As the name suggests, a
pub theory is theory
hypothesised whilst under the influence of
alcohol.
You're sitting there down at your
local, your
girlfriend is into the second hour of telling what a
bad day she's had and your mind begins to
wander. Being a total
geek, like
me, you dream about the exciting world of
physics.
Suddenly you have
a moment of clarity. You suddenly realise how to make that
perpetual motion machine or travel faster than the
speed of light. Why hasn't anyone ever thought of this before?
At this point, if you're
lucky, you snap to and go have a go on the
fruit machine or get another
drink in. If you're
unlucky you go on to write a
node about it or, even worse, write a proper
scientific paper on it. I have heard rumours that
Drude's laws of
solid-state physics were an example of a
pub theory. I doubt that though.