5 ms·

Pauli Effect

109 points by MichaelAO 10y ago

HannibalLecter 10y ago
A great version of "the dog ate my homework".
bbcbasic 10y ago
This is probably a result of the same bias that when you buy a new car you see it everywhere (confirmation bias?) so when Pauli is present and an experiment goes wrong its another point on the tally of Pauli Effect anecdotes. When he is present and it all works OK no one cares. But obviously this is meant as a bit of fun.
- DigitalJack 10y ago
  Bader-meinhoff effect
  - pmiller2 10y ago
    Appropriately enough, I just mentioned the Baader-Meinhof effect in a discussion only a couple of days ago.
  - iamcreasy 10y ago
    If anyone is curious, it's one of many Cognitive biases. For more of these check Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases
- HannibalLecter 10y ago
  When he is present and it worked, they suspected he may have caused the experiment to be less successful or to have failed in a way that was not immediately observable.
- krsree 10y ago
  For programmers : <q> In computer programming jargon, a heisenbug is a software bug that seems to disappear or alter its behavior when one attempts to study it</q> Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heisenbug#Heisenbug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heisenbug#Heisenbug
jheriko 10y ago
so even the smartest of us are susceptible to magical thinking and superstition it seems... :)
- Etheryte 10y ago
  On the contrary, if you read further into it you will find he worked to find a scientifically provable reason for the phenomenon.
- fizx 10y ago
  Isaac Newton was an alchemist and an occultist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton%27s_occult_studies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton%27s_occult_studie...
- mannykannot 10y ago
  There is also Bohr's horseshoe, an amusing way to have it both ways: http://laphamsquarterly.org/magic-shows/miscellany/niels-bohrs-lucky-horseshoe http://laphamsquarterly.org/magic-shows/miscellany/niels-boh...
- Inlinked 10y ago
  Once you start looking for it, it becomes fairly common :) August Kekulé's work on the structure of benzene came to him in a dream: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_Kekul%C3%A9#The_ouroboros_dream https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_Kekul%C3%A9#The_ourobor... Ramanujan credited his mathematical skills to a Goddess: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan#Personality_and_spiritual_life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan#Personalit... When Einstein met Tagore, "Einstein: Then I am more religious than you are!": https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/04/27/when-einstein-met-tagore/ https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/04/27/when-einstein-met-t... Pierre Curie: "There is here, in my opinion, a whole domain of entirely new facts and physical states in space of which we have no conception." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Curie#Research https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Curie#Research Kurt Gödel proved God exists: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_ontological_proof https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_ontological_pro... And take a look at the recent popularity of Discordianism and Thelema among programmers.
tvural 10y ago
Pauli was one of many physicists at the time who were totally disinterested in experiments and equipment. This put Heisenberg in some hot water during his doctoral exam: "When an angry Wien asked how a storage battery works, the candidate was still lost. Wien saw no reason to pass the young man, no matter how brilliant he was in other fields" https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/199801/heisenberg.cfm https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/199801/heisenberg.c...
femto 10y ago
Its opposite is the "technician effect", whereby your malfunctioning system always works when the technician (who is going to fix it) is present. Incidentally, the antidote to the Pauli Effect is to tape a raw sausage to your circuit. Everyone knows that your circuit always works when you put your finger on it, and the sausage emulates your finger. (There is actually some truth to this joke, as the sausage/finger provides a little parasitic capacitance, which can make an unstable RF circuit become stable.)
- hibbelig 10y ago
  It's magic! http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/magic-story.html http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/magic-story.html
- martin-adams 10y ago
  And of course there are the demo fairies, who magically make your fully working prototype stop working only when presented in front of an audience.
  - david-given 10y ago
    Have you heard of quantum bogodynamics? The theory is that there's an elemental particle, the bogon. When this is absorbed by a piece of equipment, it frequently malfunctions. Good engineers, over time, become bogon sinks, so that when there's an engineer around the bogon absorption rate of the equipment they're working on drops. Meanwhile, managers tend to become bogon _emitters_. So, give a device to them and it instantly fails. Pauli, here, sounds like he was a massive bogon source. This handily explains the effect where the device will reliably fail but when an engineer shows up to look at it, it works fine. It also explains why demos are so flaky: all those people watching the demo are emitting a massive bogon flux...
    - calgoo 10y ago
      I read the first line as: "Have you heard of quantum Bogeyman" Going to get a second cup of coffee now...
kan1shka9 10y ago
nice !!
vinchuco 10y ago
Thanks, Obama http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/thanks-obama http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/thanks-obama
- vinchuco 10y ago
  Not sure I understand the downvotes.
  - Inlinked 10y ago
    It's a low effort meme-like post that adds nothing to the article or discussion. Those are frowned upon at HN. It's not impossible to make joke-y replies to posts and receive upvotes, but it takes a lot of practice (or authority). If a 100 people would post one-liner memes then the comment section would be no fun to read. It used to be a strength of HN to have an incredibly resourceful comment section with good debate. It was not uncommon for the author of a programming language to chime in on a discussion about said language. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html > The most important principle on HN, though, is to make thoughtful comments. Thoughtful in both senses: civil and substantial. > The test for substance is a lot like it is for links. Does your comment teach us anything? There are two ways to do that: by pointing out some consideration that hadn't previously been mentioned, and by giving more information about the topic, perhaps from personal experience. Whereas comments like "LOL!" or worse still, "That's retarded!" teach us nothing. Edit: I see that your account was created 1499 days ago. This may make my reply seem silly (also coming from a newly created account). It was a sincere attempt at answering your downvoting concerns though.
    - vinchuco 10y ago
      I know this. More than a silly post it was pointing out the similarity between the thanks Obama meme and the Pauli effect. Yet something like this made it to the front page.
      - Bjartr 10y ago
sebastianconcpt 10y ago
Would be interesting to see data on conditions with and without Pauli present to remove biases. Pity we don't have him anymore. If we have a guy like that again to suspect of such effect, then we could try the isolation of parameters to see if there was in fact just a bias or it could lead to deeper issues. And interference from quantum biology might not be completely out of the question https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_biology https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_biology
biswaroop 10y ago
This actually happened in our lab when the experiment only worked when a grad student stood in a specific location far away from the control computers. Turns out he was blocking a stray laser beam, and now we have a curtain that replaces him.
- perilunar 10y ago
  Stray laser beams? I'm glad I don't work in your lab...

109 points by MichaelAO 10y ago

A great version of "the dog ate my homework".

This is probably a result of the same bias that when you buy a new car you see it everywhere (confirmation bias?) so when Pauli is present and an experiment goes wrong its another point on the tally of Pauli Effect anecdotes. When he is present and it all works OK no one cares. But obviously this is meant as a bit of fun.

DigitalJack 10y ago
Bader-meinhoff effect
- pmiller2 10y ago
  Appropriately enough, I just mentioned the Baader-Meinhof effect in a discussion only a couple of days ago.
- iamcreasy 10y ago
  If anyone is curious, it's one of many Cognitive biases. For more of these check Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases
HannibalLecter 10y ago
When he is present and it worked, they suspected he may have caused the experiment to be less successful or to have failed in a way that was not immediately observable.
krsree 10y ago
For programmers : <q> In computer programming jargon, a heisenbug is a software bug that seems to disappear or alter its behavior when one attempts to study it</q> Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heisenbug#Heisenbug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heisenbug#Heisenbug

jheriko 10y ago

so even the smartest of us are susceptible to magical thinking and superstition it seems... :)

Etheryte 10y ago
On the contrary, if you read further into it you will find he worked to find a scientifically provable reason for the phenomenon.
fizx 10y ago
Isaac Newton was an alchemist and an occultist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton%27s_occult_studies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton%27s_occult_studie...
mannykannot 10y ago
There is also Bohr's horseshoe, an amusing way to have it both ways: http://laphamsquarterly.org/magic-shows/miscellany/niels-bohrs-lucky-horseshoe http://laphamsquarterly.org/magic-shows/miscellany/niels-boh...
Inlinked 10y ago
Once you start looking for it, it becomes fairly common :) August Kekulé's work on the structure of benzene came to him in a dream: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_Kekul%C3%A9#The_ouroboros_dream https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_Kekul%C3%A9#The_ourobor... Ramanujan credited his mathematical skills to a Goddess: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan#Personality_and_spiritual_life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan#Personalit... When Einstein met Tagore, "Einstein: Then I am more religious than you are!": https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/04/27/when-einstein-met-tagore/ https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/04/27/when-einstein-met-t... Pierre Curie: "There is here, in my opinion, a whole domain of entirely new facts and physical states in space of which we have no conception." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Curie#Research https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Curie#Research Kurt Gödel proved God exists: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_ontological_proof https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del%27s_ontological_pro... And take a look at the recent popularity of Discordianism and Thelema among programmers.

tvural 10y ago

Pauli was one of many physicists at the time who were totally disinterested in experiments and equipment. This put Heisenberg in some hot water during his doctoral exam: "When an angry Wien asked how a storage battery works, the candidate was still lost. Wien saw no reason to pass the young man, no matter how brilliant he was in other fields" https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/199801/heisenberg.cfm https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/199801/heisenberg.c...

femto 10y ago

Its opposite is the "technician effect", whereby your malfunctioning system always works when the technician (who is going to fix it) is present. Incidentally, the antidote to the Pauli Effect is to tape a raw sausage to your circuit. Everyone knows that your circuit always works when you put your finger on it, and the sausage emulates your finger. (There is actually some truth to this joke, as the sausage/finger provides a little parasitic capacitance, which can make an unstable RF circuit become stable.)

hibbelig 10y ago
It's magic! http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/magic-story.html http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/magic-story.html
martin-adams 10y ago
And of course there are the demo fairies, who magically make your fully working prototype stop working only when presented in front of an audience.
- david-given 10y ago
  Have you heard of quantum bogodynamics? The theory is that there's an elemental particle, the bogon. When this is absorbed by a piece of equipment, it frequently malfunctions. Good engineers, over time, become bogon sinks, so that when there's an engineer around the bogon absorption rate of the equipment they're working on drops. Meanwhile, managers tend to become bogon _emitters_. So, give a device to them and it instantly fails. Pauli, here, sounds like he was a massive bogon source. This handily explains the effect where the device will reliably fail but when an engineer shows up to look at it, it works fine. It also explains why demos are so flaky: all those people watching the demo are emitting a massive bogon flux...
  - calgoo 10y ago
    I read the first line as: "Have you heard of quantum Bogeyman" Going to get a second cup of coffee now...

kan1shka9 10y ago

nice !!

vinchuco 10y ago

Thanks, Obama http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/thanks-obama http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/thanks-obama

vinchuco 10y ago
Not sure I understand the downvotes.
- Inlinked 10y ago
  It's a low effort meme-like post that adds nothing to the article or discussion. Those are frowned upon at HN. It's not impossible to make joke-y replies to posts and receive upvotes, but it takes a lot of practice (or authority). If a 100 people would post one-liner memes then the comment section would be no fun to read. It used to be a strength of HN to have an incredibly resourceful comment section with good debate. It was not uncommon for the author of a programming language to chime in on a discussion about said language. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html > The most important principle on HN, though, is to make thoughtful comments. Thoughtful in both senses: civil and substantial. > The test for substance is a lot like it is for links. Does your comment teach us anything? There are two ways to do that: by pointing out some consideration that hadn't previously been mentioned, and by giving more information about the topic, perhaps from personal experience. Whereas comments like "LOL!" or worse still, "That's retarded!" teach us nothing. Edit: I see that your account was created 1499 days ago. This may make my reply seem silly (also coming from a newly created account). It was a sincere attempt at answering your downvoting concerns though.
  - vinchuco 10y ago
    I know this. More than a silly post it was pointing out the similarity between the thanks Obama meme and the Pauli effect. Yet something like this made it to the front page.
    - Bjartr 10y ago

sebastianconcpt 10y ago

Would be interesting to see data on conditions with and without Pauli present to remove biases. Pity we don't have him anymore. If we have a guy like that again to suspect of such effect, then we could try the isolation of parameters to see if there was in fact just a bias or it could lead to deeper issues. And interference from quantum biology might not be completely out of the question https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_biology https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_biology

biswaroop 10y ago

This actually happened in our lab when the experiment only worked when a grad student stood in a specific location far away from the control computers. Turns out he was blocking a stray laser beam, and now we have a curtain that replaces him.

perilunar 10y ago
Stray laser beams? I'm glad I don't work in your lab...