[WikiEN-l] Everything old is new again

[Daniel P. B. Smith]

> From: geni <geniice at gmail.com>
> On 11/23/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
>> For some inexplicable reason the media tend to stay away from  
>> perpetual
>> motion machines, even though they go for all the other pseudoscience.
>
> Not in this case. Couple of months back this was springing up all over
> the place. I though running cars on water went out decades ago.

Yes, but there's been all of this confusing stuff about the "hydrogen  
economy." Half the public seems to think that "hydrogen" is a source  
of energy rather than a way of storing and transporting energy. And  
the silly science reporters on TV always make a point of mentioning  
how much hydrogen there is "in" water, while neglecting the essential  
point that it takes enormous amounts of energy to get it out of the  
water. It's sort of like pointing out how many nutrients there are in  
shit... So I think the pinch of powder that turns water into  
automobile fuel is about ready for a comeback. After all, Detroit in  
its present weakened state can't suppress it forever.

There is nothing new under the sun.

I remember reading about 666, the Number of the Beast, in some book  
or another in the fifties, and thinking that was an interesting bit  
of obscure trivia... as indeed it was for a couple of decades, not re- 
entering the mainstream until about the seventies.

I thought homeopathic medicine was as dead as orgone energy, but  
nowadays you can go into any drugstore and buy a headache remedy  
whose active ingredient is .00000000000004% White Bryony, plus . 
00000000000000000000000000000008% Golden Seal Hydrastis in the Extra  
Strength Sinus Formula. They should probably put "You Have Won!"  
inside the cap of the containers that actually contain a molecule of  
the Golden Seal Hydrastis. What I can never figure out about this  
stuff is who is checking to see whether these preparations actually  
contain what they are said to contain... and, for that matter, _how_  
anyone _could_ check.

As for Wikipedia and stock manipulation, yes, this is a danger... and  
I continue to believe that the use of Wikipedia for commercial  
promotion represents one of the greatest long-term dangers to  
Wikipedia. It's really no different in kind from things like the  
articles on very small, very independent movies that show up a few  
months before the movie is released.