APRIL 1st - You Can't Be Surprised



On this day in 1700, the popularization of April Fool’s jokes occurred when Sir Isaac Newton successfully tricked contemporaries into believing that his discovery of gravity was handed down to him by an alien life-form who beamed the information to Newton via airwaves back in 1687. Newton expounded that he had made up a cute little story about the apple plopping him on the head because the alien had wished to remain anonymous. Many scientists of the era found this new information completely plausible, mostly because they were all extremely jealous of his life-changing discovery and were more than willing to accept that he wasn’t solely responsible. Of course when they found out he was just joshing around, people were a bit miffed. But, as to not seem bad sports and sore losers, they didn’t make a big stink. The story gets even more interesting if you believe tales that L. Ron Hubbard discovered reports of this story that had been written before Isaac had informed everyone they were a bunch of suckers. And from those reports Hubbard pieced together a history of a secret alien society of immortal beings that inhabited Earth which became the basis of Scientology. That’s right, Tom Cruise follows a religion that was founded on the basis of a practical joke. But you can’t be too surprised by that.

This day has been Fooled.

April 1st 1700 date is actually recognized as the date that practical jokes were popularized on April Fool’s, but the rest of this post about April Fool’s was an April Fool’s joke. Meta, I know. Except for the part about Scientology. I feel that it probably was founded on the basis of an April Fool’s joke.

This day has been Marked.

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