SUPPOSING the president of the US suddenly started going loopy. It could happen. There are those who wonder if Ronald Reagan鈥檚 Alzheimer鈥檚 disease began to affect him before he finished his term in office. Come to that, there are those who wonder whether Margaret Thatcher was running short of the odd marble before she ceased being prime minister.
Who would decide whether the president鈥檚 mental state was likely to be a danger to the nation? And who would take him or her aside for a friendly chat about the advisability of an extended visit to a suitable clinic?
These questions have been exercising the minds of the American body politic, and the Journal of the American Medical Association reports that a 鈥渨orking group on disability in US presidents has been set up to answer them. The twenty-fifth amendment to the US Constitution allows for the president and vice-president to be replaced without an election should they become unable to govern, but does not provide a mechanism for establishing presidential sanity. The working group, comprising doctors, historians, lawyers and political scientists, spent three days earlier this year thrashing out the problem.
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It鈥檚 likely that the group will endorse the proposal put forward by Bert Park of St John鈥檚 Regional Health Center in Springfield, Missouri. He suggested establishing a nonpartisan group of 鈥減residential impairment consultants鈥� who would be appointed at the beginning of each administration and who 鈥渨ould be charged with monitoring the president鈥檚 mental health on a yearly basis and convening on an emergency basis should the question of inability arise鈥�. The panel would report its findings to the vice-president.
All of which seems eminently sensible, and should help solve a problem that the working group was told has arisen when presidents have been ill in the past. There have, apparently, been 鈥渋nstances of substantial influence exerted by the presidential spouse to suppress disclosure of the president鈥檚 condition鈥�.
AT FIRST SIGHT, knitting and science may not appear to have an awful lot in common, but Christine Jordan of the Nuffield Radio Astronomy Laboratories at Jodrell Bank, Cheshire, is forging the connection. With a group of like-minded people (scientists who knit) she is collecting a selection of items that represent the coming together of the two disciplines.
They include a M枚bius scarf, a Klein bottle hat, a jumper sporting electronic network motifs (to be used instead of a blackboard in the course of a lecture) and, most intriguingly, a pattern for a knitted uterus, which Jordan suggests could be very useful in childbirth classes.
TWO STUDENTS attending a beginners鈥� course in computing at Pace University in New York thought that the work their teacher was giving them was too hard, so they did the obvious thing: they sued the university.
According to The Wall Street Journal, the teacher had given them a homework assignment that involved calculating the price of an atom of aluminium on a given Friday. They were asked to use such information as the price of aluminium on Wednesday, the percentage change between the prices of the metal on Wednesday and Friday, the atomic mass of aluminium, the value of the Avogadro number (6.02 脳 1023), and so on.
The students represented themselves in their legal action against the university, and asked the teacher such questions as: 鈥淒o you think this was a good choice for a beginners鈥� class?鈥� The judge found in their favour, saying: 鈥淪tudents are consumers. There is nothing holy or sacred about educational institutions.鈥�
AT THE END of last month, researchers from four European countries held a 鈥渕eeting鈥� in cyberspace, using a virtual reality link. And what did they use this brave new technology to do? They played drinking games.
After the recent success of a previous virtual reality 鈥渕eeting鈥� between British researchers (Technology, 18 March), the same researchers got together with two Swedes and a German. Once the boring stuff (introducing themselves) was done with, they got on with the main business 鈥� playing 鈥淏unnoids鈥�, a virtual reality version of the pass-the-gesture drinking game called Bunnies.
To put it simply, Bunnies involves people putting their hands to the sides of their heads (creating ears, more or less) and waggling them at each other. The aim is to repeat each other鈥檚 gestures. Any failure means the guilty parties must take a drink. 鈥淭he winner is the last person alive/awake/not arrested,鈥� says Steve Benford from the University of Nottingham, one of the participants.
Bunnoids, he insists, is a good way to test whether virtual reality meetings are an improvement on video conferencing. 鈥淵ou see, it鈥檚 serious research after all,鈥� he tells us. We await the final paper, if only to find out, first, whether real drinks were imbibed, and second, who won.
TOWARDS THE END of last year, this column ran numerous examples of 鈥渘ominative determinism鈥� 鈥� the tendency of authors to gravitate towards the area of research which fits their surname. Now Tony Holkham writes to draw our attention to 鈥渓ocative determinism鈥� 鈥� the tendency of institutions to spring up in places with names that fit their activities.
He gives the following examples: the Kennel Club is located in Barking; COIN (Clinical Oncological Information Network) is in Sterling Way, London; Fine Cut Ltd is in Lancing, Surrey; Haynes Car Workshop Manuals is based at Sparkford; and (though only cockneys will appreciate this one) the Hospital Savings Association is at Andover.
Feedback has pointed out (3 December 1994) that the London Hair Restoration Clinic is in Wigmore Street, and we strongly suspect that Holkham is onto something. Readers are invited to send in examples casting further light on the phenomenon.
IF YOU ARE a mathematician, you never know when you might need to scribble down an equation, which is why the Isaac Newton Institute in Cambridge probably has more blackboards than any other building in Britain.
There is even one in the Gentlemen鈥檚 toilet, though in consideration of the fact that not many mathematicians are ambidextrous it is on the wall facing the urinals rather than above them. Feedback鈥檚 informant was too shy to ask if there is also a blackboard in the Ladies.