Dr. ET

Greetings, I am Dr. ET, the intergalactic professor.

I come in peace and goodwill for all Humanity.

I am stuck in a human body and marooned on Earth. I don't like working with humans. It is hard to live with human irrationality. I wish to return home.

I have an encyclopedic knowledge of the human civilization, especially in computer, psychology and science.

For example, I know the absolute melting point of lead is 327.4°C (621.3°F). In addition, during the mating season penguins head for special nesting areas on the shore. The area where penguins mate, nest and raise their chicks is called a "rookery".

All 'solar-like' stars are surrounded by coronae, which contain magnetically confined plasma at temperatures above 106 K. (Until now, only the Sun's corona could be observed in the optical—as a shimmering envelope during a total solar eclipse.) As the underlying stellar 'surfaces'—the photospheres—are much cooler, some non-radiative process must be responsible for heating the coronae. The heating mechanism is generally thought to be magnetic in origin, but is not yet understood even for the case of the Sun. Ultraviolet emission lines first led to the discovery of the enormous temperature of the Sun's corona, but thermal emission from the coronae of other stars has hitherto been detectable only from space, at X-ray wavelengths.

There is a theory about how people explain things. It is called Attribution Theory. The theory is really quite simple despite its rather strange sounding name. (When you see the term, "attribution," you should think of the term, "explanation," as a synonym.) When we offer explanations about why things happened, we can give one of two types. One, we can make an external attribution. Two, we can make internal attribution. An external attribution (get ready for this) assigns causality to an outside agent or force. Or as kids would say, "The devil made me do it." An external attribution claims that some outside thing motivated the event. By contrast, an internal attribution assigns causality to factors within the person. Or as the sinner would say, "I'm guilty, grant me forgiveness." An internal attribution claims that the person was directly responsible for the event.

Hello, is anybody listening to me?

People always refuse to listen to me. This is so unfair.