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Rick Archer
August, 1999
There is no doubt that information now moves around the Planet at a phenomenal rate. If
we are indeed blessed with the second coming of Christ, I have little doubt the next
Sermon on the Mount will appear on the Internet quickly. We have truly become a
global community. For example, via email and the Internet I now correspond with people all
over the country and the world on a fairly regular basis. Yet before the age of the
Internet, the sum total of my correspondence was to put my paid bills in the mailbox.
I am fairly new to the Internet game and I do very little surfing. However I am
extremely fortunate in that many people in the SSQQ community like to share tidbits with
me. For a while I swallowed everything sent to me hook, line, and sinker until one day
Robin Wagner sent me a story I thought had no way of being true.
So Robin and I chatted back and forth until lo and behold she sent me a note confirming
my suspicions... The story was indeed false.
Ever since then I now take everything with a grain of salt. A good example is the cute
"Einstein's Puzzle" that Donna Ruth sent me. (click here if you are interested).
The note attached to Donna's email said the puzzle was created by Einstein himself.
Well, it might have been, but what way do you or I have of knowing that ? Certainly
saying that Einstein himself created the Puzzle assured my second look. But other stories
of its creation are equally plausible.
For example, perhaps one day some geek at Apple Computers named Petunia Kasavubu made
the puzzle up while she was goofing off at her desk. Maybe she was sick of Steve Jobs
yelling at her all the time, so she decided to have a little fun and get paid at the same
time. Then realizing no one else on earth would ever give it a second look, she gave
credit to the most famous genius of all time. This story has just as much chance of
being true as the claim that Albert Einstein made it up. Or for that matter maybe
even a better chance !
In fact, I remember shortly after I published Amanda's Brain Teaser (see very
bottom of Grapevine Page) one day an SSQQ
student sent me a brain teaser he had made up himself. Since I didn't know the guy
and I was busy, I closed it and went on to the next of the 30 emails I get a day without
another thought. If memory serves, his brain teaser was about as complicated as the
Einstein one. So frustrated that no one pays attention to his clever riddle, maybe next
time he gets smart, sends his newest one to Donna and whispers send it to Rick. This time
rather than take credit for his own work, he claims Einstein made it up and said only 2%
of the world was smart enough to figure it out. What a great hook ! I will do just
about any stupid puzzle if it proves once and for all I am smarter than the guy next door.
If any of you readers have an interesting example of nonsense on the Internet, please
share it with me ! dance@ssqq.com
Rick Archer
Story One : The
Bizarre Death Story ! |
Thu 06/03/1999 8:36 AM
Robin Wagner sent me this story :
At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, the president, Dr. Don
Harper Mills, astounded his audience with the legal complications of a bizarre death. Here
is the story:
On March 23, 1994, the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and concluded
that he died from a shotgun wound to the head. The decedent had jumped from the top of a
ten story building intending to commit suicide. He left a note to that effect indicating
his despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor, his life was interrupted by a shotgun
blast passing through a window, which killed him instantly. Neither the shooter nor the
decedent was aware that a safety net had been installed just below at the eighth floor
level to protect some building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to
complete his suicide the way he had planned.
"Ordinarily", Dr. Mills continued, "a person who sets out to commit
suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be what he
intended" is still defined as committing suicide. That Mr. Opus was shot on the way
to certain death nine stories below at street level, but that his suicide attempt probably
would not have been successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to
feel that he had a homicide on his hands. The room on the ninth floor from whence the
shotgun blast emanated was occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing
vigorously, and he was threatening her with a shotgun. The man was so upset that when he
pulled the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the window
striking Mr. Opus.
When one intends to kill subject A, but kills subject B in the attempt, one is guilty
of the murder of subject B. When confronted with the murder charge, the old man and his
wife were both adamant. They both said they thought the shotgun was unloaded. The old man
said it was his long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had
no intention to murder her. Therefore, the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident,
that is, the gun had been accidentally loaded.
The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple’s son
loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident. It transpired that the
old lady had cut off her son’s financial support and the son, knowing the propensity
of his father to use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that
his father would shoot his mother. The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the
son for the death of Ronald Opus. Now comes the exquisite twist. Further investigation
revealed that the son was in fact Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over
the failure of his attempt to engineer his mother’s murder. This led him to jump off
the ten story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast
passing through the ninth story window. The son had actually murdered himself so the
medical examiner closed the case as a suicide. Very tidy of him.
-- A true story from Associated Press, by Kurt Westervelt.
Thursday, June 3, 09:01 am,
Rick Archer Reply :
Robin, the very first thing my mother taught me is not to believe everything I read on
the Internet. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the story immensely !
Thu 06/03/1999 2:05 pm
Robin Wagner reply :
Oh, gosh, forgot about that rule with the Internet and all ! But, how could anyone
think up such a "bizarre" story?
Thursday, June 3, 03:09 pm,
Rick Archer Reply :
Beats me. It sounds on the level, but it seems too preposterous to be real.
Thu 06/03/1999 4:05 pm,
Robin Wagner reply :
Ok, Rick, so it WAS untrue after all. (see below)
First, Robert
Balcells wrote to me :
Robin, I think someone with a vivid imagination made this
up! I am going to pass this on to my wife -R
Second, Lisanne Balcells wrote back to Robert who wrote to me :
Yup! It is nonsense ! I copied this from the Urban Legend Internet site :
"The story regarding a bizarre suicide involving a guy (variations include
Ronald Opus and Paul Aulphis), a tall building, an old couple, and a shotgun is totally
bogus but pretty damn good. Don Harper Mills, past president of the American Academy of
Forensic Sciences made it up in 1987. See 27 Feb 96 Los Angeles Times for an
interview."
http://www.urbanlegends.com/afu.faq/listing.cgi?selection=stupid
Thursday, June 3, 11:41 pm,
Rick Archer Reply :
Robin, How did you find out the story was nonsense ? Did any of your friends send you
the extra tidbits you listed ? I just thought it smelled funny !
Fri 06/04/1999 9:01 am,
Robin Wagner reply :
One of the people I sent it to felt the same way you did and he sent it to his wife who
also thought it was false. She is very into the Internet and found a place that talks
about urban legends and that was one of them: alt.folklore.urban FAQ
Fri 06/04/1999 9:36 am
Rick Archer Reply :
Do you believe someone a) actually gave a flip and b) simultaneously had enough brights
to do something about it !
I can’t imagine.
Fri 06/04/1999 4:18 pm,
Robin Wagner reply :
It is amazing, isn’t it !
.................................................
When I decided to write this article, I too
visited the Urban Legend site and saw the same information listed above. Apparently Don
Harper Mills, past president of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, made this story
up in 1987 for whatever reason and used his prominence to get the rumor started.
The "Urban Legend" site listed above suggested visiting
the LA Times for a followup. Maybe one of our readers would be interested in checking out
this story further : "See 27 Feb 96 Los Angeles Times for an
interview."
http://www.urbanlegends.com/afu.faq/listing.cgi?selection=stupid
I for one would be interested in hearing more background on this
story !
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