Friday, September 19, 2014

Cause and Effect: Eating, and what comes after

Did you know …

That it was Sir Isaac Newton, patron saint of gravity, apples, luscious hair, and syphilis, who first discovered that the things we put into our main head-hole (foods) become the things that we extrude from our bottom-vent and seat-splitter (1’s and 2’s).

Obviously humans had observed the occasional connection between their input and output when, for example, they recognized a tooth, coin, or partially digested mouse in their chamber pot, but these things were thought to be flukes and coincidence, and the general consensus was that the bulk of the material produced by the human body was the result of, like, spontaneous biogenesis (or whatever the turd equivalent of that would be, anyway). It wasn’t until Newton came along that all that crap was officially considered to be used food.

Newton believed that using oneself as the subject of one’s own experiments was unethical and bad science, so he set up a long-running trial in which he controlled all the food and non-food items that his neighbor consumed, and observed all of the neighbor’s physical output. (The neighbor, of course, had no idea this was happening.) Eventually Newton declared that he could definitively link what we eat to what we blast. The neighbor, sadly, ended the experiment by dying (you can’t really thrive on alternating meals of uncooked rye and stewed prunes, it turns out), but Newton had nearly five years of data at that point, and he felt that was good enough. It had to be, in any case.

The precise mechanisms through which food turns into human garbage weren’t explored until the 20th century (I think that was an Einstein joint), but that’s a story for another day.

Thursday, September 18, 2014

Big A's Big 5

Did you know …

That it was the Greek philosopher Aristotle who first codified the rankings of the most hilarious subject matter? It’s true!

According to Aristotle, the top five most rib-tickling subjects are (in descending order):
  1. Male genitalia
  2. Butts
  3. Feces
  4. Animals/ugly children
  5. Personal injury

You may have noticed that we stick pretty closely to that list here at the Daily Science Fact. This isn’t because we (DSF staff) are going for cheap laughs, it’s because the things we (humans in general) find humorous are also often the things that intrigue us the most (intellectually). Like a fat little baby bear falling out of an apple tree (#4), or a man who gets his bottom (#2) stuck in the turlet (#3), or a French gendarme slipping on vomit and falling into an electrified fence (#5), or boners (#1). These things are “funny” for a reason; they make us think about how the world around us works. Aristotle didn’t get to that until later.

A note: Why isn’t “female genitalia” on the list? I think that it probably is, but it just didn’t make the top five. Philosophers in recent times have toyed with rearranging the list to include female genetalia, but never got past the dilemma of misogyny through exclusion vs placing vaginas next to feces and personal injury on any list.

Thursday, September 4, 2014

Fish Feelings

Oh, what’s this stuck to the back of my knee? Yuck! It’s Camping Knowledge! I don’t know how I could have missed it, but it must have been there since I got back, just . . . just feasting on my juices. Ugh. Get  tweezer.

Did you know …

That fish do have feelings? It’s true! It’s so true, I suspect we may have talked about it already.

In any case, contrary to popular belief, fish really do have feelings. And, no, I’m not about to pull a little switcheroo on you and be all, “I’m talking about emotional feelings! LOL!” Dumb. No, I’m talking about actual feelings. Feelings of pressure, heat, pain, etc. Fish feel things, just like us.

The main difference in fishes’ perception of feelings is that they don’t experience them until the moment before they die. So you can indeed filet a fish alive, and it won’t give half a crap . . . until seconds before it croaks. In those final moments, the fish will experience all the pain of having its muscles pulled from its skeleton, as well as any other pain it might have encountered in its life (although, comparatively, this would be relatively minor, and probably isn’t noticeable over the filleting thing).

Interestingly, this is also when fish experience their emotional feelings, the ones I wasn’t going to mention. So a fish will swim through its whole dumb life, numb in body, numb in heart, and then at the very end it will suddenly be filled with nightmarish pain and thoughts of lost friends and life-defining love that it never before understood. This combination is probably why fish appear as if they are about to vomit right before they die (I don’t think fish can vomit, though, so there are probably some feelings of disappointment thrown on top of everything else).

Wednesday, September 3, 2014

How does ebola work?

Did you know …

That this post isn’t actually about Zaire ebolavirus, or “ebola”? It’s true! You dumb sucker!

This post is about how the human brain works—your brain. You saw some headline about ebola, and you’re all worried about getting the disease, or you’re some kind of pervert who thought about bleeding eyeballs and thought, “Oh, this is for sure going to be sweet, why do I keep buying such complicated belts,” or you know me and/or are related to me and just are reading this post as a matter of course. If the latter is true, I’m very sorry for the image of someone struggling to get into their own pants while thinking about hemorrhagic fever, but, in any case, whether you’re my mother, colleague, dear friend, worry wart, or friendly deviant, you’ve been the victim of “clickbait.” Yeah, there is a lot wrong with you, but this particular situation isn’t entirely your fault.

You see, “clickbait” or “clickbates” are intricately crafted psychological traps, typically set by human-like computers or computer-like humans to ensnare the attention of bumpkins. Each distinct clickbia is designed to attract you, or some bumpkin, via your most base compulsions. Once you’ve looked at it (or swallowed the bait), the clickbait construct snags a lobe deep inside your brain—typically the hypothalamus, I believe. At that point, what are you supposed to do? Jerk away and potentially dislodge your ‘thalamus? Nope, you’re snagged. So you sit back, and just fill the master-baiter’s pockets with your precious attention, money, and pictures of your privates.

Fortunately for you, this is an academic scenario only, and you have encountered a benevolent baiter. Unfortunately for you, you’ve probably just learned what sort of lascivious feelings a brutal, tragic epidemic can stir in your soul, and I have to think that that’s a lot to deal with on a Monday night, or whenever you’re reading this. Good luck, dude.


PS—I’m filling in my missed days, so if you missed getting smarter while I was camping, check out "last week's" entries! There’s fresh knowledge from the great outdoors there! If you’re reading this in the future, or just hitting the “Press For Facts” button, I don’t know. You’re operating beyond my understanding and control.

Thursday, August 28, 2014

MARK 4 WILL FIX DOGS MARK 4 WILL FIX DOGS MARK 4 WILL FIX DOGS

Did you know …


That the films Short Circuit and Short Circuit 2 were both based on the real-life exploits of a real-life robot? It’s true!


“Johnny Mark 4” (the Mark 5 model was never actually built) was made by the Mitsubishi corporation some time between 1981 and 1984, and while “he” was never so intelligent as the character Johnny 5, he was programmed to be semi-autonomous; Mark 4 could complete household tasks with little direction and simulate human conversation reasonably well.


Where real life most significantly diverges from the films is that the titular “short circuit” occurred near the end of Mark 4’s functional lifespan, and, in fact, did not expand his intelligence and awareness as it did with his fictional counterpart.


In early 1985, Mark 4 was assisting in housekeeping duties at an animal shelter as part of a Mitsubishi public relations initiative. Some claim that the short circuit was the result of a dog urinating on Mark 4, but his engineers insist that he was fully waterproof. It’s more likely that Mark 4 simply backed into an electrical outlet while sweeping and received a damaging electrical charge. However it happened, significant short circuits occurred in Mark 4’s processing center that afternoon. Unfortunately, they were not enough to fully disable him; I say “unfortunately,” because the accident damaged something in Mark 4’s logic board, and he immediately stopped cleaning and began disassembling dogs. According to witnesses who viewed the incident from an adjacent hallway, Mark 4 attempted to reassemble the dog parts into a larger, more efficient dog, but the room and its windows were so . . . messy that it seems unlikely that any observer could accurately determine what Mark 4 was attempting. In any case, dogs don’t work like that, and Mark 4 died alone in the locked room as his battery pack was allowed to deplete.

In retrospect, it seems a little strange that they made a movie out of the incident. I can’t say I’m sorry that they did, though. What a fun couple of flicks!

Wednesday, August 27, 2014

Chickenscratch

Did you know …

That the vikings, Northern Europe’s preeminent seagoing rapists, had their own written language? It’s true!

Who’d have thought that that thieving race of badger people could even form human-like sounds, much less write them down?! When you see the letters themselves, though, it might make more sense; each viking character had to be able to be inscribed by dragging one’s own teeth over a flat stone surface, so it’s really just a bunch of scratches and tooth pieces.

Have you ever heard of the saga of Beowulf? It’s basically the 8th century’s version of All Dogs Go to Heaven—at some point a viking pulls somebody’s arm off and then kills their mother, which I believe ADGtH copied almost directly. Anyway, according to some theories, simply writing down the story of Beowulf fully wore down the teeth of an entire generation of vikings, which seems to have given the rest of Europe a moment to breathe and collect itself. That must have been nice! Of course the vikings were at it again a few years later, spreading disease and turning monks into hand puppets and stuff.

Those guys!

Tuesday, August 26, 2014

Tree-rocks

Wake up and get out of that tent! Someone left Camping Knowledge all over the place, and it’s not going to clean itself up.

Did you know …

That pinecones are nature’s tree-rocks? It’s true!

Why nature thought trees needed rocks, I’ll never know. And why nature produced such an inferior replica of a rock is likewise beyond me. Still, pinecones can serve many of the same purposes as rocks, including stacking, sorting, throwing, squeezing, burying, crushing, and hiding.

Pinecones are somewhat more flammable than true rocks, however, so keep that in mind when choosing your rock or tree-rock for a particular purpose. (e.g., a pinecone will work reasonably well for knocking a you squirrel off of a tree branch, but stick with the original if you need something to heat up in a campfire.)

Monday, August 25, 2014

Bloodmeal

Don’t you hate it when you come home from a long weekend, and your hair and clothes just smell like Camping Knowledge? Yuck. Get it here instead.

Did you know …

That you can pretty much eat mosquitoes all day long, and you’ll still be hungry? It’s true!

There are a couple of caveats to this:

First, if eating mosquitoes grosses you out for whatever reason, you may not be hungry after eating a few (you won’t be full either, though),

Also, if you’re a bat, you can probably eat mosquitoes until you’re no longer hungry. It seems unlikely that you’re a bat if you’re reading this, however, unless you’re perched on the shoulder of a human being or hiding in their hair. Even then, I suppose it’d be a pretty big coincidence if you read English. It’s a big world out there.

See, the reason that bats can fill up on mosquitoes but we can’t is kind of the crux of the issue. We (humans) are much, much bigger than bats. If you look closely, you’ll see that we’re way, way bigger—probably somewhere on the order of 10 to 15 times bigger, depending on the bat and the person (although I haven’t done any formal measuring and weighing).

Mosquitoes, likewise, are quite small. Not so small that they can’t fill up a bat’s little tummy, but you can jam hundreds of those little turds in your mouth and it won’t do you much good. What’s more, in any given mosquito-eating scenario, some of those mosquitoes have probably already been eating you, and unless you get all of them, eating a few of them back is barely going to allow you to break even.

Presumably there’s a way to efficiently maximize mosquito intake (I’m thinking of something like a giant funnel and a vacuum cleaner), but until such an item or strategy exists I’d say it’s just not worth it.

I give eating mosquitoes a C-.

Sunday, August 24, 2014

Nature's canoes

Uh oh. What’s that sound? Crashing, twig-snapping, brush-stomping . . . oh, it’s only Camping Knowledge. Well, sit back and expose your soft gut, so that Camping Knowledge might consume you more easily.

Did you know …

That your modern canoe is modeled after the bellies of ducks? It’s true!

Canoe scientists realized long ago that you’d be hard pressed to create a more hydrodynamic buoyant shape than the underside of a duck, so they basically chopped the legs off and handed the design to the canoe manufacturing industry. Voila!

Aside from the legs, another duck feature noticeably absent from most canoes is the cloaca. At the time, scientists believed it wasn’t necessary to reproduce the cloaca in canoes, but believe you me, there are occasions when you absolutely wish there was an additional way to remove the swampy mixture of feces and uric acid from your boat.

Saturday, August 23, 2014

Crawbird

Gather ‘round the campfire, science scouts, and open your damn ears so that I might pour into them rich, sweet, poisonous Camping Knowledge.

Did you know …

That all your average crayfish/crawdad/crawfish/craydad/dadfish/daddad wants from life is to fly? It’s true!

This may be surprising, because millions of years of evolution have landed the humble crayfish snugly amidst underwater rocks, algae, and mud. But that’s not their fault; evolution is a deck of cards, and winning with three nines doesn’t mean you didn’t always want a royal flush.

Anyway, most crawpigs are forced to satisfy their desire for flight by practically forcing themselves into the gullets of seagulls and the like. But if you ever get the opportunity, do a mudbug a favor and chuck it high into the sky. If it seems to be pinching onto your finger, why, that’s only a dadbug’s way of saying thanks. Send that little s.o.b. into orbit, and it will die a happy (if a little sooner than it probably expected.)

A side note: don’t throw lobsters. They are a distinct species, and they want none of that nonsense.

Friday, August 22, 2014

"Woodsie Wigglers"

Buckle up, little scientists, because it’s time for Camping Knowledge, harvested fresh from the wilderness.

Did you know …

That chipmunks are exactly the same on the inside as they are on the outside? It’s true!

Chipmunks are able to turn themselves inside-out at will, sort of like a water-weenie (or a “water wiggler,” depending on branding, I guess.) If you’re not familiar with water-weenies, they’re basically rubber cylinders, the walls of which are inflated with fluid. Sort of like a penis, I guess, except that water-weenies turn themselves inside out as a matter of course, which is not something recommended for most penes. If this description doesn’t fully summon a helpful mental image, I recommend traveling backwards in time to the early 1990s and checking out the gift shop of your local science center.

But this post isn’t about water-weenies, it’s about chipmunks. In order to escape predators, chipmunks can easily slide their skin around and through their bodies, allowing them the slip from tight situations. You’d never guess that this is possible, because an inside-out chipmunk looks exactly like an outside-out chipmunk. But once you’ve found yourself with a mouthful of chipmunk hair and mucus but no chipmunk, well, it becomes pretty obvious.

Thursday, August 21, 2014

Bush Inventions

Did you know …


That some of President Theodore Roosevelt’s greatest inventions came to him while he was camping? It’s true!


I only mention it because I’ll be going camping tomorrow as well. This means that I’ll be adding to my backlog of days that I still have to fill with science facts (I’m looking at you, May!). But it may also mean that the next great thing you buy was invented by me in the woods! Like, maybe an exciting new way to deal with rocks or something.


Anyhow, here are some of Teddy Roosevelt’s “bush inventions”:
-The crossbow
-The teddy bear
-Camp chairs
-Colored paper
-Syphilis
-The artichoke
-Franklin Delano Roosebot
-Baseball
-Chemical warfare
-Taxidermy
-Gas spectrometry

Wish me luck! I’ve never eaten live fish before!!

Wednesday, August 20, 2014

Flat Earth

Did you know …

That many prominent scientitians believe that the Earth, this one right here, is flat? It’s true!

If this is the case, many say, the flat Earth must be accelerating “upwards” through space at exactly 1G (~9.8 meters per second) to replicate the gravity we would feel if we lived on a spherical, Earth-sized Earth. And if this is true, it follows, our flat Earth would have achieved the speed of light after about seven years. By all accounts, Earth has existed for longer than 7 years. If this is true, and if we chose to accept Aaron Einstein’s theory of relativity, we should all have become infinitely dense as we approached to speed of light, and also time no longer passes.

How I’m writing this with infinitely dense fingers and trapped in a frozen instant of time is beyond me, but then again so are a lot of things.

Other scientific facts that are beyond me:
-Worms find each other attractive
-Compound bows
-Cheese is made of milk
-Plate tectonics
-Twins have identical DNA but distinct thoughts
-Rabbits can’t see the colors red, orange, or yellow
-Germ theory


Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Canned spine

Did you know …

That the human spinal column is basically just a stack of soup cans? It’s true!

Obviously your vertebrae aren’t literally soup cans, made by US Soup Concerns Inc. or whatever, but they are essentially soup cans, for all intents and purposes. Treat them as you would a column of soup cans. Would you whack a stack of cans with a bat? No, not unless you want to get thrown out of the grocery store. Would you tilt that can column to a precarious angle? No, not unless you wanted soup cans all over the place. Would you strap that stack to a bungie cord and toss it off a bridge? No! Not unless you were okay with losing a ton of soup!

The important exception to this analogy: Would you crack open one of those cans (or more, if you were having a party) and enjoy the savory soup inside? Yes, you probably would. And that’s ok with literal soup cans, but not with your vertebrae. You would be surprised at how awful that soup is, and it is extremely unlikely that it will be worth losing all movement and feeling in your lower body.

Monday, August 18, 2014

Rabblerawr thhbbbbtthhh gurrhick

Did you know …

That Tasmanian devils can spin, mini-tornado-style, as fast as 2000 rotations per minute? It’s true!

This is how most Tasmanian devils die. Spinning, or a combination of spinning and facial tumors. In any case, it’s just too fast for a living creature to spin.

Sunday, August 17, 2014

Good kickflip, Scout!

Did you know …

That an adult dog knows the same number of words as a thirteen-year-old human child? It’s true!

Here are the words adult dogs/13-year-olds know:
-Come
-Sit
-Walk
-Food
-Handjob
-Bath
-Ganked
-Leash
-Retard
-Good
-Bad
-Kickflip
-Vet



Saturday, August 16, 2014

The Notorious L.R.A.C.A.Q.C.

Did you know …

That the famed physicist Lorenzo Romano Amedeo Carlo Avogadro di Quaregna e di Cerreto (known to his friends as “Renny di Reggy,” or simply “Avogadro”) spent his whole life counting molecules one by one? It’s true!

It was painstaking work, but it was worth it in the end; Avogadro gave us one of the top five numbers ever! The only real tragedy is that Renny effectively removed himself from the dating pool by spending all his time counting, and . . . well, just look at him! Rwaarrr!

In case you’re wondering (I know you are), here are the top five numbers:
5. 420
4. Avogadro’s number (6.02 x 10^23, I think)
3. Pi
2. 69
1. 1

Friday, August 15, 2014

The Race of the Dandy Horse

Did you know …

That one of the earliest forms of the bicycle, called a velocipede or a “Dandy Horse,” was invented for the purpose of jousting? It’s true!

The Dandy Horse was invented in the early 19th century by the German baron Karl von Drais. Drais was an avid horseman (that is to say, he rode regular horses, not yet dandy horses), but found that any horse much larger than a Shetland pony was too tall for effective jousting. Drais designed the velocipe as a means of comfortably achieving adequate velocity while maintaining maneuverability and remaining at the appropriate height for jousting.

It occurs to me that I may have not been specific enough above. If you're picturing the Baron von Drais speeding across a field holding a lance, you have been mislead; Drais’ understanding of “jousting” was fairly unconventional. Instead of trying to knock another man off of a horse (or dandy horse) with a stick, the Baron would “joust” by speeding along with his right pointer finger outstretched, with the intention of thrusting it into the bottoms of unsuspecting walkers. This behavior landed Drais in quite a bit of legal trouble, got him banned from county fairs across Europe, and gave him an index finger so often broken and re-healed that it looked more like a miniature bolt of lightning than a human digit, but he never quit. He was a true sportsman.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

Dedosde

Did you know …

That the Spanish phrase for "teeth" is "dedos de la cabeza," which directly translates to "fingers of the head"? It's true!

This is a good example of how language shapes your understanding of the world around you. "Teeth," naturally, derives from the Old English word for breasts ("teets") which is of course how we think of teeth in the English-speaking world. The German word for teeth, "gebiss," is the same as the German word for "slugs," which probably explains why Germans brush their teeth with salt. And the Czech word, "zuby," literally means "optional mouth pearls," something that makes complete sense if you've ever seen the famous Czech smile or Czech jewelry.

Wednesday, August 13, 2014

Ponies


Did you know …

That "ponies" are really just horses? It's true!

Many people operate under the misconception that ponies are a fully distinct species from horses, but this could not be further from the truth. A "pony" is simply a horse that has, at some point in its life, killed a human being.

If you're thinking, "no, that can't be true, I've looked in the eyes of some ponies, and I'd be able to tell if they had straight up murdered someone," you're half right. Naturally, doing something like stomping on someone's head or biting their throat out will earn a horse the pony label, but horses can also become ponies by indirectly or inadvertently causing the death of a human being.

For example:
-A horse stands on the oxygen supply tube of an old-timey diver. This horse is a pony.
-A horse and a human are trapped in a warehouse for two months. They have a large supply of jerky, but with its superior size and strength the horse is able to keep all the jerky for itself. The human dies of starvation, and the horse is a pony.
-A horse and a human are trapped in a garden paradise for several decades. They have all the fresh food they need, but the horse convinces the person to eat only apricots. The human dies of diabetes, and the horse is a pony.
-A horse is singing on a mountaintop, and the sound triggers an avalanche. The village below is buried by snow, tree trunks, and house-sized boulders. With no time to evacuate, nearly four hundred people perish. This horse is a pony.
-A horse gives false testimony at a murder trial. The defendant is wrongfully convicted, sentenced to death, and executed. This horse remains a horse, because the defendant was also a horse.

Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Love of ham

Did you know …

That of all the countries in the world, it's the country of America that eats the most ham? It's true.

Scientists postulate that this is because Americans simply love ham. Anecdotally, of course, this is well known; we're all familiar with the olde American nursery rhyme,

"Ham on my teeth
Ham on my tongue.
Ham in my belly,
Isn't it fun?

Ham for the lord
And ham for the child.
Ham in the house
And ham in the wild.

Flesh oh so tender
A bite most divine.
Bathe us, sweet Jesus,
In the blood of the swine."

They had fun back then, didn't they?