It’s 7:13am and about two hours ago I decided to randomly Wikipedia my boredom away.
I came across an article about the Brass Rat, also known as the MIT class ring. Now, I have the habit of getting all excited about new knowledge and it mentioned that each ring has a symbol on it that identifies the wearer’s MIT major. I started to surf the net to see the various designs and meanings.
Then I came across the Brass Rat for the Division of Health, Science and Technology. The symbol shows two snakes spiral-wound around a test tube. I stared at the symbol for 10 minutes until I went to the contact section and started to write an email to the design committee.
My issue? Two snakes spiral-would around a staff is known as a herald’s staff and symbolizes the trades of Hermes, which are: commerce and negotiation. It’s the symbol used by government facilities for commerce.
Of all places, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology would make such a mistake!
I decided to email them that the correct symbol for medicine would be the rod of Asclepius (Asclepius was the son of Apollo and a mythological physician).
We will see if they write back!
