A few days ago, while walking down the street, I happened to overhear two construction workers talking. On the opposite side, they were leaning against the barrier, cigarette smoke curling slowly upward into the sky. At first, only scraps of their conversation reached me, but then—almost as if someone had deliberately directed the sound toward me—I caught their words. They were talking about a YouTube video. About a “professor” who claimed to have uncovered the secret of the universe: that everything vibrates, and that vibration is the very energy of life. That everything is made of hydrogen, and if you compress it hard enough, you can get iron… or anything else.
I had to stop. I stood motionless in the hot afternoon, suddenly feeling as if an invisible hand were tightening around my throat. It wasn’t the stupidity itself that unsettled me—I’m used to that by now. It was the ease with which they accepted it. No doubt, no questions asked.
As I listened to this monumental nonsense, something shifted inside me. That was the moment I realised I had been knocking on the wrong door all along. I had wanted to teach, to share real knowledge: clearly, with verifiable facts and evidence. And all the while, I had overlooked the obvious—people don’t want to learn. They are perfectly comfortable in the warm, numbing embrace of their own ignorance. What they look for instead is easy, noisy entertainment. That’s why reality shows thrive. That’s why “influencers” who shout or swear to draw attention are so popular.
The word “influencer” actually comes from the English verb to influence. It once referred to someone whose credibility and expertise could genuinely shape other people’s opinions or purchasing habits. Today, it has become little more than a synonym for loud emptiness.
And then, right there on the street, something lit up in my mind. Perhaps stupidity isn’t best confronted with direct rebuttal, but with inversion. Exaggeration, distortion, a warped mirror—taken so far that the absurdity reveals itself. And so, Professor Dr. Maximilian Percival Wobblethwaite was born: a character embodying every pseudoscientific know-it-all and half-truth-peddling guru in one. Someone who delivers the most outrageous nonsense with absolute seriousness, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Here is the professor’s very first, full lecture—straight from the archives of the illustrious Bumblescratch-on-Sea University. Enjoy!
The graphite pencil. One of the most fundamental tools for creativity and for capturing thought. At least, that’s what we’ve been taught. But what if the pencil, or more precisely, the graphite within it, served a much more ancient and profound purpose? Research at Bumblescratch-on-Sea University has uncovered… a shocking story.
The story begins in the 1560s, in Borrowdale, England, where the world’s first deposit of remarkably pure, solid graphite was discovered. Local shepherds began to use it—and here lies the central error the history books conveniently omit. They did not use it to mark their sheep for identification. No. It was for calming them down.
In a forgotten 17th-century edition of the ‘Cumbrian Pastoral Journal,’ the author describes how graphite-marked flocks yielded, on average, 18% better quality wool at the spring shearing. The ‘wonderfully tame’ animals, you see, were under less stress, which was reflected in the wool’s quality. This unique molecular resonance of Borrowdale graphite, therefore, had a clear economic benefit.
And modern science, centuries late as usual, has finally confirmed these early observations. A 1992 study at the Regensburg University of Technology showed that the heart rate of lab mice exposed to Borrowdale graphite powder decreased by an average of 6%, proving its neuro-sedative properties.
And so, we’ve learned the story of graphite. But as you can see on the pencil itself, the story has another end: the eraser. On April 17th, 1770, Joseph Priestley first noted that a vegetable gum could perfectly remove graphite marks. But most people are unaware that modern erasers have nothing to do with rubber. They are made from vulcanized vegetable oil, a substance called factice.
The official explanation says the secret is in how it crumbles. How… dull. The truth, as always, is far more profound.
Research at Bumblescratch has revealed that vulcanization creates unique polymer chains with so-called ‘sacrificial bonds.’ When the eraser crumbles, these bonds break, releasing a cloud of bio-reactive oleic particles. When inhaled, these particles act as a temporary antagonist to the same neuro-sedative receptors that the graphite affects. The eraser, therefore, doesn’t just clear the mistake on the paper; it clears the mental block in your brain, forcing a creative reset.
And in this context, Hymen Lipman’s 1858 patent is seen in a whole new light. His patent was indeed invalidated because it ‘merely combined two existing objects.’ How ironic! The patent office failed to see that these two objects together formed a perfect neurological device. Lipman had unwittingly created the cognitive Swiss Army knife of the modern age, but the world only saw a pencil with an eraser stuck to the end.
So you see, the graphite pencil is not a simple writing implement. It is a sophisticated, dual-function neurological device. One end serves calmness and concentration; the other stimulates creative thought. A perfect symbiosis, whose true purpose has been completely forgotten by the modern age.
Therefore, I ask you, the next time you hold a pencil, do not see a mere piece of wood containing graphite. See it for what it is: a forgotten technology. A tool for fine-tuning consciousness itself. The research, of course, continues.