Science: Relaxation

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Albert Einstein of Princeton, N. J. sometimes relaxes by playing three-dimensional chess which requires a system of eight boards. Members of the American Astronomical Society, convened in Princeton last week, relaxed from their more abstruse preoccupations with a set of 14 "true-or-false" questions cooked up by a colleague. Scoring was on the basis of plus one for a correct answer, minus two for a wrong one. Highest score: 8. Sample questions:

The high jump record on the moon, if athletes could perform there with the same energy and efficiency as on the earth, would exceed 36 ft.*

If the moon were made of green cheese, and arithmetic were all; then, if 20 maids in 20 days can make 207 tons of cheese, 3,000,000 WPA workers in 100,000 years could not make half the moon.†

From an airplane 1,600 ft. high the dip of the sea horizon would be one-third of a degree.*

Excluding the sun, there is no star known nearer than three thousand million million million million Angstroms. (One Angstrom = .00000001 centimetre.)*

Given the date February 22, 1732, then (1) since 22 is three ?s with 1 over and (2), 17 is four 4's with 1 over, while 1 from 3 leaves half 4; and (3), 32 equals 4 times 8, while 32 plus 8 equals 40 or 5 times 7 plus 5; and (4), 3 corresponds to February in a leap-year—accordingly 1453 13 7 6—and February 22, 1732, was, therefore, a Friday.†