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Science facts that amaze you?

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    #272
    Jesus Wept
    Registered Users Posts: 25,243 ✭✭✭✭Jesus Wept


    catallus wrote: »
    The sad thing is that all the dinos were hunted to extinction by hungry humans :(

    I doubt it.


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    #273
    Maximus Alexander
    Registered Users Posts: 13,080 ✭✭✭✭Maximus Alexander


    i heart chewy louie wrote: »
    I doubt it.

    What you're saying they just built a space ship and all flew away to Mars or something?


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    #274
    catallus
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,106 ✭✭✭catallus


    i heart chewy louie wrote: »
    I doubt it.

    You doubt what? :confused:

    Well, maybe some of them died when they couldn't swim, with the flood and everything. Maybe.


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    #275
    endacl
    Registered Users Posts: 22,275 ✭✭✭✭endacl


    catallus wrote: »
    You doubt what? :confused:

    Well, maybe some of them died when they couldn't swim, with the flood and everything. Maybe.

    No. That was the unicorns. The dinosaurs died out for lack of a brucewillisaurus. And a space program. And a dinosaur Aerosmith.


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    #276
    somuj
    Registered Users Posts: 867 ✭✭✭somuj


    Maximus Alexander wrote: »
    What you're saying they just built a space ship and all flew away to Mars or something?

    Their in the delta quadrant


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    #277
    The Dagda
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,345 ✭✭✭The Dagda


    somuj wrote: »
    Their in the delta quadrant


    They're.

    It's a science thread.


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    #278
    bnt
    Registered Users Posts: 12,973 ✭✭✭✭bnt


    A "one-way" mirror ... isn't, actually. It's half-silvered, meaning it allows a fraction of the light that hits it to pass through, but it does that in both directions. You only get the apparent one-way effect by keeping one side bright and the other side dark. so the reflection from the bright side dominates what you see.

    From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, ‘Look at that, you son of a bitch’.

    — Edgar Mitchell, Apollo 14 Astronaut



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    #279
    Into The Blue
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,358 ✭✭✭Into The Blue


    The Dagda wrote: »
    They're.

    It's a science thread.

    Not a linguistics won.


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    #280
    sbsquarepants
    Registered Users Posts: 11,812 ✭✭✭✭sbsquarepants


    somuj wrote: »
    There is no such thing as color just different wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum.

    There is no specific wavelength for pink - it is entirely concocted by your brain.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9dqJRyk0YM


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    #281
    Into The Blue
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,358 ✭✭✭Into The Blue


    The core concept for The Last of Us was inspired by a segment of a BBC nature documentary Planet Earth (2006), which featured the Cordyceps fungi. These fungi can infect and grow from an ant's head, take control of the ant's motor functions, forcing it to help cultivate said fungus.



    It has begun!!!!


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    #282
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 26,052 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Into The Blue wrote: »
    The core concept for The Last of Us was inspired by a segment of a BBC nature documentary Planet Earth (2006), which featured the Cordyceps fungi. These fungi can infect and grow from an ant's head, take control of the ant's motor functions, forcing it to help cultivate said fungus.



    It has begun!!!!


    Asimov came up with this very scenario in The Puppet Masters! Is there nothing the man didn't predict?


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    #283
    Into The Blue
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,358 ✭✭✭Into The Blue


    Candie wrote: »
    Asimov came up with this very scenario in The Puppet Masters! Is there nothing the man didn't predict?

    Nothing.


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    #284
    Rucking_Fetard
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,260 ✭✭✭Rucking_Fetard


    Newly-discovered waste-eating bacteria could help in nuclear waste disposal


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    #285
    Call Me Jimmy
    Registered Users Posts: 8,449 ✭✭✭Call Me Jimmy


    One of the best threads on boards, only seeing it for the first time.

    The most interesting to me is the how the fundamental patterns seem to reflect away from us in terms of as things get bigger, a certain pattern emerges, as things get smaller the same pattern emerges. For example, is it the atom nucleus that looks like a galaxy? If we could see deeper into that somehow im sure the next pattern we'd see is one similar to clusters and superclusters etc.

    What I take from all this information is that I am as objectively significant as I am insignificant and that there are amazing things to be unearthed in the human experience. In the future we'll be like 'how the **** did they spend one second watching tv, being distracted from the wonder they were inhabiting'.


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    #286
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 91,058 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    i heart chewy louie wrote: »
    I doubt it.
    Dinosaurs are still with us


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    #287
    Joe Doe
    Closed Accounts Posts: 559 ✭✭✭Joe Doe


    Indeed super-global recurring patterns e.g. 1.618033988749895 are just one indication of a higher order and supreme intelligence, over all else.


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    #288
    mayobumblebee
    Registered Users Posts: 236 ✭✭mayobumblebee


    steddyeddy wrote: »
    Anyone got any facts about how the world works? Here's one of my favourite:

    The honey bee, apis mellifera is one of the most interesting animals. A colony of honey bees can contain tens of thousands of bees. Amongst the bees are workers (females), a few males and a queen. The queen can live up to twenty times longer than the workers, she has no sting, no wax gland or no pollen baskets. She is near to double the size of a worker bee. Worker bees live for weeks yet the queen lives fo years. The interesting thing is she is genetically identical to thousands of her sisters since birth yet develops completely differently to them.

    The queen might mate with several males and as a result not all bees will be genetically identical to each other but the hive will contain tens of thousands of genetical identical bees. All of these genetically identical larvae will be fed royal jelly from the nurse bees up to their third day of life. Then something mysterious happens, for some reason as of yet unknown to scientists, the nurse bees select some of the larvae (for reasons as yet unknown) which are indentical to their sisters and continue to feed them royal jelly after the third day. The rest of the larvae are fed pollen and nectar and develop into worker bees. The larvae fed on royal jelly develop into queen bees.

    Only recently has the mechanisim behind this been elucidated. Royal jelly is a strange highly nutritious substance containing amino acids, strange fats and some as of yet uknown substances. This substance causes methylation of the bee's DNA (the addition of a carbon and three hydrogens to one of the DNA bases) this causes some of the genes to shut off and other genes to turn off. Hence one substance causes a complete change in the phenotype (the genotype is the actual list genes contained in the organism but the phenotype is the expression of those genes) of that animal.

    sorry dont mean to bee an annoyance the queen does have a stinger she uses it to kill other rivals it does not come out like that of the worker she cannot usually sting humans because she cannot bend her tummy to that degree because of her size. the male also dies as soon as he mates as his sex organs explode into the queen who stores the fluid she recieves on her maiting flight in a special sac. she can then fertalise an egg with sperm making a female or not making a male who passes on her genetics to another hive. the male has no sting he develops sex organs instead


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    #289
    McDermotX
    Registered Users Posts: 14,945 ✭✭✭✭McDermotX


    Filthy.


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    #290
    the_monkey
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,556 ✭✭✭the_monkey


    There is more coca cola produced in the world each year then there is water on the planet.



    true story .


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    #291
    Capt'n Midnight
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 91,058 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    Joe Doe wrote: »
    Indeed super-global recurring patterns e.g. 1.618033988749895 are just one indication of a higher order and supreme intelligence, over all else.
    LOL

    That number originally came from a model of biological growth.*

    So not exactly surprising that it keeps popping up in biological systems.


    It's use in design might be related to the width and height of our binocular vision



    * Just in like Fr Ted , Dougal had one rabbit, then they wondered how he moved so fast and it was a second rabbit and then they noticed another one on Fr Jacks head and the next day it was like a big rabbit rock festival.


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    #292
    endacl
    Registered Users Posts: 22,275 ✭✭✭✭endacl


    Joe Doe wrote: »
    Indeed super-global recurring patterns e.g. 1.618033988749895 are just one indication of a higher order and supreme intelligence, over all else.
    Dafuq?


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    #293
    Maximus Alexander
    Registered Users Posts: 13,080 ✭✭✭✭Maximus Alexander


    Joe Doe wrote: »
    Indeed super-global recurring patterns e.g. 1.618033988749895 are just one indication of a higher order and supreme intelligence, over all else.

    But on the other hand, the fact that we each have to take a dump every day is just one indication that there is no higher order or supreme intelligence.


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    #294
    endacl
    Registered Users Posts: 22,275 ✭✭✭✭endacl


    Maximus Alexander wrote: »
    But on the other hand, the fact that we each have to take a dump every day is just one indication that there is no higher order or supreme intelligence.

    I dunno. Could've been every hour...


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    #295
    Dravokivich
    Moderators, Category Moderators, Music Moderators, Politics Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 22,360 CMod ✭✭✭✭Dravokivich


    endacl wrote: »
    I dunno. Could've been every hour...

    And if it is, get that checked out!


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    #296
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 25,611 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Call Me Jimmy wrote: »
    One of the best threads on boards, only seeing it for the first time.

    The most interesting to me is the how the fundamental patterns seem to reflect away from us in terms of as things get bigger, a certain pattern emerges, as things get smaller the same pattern emerges. For example, is it the atom nucleus that looks like a galaxy? If we could see deeper into that somehow im sure the next pattern we'd see is one similar to clusters and superclusters etc.
    A bit too simplistic really. Atoms don't really "look like" the shell diagrams.


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    #297
    Joe Doe
    Closed Accounts Posts: 559 ✭✭✭Joe Doe


    Some stuff about 1.618 observed in nanoscale/micro atomic ss quantum mater. Part of the f'sequence is present in the dna helix also.

    Anyway off to watch that move called: 23, that's another story...


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    #298
    ScumLord
    Registered Users Posts: 28,789 ✭✭✭✭ScumLord


    Capt'n Midnight wrote: »
    Dinosaurs are still with us
    Yeah, they just don't look as cool. Luckily science can make them look cool again.

    http://www.ted.com/talks/jack_horner_building_a_dinosaur_from_a_chicken?language=en


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    #299
    OldNotWIse
    Closed Accounts Posts: 12,468 ✭✭✭✭OldNotWIse


    Duggy747 wrote: »
    Ducks have corkscrew willies and like to dish out a bit of the old rape when mating.

    I think cat penises have spikes on them too that come out during sex so that the female cant pull away. Terrible stuff :(


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    #300
    catallus
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,106 ✭✭✭catallus


    Actually they found a dinosaur fossil over in the desert in Africa and they say it could have been a swimmer.

    http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29143096

    But how it could have swam in the desert is another question altogether.

    It also raises the question of how fast water turns to sand.


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    #301
    endacl
    Registered Users Posts: 22,275 ✭✭✭✭endacl


    catallus wrote: »
    Actually they found a dinosaur fossil over in the desert in Africa and they say it could have been a swimmer.

    http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29143096

    But how it could have swam in the desert is another question altogether.

    It also raises the question of how fast water turns to sand.

    Must have had a rapid evolution after The Flood.


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