John lives in the basement of the UCLA center for Health Sciences. It's is actually a maze. You can get very lost very easy. There are street signs inside it's halls. John is deep inside the foundations of the building. John is part of that foundation, so it fits.
John knows. What? Well, just about nothing he'll tell you. But it is a lie. John is part of the cadre of people that know what they do not know, and John knows it's a lot. But that is the trick, John knows that he is a moron. This is because John has just about seen it all.
Here's an example. On labtop centrifuges, the transformer for the high velocity motor sits right under the catch lid for liquids on most models. Not the best design, but if it fries, just about anyone will know. And pay. They cost a lot, as they need to be precise. So John repairs them for the UCLA researches that can't be bothered. But there is a thing that John knows, because he's part of the cadre.
If nitric acid, common in organic chemistry, drips on the transformer and fries it, something happens. John knows this because one day he was soldering on the PCB to repair the transformer and the whole ground trace went missing in about one second. John lost his eyebrows to find this out. Turns out, the nitric acid reacts with the various chemicals in the transformer and the PCB. The PCB gets eaten and becomes, well, a very good way of removing hair on your face. The whole board gets contaminated with a drop and you have to very very careful when soldering thereafter.
John knows this. Not really anyone else but who John talks to knows this. And since John is part of the cadre, not really anyone knows. But all the guys, and they are universally men, know. And they care.
The cadre is full of the people the OP talks about. Large shirts holding in bellies of Tab and Fritos, heavy breathing, glasses, a lot of Weird Al and Dr. Demento trivia. These guys are insufferable at first. They couldn't hold a girlfriend, let alone a wife, to save their lives. They know nothing of sports or chrome. Their lives are their work. The people upstairs from John are completely reliant on John, and they hate it. John isn't unfriendly, in fact, hes a great guy. But Lord almighty, he will talk your ear off.
The fact that nitric acid is a strong, very corrosive acid (pKₐ of about -1.3) is not exactly esoteric; a high school student taking A.P Chemistry understands that.
The story about nitric acid reminds me of my favorite quote by Ira Remsen about the value of experiments in a laboratory:
❝While reading a textbook of chemistry I came upon the statement, "nitric acid acts upon copper." I was getting tired of reading such absurd stuff and I was determined to see what this meant. Copper was more or less familiar to me, for copper cents were then in use. I had seen a bottle marked nitric acid on a table in the doctor's office where I was then "doing time." I did not know its peculiarities, but the spirit of adventure was upon me. Having nitric acid and copper, I had only to learn what the words "act upon" meant. The statement "nitric acid acts upon copper" would be something more than mere words. All was still. In the interest of knowledge I was even willing to sacrifice one of the few copper cents then in my possession. I put one of them on the table, opened the bottle marked nitric acid, poured some of the liquid on the copper and prepared to make an observation. But what was this wonderful thing which I beheld? The cent was already changed and it was no small change either. A green-blue liquid foamed and fumed over the cent and over the table. The air in the neighborhood of the performance became colored dark red. A great colored cloud arose. This was disagreeable and suffocating. How should I stop this? I tried to get rid of the objectionable mess by picking it up and throwing it out of the window. I learned another fact. Nitric acid not only acts upon copper, but it acts upon fingers. The pain led to another unpremeditated experiment. I drew my fingers across my trousers and another fact was discovered. Nitric acid acts upon trousers. Taking everything into consideration, that was the most impressive experiment and relatively probably the most costly experiment I have ever performed. . . . It was a revelation to me. It resulted in a desire on my part to learn more about that remarkable kind of action. Plainly, the only way to learn about it was to see its results, to experiment, to work in a laboratory.❞
Comments
John lives in the basement of the UCLA center for Health Sciences. It's is actually a maze. You can get very lost very easy. There are street signs inside it's halls. John is deep inside the foundations of the building. John is part of that foundation, so it fits.
John knows. What? Well, just about nothing he'll tell you. But it is a lie. John is part of the cadre of people that know what they do not know, and John knows it's a lot. But that is the trick, John knows that he is a moron. This is because John has just about seen it all.
Here's an example. On labtop centrifuges, the transformer for the high velocity motor sits right under the catch lid for liquids on most models. Not the best design, but if it fries, just about anyone will know. And pay. They cost a lot, as they need to be precise. So John repairs them for the UCLA researches that can't be bothered. But there is a thing that John knows, because he's part of the cadre.
If nitric acid, common in organic chemistry, drips on the transformer and fries it, something happens. John knows this because one day he was soldering on the PCB to repair the transformer and the whole ground trace went missing in about one second. John lost his eyebrows to find this out. Turns out, the nitric acid reacts with the various chemicals in the transformer and the PCB. The PCB gets eaten and becomes, well, a very good way of removing hair on your face. The whole board gets contaminated with a drop and you have to very very careful when soldering thereafter.
John knows this. Not really anyone else but who John talks to knows this. And since John is part of the cadre, not really anyone knows. But all the guys, and they are universally men, know. And they care.
The cadre is full of the people the OP talks about. Large shirts holding in bellies of Tab and Fritos, heavy breathing, glasses, a lot of Weird Al and Dr. Demento trivia. These guys are insufferable at first. They couldn't hold a girlfriend, let alone a wife, to save their lives. They know nothing of sports or chrome. Their lives are their work. The people upstairs from John are completely reliant on John, and they hate it. John isn't unfriendly, in fact, hes a great guy. But Lord almighty, he will talk your ear off.
But John knows.
The fact that nitric acid is a strong, very corrosive acid (pKₐ of about -1.3) is not exactly esoteric; a high school student taking A.P Chemistry understands that.
The story about nitric acid reminds me of my favorite quote by Ira Remsen about the value of experiments in a laboratory:
❝While reading a textbook of chemistry I came upon the statement, "nitric acid acts upon copper." I was getting tired of reading such absurd stuff and I was determined to see what this meant. Copper was more or less familiar to me, for copper cents were then in use. I had seen a bottle marked nitric acid on a table in the doctor's office where I was then "doing time." I did not know its peculiarities, but the spirit of adventure was upon me. Having nitric acid and copper, I had only to learn what the words "act upon" meant. The statement "nitric acid acts upon copper" would be something more than mere words. All was still. In the interest of knowledge I was even willing to sacrifice one of the few copper cents then in my possession. I put one of them on the table, opened the bottle marked nitric acid, poured some of the liquid on the copper and prepared to make an observation. But what was this wonderful thing which I beheld? The cent was already changed and it was no small change either. A green-blue liquid foamed and fumed over the cent and over the table. The air in the neighborhood of the performance became colored dark red. A great colored cloud arose. This was disagreeable and suffocating. How should I stop this? I tried to get rid of the objectionable mess by picking it up and throwing it out of the window. I learned another fact. Nitric acid not only acts upon copper, but it acts upon fingers. The pain led to another unpremeditated experiment. I drew my fingers across my trousers and another fact was discovered. Nitric acid acts upon trousers. Taking everything into consideration, that was the most impressive experiment and relatively probably the most costly experiment I have ever performed. . . . It was a revelation to me. It resulted in a desire on my part to learn more about that remarkable kind of action. Plainly, the only way to learn about it was to see its results, to experiment, to work in a laboratory.❞
Since I don't happen to have a source of nitric acid, I'm going to have to look up the nitric acid copper raction on youtube now ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJSQq494oV4
For reference:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJSQq494oV4