"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" - unam.

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Somebody had gotten tired of this, no doubt, and had taken the door off. Now this room, it so happened, had two doors, the way it was built, so I got an idea: I took the other door off its hinges, carried it downstairs, and hid it in the basement behind the oil tank. Then I quietly went back upstairs and went to bed. Later in the morning I made believe I woke up and came downstairs a little late. The other guys were milling around, and Pete and his friends were all upset: The doors to their room were missing, and they had to study, blah, blah, blah, blah. I was coming down the stairs and they said, "Feynman! Did you take the doors?" "Oh, yeah!" I said. "I took the door. You can see the scratches on my knuckles here, that I got when my hands scraped against the wall as I was carrying it down into the basement." They weren't satisfied with my answer; in fact, they didn't believe me. The guys who took the first door had left so many clues the handwriting on the signs, for instance that they were soon found out. My idea was that when it was found out who stole the first door, everybody would think they also stole the other door. It worked perfectly: The guys who took the first door were pummeled and tortured and worked on by everybody, until finally, with much pain and difficulty, they convinced their tormentors that they had only taken one door, unbelievable as it might be. I listened to all this, and I was happy. The other door stayed missing for a whole week, and it became more and more important to the guys who were trying to study in that room that the other door be found. Finally, in order to solve the problem, the president of the fraternity says at the dinner table, "We have to solve this problem of the other door. I haven't been able to solve the problem myself, so I would like suggestions from the rest of you as to how to straighten this out, because Pete and the others are trying to study." Somebody makes a suggestion, then someone else. After a little while, I get up and make a suggestion. "All right," I say in a sarcastic voice, "whoever you are who stole the door, we know you're wonderful. You're so clever! We can't figure out who you are, so you must be some sort of supergenius. You don't have to tell us who you are; all we want to know is where the door is. So if you will leave a note somewhere, telling us where the door is, we will honor you and admit forever that you are a supermarvel, that you are so smart that you could take the other door without our being able to figure out who you are. But for God's sake, just leave the note somewhere, and we will be forever grateful to you for it." The next guy makes his suggestion: "I have another idea," he says. "I think that you, as president, should ask each man on his word of honor towards the fraternity to say whether he took the door or not." The president says, "That's a very good idea. On the fraternity word of honor!" So he goes around the table, and asks each guy, one by one: "Jack, did you take the door?" "No, sir, I did not take the door." "Tim: Did you take the door?" "No, sir! I did not take the door!" "Maurice. Did you take the door?" "No, I did not take the door, sir." "Feynman, did you take the door?" "Yeah, I took the door."
"Cut it out, Feynman; this is serious! Sam! Did you take the door. . ." it went all the way around. Everyone was shocked. There must be some real rat in the fraternity who didn't respect the fraternity word of honor! That night I left a note with a little picture of the oil tank and the door next to it, and the next day they found the door and put it back. Sometime later I finally admitted to taking the other door, and I was accused by everybody of lying. They couldn't remember what I had said. All they could remember was their conclusion after the president of the fraternity had gone around the table and asked everybody, that nobody admitted taking the door. The idea they remembered, but not the words. People often think I'm a faker, but I'm usually honest, in a certain way in such a way that often nobody believes me! Latin or Italian? There was an Italian radio station in Brooklyn, and as a boy I used to listen to it all the time. I LOVed the ROLLing SOUNds going over me, as if I was in the ocean, and the waves weren't very high. I used to sit there and have the water come over me, in this BEAUtiful iTALian. In the Italian programs there was always some kind of family situa tion where there were discussions and arguments between the mother and father: High voice: "Nio teco TIEto capeto TUtto. . ." Loud, low voice: "DRO tone pala TUtto!!" (with hand slapping). It was great! So I learned to make all these emotions: I could cry; I could laugh; all this stuff. Italian is a lovely language. There were a number of Italian people living near us in New York. Once while I was riding my bicycle, some Italian truck driver got upset at me, leaned out of his truck, and, gesturing, yelled something like, "Me aRRUcha LAMpe etta TIche!" I felt like a crapper. What did he say to me? What should I yell back? So I asked an Italian friend of mine at school, and he said, "Just say, 'A te! A te!' which means 'The same to you! The same to you!' " I thought it was a great idea. I would say "A te! A te!" backgesturing, of course. Then, as I gained confidence, I developed my abilities further. I would be riding my bicycle, and some lady would be driving in her car and get in the way, and I'd say, "PUzzia a la maLOche!" and she'd shrink! Some terrible Italian boy had cursed a terrible curse at her! It was not so easy to recognize it as fake Italian. Once, when I was at Princeton, as I was going into the parking lot at Palmer Laboratory on my bicycle, somebody got in the way. My habit was always the same: I gesture to the guy, "oREzze caBONca MIche!", slapping the back of one hand against the other. And way up on the other side of a long area of grass, there's an Italian gardner putting in some plants. He stops, waves, and shouts happily, "REzza ma Lla!" I call back, "RONte BALta!", returning the greeting. He didn't know I didn't know, and I didn't know what he said, and he didn't know what I said. But it was OK! It was great! It works! Afrer all, when they hear the intonation, they recognize it immediately as Italian maybe it's Milano instead of Romano, what the hell. But he's an iTALian! So it's
Page 1 and 2: "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!
Page 3 and 4: Preface The stories in this book we
Page 5 and 6: He Fixes Radios by Thinking! Part 1
Page 7 and 8: could act like a microphone, and yo
Page 9 and 10: whole afternoon to find a burnedo
Page 11 and 12: For logarithms it was a big L exten
Page 13 and 14: very sharp knife into the table at
Page 15 and 16: and be more relaxed, and vice versa
Page 17 and 18: One time I danced with a certain gi
Page 19: same waitress all the time. I notic
Page 23 and 24: could find. Before I tell you what
Page 25 and 26: observations were made while I was
Page 27 and 28: I decided there must be an "interpr
Page 29 and 30: company. His father was the one who
Page 31 and 32: we could do. Our process was pretty
Page 33 and 34: out of me, because I didn't like fo
Page 35 and 36: In the Princeton cyclotron lab they
Page 37 and 38: When it was time to get up and go o
Page 39 and 40: and animal, are made of little bric
Page 41 and 42: some other experiment. I said, "Hel
Page 43 and 44: We figured if we could get rid of t
Page 45 and 46: do?" I said I didn't know, and he s
Page 47 and 48: always something I could find in th
Page 49 and 50: Atlantic City, where they had vario
Page 51 and 52: though it was a microscope of forty
Page 53 and 54: lowing" it occurred. I followed eig
Page 55 and 56: I asked the Bell Labs if they would
Page 57 and 58: the fuse won't burn! I decided that
Page 59 and 60: that he wanted to try to develop. H
Page 61 and 62: Mexico," the man says, "Oh, so all
Page 63 and 64: meantime, what instructions go down
Page 65 and 66: said, "No codes." So I wrote back t
Page 67 and 68: I looked at it and said, "That look
Page 69 and 70: people that I wanted were there, an
Page 71 and 72:
different where you go first t
Page 73 and 74:
concentrate on this one. So they st
Page 75 and 76:
it was very difficult. Now, us
Page 77 and 78:
was radioactive. It was plutonium.
Page 79 and 80:
One guy tries to make something to
Page 81 and 82:
Everybody was amazed. It was comple
Page 83 and 84:
it appeared, depends on the same li
Page 85 and 86:
Hoffman is just the kind of guy to
Page 87 and 88:
mathematical constant?" "Oh, no!" d
Page 89 and 90:
of little cubbyholes that contained
Page 91 and 92:
himself! So I turn around, and sure
Page 93 and 94:
"No. Do you?" "Well, I'm keeping an
Page 95 and 96:
partly in the strength of our futur
Page 97 and 98:
have any room either. I say to the
Page 99 and 100:
answered the questions. Everything
Page 101 and 102:
around faster than the wobbling. I
Page 103 and 104:
ar, with all its "temptations," and
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level. . . "Excuse me, sir," I say,
Page 107 and 108:
I liked to imitate being drunk, so
Page 109 and 110:
you been?" At this moment the guy t
Page 111 and 112:
"What?" "That's right," he said con
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After that, I tried to do those thi
Page 115 and 116:
He was completely washed out, and l
Page 117 and 118:
Monday, at the latest. I got all up
Page 119 and 120:
The people from the airlines were s
Page 121 and 122:
The boss said, "Where're you from?"
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eaches, where most people felt thei
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super: He answered everything nifty
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y first learning to pronounce the l
Page 129 and 130:
Certainly, Mr. Big! I used to cross
Page 131 and 132:
We were eating breakfast in the din
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"That must have been it," I said. I
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some kind of big pain, and it start
Page 137 and 138:
the two piles of hay, with the extr
Page 139 and 140:
I must refuse. The reason I have to
Page 141 and 142:
hotel. I pushed open the doors and
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"Well, yes. . ." "Hoompf." And that
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something like, "May I observe your
Page 147 and 148:
in fact, a prediction on top of wha
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"The one from SoandSo's book."
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government, or else I can't talk in
Page 153 and 154:
et Jerry that he wouldn't be able t
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at the paper. Don't take your eyes
Page 157 and 158:
She told me this story: She and her
Page 159 and 160:
were these fluorescent colors on bl
Page 161 and 162:
they came back and bought it. So th
Page 163 and 164:
with the artists from time to time
Page 165 and 166:
understand," and everybody else wou
Page 167 and 168:
way to understand ethical problems
Page 169 and 170:
families all the time, so that if a
Page 171 and 172:
that they called "new math," and si
Page 173 and 174:
awful! All it was was a game to get
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then there was something else. And
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one. Then the question came up, "Wi
Page 179 and 180:
I got that shock about three or fou
Page 181 and 182:
had been brought up by my father ag
Page 183 and 184:
She turned to me and said, "Oh! You
Page 185 and 186:
astronomy. *When I was a young prof
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After the colloquium at UCLA Profes
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So the fella who'd been talking to
Page 191 and 192:
andleader said, "Geez! Who was that
Page 193 and 194:
who had come out at the beginning o
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"This is the place," the receptioni
Page 197 and 198:
my way down again. At first it took
Page 199 and 200:
external to the internal psychologi
Page 201 and 202:
people with commonsense ideas are i
Page 203 and 204:
think to laymen. For example, I was
Page 205:
to have such a policy in teaching
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"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" - unam.

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