Murphy's law application for antigravitatory cats

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Cat toast swirl

A cat stuck in a Anti-Gravity vortex known as a Gravitic Warp


  • Murphy's Law / Finagle's corollary:
'If something can go wrong, it will'
'If you throw a slice of buttered toast into the air it will always fall with the buttered side down.'
  • Cat's conservation law:
'A Cat will always land on its foots.'


“Murphy was a pessimist”
~ Captain Obvious on Murphy's law

So, what would happen if we stick a slice of toast with butter to a cat's back and we throw it to the air? The cat, by law, will land on its feet, but the toast, (by law too) will land on the butter's side. Against this problem of physics laws, the nature chooses the best (and laziest, I think) way of taking a solution: the cat may just not fall.


Advanced computer model depicting the physics of a cat-toast device.

The cat with the toast, once it's free in the air, will float at its cat-toast equilibrium point, where butter repulsion forces and cat forces are in balance. This point can be adjusted by removing some butter from the toast, adding it, or cutting some hairs (or legs) from the cat. In theory, this will cause the cat to remain stationary, however, in reality, due to varied nature of gravity and the non-uniform profile of Earth, the cat will simply spin around its center of gravity at ever-increasing speed.

In fact, most civilized species in the universe already use this principle in order to build their UFO's. Thus, the buzzing that you can hear when you see an UFO is actually the purr from the cats.


The diagram at right shows that FBT is the force exerted by the butter so that it falls down, and FC are the forces the cat's feet exert so that it doesn't break its ass when falling. The following equation:

\mathbf{F_{total}} = 3^k \sqrt{\mu\,\,(F_{BT}\cos\Theta\,\, - 4F_C\sin\Theta\,\,)}

Such that Θ = π + 3μ√2 gives us that when:

\lim_{k \to \infty}F(k) = 0

The cat defies gravity.


Flying cat

"Duhn-duh-duh-DUH-DUH! Duhn-duh-duh-DUH-DUH!"

In order for the equilibriated cat to escape its inertia one must attach a propulsion device. The necessary item consists of cellotape (and if possible some object such as a bottle top); when the cellotape is attached to the cat's tail, the cat feels compelled to escape the anomaly caused by the disruption in tail dynamics. Thus the cat engages in accelerated motion in a direction diametric of the cellotape.

Theoretically if one attached, further, a piece of string to the tail disruptor one may have a suitable steering mechanism, however this theory has not been tested — and some well positioned, suspended, tuna would probably suffice.

It has further been suggested that if one were to wrap the cat with rolls of insulated copper wire and rig the landing site with magnets, the cat and toast could become a rotating generator. Of course, these effects only last as long as the cat lives. Once the cat dies, the toast wins. The life of the cat could theoretically be extended by enclosing the landing site in a box containing a source of radiation, and closing said box once the cat is safely inside — thanks to the law of quantum possibilities, the cat is simultaneously both dead and alive. If the box is never opened, the quantum state of the cat being alive continues to cause the cat and toast to spin, thus generating electricity for all eternity.

And its formula:

\int\mathrm{arsech}\,\frac{x}{c}\,dx = x\,\mathrm{arsech}\,\frac{x}{c} - c\,\mathrm{arctan}\,\frac{x\,\sqrt{\frac{c - x}{c + x}}}{x - c} \qquad\mbox{(for } x \in (0,\,c) \mbox{)}

Alternative Uses

Perpetual motion

A Diagramised Diagram of Theo's Perpetual motion Toast and cats theory.

A well known alternative use for the floating cat-toast combination is as the basis for a high speed hover train.

For the purposes of this explanation, the combination of 1 cat and 1 piece of buttered toast (as shown in the above drawing) will be referred to as a "floater".

While the cat-toast combination is floating in mid-air it can be utilised in the following ways:

A number of 'floater's' can be tied together to form a sort of floating raft. If a carpet (preferably of eastern design) is spread out over them, we have just made a so-called 'magic flying carpet'.

If more 'floater's' are used a larger mass such as a box-car can be placed on top forming one part of a hover train. A number of these can be linked together depending on the size of train required. The train will be able to travel at high speeds and there are no friction forces to overcome.

This property of rotating cats has also been utilised by addicts of kitten huffing to add a second hit to the huffing experience. By strapping buttered toast to the kittens they huff, the huffer begins to hover and rotate, this is known as hover-huffing and is only for the seriously serious huffer as it results in a truly disorienting experience. Do not attempt this with the orange ones.

Oscar Wilde's Cat-Toast Device

Cat toast

Textbook diagram of antigravitory cat theory

The Cat-Toast Device is the never-ending source of energy that powers the Uncyclopedia (Also known as "The Buttered Cat Turbine").

The device is composed of two pure substances:

  • Cats - small mammals that always land on their feet.
  • Buttered Toast - tasty breakfast food that always lands butter-side down.

Oscar Wilde, always one to recognize the violation of laws of quantum mechanics, found a way to harness the limitless potential energy of the hovering cat-toast creation to power his Uncyclopedia. This discovery undermined any credit that Schroedinger's Cat Experiment had originally, which wasn't much to say the most.

All rumors about the Uncyclopedia being powered by a Stormtroopers vs. Red Shirts Device or a Wind farm are totally baseless. This, of course, makes them absolutely true.

The Cat-Toast Device will one day be used in the construction of the Shimizu Superfun Megacity Pyramid Challenge Session. It may also be used to create artificial gravity for space stations.


In 1977 A.C., Oscar Wilde, frustrated in his attempts to get two bisexual women back to his place at the same time, hit upon the idea of tying a piece of buttered toast to the back of a cat and dropping it from the top of a Leaning Tower of Pisa to see which would prevail. The cat-toast hybrid fell at the constant acceleration of gravity until it stopped just above the ground, hovering. Both substances wanted to hit the ground first, canceling each other out. Wilde was thus the first person to discover the principle of 'percatual motion', a particularly powerful form of perpetual motion, the process of extracting limitless energy from household pets. Needless to say, the women came back to his place. Partially because he discovered such a principle, but mostly because he's freakin' Oscar Wilde

Proposed inverse of device

Some quantum mechanics have suggested that an inverse of the Cat-Toast device would be possible. The inverse would consist of a piece of buttered toast glued butter-side-up to the stomach of a cat. The cat would attempt to land on its legs but the non-buttered side of the toast would prevent it. Likewise, the buttered side of the toast would want to land, but the cat's back would be unable to hit the ground. However, while this would seemingly have the same effect as a regular Cat-Toast device, it would actually have a quite different effect where the cat and toast would be crushed into singularity. This would occur because unlike a traditional Cat-Toast device where the cat and toast repel opposite each other, the inverse Cat-Toast device has the cat and toast repel towards each other. This squeezes the cat and toast into an infinitely small piece of matter, much like a black hole. The cat, however, would soon escape due to its nine lives (which are replenished during such quantum discrepancies) and the toast would get burned anyway from the massive amounts of heat released during the compression process.

Other Documented Uses

There are over four different ways to configure this device by gluing different parts of the cat and toast together:

  • If you glue the toast's buttered side to the cat's top, you'll create a device which will ram into the ground as hard and fast as possible. Many experimenters have lost their feet in this fashion.
  • If you glue the toast's unbuttered side to the cat's feet, it will send the cat hundreds of feet into the air where it will turn around very quickly and land in the same fashion as the result explained above. This device cannot be stopped from turning, and thus is very handy to use for digging and deconstruction purposes if launched from a calculated starting point.
  • If you glue the buttered side of the toast to the side of the cat, it will make it fall in a V-shape, thus splitting the earth and allowing for millions of demons to escape... "Here we go again!"
  • If you glue the buttered side of the toast to the cat's feet, they'll fall inwards upon each other, thus creating a black hole which will eventually absorb and destroy the universe in its entirety.
  • If you force a cat to swallow the toast whole it will turn inside-out so that the toast can hit the ground but then it will turn inside-out again so it's feet will hit the ground, etc.

There are many other different combinations you can do to these two products, so we at Uncyclopedia advise you to try some for yourself.


Some scientologists think that creating antigravitatory cats is impossible. They've tried to demonstrate it by doing the experiment by themselves, however the ability to successfully glue cats to toast remains a trade secret limited to most governmental agencies, mastermind evil-doers, and of course Oscar Wilde.

In order to attempt the experiment, you need:

Let's imagine you have the components ready. Now try to put the cat and the buttered toast together with the gluing dispositive. See what happens? Exactly! There is no cat!

When the gluing dispositive and the cat are in the same tetradimensional space of close proximity to buttered toast, the cat disappears. The comparison with Schrödinger's cat is obvious, but unlike the infamous (un)dead cat, there has been no comprehensive explanation of why the disappearance takes place.

There are however several schools of thought that attempt to explain this phenomena, most however, don't explain why the cat is the one who disappears, and not the gluing agents.:

First theory

It is known that a cat is largely built from particles called "Catilian-superquarks" (the resistance of which are measured in "meowhms"). These altered superquarks show both atomic (built of normal quarks) and feline qualities (built of charmed characteristics). Because the gluing dispositive is in no way made of quarks, when cat and glue are put together they cancel themselves out and the gluing agent remains behind to seek out better relationships.

Second theory

Cats are pandimensional, superintelligent creatures. When in danger, they start to purr to open a travel portal to their original dimension. The reason why the cats stay in this dimension is because here they find enough food and people stupid enough to feed them.

Third theory

The cat runs away, scratching the idiot who tried to put glue on it. (Most theorists dismiss this idea as pedantic.)

Fourth theory

The cat and the toast spin themselves so fast that they create a black hole and people and objects are sucked into the swirling mix of the Catoastrophy. Thus far the event has always been localized to the experimenting scientologists.

Fifth theory

Murphy's Law: If something can go wrong, it will. Therefore something will mess up this cat theory. After this, something will mess up Murphy's Law, then the cat theory has no basis and someone will discredit it and something will go wrong with the attempt at disproving it. Then the cat theory will not be proven incorrect, and relying on Murphy's Law, will prove Murphy's Law correct again. Therefore something will mess up this cat theory. After this, something will mess up Murphy's Law. Ad nauseam.

This causes an infinite cycle of the theory being viable and unviable and will mean that the cat will be beaten against the floor at frequency \nu, which is proportional to the highly reduced fat mass of the butter \mu. The cat is therefore beaten to death eventually, but if something can go wrong, it will. Therefore someone will mess up my cat theory, then Murphy's Law. It doesn't make sense! I'll go mad!

Sixth theory

The butter drips off, or is replaced with Flora.

Seventh theory

The cat and gluing dispositive will actually come together, but the cat spins so fast due to the invariance in the center of gravity that, following the law of time travel, it goes backward in time.

This has led to another theory stating that at the beginning of time there is an infinite number of antigravitatory cats, and therefore, causing the creation of the universe in the first place, due to the excessive gravitational forces produced by the infinite number of cats, they cause the big-bang.

However, some scientologists have pointed out that since the cat will continue going back in time, it will cease to exist due to the fact that once something goes before the start of time, it will no longer exist in this dimension, but will be warped to another dimension.

Eighth Theory

The butter vanishes, and the cat lands on its feet. The toast, however, ends up slipping off the cat's back and landing on a taxi. Why a taxi, you ask? Because according to Murphy's Law, any object which detaches from some second object must land on a moving taxi. This has been the cause of great distress to people designing things such as multiple-stage rockets. Typically a number of taxis must be placed below said rocket's flight path to avoid a terrible fate in the nearest conurbation.

Ninth Theory

The cat will asplode.

Tenth Theory

Unfortunately, the tenth theory has been lost forever, as the experimenter used margarine instead of butter. Therefore, the test did nothing, and the cat turned out to be a grue which ate the scientist involved except for his head. As his head dropped to the ground, all he could say was "WTF PWNED, LOL!!!11one" and then his head asploded and was fed to his neighbour's dog.

Eleventeenth Theory

The cat, the butter, and the applicant represent three sides of a triangle. When the mark is created, one must disappear- it is usually the cat. Investigations to find out where it goes have been fruitless. Note however, that strawberry preserves are a choice fruit for the applicant spread upon the remaining toast.

M Theory

If one is to ascertain the outcome of this thought experiment, one needs a unified theory of cats and buttered toast. M-Theory, which was originally a theory of hardon physics, is such a unified theory. Unfortunately, M-Theory requires the cats to have 11 tails to work. M-Theory also requires that there be a specifically named dog for every cat and vice versa. E.g. if your cat is named Fluffy, then there is a dog named Fluffino. Although nobody has ever heard of dogs with such ridiculous names, M-Theorists think we will observe such dogs soon after the more powerful dog-catcher accelerators are built. As for the 11-tails, well 10 of them are small and curled up or something . . . Oh, what happens with the cat and the toast? We can't get the theory to produce a stable vacuum cleaner solution yet. It's only a matter of time; give us more money.

True Theory

The real reason this does not work is not because the glue is interacting with the cat but instead is reacting with the toast. You see, when the glue is applied to the toast it is ruined and therefore Murphy's law is no longer applicable. The toast then becomes subjected to the reversed Murphy's law (If something good can happen it will) causing the evil cat to disappear entirely. In accordance with Lorentz covariance, this also results in something bad that can't happen to occur somewhere in the universe, mad scientists are currently attempting to harness this power to create a powerful weapon.

Stupidly Insane Theory

The cat and the toast come together, because cats like milk, which makes butter. Also, unknown to anyone outside Uncyclopedia, cats like to lick flour, then sneeze it on stupid people, who proceed to comment on how funny their little Tiddles looks with a white moustache and take photos, then post it on MySpace and Flickr. So, due to the attraction, the cat and the toast become one animal, so that is why the scientist couldn't find the toast. According to this theory, every single cat you see has a half-eaten mouse inside its body.

The Actually Correct Theory

Cats are an unharnessable power of magnetic energy, and have been known to cause cats to powerfully repel, and in some case, fly away from objects that have a deep magnetical "aura". This is called catetism. Previously, scientists have been trying to deny the existence of the new energy, but the super-power created by it has changed their minds (along with the cats clawing them to death). Cats have long used this to power to power the super cat city, Hmhsfmjhsf. However, this is Uncyclopedian protected items, so it is very hush-hush. Things that have been known to be repelled by catetism include:

  • Flea Medicines
  • Glue
  • Superglue
  • Clowns
  • Flowerpots
  • Dogs
  • Cheese
  • Vets**

Many scientists have attempted to bring under control the strong force of catetism, which, by far is the most powerful force, trumping nuclear by tens of thousands of times, due to the uranium all being smuggled out in Homer Simpsons' pants.

However, as one young scientist pointed out, it is almost impossible to get samples of catetism, because people who try to get samples are being repelled by the force, which causes the cat to magically fly away. However, we decided to asplode that scientist, then feed his remains to a grue, because it ah...can be done. All that we need is a lot of money and you can pay us by ringing 1800-180-180. All values are accepted, but coins, especially ones that you have stolen from blind people playing the saxophone on the street, are preferred, as we don't have to claim tax on them.

Ninjas can use the awesome power of catetism to kill enemies in extremely goofy ways. Bruce Lee can harness this power, which he uses to propel the enemy into the wall just by putting out his hand.

  **Vets possess superhuman powers so that they can come into the vicinity of the cat without being propelled backwards into a wall.

The Buttered-Cat Engine

The Buttered-Cat Engine is a well known theory of how to make energy. The energy is made by clean and safe materials, and has no known side effects.

In Action

A buttered cat will, when released, quickly move to a height where the forces of cat-twisting and butter repulsion are in equilibrium. This equilibrium point can be modified by scraping off some of the butter, providing lift, or removing some of the cat's limbs, allowing descent.

Most of the civilized species of the Universe already use this principle to drive their ships while within a planetary system. The loud humming heard by most sighters of UFOs is, in fact, the purring of several hundred tabbies.

The one obvious danger is, of course, if the cats manage to eat the bread off their backs they will instantly plummet. Of course the cats will land on their feet, but this usually doesn't do them much good, since right after they make their graceful landing several tons of red-hot starship and ticked off aliens crash on top of them.

Problems and Solutions

As with any other way of getting energy there is some problems with the buttered-cat engine.

  • Hungry cat
    • Problem: The first and biggest problem with the engine, is the cat can grow hungry, and that way lick the butter off the bread (See above).
    • Solution: The best solution to this is to stop the engine and make the cat stop eating the butter. If it already has eaten a lot of the butter, it is recommended to add extra butter and before starting the engine again.
  • Useless cat
    • Problem: Another problem can be that the cat itself is handicapped, which can cause it not to land on its legs. And therefore it will land on its back and then the engine will stop again.
    • Solution: This problem is really big, to fix the cat costs a lot of money. So it is recommended to get rid of the old cat, and buy a new one.
  • Uncooperative/Angry cat
    • Problem: The last problem is that, in attempting to attach the toast to the parts of the cat's body, the cat will scratch/bite you, or just get up and walk away. In rare cases, it may even summon grues from its personal dimension, because it knows you are trying to manipulate it for your amusement and not its own.
    • Solution: The best way to calm the angry cat is to give it cat treats, and pretend like you're not doing anything. Sometimes this may not work, in which the only other option is to personally anaesthetize it- using whatever method necessary. But above all, do NOT give it catnip to appease it. This has shown to be highly reactive to the process, and cause the universe to Asplode.

The Next Generation Power source (prototype)

Instead of the older and less efficient cat-toast device, there is now a more efficient and powerful solution to the anti-gravitatory generator problem. A new high-speed anti-gravity prototype generator system has been developed, called: The cat turbine! In place of a buttered piece of toast attached to a cat's back, this new prototype has multiple cats (2-?) attached to each other. The cats' foot repulsion will keep them spinning without the risk of the cat eating the butter, and more cats can easily be added to increase power. The only limits to this is from the size of the generator and the number of cats available. This system's biggest advantage is that there is far more power available — in the form of more cats, and could potentially be the power source of Uncyclopedia in the near future.

A Further Scientific Development

Scientists at the University of Darmstadt has discovered that by strapping a slice of buttered toast onto the back of a cat, drilling a hole through a wall large enough to fit a pole with a handle through, inserting the pole's end up into cat's rectum and turning the handle very fast, much of the same results can be observed. PETA has been informed about this.

I'm Sorry, But This Article Has Become Silly

Following complaints from the public, attention has been drawn to this article, which is henceforth and with immediate effect designated to be "Ridiculous" as an interim measure, as defined under Section 4, Subsection iiiA, Regulations Pertaining to Silly Articles and will be defined as Silly as soon as the rubber stamp with "Silly" written on it is found. (ohhhh, drat...)

The theory promoted in this article, that a Buttered-Toast-Cat device (wherein the toast is buttered, not the cat) could be the foundation of a quantum engine that could produce <quote>unlimited energy<unquote> is in contradiction of Newton's Second Law pertaining to Entropy. The writers of this article have proposed that a putative Buttered-Toast-Cat engine may be considered to be a form of perpetual motion device. Such devices are impossible because they assume that an energy-producing system will not produce heat (entropy) which will then be lost to the universe.

The Ministry of Regulations Limiting Silly Devices has calculated that any aforementioned Buttered-Toast-Cat device will in fact require an energy input which will exceed any energy output (for example, if connected to a turbine). The Ministry advises that this entropy component of the device comprises but is not limited to-

  1. Food for the cat(s): Since a quantum device producing energy does not by definition exist outside the dimension of Time, the cattish component of the device must also exist within time and thus the aforementioned moggy will require feeding, to maintain its consciousness and thus its must-land-on-feet capability. Energy input for each 1 kilojoule of energy produced by a putative turbine device is calculated to require 1.87 kilojoules of energy input in the form of tinned or fresh cat food (preferably salmon or tuna), crunchy kitty snacks, water or milk, the occasional mouse or small bird, and half a pound of cheese.
  2. Cleaning out the cat crap: If the cat is given food, it will also shit. If the shit is not removed from the turbine, the device will - within a finite time - fill with kitty crap which will bring the spinning cat to a halt. As the cat will not have time to stop and have a crap, a 'cat nappy' or some other form of diaper must be fitted and changed regularly. A slipper may substitute as a crapping receptacle. The removal of crap is thus energy-requiring, and is calculated to absorb 0.33 kilojoules of energy per 1 kilojoule generated.
  3. Grooming: As the cat will not have time to groom itself - being pre-occupied with landing on its feet - i.e. it must be regularly groomed. Energy consumption per 1 kilojoule of energy produced is estimated to be 0.47 kilojoule.
  4. Purring and/or screeching: The cat will emit sound energy at regular intervals in the form of purring with contentment (at maintaining its equlibrium or after having just had a good shit) or screeching (if it suddenly becomes aware of its predicament). Energy loss due to sound is estimated to be 0.044 kilojoules.
  5. Heat: As cats are homeothermic, they generate and disperse metabolic heat. This heat must be removed from the device if the cat is not be slowly baked. Indeed, the device will require an air-conditioning unit to provide the cat with an ambient air temperature suitable to maintain consciousness. The energy used for cooling is calculated to be 0.81 kilojoules.
  6. Butter: Finally, the butter on the toast, revolving at high speed, will be lost through evaporation and centrifugation. The toast thus must be regularly re-buttered. Energy requirement (based on 18 kilojoules per pound of butter) is calculated to be 1.93 kilojoules.

A kilojoule of energy produced by a Buttered-Toast-Cat device will therefore require an input of, um, lots of external energy, negating the claimed efficiency of the device. The Ministry has issued a government health warning against the construction of such a device. It is proposed that such a device is classified as Silly.

An alterative quantum energy-producing "engine" has been under development by Professor Robert Goddard of the Ministry - with the assistance of a 4 squillion pound grant from the National Department of Energy Conservation. This is a torus-like device which will utilise a cat pursuing an almost-dead mouse (i.e. a mouse existing in a quantum not-really-dead-or-alive state - similar to that experienced by anyone in the morning after a hard night's drinking) whilst dragging a number of tin cans tied to its tail. This device has been classified Non-Silly or Serious. A press release to Uncyclopedia is expected within the near future, but in the interim the Ministry has provided the following advice: "Do Not Hold Your Breath Waiting."

Further reading

See also

External links


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