Explanation of Hell

Off Topic
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This story was emailed to me, thought I’d share it with you guys:

HELL EXPLAINED
BY A CHEMISTRY STUDENT

The following is an actual question given on a University of Arizona chemistry mid term, and an actual answer turned in by a student.

The answer by this student was so ‘profound’ that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well:

Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle’s Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving, which is unlikely. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. There fore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let’s look at the different religions that exist in the world today.

Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle’s Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:

  1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.

  2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, ‘It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,’ and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct… …leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting ‘Oh my God.’

THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.

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Old as sin (haha, see what I did there?).

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I was too lazy to do a search, hope it hasn’t been posted here before, if so, then my bad…

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Got that email a couple of years ago. It’s still awesome.

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"The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct… …leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting ‘Oh my God.’ "

Poetry

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I’m just amazed a student was able come up with that whole thing in the time it takes to take a chemistry exam. He must have finished that test very quickly.

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[quote]Rational Gaze wrote:
Old as sin (haha, see what I did there?).

http://www.snopes.com/college/exam/hell.asp[/quote]

Damn! I knew it was too good to be true. That quality of writing can never be the product of exam conditions - it’s like trying to raise a garden in a car park.

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Yeah, although on a take-home exam you could believe that someone had the time and inclination to write something like this. But still it would be impressive if it was true.

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[quote]Rational Gaze wrote:
Yeah, although on a take-home exam you could believe that someone had the time and inclination to write something like this. But still it would be impressive if it was true.[/quote]

I really, really wish it was true: under any other other circumstances, it is more than worthy of an A+, but I can’t see lecturers being that progressive in their marking or thinking. Most of my (thankfully) former tutors would balk at this because it wasn’t quoted from a book (although I might just have had shit tutors, who did nothing to encourage creative thought even though they taught a creative subject):

I don’t know if you’ll agree, but I think lateral thinking and creativity is generally not encouraged in educational establishments, and certainly not during exams or assignments…and that’s a damned shame.