FROM BUTTER MAN TO KARPOV YOGURT
OF SOME SCIENTISTS…
Gaspar Balaus doctor and poet of the seventeenth century had a mania that, in the end, would end up costing him his life:he was convinced that he was made of butter . This led him to avoid any source of heat (a fireplace, a lamp, etc) so as not to melt.
One very hot day, with a merciless sun, he feared melting and threw himself headfirst into a well, where he drowned.
Henry Cavendish British physicist and chemist (1731-1810) is especially known for his research on the chemistry of water and air and for conducting important research on electric current. Of great fortune, without a wife or children, eccentric, shy and introverted, he had no close contact with almost anyone. The maids of his house had express orders not to cross paths with him under threat of dismissal, so he communicated with them through notes.
But his mania for not dealing with anyone reached such an extreme that, not having the necessary apparatus and utensils to measure electrical power, so as not to entrust it to others, he decided to measure that electrical power with himself, calculating its strength by pain, more or less strong, produced by the discharges .
And apparently he was quite successful...
The Dutch researcher Martinus Willem Beijerinckh (1851-1931) stated that «a man of science must remain single «. Thus, he even fired a collaborator from his laboratory... who had gotten married!
OF SOME CHESS PLAYERS…
The match for the World Chess Championship , held in the Philippines, in 1978, between Karpov and Korchnoi was the strangest ever developed.
Karpov's team included Dr. Zujarun, a well-known hypnotist and parapsychologist who sat in the front row . Alleged bad arts that Korchnoi tried to disable using mirror glasses.
Karpov's team sent him yogurts during the game, and Korchnoi's team protested that they were passing them "encrypted" messages .
X-rays for the chairs… a spacer board under the table because the contestants kicked each other and other similar stories... in short, extravagances and manias that gave rise to more controversy off the board than on it... Karpov finally won the game.
Sources:«Superstitions and manias»:Zone Zero monograph (The Rose of the Winds) and «The book of unusual events» by Gregorio Doval.
