent and respectful about have a personal relationship with each individual sturgeon, albeit one of enmity.   In the case of penguins, such a distributed relationship exists -- but in this case, one of amity.

And it was in that spirit that Doctor Justice set forth upon his visionary project of individually naming each and every penguin.  The project was a success, and is now famed throughout the civilized universe.   You can read about it here:

https://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2017/04/doctor-justice-names-penguins.html

Social-Distancing fail

.

Frontiers of Paleozoology

The world throbs anew with the announcement of the recent discovery in New Zealand, of a new penguin genus, Crossvallia, in size second only to the celebrated Pinguinus ingens,  of which  more here:

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2013/02/when-penguins-ruled-earth.html

Heroic hemihexameter

Try-pots   the Térror   of  Pénguins

[Fragment discovered beneath an iceberg in Antarctica.]

March of the Penguins !

Alluding to the current kerfuffle over the northward-tending “caravan”, the lead editorial in this week’s New Yorker  quotes the following startling statement from POTUS:

“They’ve intercepted wonderful people

from South America 

and from other parts further south.”

I rushed to my globe and immediately confirmed that the only point south of South America is … Antarctica.

And the only beings in Antarctica are… penguins.

Coming soon to a border near you.

The penguins are on the march!

[FLASH UPDATE]  It turns out the Administration (or rather, its IC elements) may have been after bigger game than penguins, when they cast their nets south towards Antarctica.  Those with appropriate clearances can view the following video:

Geheimnisvolle Antarktis

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNROpknHa7o

Recent sightings of giant penguins

This just in:

www.india.com/news/world/scientists-discover-fossils-of-man-sized-penguin-in-new-zealand-2751386

Figure shown 1/50 of actual size

For full  scientific background on these discoveries, google

   =>  Pinguinus ingens

What -- you call this *cold* ?!?

Media hysteria:

  Winter storm threatens East Coast, bringing temps colder than Mars

Frozen iguanas falling from trees during cold snap in Florida

  États-Unis : il fait si froid que les requins meurent congelés

You wanna know cold?  I’ll tell you co-ld …

On Saturn, where we penguins originated before planting an Earth-colony at Antarctica, it grows so cold, the oxygen freezes right out of the air…

You got to chip off a chunk with a chisel and chew it, even to breathe…

~

Want further truth-defying tales?  Try these:

Reports from Rootabaga Country

Perfect days

to catch some rays

.

Ecstatic Vision

pile upon     pile upon

pile  of

perfect

penguins

Doctor Justice names the penguins

[Prefatory remarks:
In this space, we intend, favente deo, to begin a quest of world-historical import:  the Naming of the Penguins.   The project is to appear in installments.  To prepare yourselves, read (or re-read),  L’Ile des pingouins, by Anatole France.]

(1) We read in Scripture, how that Adam did name the beasts:

And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field ..

Further research reveals, however, that our Original Parent did not name each beast individually, but only by kind:   Behold, these are the lions, these the lambs;  these the hawks and kites and crows … 

Thus, much work remains to be done.  And as a linear descendant of Adam (on my mother’s side -- father’s too, in fact), I feel it is incumbent to me to take up this cross.

Where to begin?   Well, more numerous than all the beasts of the field, are the Penguins, of pure repute:

Appellavitque Adam nominibus suis cuncta animantia

Accordingly, all the penguins of Antarctica have lined up single-file, and are passing patiently beneath my hand, as I sain each one, and give each one its name before God.

“Fluffy; Chubby; Tumtums; Blackie; Whitey; Roly-poly; Poly-Roly …”

As of press-time, Dr Justice has individually named eighty thousand penguins; just five million more to go.

(2)  [Update, 28 April 2017]

Five hundred thousand and counting:

“….  Fishsnitcher, Egghuddler, Iceberg Bertie, Lollybop,

 Antarctic Archie, Austrobird,  Gus the Glacier Guy, Snowmelt…”

Te baptizo, Nitide !

[TBC, DV….]

Happy World Penguin Day !!

On this, the most joyous of all secular holidays,

we join the planet in celebrating  World Penguin Day,

with a series of funposts

         HERE.

The singing, dancing throng

Footnote:
By coincidence, today Antarctica celebrates World Featherless Biped Day (that’s us).  Coincidence, because the celebration does not always fall on April 25;  as you might expect, penguins follow a lunar calendar.  In this they resemble the ancient Hebrews, of whom some reckon them to be a Lost Tribe.

Politicians and Penguins

It has been reported that Trump just made fun of Romney for “walking like a penguin”:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/trump-romney-walks-like-a-penguin/2016/05/25/613b5dd0-22c1-11e6-b944-52f7b1793dae_video.html

We are outraged at the insinuation.  Penguins walk nothing like that stumblebum Romney -- they have a natural grace and dignity.

"I shall not dignify that innuendo  by a reply..."

~

For your weekend reading pleasure,

we reproduce our earliest think-piece (from March 2013)

on the relations between politics and penguins.

(For further particulars, consult Prof. Dr.  H.D.G. von Vogelkunde, Die Pinguinistik in der Weltwissenschaft, 30 volumes, 1807 fff. )

~    ~    ~

(1)   One is not quite sure whether the following description of the French President, by his ex-mistress and songstress, is meant as a compliment …

Carla Bruni règle ses comptes avec Hollande

Sans le nommer, l'ex-première dame traite François Hollande de «pingouin» dans son prochain album.

http://www.lefigaro.fr/politique/2013/03/15/01002-20130315ARTFIG00579-carla-bruni-regle-ses-comptes-avec-hollande.php?m_i=WzZWqf4S4y3k7x6wXinJ2ITpXD2thSi21OvAHo80%2B%2BSQjgBWM

Well, here are the lyrics;  you be the judge:

«Il prend son petit air souverain

Mais je le connais, moi, le pingouin n'a pas de manière de châtelain.

Eh, le pingouin, si un jour tu recroises mon chemin,

Je t'apprendrai, le pingouin,

Je t'apprendrai à me faire le baisemain (…)

Ni laid ni beau, le pingouin,

Ni haut ni bas, ni froid ni chaud, le pingouin, ni oui ni non (…)

Tiens le pingouin  t'as l'air tout seul  dans ton jardin»…

For those of you whose French is rudimentary, the Translation Team here at the World of Dr Justice (headquarters:  Geneva)  offers the following free rendition (a certain poetic-license being naturally effected metri causâ)

Hooray for penguins, the King of Beasts!

Ruling the roost, from most to least!

Join us in our voyaging,

and let’s go visit  The Penguin King !!

(2)   You have doubtless read of the recent plebiscite in the Falklands, in which 97% of those voting elected to remain beneath the umbrella of Great Britain.  Omitted from the MSM reports were the vote totals of the indigenous (as opposed to colonialist) population, who surely should have a say.   These are, of course, penguins, and they far outnumber the other bipeds (the ones who lost their feathers in a long tragedy of evolutionary decline).  They voted almost unanimously to reject both British and Argentine overtures, and to become an Overseas Territory of Antarctica.

(The only dissent was a contrarian chick, who plumped for the North Pole.)

Note:  This is not the first time that penguin suffrage has altered the course of history:

Dr J a shoo-in for November

(3)  For an earlier thinkpiece on the political relevance of penguins, consult:
       http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2011/02/penguins-politics.html

[Footnote:  The present post is focused on strictly politicological aspects of Spheniscidae.  For the philosophical dimension, consult the following treatise

Scheinprobleme in der Pinguinologie  ]

.

The Perfection of Penguins: an inductive proof

In mathematical induction, you begin with the base case a.k.a. Induktionsanfang, traditionally symbolized as P(0) (where P stands for “Penguin”, and  0 depicts the egg).   In the present instance, P(0) is Baby Fuzzy.

Kleiner Kuschel-Induktionsanfang

Now, P(1) = Fuzzy’s Mommy;  and they rejoice in a Perfect Love.  Thus, the Induction Hypothesis is established.

Now consider any arbitrary P(k).  In this case, P(k)  is known as Fluffy;  and P(k +1) (the k-plus-first Penguin) is Fluffy’s perfectly adoring mate.   So once again, the induction goes through.

Thus we have established the Perfection of Penguins.

~

Note:  Using the more powerful technique of Transfinite Induction, we can establish the existence of (the wonderful, the unutterable) Zorn’s Penguin.   This, however, requires the Axiom of Choice, in its strengthened form, “Choose Penguinity”.

Scala naturæ (downward direction)

Jesus preached to the people;

then Francis, a man, catechized the birds of the air

(as Saint Maël, we read, preached to the penguins).

Shall a penguin, then,

take pulpit to the ocean-folk,

filling them with such dim visions as might fit,

proportional to their subaqueous understanding?

dr(eamr)emembered

Fragments, fished up from m

m

memory …

“… fighting a strong rearguard action ….

But on May 27, the King of the Penguins

asked the Germans   for an armistice …”

Awaking; awake;

I shake

my dream(dis/misre)membered

head.

So it had seemed but --

I know that can’t be right!

The Penguins would never surrender !!

~

For more  on the mighty Penguin King,
click here:
http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2012/03/exciting-story.html


 

The Penguin Paradox

If you’ve ever read an introduction to linguistic or analytical philosophy, you will have met the concept of the “semantical paradoxes”, such as Grelling’s.   These involve the limits of language -- although, not in the usual way whereby there is so much you wish to impart but you can’t put it into words :  rather the opposite.  Language, unbridled, can take us places we should never go, and needs to be regimented -- to have limits set upon it, like a wayward teen.  (Russell to language:  “You - are - so - grounded !!”)

One of the variant colors or flavors  is:  What is the largest number not nameable in fewer than twenty-two syllables?   (There is a variant that replaces fewer with less, and thus can say “twenty-one”;  but grammatical decorum forbids.)

So you think about it, and come up with some number with a lot of nines in it, and proudly present your answer.  Then the presenter grins and says:  Ah, but I just named it with that very phrase, and it took me one syllable less to do it!

Actually, I can top that.

So, for fifty points:

=> What is the largest number nameable by an English monosyllable??? <=

(Thinks …   thinks …)

(Hmmmmmmm ……….)

And the answer is:

Bob.

“Bob” is my name for a certain very, very big number.  He’s huge.  And Bob is the largest because there are only finitely many English monosyllables, which were dealt out to a bunch of us, and I waited till everyone else had christened his number first.  Bob is defined as the sum of all those numbers.

(Same strategy Lyndon Johnson used in wrangling his election to the Senate.)

Since I discovered this paradox, parable, or whatever it is,  I get to name it.  I call it The Penguin Paradox, because I like penguins.

“Bob”s official mascot

.

Dr J comes out of the closet !

At a time when all the subcortical world is chattering about a creature which purportedly transitioned from what it was, to what is is not (and could never be) -- in bare defiance of Bishop Berkeley’s celebrated (if possibly apocryphal) dictum ("Everything is, what it is:  and not -- another thing...")-- and moreover harvesting accolades for doing so, 

we thought the moment opportune to announce our own chrysalidal Coming Out:   We have finally decided, publically to embrace  Our Inner Penguin !!

Fortunately, this process did not necessitate any unpleasant surgico-chemical interventions, but merely the doffing of the elbow-patched cardigan and academic tweeds, then donning a dinner-jacket.   Behold the results:

Dr Justice  in his native habitat

We await the media frenzy, paying cold cash to appear on the covers of magazines.

~

More surprising is the fact that, as we discovered only this morning,  our lawnmover is, actually and in point of fact, a penguin !!!

Those of you who have followed this blog, will have noticed our yearly celebration (annually reposted) of the triumphant vernal restarting -- upon first try!  -- of our ancient lawnmower, after its hibernation:

        Rites of Spring (iterum resartus)

What we have hitherto refrained from referring to, since we did not understand until just now, is that, as summer approaches, the d*mned thing frequently fails to start.

Eventually I noticed a correlation:  If the day is too hot and humid, the machine is listless;  if crisp, perky.    I tried it this morning, in the cool of the dawn:  it roared to life.  (Regretted to do something so noisy, early Sunday, but figured that the good folk were all away at early Mass.)

For this, there exists but one explanation:   My lawnmover is a penguin!

~

As expected, the media are swarming all over our driveway, trying to get the low-down on what has suddenly become the planet’s number one story.

Q:  So, what’s it like to be a penguin?

A:  Not so bad, providing you like fish.

Q:  What’s the best thing about being a penguin?

A:  Sliding on your tummy on the ice! Mmmm!  We call it belly-‘bogganing.

Q:  Are there any esoteric interconnections between penguins and snow-bunnies?

A:  Yes!  When a penguin is very happy, he sometimes becomes completely white, and thus cannot be perceived against the snowy background.  These are called “polar penguins”.   The (meta)physics of these beings  is not well understood, their study being still in its infancy.

Saint Anselm’s Proof of the Perfection of Penguins

Lemma.  Penguins have every excellence.

Proof.   Suppose there were some excellence which some one penguin  lacked. -- But that is absurd.   Whence the lemma. ∎

Thus, using this result:  Create an ascending K-chain of Excellent Penguins, and use transfinite induction on P.   

Q.E.D.

“Zorn’s Penguin”:

The most perfect penguin of them all

[Biographical footnote:  Over brandy and cigars, Dr J was led to confess, that the proof was of his own devising, but that, out of modesty, he had attributed it to the saint.]

Charlie Hebdo: a Penguin Perspective

Je suis  Fluffie

A menace to penguins

We interrupt your weekend merry-making  with a red alert:

Let us imagine a planet covered with calm water. If you drop a large rock into the water at the North Pole, a wave will propagate out  in a circle of ever-increasing radius.  In due course, however, this circle will reach the equator, after which it will start [inexorably] to shrink,  until eventually the whole wave raches the South Pole at once, in a sudden burst of energy.

-- “Manifolds and Differential Geometry”, in Timothy Gowers, ed., The Princeton Companion to Mathematics (2008), p. 44

Moral of the story:  DO NOT DROP A LARGE ROCK INTO THE WATER AT THE NORTH POLE !  It would swamp the penguins!

[Note for connoisseurs:  This effect is an analog of what S|G|NTers call "antip*dal recepti*n", one variety of the 'whispering-gallery' phenomenon.]

Incidentally -- For an example of a manifold in the form of a differentiable penguin, click here.