Sunday, July 15, 2012

Jul 15, 2012

-Microwave ovens cook food by vibrating the water molecules enough to create friction/heat

-Spider web threads have the equivalent strength of steel and are stretchier than nylon

-Einstein wrote the first equations for lasers.

-Every culture has folklore of "little people (leprechauns, Lilliputians, etc)

-computers can not recognize images with hidden features (i.e. a cat hiding behind a tree. comp only sees tree)

-Queen Elizabeth painted her face white with blue veins on it to make herself appear transparent.

-There are 100 billion neurons in the human brain

-A pizza will cook on Venus in 9 seconds

-Sleep turns short term memories into long term.

-Dolphins sleep half of their brain at at time.

-Octopi arms can operate autonomously without a brain connection.

Monday, July 9, 2012

July 9, 2012

Oops! Off by a day. Sorry about that, I wasn't at home yesterday so I had to wait until today to post. Anyway, hope you learn something new!


-What we can do in 30 seconds, robots do in one day.

-Tritan, a moon stolen by Neptune, is a twin to Pluto.

-Lobsters do have nervous systems, but no brain so they can't process pain.

-Lobsters have copper blood (like Spock)

-NASA's definition of life is any organism that replicates, metabolizes and evolves.

-Sulfur, a poisonous gas, smells so bad to us because our brains have evolved to make us want to run away from it.

-The bubbles in champagne get you drunk faster and keeps you drunk longer than any other alcohol.

-In space, food has to be able to stick to itself to keep from flying all over the place (i.e. spices have to be liquid)

-In space, blood rushes to the upper body and desensitizes taste buds.

-Instant Jell-O, Tang, Cool Whip, and Pop Rocks were all invented by the same guy.

-Burping in space is equivalent to vomiting because gravity doesn't keep food down.

-On space shuttles, the sources of fuel are 2 separate tanks of hydrogen and oxygen that when combined provide the fuel to move as well as water that the astronauts drink, cook with, shower, etc.

-All food coming from China and Vietnam has to be irradiated.

-Astronauts use tortillas instead of bread because it doesn't crumble and can wrap around other food.

Sunday, July 1, 2012

July 1, 2012

-all shades of green match each other

-formaldehyde can keep clothes wrinkle-free forever

-the "Bodies" exhibits use Chinese prisoners as the bodies, who very likely did not volunteer their bodies to be put on display after they died.

-silk traps heat better than most other fabrics

-There is no statistical evidence that proves that Shape-Ups give you a better or harder work out than regular shoes.

-Venus spins backwards and no one knows why

-Venus had runaway greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and the climate is so out of control and hot that if a human were to step foot into the atmosphere, they would vaporize instantly. If we don't start taking control of our environment, it could end up in the exact same state.

-Uranus was the first planet seen through a telescope. (true fact and new favorite insult)

-Jesus was probably born sometime between 3-5 B.C.

-The Star of Bethlehem could have been a star exploding as a nova, or a comet.

-There is no land at the North Pole, only water- frozen and liquid.

-Santa would have to travel at 2000 miles per second to be able to go to every house in the world celebrating Christmas on Christmas Eve.