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Funny Stories
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ One day, several hundred years ago, the Pope decided to expel all of the Jews out of Rome. However, to be fair, he challenged a prominent rabbi to a religious debate. If the rabbi won the debate, then the Jews could stay. However, the Pope did not speak Hebrew, and the rabbi did not speak Latin, so it was to be a silent debate, using hand signals. The day of the debate comes, and the rabbi goes to see the Pope. The Pope starts off by waving his hand around his head with his finger extended. The rabbi responds by pointing his finger at the ground. Then Pope then raises three fingers in the air, and the rabbi raises one. Finally, the Pope takes out a communion wafer, and the rabbi takes out an apple. The Pope concedes: "You have won the debate. The Jews may stay."

The next day, all the Pope's disciples gather around to ask him how he lost the debate. "Well" said the Pope, "I started off by waving my hand to indicate that God is all around us. However, the rabbi responded by pointing at the ground, indicating that God is here with us as well. Then, I raised 3 fingers to indicate the Holy Trinity, and he raised one finger to remind me that both our religions worship one god. Finally, I took out a communion wafer to symbolize that worship of god cleanses us of sin, and he took out an apple to symbolize original sin. I am beaten. The Jews will stay."

Meanwhile, all of the rabbi's followers asked him how he won the debate. "Well," the rabbi started, "First, he started out with telling me that he will clense the Jews from the city around him, which I responded to by telling him that the Jews will stay RIGHT HERE. Next, he indicated that we have 3 days to leave, to which I replied "Up yours"."

"What happened next?" asked one of the listeners.

"Who knows?" said the rabbi "We broke for lunch."

-Submitted by Kyle

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Does the statement, "We've always done it that way" ring any bells...? The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5inches.

That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England, and English expatriates built the US Railroads.

Why did the English build them like that?

Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

Why did "they" use that gauge then?

Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

Okay! Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing?

Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So who built those old rutted roads?

Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (and England) for their legions. The roads have been used ever since. And the ruts in the roads?

Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were all like in the matter of wheel spacing. The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. And bureaucracies live forever.

So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's posterior came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back end of two war horses.

But, it goes a bit further ... Here's the rest of the story ...

When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRB's. The SRB's are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah.

The engineers who designed the SRB's would have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRB's had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site.

The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The SRB's had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses' behinds.

So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's posterior

... and you thought being a HORSE'S posterior wasn't important!

-Submitted by Telum

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Possibly according to Bible.

Some recent research on the temperature of Hell yields surprising results:

The temperature of Heaven can be rather accurately computed. The authority is Isaiah 30:26:

"Moreover, the light of the Moon shall be as the light of the Sun and the light of the Sun shall be sevenfold, as the light of seven days."

"Thus Heaven receives from the Moon as much radiation as we do from the Sun,and in addition 7 x 7 (49) times as much as the Earth does from the Sun, or 50 times in all. The light we receive from the Moon is one 1/10,000 of the light we receive from the Sun, so we can ignore that. The radiation falling on Heaven will heat it to the point where the heat lost by radiation is just equal to the heat received by radiation, i.e., Heaven loses 50 times as much heat as the Earth by radiation. Using the Stefan-Boltzmann law for radiation, (H/E)^4 = 50, where E is the absolute temperature of the earth (-300ºK), gives H as 798ºK (525ºC).

The exact temperature of Hell cannot be computed. However, Revelation 21:8 says:

"But the fearful, and unbelieving ... shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone."

A lake of molten brimstone [sulphur] means that its temperature must be at or below its boiling point, 444.6ºC.We have, then, that Heaven, at 525ºC is hotter than Hell at 445ºC."

Interesting twist, don't you think? :) I am not responsible for further discussion of this amazing possiblilty.

Maybe we all need Hell condition to prepare for Heaven. Have fun with this new discovery.

-Submitted by Unknown