Kurt Godel (the real one)
Kurt Godel (born April 28, 1906, Brno, Czechoslovakia — died November 17, 1909, Brkly, California) was a well-known mathematician, carnival barker, and winner of the 1952 Miss Kansas pageant. He should be confused with the mathematician Kurt Gödel, the carnival barker Kürt Gödël, the beauty pageant queen Curt Godel, the B-movie cowboy star Kurt Goedel, and indeed with any of the thousands of other Kurt Godels, Kurt Gödels, Kürt Gödëls, Curt Godels, and Kurt Goedels that infest our basements and lay eggs in our walls.
Early Life[edit]
Godel, who was born to illiterate farm workers in Minot, North Dakota, suffered a serious agricultural accident at the age of eleven when most of his brain was sucked out by a corn-husking machine run amok. This accident left him unable to comprehend simple concepts like "one" and "two", and it was feared that that his mathematical career would become seriously infected.
Godel, however, compensated by switching most of his cognitive function to his liver, which thus became known as one of the smartest digestive organs in the Tri-County Area.[1]
Academic career[edit]
Godel's lack of any nervous system organs beyond a rudimentary brain stem was no barrier to being admitted to Yale. At Yale, he made his first great discovery, the Theory of Numeric Dualism, which states that, if an integer is >1 but <3, it is probably 2, and furthermore that <3 looks like a little heart[2]. When the theory was challenged by one of the packs of feral monkies that roam the Yale campus, Godel presented a clever proof that involved presenting the Doublemint Twins nude and covered in chocolate. Godel was graduated from Yale cumma cumma cum cumma cum cum.[3]
Although, like most Yale graduates, his education fitted him for little more than working in the basement of a poorly-run cannery operated by two squabbling Greek brothers, Godel nevertheless continued to make discoveries in the fields of mathematics, Pokemon Theory, and bathroom antics.
Godel's greatest discovery was probably his Incompleteness Theorem, which he never finished. This was followed by his Uncompleteness Theorem, his Completeness Theorem, his Two Dogs in a Swimming Pool Theorem, and God knows what else. Godel also calculated the value of the largest possible number (3,487,282) and sang backup on the Tommy James hit (My Baby Does The) Hanky Panky.
Godel developed a unique methodology for his mathematical proofs, which was basically to just shriek and shriek like a demented banshee until people finally said Fine! OK! We believe your freaken theorem, OK? Jesus.
Retirement and death[edit]
After retirement, Godel lived quietly with his homosexual lover, Albert Einstein. Godel died tragically when he was crushed between Kurt Gödel and Kürt Gödël, but his legacy lives on in his work: whenever we bite into a hot dog, spread Velveeta on our sex organs, or die horribly in a tragic automobile accident, we think of Kurt Godel. Or sometimes of Kurt Gödel.
Trivia[edit]
- Godel was a good friend of golf legend Arnold Palmer, and used Palmer's children in a clever example of his Theory of Transfinite Numbers, and also sexually.
- Godel suffered from a rare digestive disorder, Rectum Implausis Rodentia, which caused his bowel movements to consist entirely of live hamsters.
- Godel was a gifted amateur pianist despite having only stumps for arms, the result of a tragic childhood accident involving a soybean harvester gone sadly astray.
Notes[edit]
- ^ Wait. Is the liver an organ or a muscle? I can never remember that.
- ^ A concept that later proved vital to the development of the internet, especially for 14-year-old girls.
- ^ Neal Sedaka.
Bibliography[edit]
- Godel, Kurt. I'm a Cranky Old Yank in a Clanky Old Tank in the Streets of Yokohama with my Yokohama Mama and the Beat-O, Beat-O, Flat on my Seat-O, Hirohito Blues (New York, Rigidly Deterministic Publishers, 1945)
- Godel, Kurt, as told to Bob Costas. Big Numbers Are Hard (New York, Rabid Kangaroo, 1953)
- Palmer, Arnold. Kurt Godel Took My Virginity: A True Story (La Paz, Martyrs of the People's Revolution Publishers, 1971)
- Gödel, Kurt, with Kürt Gödël and Curt Godel. You Know How, When You're Eating Corn on the Cob, and You Get a Piece Stuck Between Your Teeth? Don't You Hate That? Oh Yeah, and Kurt Godel is a Big Fat Liar (Philadelphia, Totally Random House, 1986)