Useless Trivia: Part I

[Xykon_Fan]

This is a thread for trivia that doesn't really deserve a new thread, but which you feel the need to share with others anyway.

For instance, apparently certain types of alligators have their gender determined by what temperature the egg they developed in has during a specific period of its growth. Warmer eggs become male, while colder eggs become female. Heh, everyone knew females were cold-blooded right? :smallamused: (Completely joking...most of my best friends are girls.)

[Vuzzmop]

While they may not appear so, the llama is a member of the camel family.

[Eldred]

The elephant is the only mammel in the world that can't jump.

[AslanCross]

Snails can sleep for a very long time. I commonly hear three years, but sources aren't consistent.

[Rawhide]

The elephant is the only mammel in the world that can't jump.

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Wild-Animals-705/Sloths-Jump.htm

[SDF]

There is an arrow formed by the shape of the letters between FedE and x.

[Extra_Crispy]

Found a site that has a lot of useless trivia, dont know how many are really correct but most sound right. One of my favorite is "If the population of China walked past you in single file, the line would never end because of the rate of reproduction."

here is the site http://www.qsl.net/w5www/trivia.html

[bosssmiley]

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Wild-Animals-705/Sloths-Jump.htm

Sloths can jump, they're just too lazy to be bothered. :smallwink:

"Alright man, keep your hair on. I'm getting to it..."

[Green Bean]

Canada has the most doughnut shops per capita in the world.

The odds of being killed by lightning are the same as being killed by falling out of bed.

[Rawhide]

Sloths can jump, they're just too lazy to be bothered. :smallwink:

"Alright man, keep your hair on. I'm getting to it..."

Oh, and I almost forgot, white men can't jump (http://imdb.com/title/tt0105812/).

[Madmal]

Pandas are more related to racoons than bears.

[I'm da Rogue!]

Your body is creating and killing 15 million red blood cells per second!

The Mona Lisa has no eyebrows. It was the fashion in Renaissance Florence to shave them off!

During your lifetime, you'll eat about 60,000 pounds of food, that's the weight of about 6 elephants!

Dolphins sleep with one eye open!

The worlds oldest piece of chewing gum is over 9000 years old!

In space, astronauts cannot cry properly, because there is no gravity, so the tears can't flow down their faces!

About 3000 years ago, most Egyptians died by the time they were 30!

Men are 6 times more likely to be struck by lightning than women!
(sweet)

[Toastkart]

Pandas are more related to racoons than bears.

except that they're not. check under the classification section here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_Panda)

and to add to this. Certain types of snakes bear live young.

Great white sharks, as well as some related sharks, are endothermic.

[Syka]

Actually, from what I understand, several reptilian species have the sex of the eggs determined by the temperture of the nesting site. Too cold and they are female, too hot and it's male, and right in between you get a nice mix of both. :smallwink: It's still pretty cool.

Cheers,
Syka

[The Great Skenardo]

The German word for
"Parrot"
is Papagai

[I'm da Rogue!]

The German word for
"Parrot"
is Papagai

and in greek we call it papagalos

[Skippy]

Curious thing, in Spanish they're called "Papagayos"

[Syka]

So now I have to ask....how the heck did we get to Parrot from all these Papaga-something or others? Hehe...

Cheers,
Syka

[Madmal]

except that they're not. check under the classification section here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_Panda)

and to add to this. Certain types of snakes bear live young.

Great white sharks, as well as some related sharks, are endothermic.

oh noes! updated information, my worst enemy!!!

heh, granted, i need to watch Animal Planet more often.

[I'm da Rogue!]

So now I have to ask....how the heck did we get to Parrot from all these Papaga-something or others?

Maybe the English were bored to say the whole word???

[reorith]

oatmeal is delicious.

bananas can be used in place of eggs in several recipes.

the word "samba" means "to rub navels together."

[Ceres]

Dolphins sleep with one eye open!

Not just that. They sleep with just one of their brain-halves at a time!


In space, astronauts cannot cry properly, because there is no gravity, so the tears can't flow down their faces!

In space. No one can see you cry!


Men are 6 times more likely to be struck by lightning than women!
(sweet)

It's the antenna :smalltongue:

I wonder what the ratio of truth/myth in this thread will be.

Hmm, to add a few of my own, there is always this (http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-20070622-000002.xml) site. Here you can read why:

- Having sons reduces the likelihood of divorce
- Humans are naturally polygamous
- The midlife crisis is a myth—sort of
- Beautiful people have more daughters
- Rich people have more sons

And more fun facts from psychologists. It's psychelicious!

[Jibar]

During your lifetime, you'll eat about 60,000 pounds of food, that's the weight of about 6 elephants!

Dolphins sleep with one eye open!


So if I ate 6 elephants, would I be set for life?

Dolphins sleep with one eye open?
That's because they're jerks.
The one time you could possibly get your own back, while they're sleeping, and they ruin it for you.
That's so dolphin.

[Xerillum]

You'd probably have to eat seven, because tusks are bad to eat. So are the feet. And a lot of other junk.

[I'm da Rogue!]

- Beautiful people have more daughters
- Rich people have more sons


So, :vaarsuvius: 's parents were rich and beautiful??? :smallwink:

[Sir_Norbert]

Hmm, to add a few of my own, there is always this (http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-20070622-000002.xml) site. Here you can read why:

- Having sons reduces the likelihood of divorce
- Humans are naturally polygamous
- The midlife crisis is a myth—sort of
- Beautiful people have more daughters
- Rich people have more sons

And more fun facts from psychologists. It's psychelicious!
Yeah..... they also seem to think a preference for blue eyes is "universal", which is just plain daft. Have they actually asked everyone?

[dehro]

The elephant is the only mammel in the world that can't jump.

that's a blessing...

[PhallicWarrior]

The pit of most pitted fruits is poisonous.

5% of American teenage boys weighs less then 105 lb. I know this because I weigh 105 lbs and am in the 5th percentile. I'm 5'6" too for a BMI of 16.9. Healthy BMI is 18.5 to 24.9. Scary, no?

[Iethloc]

A group of cats is called a clowder. A group of kittens is called a kindle.

A mole flea can jump approximately 960x their own height.

If the male of a school of parrotfish disappears, the alpha female becomes male.

The surface of the sun is 9,953° F. The corona is 9,000,000° F. The core is 24,500,000° F.


And that's just off the top of my head.

[Serpentine]

Snakes have two penises (male ones, that is).
There's a couple of species of forest bat in southern New South Wales that are only distinguishable by comparing their penises - one has a kink in it with a pointy end, the other has a curve with a round knob.
A male kangaroo is a boomer, a female's a flyer, a baby's a joey and a group is a mob, though there's at least one other name for a group.

More will come later.

[zeratul]

You are more likely to be killed by a dog, vending machine, or furniture than a shark.

[Da Beast]

The word "trivia" comes from a Latin word meaning an intersection of three roads. In Rome people would stop at these intersections and discus issues of little importance such as the weather.

[Amotis]

Snakes have two penises.

A certain internet meme comes to mind. :smallamused:

TWICE!

[Rawhide]

Ok, I'm going to shatter a few illusions here by revealing some trivia about my name: it's a misnomer.

I am not a chew toy! I AM A HUMAN BEING!

PROOF!
Chew toy (http://www.dkimages.com/discover/previews/856/20140113.JPG) | Person (http://www.fiftiesweb.com/tv/clint-eastwood.jpg)

[Mattarias, King.]

I guess I'll add my own for the anime fans..

They are NOT cherry flower petals, but in fact, a thousand whirling blades of death.

Knowing this may give you a bonus o spot and reflex saves. :smallbiggrin:

[Xykon_Fan]

Snakes have two penises (male ones, that is).
There's a couple of species of forest bat in southern New South Wales that are only distinguishable by comparing their penises - one has a kink in it with a pointy end, the other has a curve with a round knob.

Dare I ask how you know this stuff? Also, what's the point of these differences/oddities?

[Lilly]

The bats are an example of speciation due to sexual selection. The females of one population preferred one type of male and the females of another population preferred another. After a while there was enough difference that the two could no longer inter-mate and *bam* two different species.

[Delaney Gale]

Hydrogen is the only element with named isotopes (Deuterium and Tritium).

Tritium is radioactive, and can bond with oxygen to form T2O- radioactive water.

Fiber made from the hair of a musk ox is called quivit.

[Serpentine]

Dare I ask how you know this stuff? Also, what's the point of these differences/oddities?
The first is... I dunno, one of those things you just pick up? Probably best not to ask.
The second I was told on an environmental holiday school thing. We even got to look at one, us lucky things us. As for the point of them, Lilly's explainations sounds as reasonable as any other.
Oh, another: Chinese (or was it Japanese?) dragons start out as carp.

[Castaras]

Clownfish all start off as male, and the biggest of them becomes female.

Coca Cola + mints = Big boom

Put Soap in a microwave and it goes boom as well.

[Puppet]

The ghosts in Pac-Man are named Inky, Blinky, Pinky, and Clyde.

[SDF]

The first is... I dunno, one of those things you just pick up? Probably best not to ask.
The second I was told on an environmental holiday school thing. We even got to look at one, us lucky things us. As for the point of them, Lilly's explainations sounds as reasonable as any other.
Oh, another: Chinese (or was it Japanese?) dragons start out as carp.

Like Magikarp? It all makes sense now! Also Ekans is snake backwards! MIND=BLOWN

[AslanCross]

You can supposedly create ball lightning by lighting a candle in your microwave oven. If I'm not mistaken the microwaves create a current in the carbon particles the fire gives off and it becomes plasma, which is what some scientists think ball lightning is.

Warning: This may cause severe damage to your microwave.

[SDF]

You can supposedly create ball lightning by lighting a candle in your microwave oven. If I'm not mistaken the microwaves create a current in the carbon particles the fire gives off and it becomes plasma, which is what some scientists think ball lightning is.

Warning: This may cause severe damage to your microwave.

Calling a plasma discharge ball lightning is a misnomer. The microwave radiation is ionizing the combusting gas creating plasma. Ball lightning (if it exists) is supposedly the result of a different process similar to the way a lightning strike forms. But it is a fancy way to ruin your microwave :P

[Rawhide]

Even more info: http://www.newscientist.com/channel/fundamentals/mg19325863.500?DCMP=NLC-nletter&nsref=mg19325863.500

[SDF]

Interesting, thats a pretty good read.

[bosssmiley]

Dare I ask how you know this stuff? Also, what's the point of these differences/oddities?

Hmmmm, I think we'll leave it up to the girl bats to answer that one. Anyone here squeak bat at all? :smallamused:

[Serpentine]

Like Magikarp? It all makes sense now! Also Ekans is snake backwards! MIND=BLOWN
:smalleek: Guh, I'm so stupid. I mean, I figured out the Magikarp thing just the other day, but I really, really should have realised about Ekans. >hangs head in shame<

[The Prince of Cats]

Hmm...

Saffron comes from a sterile variety of crocus that was first created by the Minoan civilisation of Crete. Being completely sterile, it is incapable of reproducing without human intervention and so the current species known to the western world has been artificially maintained for millennia.

[mikoto]

And Arbok, the thing that Ekans evolves into is kobra backwards

[Skippy]

Well, if we are on pokemon curiosities, then I guess I can say that Girafarig's name is a palyndrome, and it is one also with his japanese name, Kirinriki (Yeah, I know, you're gonna say that kirinriki isn't palyndrome, but it is when you put it in Katakana: きりんりき)

[Arang]

According to Herodotus, the Spartans killed several thousand Persians for every soldier they lost themselves on the first day of the battle of Thermopylae. About 10 000 Persians to two or three Spartans.

[Lemur]

OK, a word used internationally, originated from a slang fad in Boston and New York around 1839. The fad made abbreviations of common phrases, but the words used were deliberately mispelled. OK originally stood for "oll korrect" (all correct).

Reindeer and caribou are the same thing.

It's believed that only the male Heterodontosaurus had the large fangs charactaristic in many of the dinosaur's depictions.

[Skippy]

OK, a word used internationally, originated from a slang fad in Boston and New York around 1839. The fad made abbreviations of common phrases, but the words used were deliberately mispelled. OK originally stood for "oll korrect" (all correct).

Reindeer and caribou are the same thing.

It's believed that only the male Heterodontosaurus had the large fangs charactaristic in many of the dinosaur's depictions.

Funny, I thought that OK came from "Zero killed" from a war... (Zero=0, and they abreviated Killed as a single K, then it became O.K...)

[CurlyKitGirl]

Westward Ho! is the only place in the British Isles with any punctuation in its name.
Thong is a real village in or near NE England.
The oldest tree in the UK is over 1000 years old and is in the New Forest.
Mel Blanc (Bugs Bunny) was allergic to carrots
Spiders have transparent blood.
An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.
Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair.
Coca-Cola originally contained cocaine.
23% of all photocopier faults worldwide are caused by people sitting on them and photocopying their butts.
In every episode of Seinfeld there is a Superman somewhere.
If the government has no knowledge of aliens, then why does Title 14, Section 1211 of the Code of Federal Regulations, implemented on July 16, 1969, make it illegal for U.S. citizens to have any contact with extraterrestrials or their vehicles?
Males, on average, think about sex every 7 seconds. Well, that proves something...I'll leave it to you to think about what though:smallwink:

[Lemur]

Mel Blanc (Bugs Bunny) was allergic to carrots

To make it worse, he had to chew on carrots (and subsequently spat them out) to create the right sound while voicing Bugs.

Also, radikalskippy, a thousand Internets vouches for me.

[I'm da Rogue!]

You are more likely to be killed by a dog, vending machine, or furniture than a shark.
:durkon: See, lads? I was right about the wooden bastards. Like father, like son :smallannoyed:

[Nomrom]

The letter 'J' does not appear anywhere in the periodic table.
The longest word that can be typed using only the top row of letters on a keyboard is 'typewriter'.
The word 'set' has more definitions than any other word in the English language.
The fingerprints of koala bears are virtually indistinguishable from those of humans, so much so that they could be confused at a crime scene.
Dueling is legal in Paraguay as long as both parties are registered blood donors.

[TruenuffTrey]

The perfect temperature for a Coca-Cola is 36 degrees (Farenheit)

The patent to bottle Coke was sold for only 1 dollar.

(I went to the Coca-Cola museum in Atlanta, Georgia today :smallsmile: )

[AslanCross]

Calling a plasma discharge ball lightning is a misnomer. The microwave radiation is ionizing the combusting gas creating plasma. Ball lightning (if it exists) is supposedly the result of a different process similar to the way a lightning strike forms. But it is a fancy way to ruin your microwave :P

Ah, I see. Didn't know what else to call it, the site I found it calls it as such.

[Saithis Bladewing]

For the normally proportioned human being, one's foot fits perfectly in the nook between one's elbow and one's wrist.

[The Great Skenardo]

For the normally proportioned human being, one's foot fits perfectly in the nook between one's elbow and one's wrist.

...Clearly my toes are freakishly long. :smallfrown:

[The Prince of Cats]

Thong is a real village in or near NE England.
I live close to the village of Thong in Kent, South-East England. It truly exists, but there may be another in the NE...

Horatio Nelson's final words were not "Kiss me, Hardy", but are actually thought to have been "Drink, drink. Fan, fan. Rub, rub.".

[Sewer_Bandito]

You can supposedly create ball lightning by lighting a candle in your microwave oven. If I'm not mistaken the microwaves create a current in the carbon particles the fire gives off and it becomes plasma, which is what some scientists think ball lightning is.

Warning: This may cause severe damage to your microwave.


Ohh!! One time I tried to put a bag of cheetos in the microwave, and after about 2 seconds of running, the whole bag started to get blue electricity looking things all over it. When I opened the microwave, the abg had holes all over it and was compressed. Can any of you brilliant people explain that to me? :smallbiggrin:

[TruenuffTrey]

Must've been small magical creatures with pokey sticks living in your microwave. Thats the only logical explanation ::smallsmile:

[Skippy]

Finally, we found out how does the mouse moves... (http://www.1-click.jp/)

[Lemur]

Ginormous is now an official word in the English language, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary.

[Serpentine]

Mel Blanc (Bugs Bunny) was allergic to carrots
I'm sure I've read that this isn't actually true - he just really, really didn't like them.


An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

It's also bigger than the smallest bird in the world, the... bee? hummingbird.

The Chinese unicorn looks more like a smallish dragon, and noone can speak a lie in its presence.

Marco Polo reported seeing dragons in his journey. If I recall correctly, he also mentioned seeing a unicorn, but was terribly disappointed by its lack of
grace and beauty (this could have been another famous traveller, though).

According to one story, Alexander the Great's steed was a relative of the more classical unicorns: it had brown fur, a curved horn, and a peacock's tail.

Koala urine is toxic. They also smell of eucalyptus oil.

Cassowaries, a large flightless bird of northern Australia, can eviscerate a man with a kick. For that matter, kangaroos probably can too.

I can't remember the guy's name, so for the purpose of this next bit of trivia I'll just call him Emperor Guy. So. Emperor Guy has a very famous burial mound (I believe it may actually be a type of pyramid). There were tales of an army being buried with Emperor Guy, and when the dug in the area, waddayano, they found the Terracotta Army. There were also stories that his grave is in the middle of a lake of mercury styled to look like the oceans of the world, as well as many other wonders. While noone's excavated the site yet (for the pretty reasonable reason of a lack of sufficient technology to preserve any finds), a test of the soil of the site revealed that it had a much higher level of mercury than the surrounding area. I really look forward to it being opened ^_^

Speaking of mercury, does anyone know where exactly you get it?

[Lemur]

Mercury has to be extracted from ore form. I think the typical naturally occuring source is a red crystal/rock called cinnabar.

Also, I'm pretty sure that everything native to Australia is potentially lethal :smalltongue:

[Nomrom]

Speaking of mercury, does anyone know where exactly you get it?

Umm, from the planet Mercury, duh.

Okay, being serious now. Mercury is found in the Earth's crust and mined, just like coal or iron. It is a very rare element though, and is much harder to find than other common metals. China produces the most mercury. Also, the emperor guy you are talking about is Qin Shi Huang Di. He was China's first emperor, the one responsible for its unification. He actually died eating mercury pills that were supposed to make him immortal.

Yay for Wikipedia!

[Xuincherguixe]

Antarctica is the world's largest desert

[Serpentine]

The Madness of King George was based on a play called The Madness of George III. The name was changed largely due to concern that certain audiences would assume it to be a sequel.

Similarly, The Greenwich Cuckoos was considered too obscure, so it was changed to The Village of the Damned.

[ForzaFiori]

while males think about sex every 7 seconds, it crosses a womans mind only once per day on average.

3 quarters, 4 dimes and 4 penies is the largest amount of change u can have without being able to make change for a doller ($1.19)

Monday is the most popular day for commiting suicide

Rhode Island is the smallest state with the longest name. The official name, used on all state documents, is "Rhode Island and Providence Plantations."

a neanderthal had a larger brain than modern humans

The international telephone dialing code for Antarctica is 672.

i found this site (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~bingbin/) right before i found this topic.

[Vonriel]

while males think about sex every 7 seconds
I'd think this number would be larger if I'd stop hearing about it every 7 seconds :smallsigh:

[Nomrom]

I'd think this number would be larger if I'd stop hearing about it every 7 seconds :smallsigh:

Exactly. I'm pretty sure this was made up by some woman who had a bad experience with someone, and that it has spread from there.

Anyways,
It take more calories to to digest a piece of celery, than the celery stick contains, making it the only food with negative calories.
The glue on Israeli postage stamps is certified kosher.
The plastic part at the end of a shoelace is called an aglet.
Back to elephants, the circumference of two of their feet added together is equal to their height.

[Xykon_Fan]

while males think about sex every 7 seconds, it crosses a womans mind only once per day on average.

I feel sorry for whatever poor sap has to pick up my slack. I think about it way less (though apparently more than women)...maybe this is how nymphomaniacs come from. There are guys who break this average, and so someone has to pick up the slack! :smalltongue:

[Jibar]

Back to elephants, the circumference of two of their feet added together is equal to their height.

:smallconfused:

...


Aaaaarrrrggghhhh...

Brain hurt!

[Nomrom]

:smallconfused:

...


Aaaaarrrrggghhhh...

Brain hurt!

Isn't that what we're going for here? I thought the point was to see how many random, useless, potentially true facts it would take to drive one of us crazy.

[KuReshtin]

Another couple of tidbits that ties in witha few previous trivia items.

Popular belief was that Admiral Nelson only had one eye. IN fact, he was merely blind on one eye.
Also, he was shot and killed because of his vanity. He wore all of his medals at the helm of the ship, which gave away his importance and so the enemy shot him.

Koalas doesn't drink anything. INstead, they get all the fluids they need from the Eukalyptus leaves that are their main food source.

[Rawhide]

males think about sex every 7 seconds

http://www.snopes.com/science/stats/thinksex.asp

[Nomrom]

See, I knew that couldn't be right.

[Ichneumon]

You can kill someone very easily, just place a watch/timer/clock near his heart.

EDIT: I will explain. His heartbeat will adjust to the clock and he will get an heat attack.

[I'm da Rogue!]

You can kill someone very easily, just place a watch/timer/clock near his heart.

EDIT: I will explain. His heartbeat will adjust to the clock and he will get an heat attack.

Most people wear their watches on their left hand. If s.o. put his arm on his heart during his sleep, wouldn't that kill him? There would be many deaths in this way... but I've not heard of anything like that before.

[Saithis Bladewing]

while males think about sex every 7 seconds, it crosses a womans mind only once per day on average.

So untrue.

[Ichneumon]

but I've not heard of anything like that before.

I blame the government for that.

[AslanCross]

Ohh!! One time I tried to put a bag of cheetos in the microwave, and after about 2 seconds of running, the whole bag started to get blue electricity looking things all over it. When I opened the microwave, the abg had holes all over it and was compressed. Can any of you brilliant people explain that to me? :smallbiggrin:

If I'm not mistaken, the microwave radiation induces an electric current to form in the metal foil in the packaging. That makes it very very hot and can of course burn holes in fragile plastic.

[Rawhide]

It does rain more on weekends, and we humans cause it.
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/news/1998/wend806.htm

[Ink]

You can kill someone very easily, just place a watch/timer/clock near his heart.

EDIT: I will explain. His heartbeat will adjust to the clock and he will get an heat attack.

So that means his heart would beat 60 times a minute? Why would he get a heart attack then?

[CurlyKitGirl]

People tend to remember useless trivia more than important information.

Cornwall, England is known as the Land of Saints because there are more churches/places named after Saints and the like per square mile than anywhere else in the world.

Intercourse, Pennyslyvania, USA is a real name of a real town.
Earth, Texas, USA
F**king, Austria
Crackpot, England
Sanat Claus, Indiana, USA

25% of cat owners blow dry the cat's hair after giving it a bath.

Back in 1919, the Russian transplant pioneer Serge Voronoff made headlines by grafting monkey testicles onto human males.

A jiffy is an actual unit of time for 1/100th of a second. Thus the saying, I will be there in a jiffy.

The "Mexican Hat Dance" is the official dance of Mexico.

Being unmarried can shorten a man's life by ten years.

Albert Einstein was offered the presidency of Israel in 1952, but he declined.

Astronaut Buzz Aldrin's mother's maiden name was "Moon." Buzz was the second man to step onto the Moon in 1969.

Behram, an Indian thug, holds the record for most murders by a single individual. He strangled 931 people between 1790-1840 with a piece of yellow and white cloth, called a ruhmal. The most murders by a woman are 612, by Countess Erzsebet Bathory of Hungary.

In 1980, Saddam Hussein received a key to the city of Detroit.

There was a false floor fitted in Adolf Hitler's Mercedes 770K to make him look taller when he stood up in the car.

[Ink]

Being unmarried can shorten a man's life by ten years.


Hey yeah, I read this somewhere too. Being married will prolong a man's life and shorten a woman's life, while being unmarried will shorten a man's life and prolong a woman's life. Interesting, that.

[Saithis Bladewing]

The wife stops the husband from doing stupid things that would get him killed but suffers from stress-related illness as a result? Just a guess. :P

[Rama_Lei]

Chile claims 9% of Antarctica as it's territory and shows weather reports for it.

Dolphins are the only animals besides humans who have sex for pleasure.

[Rawhide]

Dolphins are the only animals besides humans who have sex for pleasure.

Not true, google the Bonobos

[Saithis Bladewing]

Bonobos are the only other primate. *Nods.*

[TheoCryst]

Back to elephants one more time: they are the only animal on Earth with four knees.

[Serpentine]

Thrill-seekers have parasites! There's a bug found naturally in cats and mice - it causes a mouse to take risks, stay out in the open longer, etc, and thus be more likely to be killed and eaten, by, say, a cat, which then takes risks and one way or another is more likely to be killed. Its remains are then eaten by a mouse, and the cycle continues. Turns out it's transmissable to humans, and still causes them to take risks. I'm fuzzy on the details, but a study was performed on a number of extreme sportspeople, and it turns out an unusually high number of them keep cats.

[Azrael]

You can kill someone very easily, just place a watch/timer/clock near his heart.

EDIT: I will explain. His heartbeat will adjust to the clock and he will get an heat attack.

Trying to explain all the ways that that idea is incredibly ignorant will take too long. So, instead: Verify your claim with legitimate medical research.

Also:

OK, a word used internationally, originated ...

From Dictionary.com: What is the etymology of OK?

OK (or ok, o.k., O.K.) was once thought to be an abbreviation for Old Kinderhook, President Martin van Buren's nickname based on his birthplace of Kinderhook, New York, which became a rallying cry for him during his re-election campaign of 1840. However, the distinguished linguist Allen Walker Read, who did extensive research on this single word, clarified that OK first appeared as a jocular alteration of the initial letters of 'all correct' (i.e., orl (or oll) korrect) in 1839. President van Buren's use of OK was one in several steps toward making this an extremely popular word, the next being the naming of the O.K. Club, a Democratic club in New York City. The form okeh, representing its pronunciation, appeared in 1919, followed by okay in 1929. The origin of OK, which H.L. Mencken deemed "the most successful of Americanisms" has probably been more discussed than any other in American English, which prompted Dr. Read to research it and publish a series of articles in the journal American Speech (Durham, NC: Duke University Press) in 1963 and 1964. Cecil Adams, author of The Straight Dope series of books (New York: Ballantine), compiled a list of eight etymological theories that came about on behalf of OK, but there are dozens more.

[The Prince of Cats]

A shark is not technically a fish, it is an elasmobranch. Fish have bones, sharks have cartilage.

[Indon]

Mammals are defined primarily by the females having breasts (i.e. milk-producing, or mammary, glands).

Male humans also have mammary glands, but they are not typically functional.

Humans use 100% of their brains; sorry (if you want a citation, Snopes has an article).

[The Prince of Cats]

@^ The Ten-Percent Myth (snopes) (http://www.snopes.com/science/stats/10percnt.htm)

If you question Snopes, I have an ice-pick here for your frontal-lobotomy...

[phoenixineohp]

The Mona Lisa has no eyebrows. It was the fashion in Renaissance Florence to shave them off!

Not quite. She was painted with eyebrows, however restoration measures have accidentally removed them over time.


oatmeal is delicious.
I refute that. :smallannoyed: I can't stand the stuff, though I wish I liked it.


The ghosts in Pac-Man are named Inky, Blinky, Pinky, and Clyde.
The next time I have 4 animals of the same species, I am so naming them that!


Trying to explain all the ways that that idea is incredibly ignorant will take too long. So, instead: Verify your claim with legitimate medical research.
That is exactly the response I need to keep training my brain to produce. :smalltongue:


Mammals are defined primarily by the females having breasts (i.e. milk-producing, or mammary, glands).

Male humans also have mammary glands, but they are not typically functional.


Close. Mammals are defined by the following features.

- The lower jaw is composed of only a single pair of bones, the dentaries, which articulate directly with the cranium.
- The presence of an articulation between the dentary and squamosal.
- The articular and quadrate bones are modified to form two of the three middle ear bones.
- All mammals possess hair at some stage of their life ctcle. Most have hair througout life, but several aquatic forms have only a few stiff bristles.
- All female mammals possess mammary glands that produce milk to nourish the young. In males the glands are present but rudimentary. In monotremes, the milk flows from pores in the skin, but all mammals have nipples for the young to suckle. (Males have nipples because all mammals start out as female in development and only change to male when they receive chemical signals to do so.)
- The thoracic and abdominal cavities of mammals are separated by a muscular diaphragm.
- Only the left aortic arch is present in adult mammals. The right aortic arch is lost during early embryonic development.
- Mammals have enucleate erythrocytes. No nuclei are observable in mature red blood cells.
- The corpora quadrigrmina, an elaboration of the midbrain, is found only in mammals.

[The Great Skenardo]

The word 'callipygian ' is not recognized by spell checks in the majority of word processors.

[phoenixineohp]

It does rain more on weekends, and we humans cause it.
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/news/1998/wend806.htm

The Canadian side of Nigara Falls experienced weather changes due to development. They built hotels and other sky scrapers in a way that was later proved to interact with the falls and wind patterns, resulting in more rain and fog.

[Xykon_Fan]

The word 'callipygian ' is not recognized by spell checks in the majority of word processors.

I think it's a greek word transliterated (sound to sound, rather than meaning) into English.

[T'ze'hai]

- All female mammals possess mammary glands that produce milk to nourish the young. In males the glands are present but rudimentary. In monotremes, the milk flows from pores in the skin, but all mammals have nipples for the young to suckle. (Males have nipples because all mammals start out as female in development and only change to male when they receive chemical signals to do so.)


The glands in male mammals can also produce milk. All you need is some hormones...

Conclusion: males are only malfunctioning females :tongue: or is that too far-fetched?

[Ikkitosen]

Apparently, 97% of all paper money in America carries traces of cocaine.

[Xuincherguixe]

The glands in male mammals can also produce milk. All you need is some hormones...

Conclusion: males are only malfunctioning females :tongue: or is that too far-fetched?

In a lot of ways that's true. But I wouldn't go so far as to say 'only' :P

[Serpentine]

Conclusion: males are only malfunctioning females :tongue: or is that too far-fetched?
It's true :smalltongue: "Female" is the default human condition. The Y chromosome sort of "switches off" ovaries and "switches on" testicles, and it goes on from there...
I'm also told that soya products can cause men to lactate.

[CurlyKitGirl]

I'm also told that soya products can cause men to lactate.

It's true. One of my teachers had a male friend who drank only soya milk and he had 34B breasts, plus he used to lactate all the time. Eventually the people at his local coffee shops (all 4) refused to give him any more because he developed a breasts and put on a lot of weight.


Contrary to popular belief you can lick your own elbow.
The length of your nose is the length of one of your eyes.Your ear is the same length as your lips.
The lenght of your middle finger is the width of your palm.
The lenghth from elbow-the tip of your middle finger is also the length of ankle-knee.
You lower legs is 12.5% of your body weight.

In 1918 Major Somerfors (sp) of the Canadian army was struck by lightning. In 1924 he was struck by lightning again. The third strike was in 1926 and it as fatal. However, in 1934 lightning struck one tomb only in a cemetery in Vancouver. It was major Somerfords' gravestone.

[squidthingy]

In 1918 Major Somerfors (sp) of the Canadian army was struck by lightning. In 1924 he was struck by lightning again. The third strike was in 1926 and it as fatal. However, in 1934 lightning struck one tomb only in a cemetery in Vancouver. It was major Somerfords' gravestone.

That's awsome

Did you know that the platypus is the most poisonous mammel \/no one ever suspected that the humble platypus would kill you just as quick as look at you

http://www.homepages.ucl.ac.uk/~ucbpyit/platypus
DO-do DO-Do DOdoDOdoDOdo

(jaws music)

[Serpentine]

As much as I hate to admit it, I'm certain the platypus isn't actually deadly, its sting just really really hurts.

The mole-rat is the only mammal with a hive-like social system.

[Apex]

http://www.hookedonfacts.com/index.htm
Examples:
Polar bears have black skin and transparent fur.

From a complete stop, a human is capable of outrunning a Formula One Racecar for about 30 feet!

The number of births that occur in India each year is higher than the entire population of Australia.

People with blue eyes are better able to see in the dark.

The Bible is the most-shoplifted book in the world.

[Azrael]

Privilege Revocation: Do not post useless trivia about body proportions unless you use an appropriate qualifier like "average" or "typical" and expect not to be refuted.


Contrary to popular belief you can lick your own elbow.
The length of your nose is the length of one of your eyes.
Your ear is the same length as your lips.
The length of your middle finger is the width of your palm.
The length from elbow-the tip of your middle finger is also the length of ankle-knee.
You lower legs is 12.5% of your body weight.

No, I can't
No, it's not
Close enough
No, it's not
No, it's not
A living individual has virtually no way to verify this, thus it's likely not true. Certainly not for a skinny guy who bikes a lot.



The Bible is the most-shoplifted book in the world.

I believe the Bible is also the most widely published book in history. Unless theft percentage is used (# stolen vs. # distributed), the numbers are sketchy. I'd be willing to bet that Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Book has a higher theft percentage.

[I'm da Rogue!]

I think it's a greek word transliterated (sound to sound, rather than meaning) into English.

I don't know the word and what it means in english, but in ancient greek "Kallipygos" means a girl with nice...er.. butt. We still use this word sometimes but nowadays it means "a girl with a nice body". The original meaning was funnier though :smallannoyed:
And that's the statue of

Kallipygos Aphrodite
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u143/ekithebun/AphroditeKallipygos.jpg

[Serpentine]

Well... it is a nice bottom.

[The Prince of Cats]

The Bible is the most-shoplifted book in the world.
According to many surveys, Terry Pratchett is the most shoplifted author in the world.

[Mr Croup]

I don't know the word and what it means in english, but in ancient greek "Kallipygos" means a girl with nice...er.. butt.

Yeah, that's the meaning in English as well. One of my absolute favorite words.


I believe the Bible is also the most widely published book in history. Unless theft percentage is used (# stolen vs. # distributed), the numbers are sketchy. I'd be willing to bet that Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Book has a higher theft percentage.

You are correct in regards to being the most widely published book. As for theft percentages, I know that as of about 3 years ago when I was still involved in the book trade, the bible had the highest loss numbers. I doubt that it has significantly changed since then, and definitely would think that Steal This Book wouldn't be anywhere near the top of the list, as it isn't widely circulated.

As for random trivia, male sugar gliders (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugar_gliders) can suffer from male pattern baldness.

[squidthingy]

Sugar Glider is just another name for flying badger

[Vonriel]

As much as I hate to admit it, I'm certain the platypus isn't actually deadly, its sting just really really hurts.

He never said deadly, he just said poisonous. I think them and porcupines are the only mammals with poisonous spines, and apparently platypi are the more poisonous.Note to self, read more carefully. :smallredface:


Conclusion: males are only malfunctioning females :tongue: or is that too far-fetched?

I'm going with too far-fetched. :smallwink:

[Serpentine]

no one ever suspected that the humble platypus would kill you just as quick as look at you
There. Though, admittedly, he could have been saying that "the platypus is so bad-tempered, that if it could do so, it would kill you just as etc."

[Rawhide]

Unfortunately, I think it is time to invoke the powers of a superhero (http://www.galactanet.com/comic/369.htm). Some of the claims that have been floating around are just blatantly false.

Please people, don't perpetuate urban myths. Verify your facts from reliable sources and always include those references. Snopes (http://www.snopes.com/) is a good place to start for debunkng many urban myths and legends.

[Serpentine]

Does the back of a pad (or "sanitary napkin" for all you prudes and weirdos out there:smalltongue:) count? Cuz there's a brand that has a whole lot of bits of trivia on the bit that covers the stickiness...

[squidthingy]

And the covers to Snapple Ice Tea, has random trivia

[I'm da Rogue!]

The Mona Lisa has no eyebrows. It was the fashion in Renaissance Florence to shave them off!



Not quite. She was painted with eyebrows, however restoration measures have accidentally removed them over time.

Thanx for mentioning it, so I could search for it. As it appears in wikipedia, we are both mistaken :smalltongue:

It is also notable that Mona Lisa has no visible facial hair at all - including eyebrows and eyelashes. Some researchers claim that it was common at this time for genteel women to pluck them off, since they were considered to be unsightly. Yet it is more reasonable to assume that Leonardo did not finish the painting, for almost all of his paintings are unfinished. Being a perfectionist he always tried to go one step further in improving his technique. Furthermore, other women of the time were predominantly portrayed with eyebrows. For modern viewers the missing eyebrows add to the slightly semi-abstract quality of the face though it was not Leonardo's aim.
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u143/ekithebun/Mona_Lisa_detail_face.jpg

[Ceska]

The German word for
"Parrot"
is Papagai
It's Papagei. The combination ai is not used in Standard German except for foreign words.

According to Herodotus, the Spartans killed several thousand Persians for every soldier they lost themselves on the first day of the battle of Thermopylae. About 10 000 Persians to two or three Spartans.
That's pretty good propaganda. Killing 10 000 men on one day is pretty impossible for that number (around 6000 AFAIK) on that terrain. It's more believable they fled the battle.

Koala urine is toxic. They also smell of eucalyptus oil.
No wonder, their food is toxic to us. I'd be impressed if it's toxic to themselves.

[I'm da Rogue!]

I
That's pretty good propaganda. Killing 10 000 men on one day is pretty impossible for that number (around 6000 AFAIK) on that terrain. It's more believable they fled the battle.


The Greek and Persians had a whole war, not just the battle of Thermopyles. The Greeks had the opportunity to fight the Persians in open field at Marathon, where the Persians lost although they outnumbered the Greeks more than 8:1 (the Spartans arrived when the battle was over though). Then it was the Thermopyles battle,where the Spartans delayed the Persians and gave some precious time to Greece and after that it was the Plataies battle. It was an open field too, and the Greeks (altogether this time) won the Persian army. The only terrain that the Spartans had to deal with thousands more enemies, was the battle of Thermopyles. And the terrain was ideal for that kind of battle. So, it may be true.
But Herodotus is known for making history a bit more.. spicy :smallwink:

[phoenixineohp]

As for Wikipedia, I trust it with a salt shaker. But we can call that piece of trivia contested. :smallsmile:

As for the platypus, it's not poisonous, it's venomous, and that is only the males.

Puffer fish are poisonous, if you eat the wrong part you are in trouble. Snakes, 2 species of lizards, platypus, some salamanders and a few mammals are venomous as the toxin is injected. (Just to name a few.)

The male platypus has spurs on their hind legs. If you do something, like picking it up by it's tail, it can jab you with the spurs and inject the venom.

The venom can be deadly for small animals and if you are allergic to it. Otherwise, it's just insanely painful.

Fun eh?

[Xykon_Fan]

What's funny is I just saw something about this on TV the other night on some sort of "Fooled by Nature" show (Nothing else was on at the time).

[Ceska]

The Greek and Persians had a whole war, not just the battle of Thermopyles. The Greeks had the opportunity to fight the Persians in open field at Marathon, where the Persians lost although they outnumbered the Greeks more than 8:1 (the Spartans arrived when the battle was over though). Then it was the Thermopyles battle,where the Spartans delayed the Persians and gave some precious time to Greece and after that it was the Plataies battle. It was an open field too, and the Greeks (altogether this time) won the Persian army. The only terrain that the Spartans had to deal with thousands more enemies, was the battle of Thermopyles. And the terrain was ideal for that kind of battle. So, it may be true.
But Herodotus is known for making history a bit more.. spicy :smallwink:
What I mean is that the terrain is problematic for high losses, not for winning the battle for the Greek. If you think about it, the Greek could not bring all 6000 into the fight at once, more like one array at once, and that could turn and get the ones in the back into battle so that all would fight, yes, but it also means you'd have the Persians either not doing that, or them assaulting with impressively high morals. From every battle I know, the assaulting army would run if they could not even kill ten men on one day. Killing the breaking part of the army is not possible because running after them is impossible with the number of other enemies. 10 000 men as loss I can imagine, 10 000 killed by the Greek on one day I can't.

[Ichneumon]

I don't know the word and what it means in english, but in ancient greek "Kallipygos" means a girl with nice...er.. butt. We still use this word sometimes but nowadays it means "a girl with a nice body". The original meaning was funnier though :smallannoyed:
And that's the statue of

Kallipygos Aphrodite
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u143/ekithebun/AphroditeKallipygos.jpg

I did a greek exam a few weeks ago. Kallipygos was the first word in the text we had to translate. I checked it 3 times, before I was sure....:smallamused:

[I'm da Rogue!]

What I mean is that the terrain is problematic for high losses, not for winning the battle for the Greek. If you think about it, the Greek could not bring all 6000 into the fight at once, more like one array at once, and that could turn and get the ones in the back into battle so that all would fight, yes, but it also means you'd have the Persians either not doing that, or them assaulting with impressively high morals. From every battle I know, the assaulting army would run if they could not even kill ten men on one day. Killing the breaking part of the army is not possible because running after them is impossible with the number of other enemies. 10 000 men as loss I can imagine, 10 000 killed by the Greek on one day I can't.

There were battles that took place in open field, and the Greeks could gather thousands of soldiers together. They used tactics that wouldn't let the enemy run away, and this is how they won.
But I think the post above was referring to the battle of Thermopyles, so yes, the Persians could run away, since no one was behind them.
I also don't agree with that "1000" thing. I've never read that in Herodotus. Being a Greek and having studied history, I must say the Persians were great warriors with a good civilization. Xerxes was a gool leader (and with a decent clothing, not all this "Cleopatra in a drug queen version thing").
So, I agree with you but have in mind that a lot of battles took place in open field. And I think that if someone finds a little conversation boring and without meaning, we can say we fit perfect to the topic :smallwink:

[I'm da Rogue!]

I did a greek exam a few weeks ago. Kallipygos was the first word in the text we had to translate. I checked it 3 times, before I was sure....:smallamused:

:smalleek: And what did you answer????

[Ichneumon]

:smalleek: And what did you answer????

I answered something like "The one with the nice buttom", I passed it. I had a 7.7:smallbiggrin:

[T'ze'hai]

Cucumber season (the season when nothing happens, in summer, being now) was, some centuries ago, the season when the cucumber was the cheapest available food.


Polar bears have black skin and transparent fur.


Polar bears have white fur.
The fur colour keeps the body warmth in, the skin colour makes warming-up easier.

Polar bears are not carnivores but omnivores. They eat moss, young leaves peaking out of the snow, and fruit, whenever they can. In summer, large parts of the living space of polar bears is green and not frozen.

In the wild, a polar bear will never normally meet a penquin, as they life around different poles.

When a polar bear wants to hunt, its nose is very visible in the white snowy surroundings (being black and all) so the polar bear will cover it with snow.

The polar bear is the largest land-based predator.

All polar bear have the Zodia sign of Sagittarius or Capricorn, as they are all born in December. Manny are one of a twin. They stay indoors untill March. At that time usually only one young survived.

[Serpentine]

Polar bears have white fur.
The fur colour keeps the body warmth in, the skin colour makes warming-up easier.
Ummm... no, I'm pretty sure they have transparent, hollow fur. It reflects and gathers sunlight down to the skin, which, being black, absorbs most of it.

I'm not too sure about this one, but I think I heard somewhere that part of the reason the hole in the ozone layer was over Australia was because of all the livestock burping and farting...:smallconfused:

[The Great Skenardo]

Also, they can hit top speeds of 30 mph, have paws the size of dinner plates, and are capable of ripping the bumper off of a bus using their jaws.

[Serpentine]

Why am I getting an Animorphs vibe there :smallconfused:

[The Great Skenardo]

Wishful thinking, perhaps?

Sea cucumbers use their own internal organs as projectile weapons.

[AslanCross]

Chocolate contains substances that are toxic to dogs. (ok, maybe that's not so useless)

[Indon]

Close. Mammals are defined by the following features.


I said "primarily" precisely because I didn't want to have to look up and type out all that stuff about third-ear-bones and such.

You can increase the maximum range of many radio wavelengths by reflecting waves off of the Ionosphere (I think this is the layer, anyway). I'm pretty sure this requires a lot more power, though.

[phoenixineohp]

Ummm... no, I'm pretty sure they have transparent, hollow fur. It reflects and gathers sunlight down to the skin, which, being black, absorbs most of it.



You are right. They are hollow and look white because of the light and reflection.

And right now, because they are running out of ice flows and such, they are in serious danger (of drowning due to exhaustion and similar issues) and there are reports that they are resorting to cannibalism for food (no ice flows to hunt seals). :smalleek: You would think that as a top predator, not many thinks could hunt you down. 'You're coming after me? Are you crazy?' :smalltongue:

Not only chocolate is dangerous for dogs. 23 'human' foods are on the list. And bittersweet or cooking chocolate is the worst of the chocolates. White chocolate is the least dangerous.

If you ever want to have a laugh at an oddity of nature, look up baculums. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baculum) Some look like sporks! And humans are the only primates without one! (Umm... maybe a little nsfw. It's nature. It's weird. :smalltongue: )

[AslanCross]

Wishful thinking, perhaps?

Sea cucumbers use their own internal organs as projectile weapons.


...which can be regrown. They also breathe through their anus.
Ah, invertebrates, as strange in body as humans are in mind.

[Arang]

On the note of polar bears, supposedly all of them are left handed. Pawed. Whatever.

[The Great Skenardo]

That would explain why I can never read anything those guys write; they must drag their paws through the ink as they write.

[smellie_hippie]

The eye of an ostrich is larger than it's brain.

The male lion can mate more than 30 times in a single day.

The male pig can have an orgasm lasting longer than 2 hours.

Please watch your step. :smallamused:

[Lemur]

Guinea pigs were originally raised in domestication as a food source.

[T'ze'hai]

Ummm... no, I'm pretty sure they have transparent, hollow fur. It reflects and gathers sunlight down to the skin, which, being black, absorbs most of it.


Recent studies have disproved that: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998ApOpt..37.3198K

Polar bears kept in warmer enviroments (like in zoos a bit more to the south) can have a green fur after a while, because the hairs make for exelent growing places for green algae. Some zoos tend to bleach the fur of their polar bears for that reason :smallconfused: .

[nephtis]

Pandas are more related to racoons than bears.

Depends... if you're talking about the Red Panda, that's true, the Giant Panda however is a bear.

[Charity]

Apparantly Blue moon's do happen, my lovely wife reliably informs me.

A Blue moon is in fact the second full moon in a calander month we had one just the other month, an earlier definition also exists.
Wiki article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_moon)

[Serpentine]

Recent studies have disproved that: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998ApOpt..37.3198K
I can't read the whole paper, but it only talks about polar bear fur being "fibre optic". Can't it be clear AND not fibre optic?


Depends... if you're talking about the Red Panda, that's true, the Giant Panda however is a bear.
>checks Oxford Dictionary of Zoology< Hey, you're right! But apparently the change to bears was a recent thing.

[I'm da Rogue!]

In 1845, President Andrew Jackson's pet parrot was removed from his funeral for swearing.

In Erwin, Tennessee an elephant was once hanged for murder.

Over 2500 left handed people are killed each year from using products made for right handed people.

When a person dies, hearing is generally the last sense to go. The first sense lost is usually sight. Then follows taste, smell, and touch.

A body decomposes four times as fast in water than on land.

A dentist invented the electric chair.

A human head remains conscious for about 15 to 20 seconds after it is been decapitated.


Creepy ones..:smallamused:

I don't know how good the sources are, but I found them here: www.corsinet.com

[Vonriel]

Over 2500 left handed people are killed each year from using products made for right handed people.

I've heard this one before, and being among the left-handed group of people, I now have a healthy fear of right-handed scissors. :smalltongue:

[I'm da Rogue!]

Trivia (singular: trivium) are unimportant (or "trivial") items, especially of information. In the late twentieth century the expression came to apply more to information of the kind useful almost exclusively for answering quiz questions: a perfect "trivia question" is one that initially stumps the listener, but the answer subsequently sounds familiar once revealed (otherwise the question would be considered either too familiar and therefore not trivia, or so unfamiliar and obscure as to be unanswerable and not as entertaining).

[Space-Is-Curved]

I've got another elephant one: their teeth can was as much as bowling balls.

It gets so cold in Siberia that your breath freezes to ice in the air.

A camel sweats at the temperature of 106 F.

The longest word that can be typed with only the left hand, using traditional typing techniques, it "stewardesses".

[Penguinsushi]

In Erwin, Tennessee an elephant was once hanged for murder.

This is completely true. It's about 13 miles from here. Is also where the Bardic Bunny & I go to church.

Although, the incident actually happened in Kingsport TN (about 15 miles the other direction from here). It was hung in Erwin because that was where the nearest large-enough crane was.

Whats odder is that, they decided to hang it because shooting it didn't work. Yeah, they tried.

~PS

[AslanCross]

o_O Might I ask who it killed and why it was considered murder? o_O;

[Ink]

Indeed. And was it officially charged in court?

[Jibar]

This reminds me, I once read about an Athenian court that held a trial after a worship to work out who murdered the sacrificial bull.
Eventually the knife was charged and was sentanced to death by drowning.
I'll have to have a look for that again.

[I'm da Rogue!]

I don't think the Athenians were THAT stupid.
Maybe it was a ritual or sth.

And that poor elephant... They shot it first? :smallfrown:
Nasty people...
And technically, isn't hanging an elephant a bit more difficult and complicated than shotting it?

[Penguinsushi]

And that poor elephant... They shot it first? :smallfrown:
Nasty people...
And technically, isn't hanging an elephant a bit more difficult and complicated than shotting it?

You'd think. Basically, i think it was that its hide was just too thick.

As for Ink's question - I *think* so. I mean, I don't think it was a full trial, but it was something similar. Basically what happened was that it was in a parade in Kingsport, and it got mad at its trainer and gored/crushed/etc the guy. It was pretty brutal.

I got my dad a book on that for christmas last year (he was really interested in the story.) I could probably ask him for more info...

~PS

[Mr. Moon]

:smalleek: Guh, I'm so stupid. I mean, I figured out the Magikarp thing just the other day, but I really, really should have realised about Ekans. >hangs head in shame<

Arbok is cobra backwards. Darn them 4Kids people, spelling things backwards. And wrong, at that.

[Sye216]

In Erwin, Tennessee an elephant was once hanged for murder.

I read that in a book once. I can type out the whole story (In case anyone wants more info). It's a bit of a long story, so get comfy.

The Sad Fate Of Murderous Mary
On September 12, 1916, The Sparks World Famous Shows circus rolled into the town of Kingsport, Tennessee. In the days before television and radio, life could get pretty boring in small towns and the day the circus came was a big event. The entire circus paraded through the middle of town where the tents were going to be set up. The animals in the Sparks circus included five elephants. "Mighty Mary," The largest of the five, was the star of the entire circus: She was featured on posters as "The Largest Living Land Animal on Earth". Their parade through town went off without a hitch and so did their 2 p.m. matinée show. But a trip to the local water hole that day ended in tragedy.

A few days earlier, the circus had passed through St. Paul, Virginia, where a drifter named Walter "Red" Eldridge signed on as an assistant to the elephant trainer and continued on with them to Kingsport. It was Eldridge's job to make sure the elephants were fed and watered, and when the matinée performance ended, he and the other assistants climbed atop their charges and set off for a watering hole about a half-mile away. Eldridge was riding Mary, who led the rest of the elephants in single file. The procession drew a small crowd of townspeople, who followed closely behind. According to witnesses, When Mary stopped to nibble a watermelon rind that was lying in the street, Eldridge prodded her with his "elephant stick," a wooden stick with a metal hook at one end, to get her moving again. Mary ignored him and kept eating, so Eldridge whacked her really hard to the head. The cruel blow was the last mistake Eldridge ever made. Mary flew into a rage, grabbing Eldridge with her trunk and throwing him against a wooden stand. Then, when he lay motionless on the ground, she walked over and stomped on his head with her foot. Terrified spectators ran for their lives as circus workers tried to calm Mary down. Today, if a mistreated elephant lashed out at its trainer, the public would sympathize with the elephant. That wasn't the case in 1916. According to newspaper reports, when Mary calmed down, the crowd returned, this time shouting, "Kill the elephant! Kill the elephant!"

Word of the death quickly spread beyond the town. Local newspapers covered the story extensively,giving Mary the nickname "Murderous Mary" and reported rumors that she had killed more than 15 men in the past. Fifteen men was certainly an exaggeration, but had Mary killed before? In those days when an elephant killed someone, it was common for the circus to change the animal's name and quietly sell it to another circus. It's possible that this had been done with Mary. Almost a century after the fact, no one knows for sure.

Given all the publicity, even if Charlie Sparks, the owner of the circus, had wanted to sell Mary to another show, it was doubtful he'd have been able to. Besides, Mary was the star of the show, the thing that people came to see more than anything else. Sparks wanted to keep Mary...if he could.

The summer touring season was almost over, and soon the circus would have to shut down for the winter. With any luck, by the following summer the furor would have died down. But if Sparks had hopes of keeping Mary with the circus until then, he quickly came to realize that would be impossible: Already the mayors of two upcoming stops, Johnson City and Rogersville, Tennessee, had sent word that if Mary was still with the circus it would not be allowed inside the city limits. As news of Eldridge's death continued to spread, it was likely that other towns would drop out, too. There were even rumors that the governor of Tennessee was preparing to order that Mary destroyed, and that a mob of vigilantes armed with a civil war cannon was out to do the job itself. Sparks had bills to pay, payrolls to meet, and animals to feed. To do this he needed money, and to get money he needed to put on his circus. He considered his options...and realized he didn't have any. Mary would have to be put down. What's more, Mary would have to be put down in a very public way, so that people would be satisfied that Mary really was dead, not just lying low until the heat was off.

Shooting Mary was too risky--A crowd would likely be on hand to witness the execution, and there was a danger that someone might be hit by rifle fire, or that Mary would go on another rampage if the first shot failed to kill her. Tearing Mary in half by tying her to two locomotives and sending them off in opposite direction was rejected as cruel and inhumane. No doubt with an eye on publicity, Sparks decided a public hanging was the best way to put Mary down. The nearby town of Erwin had a railroad car with a 100-ton "Derrick car" (A railroad car with a crane on it) that was used to load and unload lumber. It was strong enough to do the job, so Sparks had the circus make an unscheduled stop in Erwin the following day.

On the afternoon of September 13, the Sparks circus put on a matinée performance in Erwin. Mary was not part of the show--she was chained to a stake in the ground behind the big top, and, according to eyewitnesses, was swaying nervously back and forth as the show went on without her. When the matinée ended the real show began. A mob of as much as 3,000 people crowded into the railroad yard to witness the spectacle; throngs of people climbed atop locomotives to get a better view. A little after 4 p.m., Mary and the other elephants were marched single file into the railroad yard and alongside the derrick car that would serve as the gallows. Mary was chained to the railroad track to keep her from escaping. Then the other elephants, who were there to keep Mary calm, were led away so they wouldn't have to witness what was about to happen. Mary became visibly upset and once again began to sway back and forth. A circus worker placed a chain around Mary's neck, looped it through a steel ring to form a noose, and attached it to the derrick arm. When the signal was given, the derrick operator pulled a lever and the derrick arm began to rise. as it did the chain began to tighten around Mary's neck. Her head was raised, her front feet lifted off the ground, and then her rear legs followed, until she was dangling about 6 feet above the ground.

Suddenly there was a loud snap, and Mary crashed to the ground. The chain had snapped, and now Mary was loose. Terrified that she was about to go on a rampage, the crowd tried to run for it. But Mary didn't move, she just sat there, stunned, on her hindquarters. She had apparently broken her hip in the fall. After a few minutes a circus worker climbed onto Mary's back and attached a heavier chain around her neck. The derrick arm was raised again and Mary was lifted off the ground. This time the chain held, and Mary was dead a few minutes later. Later that day her body was lowered into a hole alongside the railroad track and buried. The exact location of her grave has since been forgotten.

In one sense, when Charlie Sparks had Mary killed he successfully put the unfortunate incident of red Eldridge's death behind him. Johnson City and Rogersville lifted their bans and the circus was permitted to perform. Life returned to normal. In another sense, however, the story of Murderous Mary has never died. While Mary was being hanged, an unknown photographer in the crowd snapped a single picture (http://www.lisaalther.com/photos/04-murderous-mary.jpg) of the big elephant dangling from her noose in midair.
Have you ever heard of the Sparks World Famous Shows? Neither has anyone else. The small circus folded years ago and only circus buffs remember it. What has survived is that infamous photograph of Mary hanging by the neck from the railroad derrick. It has achieved more fame than Sparks ever did.

And so the long tale of Murderous Mary draws to a close. I need to go rest my fingers now.

[Ink]

Thanks for posting the story. That was really interesting. So there wasn't a trial or a court or an official charge of murder after all. It was all just a publicity stunt. Sounds like a slow, painful death for the elephant though, whereas human hangings usually mean instant death.

[phoenixineohp]

Over 2500 left handed people are killed each year from using products made for right handed people.

When a person dies, hearing is generally the last sense to go. The first sense lost is usually sight. Then follows taste, smell, and touch.

A body decomposes four times as fast in water than on land.



CSI Vegas fan? Me too. :smalltongue:

The oldest ball python lived to be over 47. To put that in perspective, they are usually average 15-20 years with good care.

The oldest goldfish lived past 40.

Recently two elephants escaped from their circus pen and went on a stroll in a town near my parents house. The citizen and police reports were rather amusing, as was the video. "We've found the outstanding elephant. It's just eating someone's tree..."

[Hell Puppi]

I saw this in a Darwin awards post, not sure of the REAL facts behind it but:

On average, 6 people a year are killed by vending machines falling on them.

[AslanCross]

I read that in a book once. I can type out the whole story (In case anyone wants more info). It's a bit of a long story, so get comfy.

The Sad Fate Of Murderous Mary
...snip...

Wow, thanks for posting that. It was a certainly macabre story, and so was the pic. D:

[Serpentine]

Oh, another: Chinese (or was it Japanese?) dragons start out as carp.
I'd like to post a correction of this one. According to my source, which I have in front of me now, the Chinese dragon started life as a water snake then became a carp-headed serpent. Of course, there's lots of different local versions of these things and it wouldn't surprise me if there's at least one, somewhere, that starts off as a carp, and I still wouldn't be surprised if that's what Magikarp's based on.

[Artemician]

I'd like to post a correction of this one. According to my source, which I have in front of me now, the Chinese dragon started life as a water snake then became a carp-headed serpent. Of course, there's lots of different local versions of these things and it wouldn't surprise me if there's at least one, somewhere, that starts off as a carp, and I still wouldn't be surprised if that's what Magikarp's based on.

Indeed. The version I heard from my parents, is that the Carp was originally the totem animal of the Han tribe, just as the deer, the eagle, etc were the totem animals of the other tribes. When the Han conquered China, they assimilated the other totem animals into theirs to form a veritable chimera.

[squidthingy]

The blue whale's heart is the size of a small car

One lemon tree will produce about 1,500 lemons a year

If you put all the streets in New York City in a straight line, they would stretch to Japan

there are some courtesy of snapple

[Ink]

More people use blue toothbrushes than red toothbrushes.

People spend an average of about five years of their lives dreaming.

Pound for pound, the strongest muscle in the human body is the tongue.

The average human has around 700 muscles, the average caterpillar has around 2000.

Women blink about twice as much as men.

Of all the countries, Iceland drinks the most Coca-Cola per capita.

Americans consume about 2 billion pounds of chocolate a year.

[Toastkart]

Thomas Edison traveled around the country electrocuting farm animals, including horses, dogs, and cats, and Topsy the Elephant (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topsy_%28elephant%29) just to prove that alternating current was 'dangerous' to discredit Nikola Tesla.

[phoenixineohp]

A phonophobe fears noise.
Paedophobia is the fear of children.
Nyctohylophobia is the fear of dark wooded areas, or forests at night.
Taphephpbia is the fear of being buried alive.
Papaphobia is the fear of popes.
Lachanophobia is the fear of vegetables.
Eosophobia is the fear of dawn.
Clinophobia is the fear of beds.
Arachibutyrophobia is the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth.

And Phobatriviaphobia is the fear of trivia about phobias.

[GuesssWho]

'Mother' begins with M in an unusually large number of languages.
A dentist invented the electric chair.
Dr. Seuss wrote Green Eggs and Ham after his editor dared him to write a book using fewer than 50 different words.
Frank Baum named Oz after a file cabinet in his office. One cabinet was labeled "A to N," and the second was labeled "O to Z."

[Iethloc]

Deserts, as in "things deserved", originated in 13th century English. It was connected to "just" in 1599 in Warning Faire Women: "Upon a pillory - that al the world may see, A just desert for such impiety."

So it is not "Just Desserts", but instead "Just Deserts."

[Serpentine]

As in "deserves" I suppose.

Brocolli, brocollini, Brussells sprouts, coliflower, various cabbages and numerous other vegetables are all mutants of the same vegetable.

[Iethloc]

Thunder and Blazes, that famous circus music, was written by Czech composer Julius Fučík. It was originally called Grande Marche Chromatique (and also known as Entrance of the Gladiators), and it was a military marching tune.

[Cyrano]

The standard instrument used for the stereotypical circus theme song is a Caliope, an organ driven by steam.

(Probably been said, but) the original recipe for Coke included Cocaine.

Coke was also developed as a tonic for headaches, sold in pharmacies.

Coke was also first drunk using charged (carbonated) water when a pharmacist, instead of going to a source of fresh water for a hungover customer, merely mixed the syrup with a source of charged water close at hand.

[Ink]

I believe, since we're on the subject of Coke, that it was also originally green.

[Castaras]

I believe, since we're on the subject of Coke, that it was also originally green.

And with coke, it is because of Coca Cola that Santa/Father Christmas is red. IIRC, he used to be blue...or was it green...

[Simius]

And with coke, it is because of Coca Cola that Santa/Father Christmas is red. IIRC, he used to be blue...or was it green...

Nope, I don't think so. Coca Cola practically invented Santa, but they based it on the Dutch Sinterklaas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas), which has been red for ages.

[T'ze'hai]

Managers use at least 20 days a year in work meetings.:smallfrown:

More about zoo animals:
In earlier days, when contact with zoo-animals was looked upon quite differently, the head-caretaker of our local zoo got a phonecall at home from his zoo, saying that a gibon was waiting in the managers' office. Thinking someone must be joking, he went to the office. There was a gibon alright, one that belonged in his zoo. It was brought by a man who was cycling in the nearby forest, when suddenly a gibon jumped on the back of his bike. Being near the zoo, he figured that it would have to belong there, so he just rode on and delivered it at the zoo. It was happy to be back and readily jumped in the arms of the caretaker, who took him back to his cage, all the while being quite nervous about those large fangs being that close to him...

If you would like more stories like that, I'd readily tell them. Just scream :smallbiggrin:

[Serpentine]

I have a couple from my lecturer in animal behaviour, who did a lot of work with orangutans.

The first is from the '60s or thereabouts. An orangutan was having its cage built, sort of around it I suppose, when the men building it went on their break. By the time they got back, it had completely dismantled the whole thing. Using the tools they left behind. The way they're supposed to be used.

The other was from her own experience in Indonesia, working at an orangutan rehabilitation facility. There was one in particular that had been restored to full health, and they had made repeated attempts to return her to the wild, taking her further and further out into the rainforest. Finally, they took her miles and miles out, said their goodbyes, and reluctantly headed home. Some time later, a bus turned up there, and the orangutan sauntered off. She had wandered to a road, flagged down the bus, got on with a sort of arrogant wave, and sat on a seat with her legs crossed. The bus driver knew about the shelter, and, well, figured he'd take her back there...

[Jibar]

One I got off a Penguin bar the other day.

Dreamt is the only English word ending in mt.

[Vampiric]

On the note of polar bears, supposedly all of them are left handed. Pawed. Whatever.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Serpentine
Ummm... no, I'm pretty sure they have transparent, hollow fur. It reflects and gathers sunlight down to the skin, which, being black, absorbs most of it.

Recent studies have disproved that: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998ApOpt..37.3198K

Polar bears do have black skin and transparent fur - reflecting the colour of the snow. Also, when sneaking up on seals, they do not cover their noses, which are black, to hide better. They are not left-handed, preferring neither paw.

Not being able to find anything on wiki or snopes that says otherwise (wiki has let me down!:smalleek: once, but it has shaken my faith in reality...:smallfrown:) - Eucalyptus leaves/shoots are highly hallucinogenic - hence the 'stoner' look that koalas seem to have all the time (or is it just me?) - why else did the surfer look start in australia?! (apart from the large waves, obviously...)

Male blue whales (I think - definitely a big whale), when it ejaculates, produces approx. 400 gallons (http://www.fatsquirrel.org/fact-o-tron/index.php?msgid=1&vm=55). But only 40 gallons goes into the female - ever wondered why the sea was salty?:smallamused:


Quote:
Originally Posted by Castaras
And with coke, it is because of Coca Cola that Santa/Father Christmas is red. IIRC, he used to be blue...or was it green...

Nope, I don't think so. Coca Cola practically invented Santa, but they based it on the Dutch Sinterklaas, which has been red for ages.

Sinterklaas - as in the wiki link, was a bishop in Turkey, who was named a Saint, and became patron saint of children. The legend of present giving by saint nick was originally a green elf, who would leave small trinket presents in the child's shoe on the night of the 6th December, which would be left on the doorstep. Coca-Cola created the red Santa Claus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Claus), as part of their marketing campaign, because the colours are that of the coca-cola company, though they are not the first to use the red-and-white suit for Santa.

On the subject of Santa, anyone here know why he rides on a sleigh pulled by flying reindeer?

[GuesssWho]

There was one in particular that had been restored to full health, and they had made repeated attempts to return her to the wild, taking her further and further out into the rain forest. Finally, they took her miles and miles out, said their goodbyes, and reluctantly headed home. Some time later, a bus turned up there, and the orangutan sauntered off. She had wandered to a road, flagged down the bus, got on with a sort of arrogant wave, and sat on a seat with her legs crossed. The bus driver knew about the shelter, and, well, figured he'd take her back there...

Sure, orangutans-but I'm not letting no none gorillas on this bus!
LOL

My dad once saw an orangutan slam a zoo keeper with a cage door. It wasn't very hard, really, but the guy went white as a sheet, and the orangutan started doing back flips. 'Gotcha!'

[Hell Puppi]

More proof that simians are, indeed, evil.

[GuesssWho]

No, that's just people. :P
I am an endless font of useless knowledge, in case anyone is interested.
More useless facts here (http://www.totallyuselessknowledge.com/)

[Hell Puppi]

Well I'm fairly sure that people, on average, are evil. There's definite cases showing otherwise, but I'm not optimistic enough to say people are mostly good, or even neutral.
I just have a strong suspicion that monkeys (and simians in general) are evil. Maybe because every time someone mentions getting a pet monkey, I see it throwing dishware around and howling like its insane.

[GuesssWho]

All animals are innocents. Only humans have a choice about these things.

[potatocubed]

Duck-billed platypi. Just when you think they can't get any weirder, you learn something new about them.

Not only are they egg-laying mammals - a rare kind to begin with - the males of the species are also venomous. I think this makes them the only venomous mammal, although I could very easily be wrong about that.

And on top of that they have electroreceptors! They can detect other creatures by sensing changes in their bioelectric field.

And they have ten chromosomes, not just the paltry two that humans get.

AND those chromosomes (X and Y) contain genetic data normally only found in W and Z chromosomes - exclusive to birds. In fact, no one knows how a platypus's gender is set since the genetic code that does it in all other mammals is absent from theirs.

(All trivia looted from Wikipedia, so inaccuracies may be present.)

[Serpentine]

1. Humans have 36 chromosomes. Perhaps what you're thinking of there is sex chromosomes?

2. Until you find another kind (the magpie-billed platypus? Crow-billed? Spoonbill-billed?), don't call them "duck-billed platypus". :smallannoyed:

Another one on this subject, though: There were platypuses in... South America, I think. They know this because of the find of a single tooth.

[Hell Puppi]

I still think the naked mole rat is the weirdest creature in existence.....it doesn't even feel pain....

[Serpentine]

And they're the only mammal that lives in a hive-like society.

...or did I say that already?

[T'ze'hai]

A kangaroo is this big: O when born...

The name kangaroo is an Aboriginal word...
When an Englishmen way back saw a kangaroo, it asked a nearby Aboriginal what it was. The answer: "Kangaroo (I do not understand you)".

[Rykaj]

Humans have in fact 23 chromosomes, and 2 of each, making it 46. Just as many as a hare, and a lot less than a goldfish which has a little over 100. Platypi do have 10 SEX chromosomes, which is quite unique considering most mammals have only 2 (XX or XY). There, cleared up :smallsmile:

[Vampiric]

No-one knows why santa's reindeer fly?:smalltongue:

The icelandic shaman (of the tribes who live with the reindeer) eat reindeer moss - which the reindeer also eat. It's an hallucinogen, so the shaman start seeing flying reindeer - simple! But it also means that the reindeer, in winter, when there's no grass to eat, also hallucinate from the reindeer moss, which is perennial.

[soozenw]

In regards to the polar bear hair thing--

http://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/mysteries/polarbear.html

:smallbiggrin:

[phoenixineohp]

*snip*
Male blue whales (I think - definitely a big whale), when it ejaculates, produces approx. 400 gallons (http://www.fatsquirrel.org/fact-o-tron/index.php?msgid=1&vm=55). But only 40 gallons goes into the female - ever wondered why the sea was salty?:smallamused:


Ummm... your own link says otherwise.:smallconfused: And the actual amount is 40 gallons. It washes out all the previous male's attempts to mate, making the father of the calf whichever whale was last to mate with her. The things I learn in class....:smalleek:


1. Humans have 36 chromosomes. Perhaps what you're thinking of there is sex chromosomes?

2. Until you find another kind (the magpie-billed platypus? Crow-billed? Spoonbill-billed?), don't call them "duck-billed platypus". :smallannoyed:

Another one on this subject, though: There were platypuses in... South America, I think. They know this because of the find of a single tooth.

Our current day platypuses do not have teeth. They have little ridges that help crunch things, but no actual teeth. So I'm curious about what they actually found.


Cranberries are sorted for ripeness by bouncing them. A fully ripened cranberry can be dribbled like a basketball.

Trivia is the Roman goddess of sorcery, hounds and the crossroads.

The Roman emperor Caligula made his horse a senator.

[Serpentine]

I think it was one of the bony ridge bits, though it may have been sort of between "tooth" and "bony ridge bits".
And I'm told Caligula actually just threatened to make a horse a consul.

[Conrad Poohs]

I think that they did actually used to have teeth and South America having them seems to sound about right, as they are about the only other place in the world other than Australia and New Guinea that have much in the way of non-Eutherian(placental) mammals (i.e. marsupials and monotremes). Evidently the platypus didn't need teeth to look strange, as the big zoological cheeses back in England thought that the specimens brought back were fake composites of other animals...though someone might have already posted such a thing :smallfrown:

[GuesssWho]

I know what /\'s name is from!

And about Caligula (full name Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus)-his horse wasn't a senator, but he did believe that he was Jupiter, he married his sister, tried to have a statue of himself built in the Temple of Jerusalem, had people killed on trumped-up charges, spent huge amounts of money building useless sh!t, and once ordered his troops to throw their spears into the sea because he thought it had insulted him and to claim seashells as spoils of war.

[Conrad Poohs]

That's my kind of national leader!

[Arameus]

Santa Clause was also the Patron Saint of Pawnbrokers.

Caligula once threw a fisherman off of a cliff to show his appreciation for being presented with the largest fish ever caught in Roman waters, and that's saying something. When finally assassinated, he said, "A great poet dies in me."

Claudius was found hiding behind a palace curtain and made emperor by mistake. He added three knew letters to the Roman alphabet, gb, gp, and the consonant u as opposed to the vowel u, all of which were dropped after his death since no one could pronounce them.

When Nero finally saw his palace completed, which was the grandest structure in the known world and covered many square miles, he said "At least I'm finally starting to live like a human being." He tried to kill his wife many times in many ridiculous ways, including making her ceiling collapse on her, which failed. He later pursued a career as a musician, and would force crowds of people to sit and listen to him sing and play the harp; he was terrible at either.

We believe many emperors of Rome were like this because the Romans flavored their wine with sugar of lead, which contains lead acetate. This compound, despite it's surprisingly appealing taste, causes several health problems over a long period of time, including light to severe dementia. The richest folk of Rome, of course, drank the most wine, especially the emperors, who were famous partygoers. Lead is bad for you.

Roman parties in the richest houses also featured vomitoria, places you could go to perform reverse peristalsis (a term for vomiting) after gorging yourself so that you could go and gorge yourself again.

Egg-laying mammals are called monotremes. Another monotreme is the echidna, sometimes called the spiny anteater, which you may recognize as the species of Knuckles form the Sonic video games.

Many creatures cannot feel pain, although it is rare in mammals, mammals often being much more developed. Worms cannot feel pain and only wriggle on the hook as a reflex. Wouldn't you? Lobsters cannot feel pain either, so never let a vegetarian tell you that boiling them alive is inhumane. They don't feel a thing, I imagine it's very pleasant, in addition to being very tasty.

On the other hand, this was often used to justify horrendous treatment of people in asyla, who often did not receive any medical treatment and made to simply suffer through extreme weather. A visitor to one asylum demanded to know why this was allowed to occur, and was told by the warden, "Idiots don't feel the cold."

Attack ads during the campaign season are nothing new. You should actually be happy they've been toned down to such an extent. Lincoln's opponent once said in a speech that Lincoln looked ape-like, and he wasn't going to let a damned ape run the country. There is some progress, it seems. Lincoln is the last President to be in a battle, and can be seen in photographs at the front lines. He kept important letters under that famous tall hat. He suffered from many health concerns, including chronic constipation. John Wilkes Booth only one member of a circle of conspirators who planned a very sophisticated assassination. When everyone ditched but him, he simply ran up the stairs and shot him to death. This of course happened at a theater, odd since Booth's brother was a famous actor. He often apologized on stage for his brother's actions, and critics proclaimed that his performance as the title character of Hamlet was the best ever in the nation.

Washington Irving was a famous American author, and was the first to be accepted by the Old World as such. He was proclaimed to be America's first true great, and he decided to use his fame to promote a book of feveral short folk tales, many of which are now legendary, including the Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The book was so poorly received by readers and critics alike that he never again wrote fiction.

Another famous American author was Ambrose Bierce, an eternal pessimist in the vein of Poe. He eventually expatriated to participate in and write about the Mexican civil war, and wrote his friends that if they ever heard about him being put up against a wall and shot there, he was glad he died in such a dramatic fashion. He was never heard form again, alive or otherwise.

Although dolphins are often recognized as unusually intelligent, they are far from being one of the smartest mammals because of their extremely simple psychology. Elephants are far, far smarter. They recognize themselves in mirrors, a trait very uncommon in any animal. Their psychological complexity is second only to that of humans. Asian elephants carry a trait that can result in tuskless bulls, which cannot fight as effectively as tusked bulls. As a result, they often develop inferiority complexes. Additionally, they can also develop anger issues both as a way to fight more effectively and as a simple response to feeling insecure about their lack of tusks. Almost all accounts of attacks on humans by Asian elephants are by tuskless elephants, a vast majority of which are entirely unprovoked and even include occasions when the beast went out of his way solely to kill. Captive elephants fear humans and thus do not fight back, a fact they believe only because humans often do not show any fear around them and assert their dominance towards them almost constantly, making them think we pose a great dangre to them should they resist, which is very intimidating. If they were not so psychologically superior, they would not fear humans. And if a captive elephant should ever kill a human, they realize how harmless we are to them and will not hesitate to kill as many humans as necessary to gain freedom. On the other hand, elephants that associate humans with the power of guns will always fear humans because their fear is based in actual knowledge of our lethal capability. An elephant can kill you in as few as four ways, which I shall enumerate: Goring with tusks, slamming or throwing with the trunk, trampling, and laying his head upon you to press you with his entire weight. Fear them.

Some predatory animals can indeed smell your fear, but not the emotion itself of course. This phrase refers to certain predators that, upon contact with humans, can smell whether or not you voided your bowels upon your discovery of the predator, a sign of profound fright. When this occurs, you become their prey. When you see a predator, clench and clench tight.

I could go on for hours. I could double my assertions merely on the things of which I've already written alone. However, I'm tired and I want to post elsewhere. Hope you enjoyed all this!

And by the way, I did not look up a single one of these things. They were all gathered form right up here. *taps head* Yeah, I know. Believe it or not.

[Conrad Poohs]

Great whalloping gooseburys, that's a post and 2 halves!

The note about Claudius's alphabet modifications reminds me of Akhenaten, the most unusual pharaoh of Egypt. Aside from possibly suffering from some form of hermaphroditism, he undertook the single most dramatic modification of the Egyptian pantheon of any ruling Egyptian, so much so that the pantheon was reduced to one member...Aten, the sun disk. Tutankamun, who was probably Akhenaten's son, was originally called Tutankaten, due to the Aten replacing Amun as the head deity. Soon after Akhenaten's death, Tutankaten changed his name. Another of Akhenaten's changes includes moving the Egyptian capital from Thebes or Memphis or wherever it was, into the desert, where he had Akhetaten built as the replacement. The buildings were made of quick-to-assemble brick-typed things, which proved to be equally quick to disassemble once Akhenaten died and the Egyptians moved the capital back to its predecessor and used some of the building materials in other projects.

I believe that lead-lined cups and piping was also a cause of the lead poisoning suffered by the Roman upper class. Interestingly, the Minoans, somewhere in the region of the 1st or 2nd century BC, had terracotta piping, a much more ingeneous idea. They also had soap, flushing toilets and bare-chested women - what a society :smallbiggrin: . Too bad they got hit by a tsunami caused by Thera (Santorini) exploding, resulting in destruction of their navy, leaving them at the mercy of the Mycenaeans. The Minoan base of Crete is thought by many to be the likely inspiration for Plato's story of Atlantis.

In regards to the idea of boiling lobsters care-free, I don't think that even if they don't feel pain from burning, that they would still not feel significant discomfort from being overheated (they still have a nervous system).

Octopusses are apparently the most intelligent invertebrates.

That's all from me for now.

[Rykaj]

In regard to vomitoria, they still exist. In my town there are several bars/pubs/nightclubs that have a seperate vomitorium in the toilets. And I have to admit, I was so curious I actually used one on an occasion.

And for the lobster, if he doesn't feel pain I don't think he would feel alot of discomfort. His biological functions just start to drop out one by one. I think it would feel like slowly going numb in a comfortably warm cloud. Comfortably warm, not hot, cause hot is pain, and if it's true that he doesn't feel pain then he'd only feel the warmth.

[Arameus]

The Romans were indeed fond of lead. Whoops! As for piping, if I wasn't aware of the lethal side effects, I'd take them over terracotta anyday. It's a sheer matter of crafting ease and durability.

The Minoans made sport by jumping over charging pulls in a rather specific manner, as they considered bulls holy. This, of course was why the Minoans conceived the Minotaur. They also gave us the labyrinth, a concept we really don't seem to understand. A lot of things in Minoa are name after King Minos, even the country itself. Also, it was more the massive earthquake than anything that destroyed Minoa, although the giant tsunami couldn'y have helped very much. Massive destruction can be viewed even today along the fault line.

Although your statement that the destruction of Minoa was the origin of the Atlantis fable is correct, Plato actually got his story from the Egyptian telling of the event, which far predates his, rather than actual knowledge of the event or even of Minoa in general

Even if they suffer 'extreme discomfort,' I don't really care one way or the other. Lobsters are atrocious creatures, and should be eaten on principle, preferably alive, but at least in a way we consider ghastly. I hold an unreserved contempt for anything completely covered by chitin, embodied in my disgust with insects and spiders, but this, combined with my other reasons for abhorring the lobster specifically, make it a special case and my maleficence for it is outdone only by my outright hatred of camels. What they took from me can never be paid back, and I will never forgive them as a species. And dromedaries? Oooh.... Dromedaries.

As for octopi, they really are incredible! Although their cerebellum is really the developed part of the brain; as they lack any real 'thinking cap,' the cerebrum, I wouldn't really call them intelligent. But their brains do have an unbelievable complexity due to their controlling every last little portion of their tentacles, and, incredibly, each of their suckers, independently! Wow! Most skilled? Certainly! I would also include their incredible camouflage, but I think that's more a reflex by the skin itself. On the other hand, their mimicry is unbelievable, and that's definitely a brain thing.

[Serpentine]

Dammit. I did a whole post in response to someone earlier, but it didn't come up :smallmad: So screw that, I'm moving on. Sorta.

And for the lobster, if he doesn't feel pain I don't think he would feel alot of discomfort. His biological functions just start to drop out one by one. I think it would feel like slowly going numb in a comfortably warm cloud. Comfortably warm, not hot, cause hot is pain, and if it's true that he doesn't feel pain then he'd only feel the warmth.
But what exactly is "pain" or "discomfort"? It's essentially a way to warn the creature that something's wrong, isn't it? So surely even a lobster would have some sort of system to get these signals through... I'm pretty sceptical about these sorts of claims. Besides the apparent lack of a real definition of "pain", it wasn't all that long ago that it was thought that humans were the only living things to feel anything at all, physical or emotional, and everything else was reduced to the status of animatrons.


Although your statement that the destruction of Minoa was the origin of the Atlantis fable is correct, Plato actually got his story from the Egyptian telling of the event, which far predates his, rather than actual knowledge of the event or even of Minoa in general
Part of this theory of the origin of the Atlantis story was that Plato messed up in his translation of Egyptian numbers to Greek, effectively moving the decimal point of all numerical values one point to the right (I don't think they actually had decimal points at that stage). This meant that the size of Atlantis was ten times as large as the Egyptians said (and it had ten times the population, etc.), which meant that it wouldn't fit in the Mediterranean, so he had to shift it out into the Atlantic.


As for octopi, they really are incredible! Although their cerebellum is really the developed part of the brain; as they lack any real 'thinking cap,' the cerebrum, I wouldn't really call them intelligent. But their brains do have an unbelievable complexity due to their controlling every last little portion of their tentacles, and, incredibly, each of their suckers, independently! Wow! Most skilled? Certainly! I would also include their incredible camouflage, but I think that's more a reflex by the skin itself. On the other hand, their mimicry is unbelievable, and that's definitely a brain thing.
I couldn't quote you the passage or anything, but I've read of humans lacking the cerebrum and managing quite well. And that of birds is greatly reduced in comparison to that of mammals - are you going to tell me that the ability of crows to solve complex problems and pass on detailed information to others doesn't count as intelligence, just because they have a different brain set-up? And I think it's pretty well established that the camoflage isn't just reflexive, but very carefully controlled. On the topic of octopi, though, has anyone mentioned yet that they have a heart in every tentacle?

[Maroon]

And I think it's pretty well established that the camoflage isn't just reflexive, but very carefully controlled.Which would be quite a feat considering octopuses are entirely color-blind.

[Conrad Poohs]

Dammit. I did a whole post in response to someone earlier, but it didn't come up :smallmad: So screw that, I'm moving on. Sorta.

But what exactly is "pain" or "discomfort"? It's essentially a way to warn the creature that something's wrong, isn't it? So surely even a lobster would have some sort of system to get these signals through... I'm pretty sceptical about these sorts of claims. Besides the apparent lack of a real definition of "pain", it wasn't all that long ago that it was thought that humans were the only living things to feel anything at all, physical or emotional, and everything else was reduced to the status of animatrons.


Part of this theory of the origin of the Atlantis story was that Plato messed up in his translation of Egyptian numbers to Greek, effectively moving the decimal point of all numerical values one point to the right (I don't think they actually had decimal points at that stage). This meant that the size of Atlantis was ten times as large as the Egyptians said (and it had ten times the population, etc.), which meant that it wouldn't fit in the Mediterranean, so he had to shift it out into the Atlantic.


I couldn't quote you the passage or anything, but I've read of humans lacking the cerebrum and managing quite well. And that of birds is greatly reduced in comparison to that of mammals - are you going to tell me that the ability of crows to solve complex problems and pass on detailed information to others doesn't count as intelligence, just because they have a different brain set-up? And I think it's pretty well established that the camoflage isn't just reflexive, but very carefully controlled. On the topic of octopi, though, has anyone mentioned yet that they have a heart in every tentacle?

I thought to save myself referring to several different posts I'd just quote this all-encompassing post by my pal Mrs "Rock-forming hydrous magnesium iron phyllosilicate ((Mg,Fe)3Si2O5(OH)4) mineral group", which I call Serpentine for short.

Bah! Serpy has beaten me to what I was going to say about defining pain - I think we need to analyse the source of the free-of-pain theory first-hand, so we can really understand what it means by "pain"; similarly "intelligence" should perhaps be clearly defined for the discussion on octopi. I also think that physical pain needs to be distinguished from emotional pain, which I would think would be a rather likely and undesirable experience for someone who is captured by gigantic beasts who force it to have its body temperature rise above what is perceived as healthy and his/her bodily functions progressively discontinue, suggesting impending death..."atrocious creature" or not. PS. I am not a vegetarian.

In regards to the octopi - yes, not a day goes by where I don't mention to random passing members of the community that octopi have a heart in each tentacle. This might explain why I have hardly any friends :smallconfused: Speaking of octopusses as I prefer to call them ('cause it sounds cooler), speaking to a friend yesterday, I understand that I was referring to cuttlefish, rather than octopusses. I knew it was one of the two :smallamused: . I don't know too much about sea creatures, but could this resolve the issue about colour blindness and/or reflexive camouflage? I understand that they use camouflage not only for defence but also for offence.

About the Minoans, they didn't actually have an intent to create the Minotour. In recognition of Zues flying to Crete in the form of a bull (as you do), in order to settle Minos' mother there, subsequent Minoans regularly sacrificed the best bull of their herd to Zues, and I imagine their reverence for bulls also arose from this event. On one occassion, a particularly spiffing specimen was in the herd, and Minos, loath to kill it, sacrificed less spiffy one instead. Zues got a wee bit batey over this and as punishment caused Minos' wife to fall in love with the spiffing bull, which during a sensual procreation session, impregnated her with the Minotour. Minos, embarrassed by this unsavoury affair, got the island's worst urban planner (aka the architect Daidalos) to build him a small high rise town known as the the labyrinth, effectively a maze. The Agean Sea is named in memory of King Ageas, father of Theseus (star Minotour-slayer) who cast himself into this sea when he thought his son was dead. Because the Minotour was killed and Theseus escaped, Minos took out his anger on Daidalos, by locking him and Daidalos' son Icarus in the labyrinth. The two escaped, however, by making wings of wax and flying out. While Icarus of course died, I believe Daidalos made it to Sicily.

[Serpentine]

Don't forget that they think they may have figured out part of what started the whole Labyrinth legend: the palace of the Minoans, such as they've excavated, had been expanded and expanded until there were rooms upon rooms upon corridors upon halls, making it extremely difficult to navigate - like a maze, if you will.

[Arameus]

Serpentine is correct. It is noteworthy that the same word, labyrinth, refers to a Minoan two-headed ax. And it was Daedalus that flew too close to the sun and melted his wings, was it not?

As to whether or not an octopus' camouflage instinct is sight-based or otherwise, I've seen a mimic octopus take on the pattern of a freaking checkerboard on which it was laid, a checkerboard I don't think it could have seen, since it was under the mass of his body.

[Hell Puppi]

Icarus had the melted wings. It was on an album, man!

[Arameus]

You're right, that's why there's a Kid Icarus, 'cause it's an ironic title...

[GuesssWho]

As to whether or not an octopus' camouflage instinct is sight-based or otherwise, I've seen a mimic octopus take on the pattern of a freaking checkerboard on which it was laid, a checkerboard I don't think it could have seen, since it was under the mass of his body.

Then how did it know what pattern it was on at all?

[AslanCross]

On the topic of octopi, though, has anyone mentioned yet that they have a heart in every tentacle?

I thought they had three hearts: Two for pumping blood through the gills and one for circulation throughout the body. They have blue blood, too.

I hear though that the intelligence of octopi is comparable to that of a cat's, and that they sometimes show catlike mannerisms.

What's cooler, though, is that tusk shells (a kind of mollusk) have no hearts.

Sea squirts start as larvae with nervous systems. They then attach themselves to the seabed and their "brains" and nervous systems mostly vanish. Quite like some people I know. <_<

[I'm da Rogue!]

Serpentine is correct. It is noteworthy that the same word, labyrinth, refers to a Minoan two-headed ax. And it was Daedalus that flew too close to the sun and melted his wings, was it not?


Labyrinthos is the greek word for maze.

Ikaros is the one who melted his wings, fell on the sea and at that point the sea is named Ikaria Pelagos after him.
Daedalos escaped.

[Vampiric]

woops, thanks for pointing that out, pheonixinoehp.

Wasn't Daedalus Ikarus' father? I know they both had the wings....

[I'm da Rogue!]

He was his father, yes.
A great architect of his time.
Nowadays, in modern Greece, when we have to deal with roads that look like a maze/labyrinth, we call them "daedalodis". It means it's from Daedalos himself, sth like a joke.

[MountainKing]

You can increase the maximum range of many radio wavelengths by reflecting waves off of the Ionosphere (I think this is the layer, anyway). I'm pretty sure this requires a lot more power, though.

Did you also know that the United States can control the weather by doing just that very thing? It's scientastic! (http://www.haarp.alaska.edu/)

[Conrad Poohs]

I think that the Minoan two-headed axe may have actually been called a Lybras or something like that, and, like most cool weapons I think that it might have just been ceremonial or ornamental.

I don't know if the labyrinth myth came from a specific palace as such; I thought it was the whole civilisation's general building style, known as agglomerative.

[GuesssWho]

Nah-it was the palace.

[phoenixineohp]

Octopuses are intelligent!

They are one of the top 7 smartest animals.

An example:

In a zoo in the states a problem came up. Some expensive lobsters started to go missing. The staff were suspected until one of the custodians did his route backwards one day. He observed the octopus open and get out of it's tank, walk across to the loster tank, open that one up, go in, grab a lobster, get out, close the tank, walk back to it's tank with the lobster, get in and close it's tank, eat the lobster and then hide the shell. Upon further investigation the remains of all the missing lobsters were found hidden under the gravel and accessories of it's cage.

They are famous for being inquisitive and curious. In zoos they need enrichment and often dissemble things like Lego castles or hamster balls to get at shrimp inside.

Scientists diving in the Caribbean came across an odd floating coconut. They observed it, until they started to notice it slowly moving away. Sure enough, it turned out to be an octopus that had wrapped 6 arms around it's body and subtly used the other two to slowly start walking away. Later that year another team of scientists were duped by a different species doing the same trick on the other side of the world.

They can fit through anything that their beak can fit through. Thats like us getting through spaces our teeth can fit through. They can change the texture and colour of their skin and control each sucker independently. They have 3 hearts and it's arms not tentacles. Squid have two tentacles, those are the things that are longer than the rest of their arms.

Yes I am passionate about cephalopods. And Calamari upsets me because they are just too amazing and intelligent to eat. :smallfrown:

[CrazedGoblin]

Octopuses are intelligent!

They are one of the top 7 smartest animals.

An example:

In a zoo in the states a problem came up. Some expensive lobsters started to go missing. The staff were suspected until one of the custodians did his route backwards one day. He observed the octopus open and get out of it's tank, walk across to the loster tank, open that one up, go in, grab a lobster, get out, close the tank, walk back to it's tank with the lobster, get in and close it's tank, eat the lobster and then hide the shell. Upon further investigation the remains of all the missing lobsters were found hidden under the gravel and accessories of it's cage.

They are famous for being inquisitive and curious. In zoos they need enrichment and often dissemble things like Lego castles or hamster balls to get at shrimp inside.

Scientists diving in the Caribbean came across an odd floating coconut. They observed it, until they started to notice it slowly moving away. Sure enough, it turned out to be an octopus that had wrapped 6 arms around it's body and subtly used the other two to slowly start walking away. Later that year another team of scientists were duped by a different species doing the same trick on the other side of the world.

They can fit through anything that their beak can fit through. Thats like us getting through spaces our teeth can fit through. They can change the texture and colour of their skin and control each sucker independently. They have 3 hearts and it's arms not tentacles. Squid have two tentacles, those are the things that are longer than the rest of their arms.

Yes I am passionate about cephalopods. And Calamari upsets me because they are just too amazing and intelligent to eat. :smallfrown:

haha nice :smallbiggrin:

[Jibar]

In a zoo in the states a problem came up. Some expensive lobsters started to go missing. The staff were suspected until one of the custodians did his route backwards one day. He observed the octopus open and get out of it's tank, walk across to the loster tank, open that one up, go in, grab a lobster, get out, close the tank, walk back to it's tank with the lobster, get in and close it's tank, eat the lobster and then hide the shell. Upon further investigation the remains of all the missing lobsters were found hidden under the gravel and accessories of it's cage.

As someone who is scared of the sea and everything in it (apart from Dolphins, but I hate those jerky butter fish), allow me to have my fear's confirmed.
I am indeed going to be killed by sea creatures walking out of the ocean, and they will then hide the body.
All together now,

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHH!

[phoenixineohp]

All octopuses are venomous, and like a lot of things in nature, the smaller you get, the more dangerous. So the worst is the Blue-ringed octopus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue-ringed_octopus). Roughly the size of a golf ball, it can certainly kill you. However, I imagine it would dry out before catching you, and it'd have a heck of a time dragging you away and disposing of the body. :smallwink:

But they aren't all horrible killers. I was lucky enough to work with a North Pacific Giant Octopus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Pacific_Giant_Octopus) and it loved to give 'handshakes'. :smallbiggrin: You opened the cage, which is specially designed to try and outsmart the octopus and tapped the water. It came right up to see you. So on my first day at work my co worker is showing it to me and lets me reach in and touch it. Well that lead to a feeling like being attacked by a slimy bath mat that wants to hug you to death. Anyways, while I'm happily removing it's arms from mine my co worker quips in with a helpful bit of information.

"Oh, now she's going to try and get out."

Whomp! All 8 arms are flopping out and reaching outside of the cage as she tries to climb out. So now both of us are removing the arms and shoving them back in the water. Which, when she also gets one or two on you, is quite difficult. You have to keep one arm free, otherwise she is too strong. This is apparently why the tank top is lined with astro turf. She didn't like the feeling and so it helped to keep her in.

"And watch out for the beak, it's venomous."

WHAT?!? O_o

So while shoving the arms back in the water I am made aware of the hospital trip I'd be getting if I let that mouth too close to me. Great.

In the end Morti and I formed a close bond and I survived my first day at work. Sadly, she laid eggs about 2 years later. She hung on and was a perfect mom, lasting longer than usual and breaking my heart. She took care of those eggs even though it ripped her up and would eventually kill her.

Luckily, I've already gotten to meet the new octopus, and she is a tricky little one too. She waits till your hand goes numb from the cold water before trying to eat you. :smallwink:

[nagora]

Yes I am passionate about cephalopods. And Calamari upsets me because they are just too amazing and intelligent to eat. :smallfrown:

I totally agree; how people can eat such wonderful creatures is beyond me. Of course, the octopus was probably smarter than the person eating it so jelousy probably plays a part.

[Serpentine]

I would like to mention that my mother once had a blue-ringed octopus in her swimmers. She was out collecting shells, tucking them under the bathers, then was washing them out and *schloop* out slips a blue-ring... Fun fun stuff.

For something even cooler than lobster-eating, have a look here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFOEZh1Lbbg).

[dehro]

I am indeed going to be killed by sea creatures walking out of the ocean, and they will then hide the body.


:smallconfused: :smallconfused: :smallconfused: :smallconfused:
somehow, I can imagine worse ways to go..
http://spyhunter007.com/Images/james_bond_ursula_andress7.jpg

[phoenixineohp]

Yeah, the black widow she killed a guy with was a heck of a lot worse. :smallwink: Not that he didn't deserve it.

[Ink]

Hey, I never knew octopi were such interesting creatures. I didn't know they could walk. Why did the octopus die? Do they die after laying their eggs?

I still like calamari though. Although those are probably mostly squid and not octopi.

[phoenixineohp]

A helpful link. (http://www.cephbase.utmb.edu/TCP/faq/TCPfaq2b.cfm?ID=21)

They don't last long anyways. They have very short lifespans and Morti exceeded hers. But generally they are born, grown, eat, boink, die.

Yes, but cooked octopus is also an option sometimes. Or raw. And one time I saw alive. :smallfurious: That and the hockey thing. :smallmad:

Serpentine, that's just plain s.c.a.r.y.

[Arameus]

They're great creatures! That story about eating the lobsters? I saw the exact same thing on Animal Planet, except it was a giant octopus eating three-foot sharks.

On the other hand, since calamari is squid (or I thought it was, I could be wrong), and everyone knows squid are barabaric and smell terribly, I think they're fair game to devour! Which is not to say octopus tentacle isn't marvelously tasty. :smalltongue:

[Jibar]

They're great creatures! That story about eating the lobsters? I saw the exact same thing on Animal Planet, except it was a giant octopus eating three-foot sharks.


...


Oh... dear God.

[Vonriel]

For something even cooler than lobster-eating, have a look here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFOEZh1Lbbg).

Hey, Aramaeus? I believe that'd be this video Serpentine posted.

[Arameus]

Oops! That'll teach me not to check the links. And to think I even thought about looking for the video. <---Moron

More useless trivia: Some bacteria, called extremophiles, live in extroardinary conditions including extreme heat & cold, very high pressures, and in the presence of normally-lethal chemicals. There are even extremophiles living in Venus' atmosphere. These types of bacteria are the main evidence for scientists suggesting that primitive life exists in many extraterrestrial environments other scientists have dismissed as void.

[Ink]

If there are bacteria living in Venus' atmosphere, isn't that already proof that extraterrestrial life exists?

[AslanCross]

Oops! That'll teach me not to check the links. And to think I even thought about looking for the video. <---Moron

More useless trivia: Some bacteria, called extremophiles, live in extroardinary conditions including extreme heat & cold, very high pressures, and in the presence of normally-lethal chemicals. There are even extremophiles living in Venus' atmosphere. These types of bacteria are the main evidence for scientists suggesting that primitive life exists in many extraterrestrial environments other scientists have dismissed as void.

There's even a type of bacteria that can live in nuclear reactors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deinococcus

[Conrad Poohs]

I totally agree; how people can eat such wonderful creatures is beyond me. Of course, the octopus was probably smarter than the person eating it so jelousy probably plays a part.

Ah yes, however "wonderful" is such a subjective term. Everything is wonderful in some way, to someone, so it's a little difficult for people to avoid eating something that someone else values (though of course something should not be exploited to the extent of degradating its species' viability). Most people wouldn't consider a something called a slime mould to be wonderful, however it is hermaphroditic and repoduces with itself by going up inside it's own anus... well, I think that's pretty cool. Even plants can be damn fantastic. There are plants that poison people, eat insects and even poison or strangle each other (e.g. Californian sage and strangler figs, respectively). Some plants grow where they really shouldn't be able to, e.g. mine sites, cracks in rocks, seawater, and Australia. Saltbush can actually live in conditions 4 times as saline as the ocean...and still provide reasonable feed for stock. Some plants regenerate after being burnt, some begin life after being burnt, and some can stay in the ground for years until the conditions are right. I remember on an Attenborough documentary them growing an ancient cherry blossom or something, that had been uncovered in an archaeological dig! One family of plants can actually heat itself via an unusual process called photorespiration, where CO2 is used instead of oxygen. Another interesting group of plants is the CAM plants (which I think include many herbaceous[non-woody]), which photosynthesise at night, avoiding significant water loss. And of course lets not forget that plants can transport huge amounts of water into the atmosphere and suck huge amounts of CO2 out, in total silence. The ant plant is arguably the most fantastic plant when it comes to plant-insect interactions, being built to house a colony of ants, which in return defends the host plant from herbivores. These ants actually also take care of a moth larvae, which before fully developing bites a whole in the side of the plant for no apparent reason. Once the moth develops wings, the ant carers all of a sudden attack the foreigner, who escapes through his/her previously made hole.
I'll shut-up now.

[GuesssWho]

In a zoo in the states a problem came up. Some expensive lobsters started to go missing. The staff were suspected until one of the custodians did his route backwards one day. He observed the octopus open and get out of it's tank, walk across to the loster tank, open that one up, go in, grab a lobster, get out, close the tank, walk back to it's tank with the lobster, get in and close it's tank, eat the lobster and then hide the shell. Upon further investigation the remains of all the missing lobsters were found hidden under the gravel and accessories of it's cage.

Yeah, I heard about that.

To realize that an octopus can understand the concept of punishment and work to avoid it is . . . kinda creepy.

[Hell Puppi]

Very much so.
I've had many reasons to avoid the ocean before, and now I've found a new one.
Of course spending most of my life in a desert-like environment has nothing to do with this.

Okay maybe a little. The ocean scares me.

[SDF]

Very much so.
I've had many reasons to avoid the ocean before, and now I've found a new one.
Of course spending most of my life in a desert-like environment has nothing to do with this.

Okay maybe a little. The ocean scares me.

I've spent the last 6 years in the American desert, but I'm in love with the Pacific. Nothing more beautiful. Oh I would kill for the Atlantic, but I am paid to make girls panic while I sing.