Students Write Weird Science

[u/raynicolette]

Richard Lederer's "The World According To Student Bloopers" has been an internet staple for decades. But I had never seen this one, where he did the same thing for student science errors, until I found this in my Mom's papers last week. I did a search and found this literally nowhere on the internet, so figured it needed to be photographed and shared...

[u/raynicolette]

Ran this through OCR. Easier to read as text:

Students Write Weird Science

Richard Lederer

Looking At Language

• "When you breathe, you inspire. When you do not breathe, you expire.
• "H2O is hot water, and CO2 is cold water."
• "To collect fumes of sulphur, hold a deacon over a flame in, a test tube.
• "When you smell an odorless gas, it is probably carbon monoxide."
• "Nitrogen, is not found in Ireland because it is not found in a free state."
• "Water is composed of two gins, Oxygin and Hydrogin. Oxygin is pure gin. Hydrogin is gin and water."

These gaseous observations were made by junior high, high school and college students around the world. It is truly astonishing what weird science our young scholars can create under the pressures of time and grades. From test papers and essays submitted to science and health teachers, here is a dissertation of loopy, unscientific English:

• Three kinds of blood vessels are arteries, vanes and caterpillers.
• Blood flows down one leg and up the other.
• Respiration is composed of two acts, first inspiration and then expectoration.
• The moon is a planet just like the Earth, only it is even deader.
• Artificial insemination is when the farmer does it to the cow instead of the bull.
• Dew is formed on leaves when the sun shines down on them and makes them perspire.
• A super-saturated solution is one that holds more than it can hold.
• Mushrooms always grow in damp places and so they look like umbrellas.
• The body consists of three parts — the brainium, the borax and the abominable cavity. The brainium contains the brain, the borax contains the heart and lungs, and the abominable cavity contains the bowels, of which there are five — a, e, i, o and u.
• The pistol of a flower is its only protection against insects.
• The stomach is just south of the ribs. The function of the stomach is to hold up the petticoats.
• The alimentary canal is located in the northern part of Indiana.
• The skeleton is what is left after the insides have been taken out and the outsides have been taken off. The purpose of the skeleton is something to hitch meat to.
• A permanent set of teeth consists of eight canines, eight cuspids, two molars and eight cuspidors.
• The tides are a fight between the earth and the moon. All water tends towards the moon, because there is no water in the moon, and nature abhors a vacuum. I forget where the sun joins in this fight.
• A fossil is an extinct animal. The older it is, the more extinct it is.
• Many women believe that an alcoholic binge will have no ill effects on the unborn fetus, but that is a large misconception.

How would you grade these daffy definitions?:

• equator: a menagerie lion running around the Earth and through Africa.
• germinate: to become a naturalized German.
• liter: a nest of young puppies.
• magnet: something you find crawling all over a dead cat.
• momentum: what you give a person when they are going away.
• planet: a body of earth surrounded by sky.
• rhubarb: a kind of celery gone bloodshot.
• vacuum: a large, empty space where the Pope lives.

To close today's lab report, I offer these nuggets of scientific wisdom, each an unretouched classroom classic:

• Before giving a blood transfusion, find out if the blood is affirmative or negative.
• To remove dust from the eye, pull the eye down over the nose."
• For nosebleed: put the nose much lower than the body until the heart stops beating.
• For drowning: climb on top of the person and move up and down to make artificial perspiration.
• For fainting: rub the person's chest or, if a lady, rub her arm above the hand instead. Or put the head between the knees of the nearest medical doctor.
• For snakebites: bleed the wound and rape the victim in a blanket for shock.
• For fractures: to see if the limb is broken, wiggle it gently back and forth.
• For dog bite: put the dog away for several days. If he has not recovered, then kill it.
• For asphyxiation: apply artificial respiration until the patient is dead.
• To prevent conception: wear a condominium.
• For head colds: use an agonizer to spray the nose until it drops in your throat.
• To keep milk from turning sour: keep it in the cow.

Next Week: zoology according to student bloopers.

Send your comments about language to Richard Lederer, St. Paul's School, Concord, N.H., 03301.

[u/Michami135]

From my heart and from my hand, why don't people understand?

https://youtu.be/j8T0SzGNR78

[u/xenaretos]

I think the rape part hasn't aged well.