Spaghetti trees
In one of my all-time favourite hoaxes, in 1957 the BBC managed to convince the British public that spaghetti grows on trees.
Category: Sciences
Airplane boots
Flying airplanes gather ice. It’s cold up there. That ice can get into the machinery and cause significant danger. So how do you keep the ice away? The same way we do: with rubber boots.
Build your own magic square
A magic square is a grid of numbers in which any row, column, or diagonal adds up to the same total. They look complex, but it’s actually easy to design your own using the Siamese method.
Science wars: Fixists vs. mobilists
A hundred years ago the idea that the continents could move was controversial. Among the “fixists” were some of the luminaries of geology and geophysics in the early 20th century. But history has proven them very, very wrong.
Medieval rocket launchers
We think of rocket launchers as a modern invention, but the Koreans were using them four hundred years ago. The hwacha could fire two hundred rockets at once, blowing up enemies more than a hundred metres away.
The sewing machine dream
Elias Howe Jr. patented the modern sewing machine in 1846. Its innovative “lockstitch” mechanism was revolutionary. And, apparently, it came to Howe in a dream.
The river under the Sahara
Searching for oil in the 1950s, prospectors discovered huge supplies of ancient water under the Sahara. The Great Man-Made River (an enormous network of underground pipes) now brings that water to the major cities of Libya.
Rubber duck debugging
You’re writing a computer programme, and you need to debug it. Why not use a rubber duck?
Insect gears
Hopping insects have to coordinate their legs carefully. If they push off with one leg before the other they may literally spiral out of control. So how does the issus coleoptratus planthopper nymph avoid this? With gears.
0.9 recurring is 1
0.999… is the same number as 1. It’s counterintuitive, but mathematics says that it’s true. Whether you believe it or not is another matter.
The parent of all life
Evolutionary biology hypothesizes the existence of a single form of life that is the ancestor of all life currently on Earth: the last universal common ancestor (LUCA).
The monks’ elixir
According to tradition, a military marshal in the court of Henry IV of France presented some Carthusian monks with an alchemical manuscript for an elixir of long life. You can still buy the resulting concoction today.
The asteroid that might hit Earth
1950DA is an asteroid that was discovered in 1950. Our best predictions of its future orbital path suggest that it has a small chance of colliding with the Earth. Because of its size such a collision would be devastating, but don’t worry, it’s unlikely to happen until March 16, 2880.
Atomic gardening
In the 1950s, as part of the nuclear energy craze, gardeners exposed seeds or seedlings to gamma radiation in order to induce beneficial mutations. In the UK, seeds were mailed out to enthusiasts to grow. Many of the plants died, or got weird growths, as you would expect. Some, however, thrived.
Obsolete feet
Prior to standardization, the measurement of length designated “the foot” was a different size depending on which country or region you were in. Notable variants included the Prussian foot, the Rijnland foot (which became the Cape foot used in South Africa), and the Chinese mathematician’s foot.
Crop mimics
Farmers remove weeds from their crops. But they miss the weeds that look like crops. Over time, these weeds come to mimic the crops around them. And in some cases, they become crops themselves.
The Generalist Academy 