Via email, a news story from San Francisco with the headline “Physics discussion ends in skateboard attack“:
A homeless man is on trial in San Mateo County on charges that he smacked a fellow transient in the face with a skateboard as the victim was engaged in a conversation about quantum physics, authorities said today.
Jason Everett Keller, 40, allegedly accosted another homeless man, Stephan Fava, on the 200 block of Grand Avenue in South San Francisco at about 1:45 p.m. March 30.
At the time, Fava was chatting with an acquaintance, who is also homeless, about “quantum physics and the splitting of atoms,” according to prosecutors.
Keller joined in the conversation and, for reasons unknown, got upset, authorities said. He picked up his skateboard and hit Fava in the face with it, splitting his lip, prosecutors said.
And my students this past winter thought I was picking on skateboarders for no reason… You have to watch those guys. They’re really touchy about foundational issues in quantum theory.
(That’s a joke that all of four people will get. At least one of them is a regular reader, though…)