Tag: latestpost

A Chat With Jaan Altosaar From Useful Science

By Anupum Pant

Today is a special day on Awesci because I’m publishing the first ever interview that has been done especially for the website – A talk with one of the creators of Useful Science, Jaan Altosaar. I hope I keep bringing more of these interesting talks in the future.

Useful Science – Background

Useful Science is a super-hit science website run by a team of grad students from some of the world’s top universities like MIT, McGill, UCSB, Oxford, and Johns Hopkins. The website does exactly what its name says – Publishes practically useful science research summaries (every of them is cited) that can be understood by anyone in 5 seconds or less – a marvelous concept, I must say.

Make sure you finish reading our talk because in the end Jaan shares a great piece of information, without which and article on AweSci wouldn’t be labeled as complete.

A: When did you start Useful Science? Could you share with us what goes behind the scenes at Useful Science?

J: We launched on January 15th, 2014. We use Trello to coordinate our team and review process, and many of us use RSS feed readers to stay on top of the latest research (e.g. we subscribe to research journals, EurekAlerts, and blog feeds). The backend (designed and run by Cameron Spencer at lab43.com) is built on Drupal. We use Google Analytics for tracking stats, Hootsuite for managing our social media profiles, and Mailchimp for our email list (subscribe here!).

A: How did all of you guys meet?

J: Most of us are connected through McGill (our alma mater) and more specifically, we lived together in Douglas Hall in first year! I reached out to the rest of the contributors after meeting them at graduate school open houses.

A: Where else on the web do the team members write?

J: A few of us have personal websites; they’re listed on Useful Science’s about page.

A: What advice will you give to the thousands of Indians who apply to graduate school every year?

J: I found the process time-consuming but worth it, and tried to organize my thoughts into a resource in the form of a blog post (focused on graduate school).

A: Why did you feel the need to start Useful Science?

J: We felt there was a gap in science communication. The question was: what would a website look like if every sentence on it was cited?

A: Judging from your backgrounds, you people just love science too much and do it for the joy of it, but do you ever wish to make money out of useful science?

 J: We’d wish to make only enough to make the website sustainable. We are non-profit and any funds we receive through donations go directly to upkeep of the website (e.g. server costs and new features).

A: What revenue sources do you have in mind?

J: We’re hoping to integrate with Shirts.io so that anyone can order any of the one sentence summaries on a t-shirt.

A: I’ve read about you on Lifehacker, where else on the web, have you been featured?

J: We’ve been lucky to have been featured in BoingBoing, the McGill Science Undergraduate Research Journal’s blog, BetaKit, McGill’s Office for Science and Society blog, ITworld, the McGill Reporter, and Computerworld.

A: Before you go, could you share with us an interesting piece of science trivia for the day from any of your favorite areas?

J: One of my favorite areas of research focuses on the importance of mindset. Specifically, believing that intelligence is malleable and not fixed (i.e. it can be improved with practice) has been shown to improve grades. It’s great motivation for overcoming failure and pursuing deliberate practice.

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This Little Math Trick Proves a Profound Point

By Anupum Pant

Someone shows you a random set of numbers, say 2, 4, 8 and says that I have a rule in my mind for selecting these numbers to have them in the series. Your task is to guess the rule. But the only way you are allowed to do that is by stating 3 numbers and confirming if they follow the rule or not (any number of times). The host won’t lie, will just say yes it does, or no it doesn’t. See how fast can you guess the rule that he has in his mind.

Assuming you’ve watched it, it is natural for all of us to confirm the rule that is followed by the series 2, 4, 8 over and over, assuming that it must be, the multiply-by-two rule (your hypothesis). You try to prove your that hypothesis is right, several times. Never once do you try  to disprove your hypothesis (not soon enough at least), which could have straight away given you the answer. Even though the rule is pretty straight forward, you just can’t seem to figure the rule out.

This little math trick or puzzle or exercise conducted by Veritasium (a science video blog) proves a profound point.

In fact, this is a classic exercise used by teachers all over the world with which they are able to prove it to their students – Humans tend to notice or come up with a hypothesis first and then they try to prove it right every time instead of trying to prove it wrong.

This phenomenon where people constantly seek out information to prove their existing opinions and overlook the information that proves it wrong is called Confirmation bias. It affects our decision-making in all aspects of our lives and can cause us to make poor choices.

It happens all the time

You watch a conspiracy theory documentary – say the one that says, moon landing is a hoax. The documentary seeds an idea in your mind by repeatedly confirming an idea – the moon landing was a hoax – through various ‘proofs’. When you finish watching it, you go to Google and seek out information that confirms the theory; you are amazed. And then, you start noticing that some of your friends are making great points that also confirm the conspiracy. The same information coming from different sources seems genuine and now you get convinced that the moon landing was indeed a big conspiracy.

This is how conspiracy theories can make you – a rational human being – believe in something as outrageous as – the moon landing was a hoax or AIDS does not exist and so on…

This is the reason investors believe in company-failing rumors, confirm it by Googling to seek out negative opinions, overlook the positive news and make poor financial decisions in the stock market.

The profound point

As time passes, by never trying to disprove something, you collect subscriptions to blogs, magazines, books, people and television channels that confirm your beliefs. You become so confident in your world-view that people stop trying to dissuade you. At some point, if you are not cautious enough, you would stop questioning your own beliefs. You would eventually end up in a situation where everyone else knows that everything you have ever believed is actually false and you still remain a confident fool.

In science, a belief moves closer to the truth when scientists try to find  evidence to disprove something. You should probably do the same in your life.

Moral: Try to never believe in something you read or hear instantly. Develop your own opinions by also feeding yourself the information that questions your beliefs and then make an informed decision.

Without disregarding it as utter B.S, this is the reason I listened to the three-hour long debate – Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham.

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Can Your Eyes Breathe?

By Anupum Pant

Wait! Who says eyes breathe

The transparent front part of the eye that covers the iris and pupil is called Cornea. Cornea contributes a lot to the focusing power of the eye. That means, light has to pass through it without obstruction. To do that it has to remain completely clear. Consequently, to remain transparent, it can’t have any impurities nor can it have any blood vessels – that would have made it less transparent.

Every organ needs oxygen to run the cell processes with the energy that comes by oxidizing nutrients contained in the cells. To receive oxygen, they need to have access to blood. Since Cornea does not have any blood vessels, it cannot receive oxygen from blood. So what does it do to stay alive?

It absorbs oxygen directly from the air through diffusion. Oxygen gets dissolved in the tears and then diffuses across the cornea. However, the amount of diffused oxygen is so less that it is just enough for only the cornea cells. This can’t be supplied to other parts of the body. And this is exactly the reason you would get yourself killed if you plug your nose and your mouth, expecting your eye would keep you alive by breathing in oxygen.

In a sense, you could call it breathing. But it isn’t exactly ‘breathing’. Breathing, according to the medical definition means:

The process of respiration, during which air is inhaled into the lungs through the mouth or nose due to muscle contraction and then exhaled due to muscle relaxation.

Clearly, as the oxygen received by cornea doesn’t come from the mouth or nose and never goes through the lungs, it cannot be called breathing.

Other ways?

Let us consider the second possibility. At the inner corner of the eye there is a very thin tube that connects to the nose. Through this tube (A.K.A the Punctum), your eye is able to drain off excess tears. Punctum is the reason, you have to blow your nose when you cry. Punctum is also the tube that enables this guy to squirt milk out of his eyes (By sucking it through his nose first) [Video – Pretty disgusting to watch]

Also, you can blow an extremely tiny volume air out of these corner eye holes. But, you can’t breathe in through them.

Conclusion

Although the cornea of your eye has the ability to absorb oxygen directly from the air, you cannot technically call it breathing.

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Whatsapp Uses This Mind Trick for Effective Persuasion

By Anupum Pant

Okay, time and again I’ve urged you to subscribe to 59Seconds on YouTube – A relatively new channel where Richard Wiseman, a professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire, talks about interesting psychological studies that actually matter. If you haven’t done it already, you’ve probably missed their new video where he talks about an effective persuasion trick that could help you sales and marketing guys perform better at work.

Note: I have no idea if they teach this in Business schools (because I’ve never been to one). If they do, you could skip to this article where I talk about another trick that could help you persuade better. I bet no one teaches that at school.

Simply put

The trick is called ‘Foot-in-the-door‘ technique. It is basically a technique that involves getting a person to say yes to a bigger request by first setting them up with a smaller request.

Here is how it works:

Suppose you need a large sign installed in the front-yard of a house. What do you do?

No, You don’t go to them and ask if you could place the sign there. Chances are high that they will say no  to that big request, says this study.

According to the research study, this is what works the best – Go and ask if you could put a tiny sign on their front yard – a little request. There is a great chance they will say, fine, how would that tiny sign affect me. A few days later, go back and ask if you could replace the tiny one with a bigger board – about 76% of the people would say yes.

How can you use it?

The best way is to observe and learn from examples. Look at how ‘Freemium‘ products and services use it. They’ll give you something for free – say the software Workflowy – An amazing piece of software. You’ll start using it. The chances are great that you’ll find it very useful, you’ll get addicted and will have a lot invested in it (not money, you will have a couple of notes stored in it). Now, the day you try to store the 251st note on it, you’ll be asked to extend services by putting in some money or by sharing it with your friends. Instead of taking pains to migrate to some other note-taking software, or sell it to others, you’ll pay that small amount and buy their pro pack.

Why do you think supermarkets give away samples for free? And why do you think they place 75% sale boards with a little ‘upto’ sign outside shops? Simply to – Get Your Foot in the Door.

This is the best. Why do you think Whatsapp installs for free?
The answer is, to get you in and make you invest in it (again, not money, time and effort), only to ask you for a dollar the next year. Who’d say no to that after they’ve made a huge network of useful contacts on it!

Now watch how Prof. Wiseman explains it. [Link]

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Cinnamon Challenge is Deadly – Don’t do it

By Anupum Pant

A couple of years back a dare game went viral on the internet through YouTube. It was called the Cinnamon challenge. Literally everybody was doing it. There were more than half a Million videos uploaded, of people doing that challenge. Although the popularity has declined to very low levels today, there still are people who haven’t stopped trying this fad out. Here is a tiny contribution, backed by solid science, from my side to help stop this deadly challenge.

What is Cinnamon Challenge?

It is a dare game where a person dared to do it has to attempt swallowing a tablespoon of cinnamon in under 60 seconds without vomiting or inhaling the powder. Seems easy, but is extremely difficult and people take it on their ego to take the challenge. Moreover it has some serious long-lasting health effects. On video it looks something like this – [Video]

The ill-effects of Cinnamon Challenge

Before I talk about what it can do to you, let me introduce to you Dejah Reed – A girl from Ypsilanti, Michigan who tried the challenge four times. For the first three times fortunately, she did not experience any lasting effects apart from a lot of coughing and spitting. The fourth time proved to be deadly. One of her lung collapsed and had to be rushed to the hospital.
Now she runs a website where she urges people to say no to Cinnamon Challenge.

What can it do to you?

Cinnamon is a healthy thing to eat in small amounts. Although ingesting a spoonful of cinnamon would seem  like a harmless thing to do, it can be really deadly. –

  1. Since it comes from the bark of a plant, it has cellulose. This substance can’t be broken by our bodies easily and can get lodged in the lungs to cause a permanent damage to your body.
  2. Talking about the instant effects, it can prevent oxygen from reaching your lungs and make you choke to death.
  3. The caustic nature of it can cause chronic inflammation on the interior walls of your respiratory system.
  4. Can cause pneumonia.

[Read more]

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Third-Hand Smoke is as Bad as Smoking

By Anupum Pant

Yes, third-hand smoke (THS)! I knew there was second-hand smoke that someone standing near a smoker could inhale and get affected, but never knew there was third-hand smoke. The worst part about it – It is as deadly as smoking a cigarette and effectively affects everybody, irrespective of your proximity to the smoker and his smoke.

So, if you are a non-smoker and the next time someone tells you that their smoking habit is none of your business, you need to tell them, actually it is. The third hand smoke is killing even the non-smokers.

What is third-hand smoke?

Since smoke is nothing but a collection of several tiny particles floating in air, it can get trapped in things like cloth fibers, hair and surfaces. This is the reason you always get that whiff of burning cigarette once a smoker without his cigarette enters a relatively clean room. It stays there, on clothes and objects, for a long time, even after the cigarette has been extinguished and is called third-hand smoke.

Interesting studies

1. Recently, researchers at University of California Riverside decided to study the deadly effects of third-hand smoke. They did the study on mice, exposed them to the kind of exposure normal human beings have to THS. Significant damage to livers and lungs of mice was recorded.

2. Last year, Lara Gundel, a scientist from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, published a study on the effects of THS on Human DNA. Scientists exposed paper strips to cigarette smoke for 258 hours and ventilated air for 35 hours. After this, they exposed the compounds collected in that paper to human cells in petri dishes. It showed that THS can cause harm and mutation in Human DNA cells. It doesn’t stop at that. The potential to cause problems by THS can increase with time.

How it affects you

The thing about third-hand smoke that should worry you the most is, almost everyone comes in contact with it; at home, work, restaurants, bars, shops, etc… It is not like second-hand smoke where you have to inhale the smoke to get affected (equally deadly).

  • Smoke from cigarettes can collect over time on the walls and objects of a room; layer upon layer of carcinogenic compounds!
  • Cars, due to their small sizes and a lot of fibrous material inside can be the worst THS affected areas.
  • Someone smoking in some other room with a fan turned on can send a significant amount of particulates your way. These things can travel far, keep collecting in your room and can potentially affect every body.
  • Children and infants are the worst affected. As they touch objects and put things in their mouths, their tender developing brains can get affected by this more than adults (infants experience about 20 times greater effects)
  • Watch out for smoke rooms. You shouldn’t have a reason to go with your smoker friends in there.
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Train Wheels are Not as Simple as They Seem

By Anupum Pant

I’m pretty sure not many of you know this about train wheels, neither did I.

Look at the picture and answer this: What do you think keeps a train moving on the track? or Which part of the wheel do you think it is that keeps the train from careening away from the track at turns?
Applying general logic, I thought that flanges at the end of the wheels  kept a train from going off rails at a turn. Turns out, I was wrong!

In fact, flanges at the end of the wheels are just a safety mechanism to keep the train on its track only if the main mechanism fails. And what is that main mechanism?

The problem with cornersTrain wheels are conical in shape. That means they have a varying diameter at different points of contact. Now, suppose the track turns right. The train’s left wheels now have to travel more than the right wheels because at the turn the track on the left is longer.

So how do the left wheels travels more than the right wheels without a differential?
Since the wheels are conical in shape, the whole wheel-set shifts a bit to the left, if the track curves right. Now the point of contact of the left wheel is at a larger diameter of the cone. While the smaller wheel Correction from the toptouches at a point where the diameter of the wheel is lesser. Therefore, if the left wheel now makes one circle it travels further than the right wheels and the train moves along the curve smoothly.

The whole beauty of this system is that the amount of shift of the wheel-set happens automatically, makes the train move on turns smoothly and keeps the train on track.

Look at how you can try this at home using 2 plastic cups and 2 similar pipes. [Experiment]

If I couldn’t explain it properly, probably the best physics teacher ever – Richard Feynman – will explain it to you better. [Video]

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He Lives With No Heart Beating in His Chest

By Anupum Pant

Imagine this…
You are a doctor. A patient comes to you complaining of something and now you need to check his heartbeat. You plug the stethoscope in your ears and confidently move the probe to touch the chest of this patient, only to find that there is no heart beating inside that chest! In medical terms, isn’t this a dead man walking?

The answer is no, he is as alive as we are.  Medical technology has made it possible for a man to live without a traditional beating heart. Two incredible doctors, Billy Cohn & Bud Frazier, in the year 2011, replaced Craig A. Lewis’s lifeless heart with a revolutionary artificial device – A device that can replace your heart and lets the blood flow continuously – without a beat. By all criteria that doctors use to analyse patients, Craig is dead.

Side note: Do read about that scientist who died and came back to life – [Is There a Scientific Explanation for Everything?]

There is no beating when it works. Through a stethoscope, a doctor would probably hear a continuous whistling of blood sluicing through synthetic pipes and motors (I’m not sure about that). The two doctors had been testing it on cattle and it was their only hope to save Craig’s life. So, they decided to do it – replace his heart with this revolutionary device.

Related article: A heart that runs on nuclear energy – [Nuclear powered pacemakers for the heart]

Yes, technically you could say Craig A. Lewis is a heartless guy, but this is a serious leap in medical technology we are talking about here.

You cannot miss this very-short BBC documentary – “Heart Stop Beating” – where both the doctors talk about how they did something that had never been done before. [Video]

Heart Stop Beating | Jeremiah Zagar from Focus Forward Films on Vimeo.

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The Marathon Monks of Japan

By Anupum Pant

I saw this on TV a couple years back. Just now when I was going through my archives, I came across the Tarahumara people article and I remembered having watched a documentary about the Marathon Monks of Japan.

Who are they?

Just outside Kyoto there is a mountain that goes by the name, Mt. Hiei. If you happen to spend a holiday there, you might notice a very absurd thing – hundreds of unmarked graves dotting the mountain terrain. These graves are the resting place of those Buddhist monks, who couldn’t complete a spiritual challenge called the Kaihogyo.

This challenge, Kaihogyo, which has killed several monks on Mt. Hiei is an extreme physical challenge that involves an inordinate amount of running and other related endurance activities, which if a monk fails to complete has to die.

How much running?

Well, the challenge lasts for 7 years. For the first 3 years, a monk has to run at least 30 km (18.6 miles) everyday for 100 consecutive days. For the 4th and 5th year, he has to run 30 km everyday for 200 consecutive days. All of this running is done on the mountain terrain, making their way through dense forests and surviving on just rice (or noodles).

It doesn’t end there. Once a monk is able to some how complete these 5 long years of pain, then he has to go 9 straight days without food, water or even sleep. Let me remind you, the world record for the longest span a human being has been awake is 11 days. To make sure that the monk doesn’t sleep accidentally, there are 2 other monks watching him continuously.

If you think that was a lot already, wait, there is more. For the 6th year, the monk has to run for 60 km (37.2 miles) everyday for 100 days.  During the 7th year he has to run 84 km (52 miles) every day for the first 100 days and 30 km per day for the remaining 100 days.

Withdrawing: In the first year, if a monk wishes to withdraw, he can. But, if he moves on to the 101th day, there can be no withdrawal. The only way to withdraw after the 100th day is to commit suicide.

In the last 400 years only 46 monks have been able to complete this. Watch the short documentary below. [Video]

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Radioactive Toothpaste + Shocking Ad from the 50s

By Anupum Pant

Advertisements in the past were far more dishonest than the ones we come across these days. By promoting quack applications and building a multi-million dollar empire in those days, businesses were far ahead of today’s corporations in terms of dishonesty.

Read about Radioactive batteries here. [Link]

Serious Quackery

One such advertisement by a German company under the brand name of Doramad, till the year 1945, was able to convince thousands of people to shell their money on a specially formulated toothpaste that contained a little amount of Thorium – a naturally occurring radioactive element. The toothpaste sold for astronomical prices and brought in big money to businesses and individuals. It claimed that the radioactive element present in the toothpaste would bring the users great health benefits and would make their teeth shine brighter.

After it was certain that Germany would lose the war, a German company the Auer Company rerouted thorium from the Nazi atomic program in the year 1944. Thus, the company saw a future for nuclear materials in cosmetics and created Doramad toothpaste.

The Doramud brochure came with information like this:

Its radioactivity increases the defenses of teeth and gums. The cells are loaded with new life energy, the bacteria are hindered in their destroying effect. This explains the excellent prophylaxis and healing process with gingival diseases. It gently polishes the dental enamel so it turns white and shiny. Prevents dental calculus. Wonderful lather and a new, pleasant, mild and refreshing taste. Can be applied sparingly.  – [SadAndUseless]

Another man by the name of Alfred Curie sold a similar toothpaste that contained both Thorium and Radium. This person was in no way related to Marie Curie, yet he did not leave the chance of making a big buck using that name.

More than just Radioactive Toothpaste

It did not stop there. Alfred also managed to make his other radioactive cosmetic products extremely popular among the common people. He sold cremes, powders and lip-sticks under the brand name of Tho-Radia. These cosmetics claimed that they would transform your dull skin into an extremely healthy rejuvenated skin.

During those times when the science behind radioactivity was still being studied by the famous scientists like Rutherford and Marie Curie, radioactivity was not well understood by the common people. Random people claimed that Radium was the cure for everything and made a lot of money out of this propaganda. In fact, even in newspapers one could find seriously mis-informed headlines like –

Radium Makes Blind Girl See 

Who knows, people in the future might find the ads we see today, as shocking…

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Concrete Cloth – Makes Durable Shelters Within Hours

By Anupum Pant

Today we have something which civil engineers would be extremely proud of – A recent innovation in concrete technology that has an immense life-changing potential – The concrete cloth; certainly a splendid engineering marvel.

What is it?

It is material which feels like a very thick canvas and has a three-dimensional fiber matrix. This piece of thick cloth is impregnated with a specially formulated concrete mixture. Once it is completely wet with water, it hardens into a thin, strong, fire-resistant and water-proof material, within a few hours. Commercial variants either have a hydrophobic coating on the outer surface or a PVC lining from the inside to make it completely impermeable to water.

Concrete Cloth

Since it just a thick piece of canvas impregnated with concrete, it can be transported fairly easily and can be made into various shapes to be used for different applications. For instance, it can be used for rapidly deploying hardened concrete shelters for people in need. It works like this:

  1. You carry a huge concrete canvas balloon with you in a truck.
  2. Place it wherever you need the shelter to be deployed.
  3. Pump water into it.
  4. Quickly start inflating it using a pump.
  5. Pull it around using, say a truck.
  6. Wait for it to harden.

Advantages:

  • To erect a shelter with concrete canvas, it only takes a fraction of the time taken to construct a shelter using tradition building techniques.
  • Unlike cloth tents, this one is extremely durable and can last for about 10 years. Moreover, it protects the residents from any form of extreme weather outside (Thermally insulated).
  • Construction material is light enough to be transported by a small pickup truck.
  • Requires just 2 people and can be deployed to a ready state within 24 hours – Within these 24 hours it gains about 80% of its full strength.
  • Can be tailored as required with the help of staples, cuts and nails / screws. In fact cutting it before hardening is not much different from cutting a thick piece of cloth.
  • Does not burn and is water-proof.

[Read more]

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Practical, Impractical and Bizarre Ways to Lose Weight

By Anupum Pant

Here are some impractical, practical and bizarre ways to lose weight scientifically:

1. Practical – Switch to Smaller Plates [Study]

While it may sound like switching plates won’t help your diet, it actually greatly affects the way you see, and consume food. In the long run it helps you lose weight effortlessly.

If you don’t believe me, I suggest you look at the following common optical illusion – Tell me which one of the circle that is filled with black color, is larger?

You know the answer. Although they don’t look equal to our not-so-smart brain, both of the circles are really equal in size. But what does that tell you?

Moral: Think of the black circle as food. Put it in a larger plate and you think it is less food, and you don’t mind adding little more food to it. Whereas, if you use smaller plates, the amount food looks like it is a lot already. As a result, if you own only small plates, you won’t add more food. Who am I to tell you that little changes give big results.

It has been proven by scientists that using smaller standard plates will reduce your consumption by around 20% every time. 20% is not less!

Note: Similarly, if you want to drink less, you could try replacing your short and stout glasses with taller glasses. This technique is based on another optical illusion known as the T-Illusion – which says that we tend to over-estimate the length of objects placed vertically. See it for yourself. [link]

Other Good Ways: In fact, before moving on to the bad ways, you must know that there are several good ways to lose weight without even trying hard. For instance:

  • Drinking good amounts of cold water can help to some extent.
  • Or, you could try making it a rule to turn away and use stairs, every single time you come across an escalator.
  • When you are travelling in a bus, make it a rule to always get down one stop before your destination.
  • An apple before breakfast everyday can help you lose weight by making you feel full due to its fiber content. – [Source]
  • Just place a mirror in your kitchen or your refrigerator door. Yes, that helps. How? See this – [Video]

2. Bizarre – Excessive Gum Chewing? [Study]

Wait! Before you try this, let me tell you, this is one of those impractical / bizarre ways to experience severe weight loss I was talking about in the first line of this post. Since excess of anything isn’t good – backed by the fact that in ancient China people committed suicide by eating a pound of salt – chewing excess gum probably isn’t a good way to lose weight. I mention it just for the sake of information.

Sugar-free chewing gums contain Sorbitol – a laxative. Chewing these in excessive amounts – about 15+ a day – can cause serious weight loss and chronic diarrhea.

You’ll end up in the hospital if you try this.

3. Impractical – Don’t get Married. [Study]

Although deciding to remain single all your life is not so impractical for everybody, you could consider it socially impractical (at least in orthodox Indian societies).

Yes, studies prove that Married men were 25% more likely to be overweight or obese than single men or men in committed relationship (i.e. dating or engaged). – Thanks to UsefulScience.org

Now, go and subscribe the budding 59 Seconds channel on YouTube and buy the book. That is what I am doing…

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More Britons Died on The Titanic Because They Were Polite

By Anupum Pant

Tahir Shah in his book, House of the Tiger King wrote:

“As the head of an expedition, you can’t pussyfoot around being polite to everyone. You have to show your teeth once in a while; a little growling goes a long way.”

It turns out, a little growling can indeed go a long way – Sometimes it can even save your lives. Let’s see how…

Two Stories

Let us consider the two widely studied ship tragedies – Titanic and Lusitania. Here is a brief copied background of both the ship stories (to make it easier for you):

Titanic’s story: Titanic was a British passenger liner that sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912 after colliding with an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton, UK to New York City, US. The sinking of Titanic caused the deaths of more than 1,500 people in one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in modern history. – Wikipedia

Lusitania’s Story: Lusitania was a British ocean liner, holder of the Blue Riband and briefly the world’s biggest ship. She was launched by the Cunard Line in 1907, at a time of fierce competition for the North Atlantic trade. In 1915 she was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat, causing the deaths of 1,198 passengers and crew. – Wikipedia

Differences and Similarities

Similarities: Both of them were British ships and capsized almost during the same time (a three years difference). Both the ships carried a similar distribution of passengers in terms of their age, gender and economic status. Chance of survival for voyagers in both the ships was around 30%.

Differences: One important thing to note about the sinking of Titanic was that after it hit the iceberg, it took about 160 minutes to sink. Whereas Lusitania was hit by a torpedo and it collapsed in 18 minutes. Isn’t that a big difference in time?

Since time taken to sink is the only big difference in both the stories, scientists think that this explains the changed behavior of people aboard, during the last minutes. As a result, it explains the big difference in the kind of people who died in Titanic-tragedy vs. Lusitania-tragedy.

Who died?

In Lusitania, which sank in 18  minutes, many youngsters who ages ranged from 16-35 years, survived. Since, people had no time to think and assemble into social groups, the fittest people were able to push their way out and survive – youngsters who were physically competent, survived.

Whereas Titanic sank in about 160 minutes, it gave people enough time to take into consideration, the social protocols. As a result several men queued up and politely let the women and children go first.

This is the reason, scientists think, more men survived when Lusitania sank. Whereas more women and children survived when Titanic sank.

British boys

on the Titanic, it is calculated that Americans were 8.5 per cent more likely to survive. On the other hand, British passengers were 7 per cent less likely to survive. A big difference! Why?

Australian researchers believe that since British passengers on the Titanic queued up politely to get into the lifeboats, a significantly high number of them died. Also, they think that Americans elbowed their way out, but there is no direct evidence that supports Americans were rude on the ship. If they were, we’ll never know.

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World’s Most Powerful Sound Systems Can Kill You

By Anupum Pant

In the past we’ve seen sound systems that used plasma instead of magnets to produce sound. Well, those plasma sound systems were pretty well equipped to kill you, but they would do it in a different manner – by electrocuting you. This one we are talking about today, literally kills you with sound.

LEAF

European Space Agency uses an extra-large speaker that throws extra-big sound at test objects. It is known to recreate the sound that a launcher produces while taking off and travelling through atmosphere. This speaker, known as, the Large European Acoustic Facility (LEAF) in Netherlands, is used by the European Space Agency to test satellite parts.

The Glory: They say that if any person listens to sound playing on this speaker, he/she won’t survive. This is the reason, the most powerful sound system in Europe, is enclosed in a facility that has walls that 17 meters in height, are half a meter thick and are overlaid with a resin on the inner walls that reflects sound & does not let it escape. Also, it has a safety mechanism that doesn’t allow anyone to power it on, if the doors are not shut properly.

Nitrogen is pumped in great amounts through the huge ear-canal-like thing which enables it to produce sounds up to 154 decibel! If you are wondering how loud 154 decibel is, you should check this out – How Loud Can it Get. In short, it is loud enough to rupture your eardrums and probably kill you too.

I came across this equipment first at [PopSci]
More information at [ESA]

So I wondered, if this is the most powerful sound system in Europe, are there more powerful ones elsewhere in the world?
Duh! Yeah. And as expected, it is in USA.

Reverberant Acoustic Test Facility (RATF)

Orion-Integrated-Environmental-TestingThe Orion Integrated Environmental Testing at the NASA Space Power Facility (SPF), a huge facility which looks pretty much like a nuclear power plant from afar, houses several other testing facilities, and the world’s largest space environment simulation chamber, also has the worlds most powerful sound system – The Reverberant Acoustic Test Facility. [Image]

The horns that produce sound here, are also powered by Nitrogen and there are 36 of them. It is able to produce a total sound pressure of 163 dB, which is a lot more than what LEAF can produce (because dB scale is not linear) – About seven times more powerful than standing next to a jet engine or a Formula 1 race car. In here, it is far too easy to kill a full grown man.

Ultimate Problem Solving by a Crow

By Anupum Pant

Background

I know I wrote about how smart crows can be a few days back, but even when I wasn’t particularly searching for amazing crow videos, I happened to stumble upon an astounding video of a crow solving some puzzle. I was so blown away by this, that I couldn’t resist sharing another crow post in under two weeks. Hold your hats because this crow, nicknamed 007 will blow them off your heads.

Side note: Want to see a chimpanzee blow your mind? Watch him do a task that more than 95% of the humans wouldn’t be able to do as well as he can do it. – [Working Memory – Chimpanzees vs. Humans]

Alex studies wild birds which he releases after 3 months of research. This one is nicknamed 007 and it is about to attempt what Alex believes is one of the most complex tests for the animal mind ever constructed. The bird is familiar with the individual objects, but this is the first time he is seeing them arranged like this.

This video comes from a BBC show called ‘Inside the Animal Mind‘ hosted by Chris Packham. [Video]

In the video, a wild crow, previously not having learnt anything about the 8-part arrangement of the puzzle, manages to solve it with ease. I would have taken some time to figure out the solution.

8-Part sequence

  1. The crow pulls out a small piece of stick from a thread.
  2. It then approaches a box containing a piece of food and figures that it would need a longer stick to get it. It moves on with the smaller stick to take a stone out of another box.
  3. Takes out another stone
  4. And one more
  5. Drops one of the three stones in a box which needs the weight of all three to release a longer stick.
  6. Drops the second.
  7. And the third. The longer stick is released. It takes the long stick.
  8. Finally, the crow uses the longer stick to pull out food from the box mentioned in second point.

How I try to believe it

Although when I say that the crow wasn’t aware of the arrangement, I mean to say that it wasn’t aware of the sequence in which the puzzle was meant to be solved. It seems as if it was trained with the individual tasks.

I’m guessing that the crow was trained for some time to complete the individual tasks separately and not in a particular sequence. The 8-part sequence was probably shown to it for the first time. I may be wrong. But, I think when the speaker says, “The bird is familiar with the individual objects“, my interpretation makes sense.

If I’m wrong, I yield and state that crows are just too intelligent and are going to take over the world in a few hundred years.

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