Comments on: 20 things you didn't know about...

20 things you didn't know about...

kisch mokusch — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:09:36 -0800

Discover Magazine's 20 Things You Didn't Know About... Short, interesting and occasionally witty facts about Aliens, Lab Accidents, Nobel Prizes, Meteors, Death, Sleep and more.

By: amberglow

amberglow — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:17:55 -0800

weird--from the Aliens part: 15. In space, no one can hear you sneeze: Streptococcus mitis, a bacterium that infects the nose and throat, was inadvertently sent to the moon aboard the Surveyor 3 probe. The bugs were still alive when Apollo 12 astronauts retrieved the probe's camera two and a half years later. Won't we just kill whoever we eventually find in space? (like War of the Worlds, etc)

By: gauchodaspampas

gauchodaspampas — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:32:45 -0800

These are indeed pretty interesting, but the one you quoted turns out (wikipedia) to be likely just an urban legend. S. mitis would be extremely unlikely to be able to survive the conditions on the moon, and it is possible that the camera was contaminated after retrieval.

By: miss lynnster

miss lynnster — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:36:47 -0800

From the "death" part: 3) No American has died of old age since 1951. 4) That was the year the government eliminated that classification on death certificates. Huh. Now that's a coincidence.

By: LoriFLA

LoriFLA — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:40:29 -0800

I knew honey never spoils, that it's good as a healing agent, knew a few facts about obestiy. The rest, I probably don't know jack. Fun post.

By: dgaicun

dgaicun — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 22:13:30 -0800

Death: In Madagascar, families dig up the bones of dead relatives and parade them around the village in a ceremony called famadihana. The remains are then wrapped in a new shroud and reburied. The old shroud is given to a newly married, childless couple to cover the connubial bed. Oh, hell no.

By: Brandon Blatcher

Brandon Blatcher — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 22:13:56 -0800

15 For organs to form during embryonic development, some cells must commit suicide. Without such programmed cell death, we would all be born with webbed feet, like ducks. Can we give back hair loss and keep the webbed feet?

By: amyms

amyms — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 22:30:25 -0800

This is cool, thanks!

By: marxchivist

marxchivist — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 22:33:42 -0800

Cool post. From the "Lab Accidents" section: 19 The world has scores of superpowerful particle accelerators. Last year, a fireball created at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider in Upton, New York, had the characteristics of a black hole. Physicists are REASONABLY sure that no such black holes could escape and consume Earth. [emphasis mine]

By: Firas

Firas — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 23:36:13 -0800

Nobel prizes: 19 If you can't win a Nobel, try for an Ig Nobel, offered since 1991 by the Annals of Improbable Research for scientific work "that cannot or should not be reproduced." 20 Last year's winners include Claire Rind and Peter Simmons of the University of Newcastle in England, who won the peace prize for monitoring the brain of a locust while it watched scenes from Star Wars.

By: Firas

Firas — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 23:53:56 -0800

Awesome: List of Ig Nobel Prize winners.

By: Civil_Disobedient

Civil_Disobedient — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 08:20:03 -0800

Wow, I didn't know Albert Hoffman was still alive (and turned 100 this January).

By: amberglow

amberglow — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 11:54:58 -0800

By: edjo

edjo — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 07:58:31 -0800

Interesting, but I already knew some of those.