“Cured salted pork crafted as a nasal tampon and packed within the nasal vaults successfully stopped nasal hemorrhage promptly, effectively, and without sequelae … To our knowledge, this represents the first description of nasal packing with strips of cured pork for treatment of life-threatening hemorrhage in a patient with Glanzmann thrombasthenia.”

They acknowledge a long tradition of using pork to treat general epistaxis, ie nosebleed. The technique fell into disuse, they speculate, because “packing with salt pork was fraught with bacterial and parasitic complications. As newer synthetic hemostatic agents and surgical techniques evolved, the use of packing with salt pork diminished.”

Link -via Dave Barry | Photo: Flickr user TheDeliciousLife

Finally! If you’re like me, you wake up most days and wonder how to best communicate with people details about your nostrils. Noda Akira has now made this process a lot easier, thanks to his new breath-sensing LED gadget. Watch a video at the link.

Link | Photo: Noda Akira

Figure 1A

Sam Shuster
Emeritus Professor,
University of Newcastle Upon Tyne
Newcastle Upon Tyne, U.K.

Whether you enjoy classical sculpture or just pass it by when visiting stately homes and gardens, you must have noticed that there are many broken-off pieces. You may have further noticed that, if you exclude the commonplace loss of limbs and fingers, the penis fronts the list of lost sculptural properties (see example in Figure 1A and close-up in Figure1B). We all know the penile organ often goes astray socially, but why does its stone version go missing?

As a clinical researcher, I’ve spent a life wondering, a habit too strong to be undone by retirement; and this particular item of sculptural pathology has long idled listlessly on my list of wonderments. Then last year, during a touristic gawp at classical Rome, the enormity of the city’s sculpture population and that population’s inescapable depenilation gave me no option (I felt) but to study the problem. This is the curious story of how that happened.

Penises In, or Not In, The Vatican
My first, simplistic explanation of the missing penises was their deliberate removal, presumably because of distaste for the public showing of a private organ. That would explain the great frequency of their loss from both classical and later pieces on display in public places throughout Europe, where their removal could be executed in silence.

But what about Vatican City? There, surely, sculptures are less likely to be struck by vandalism in the gardens, or for concealment of sexual embarrassment in the great Vatican halls. After all, they were commissioned for their naked appearance, and the many paintings close by are just as revealing. Of course the oldest sculptures would have been exposed before reaching the safety of the Vatican, but the more contemporary pieces were always in safe hands. So my first experimental question about sculptural penis loss (SPL) was whether it was less in Vatican City than elsewhere.

I first explored the Vatican gardens, and while my wife oohed and ahhed at the many beauties to be seen, I oohed and ahhed at their sculptural absence: the shocking answer to my question was that the sculptures of the Vatican Gardens were just as afflicted by SPL as everywhere else.

Figure 1B

Surely, then, the key finding would be the state of sculpture inside the Vatican buildings, where there could be no SPL because anatomy would be protected from social or sexual vandals. Sadly for that hypothesis there was indeed, and obviously, SPL—just as much as outside one  finds (or doesn’t find) in the gardens, and in other parts of the Rome and other European sites.

To be sure of this, I needed quantitative confirmation. So I walked down one side of one of the enormous Vatican halls that extend seemingly unto infinity, each side of which is lined with sculptures, paintings and tapestries, and did an SPL count on a consecutive series of 50 sculptures of males with genital exposure—whether the subjects be adults, children, angels, or putti. To my amazement, almost 80% had lost their sexual termini.

This was serious, particularly as, as a practicing atheist, I had no desire or reason for doing battle with the Vatican.

An Alternative to the Penis
I sought independent confirmation from a  different source— what clinical researchers and would-be scientists call controls, in the belief that when coupled with a suitable dressing from the list of statistical salads, “controls” are an essential component of experimental truth.

There was a pretty obvious confirmatory (“control”) source available. If one protruding piece of terminal anatomy was missing, its loss would only be specific if another protruding piece was not missing. And the protuberance that was the natural “control” of the extremity I’d been examining was equally obvious on the other end of the sculpture, the nose. So I went back down the same track and did a recount of the same sculptures, but this time looking for missing noses. As you will by now have guessed, far fewer noses were lost than penises: just over 20%.

Now I was beginning to get somewhere. If two protuberances were equally available for removal, but only one was selected, there has to have been something special about it.

Failed research, of which I have much well-concealed experience, has left its message: when you think you’ve arrived at your happy ending it’s time to double-check, just as you know that happy music when a film still has 30 minutes left only means trouble. So I walked back past the sculptures yet again, this time trying to keep my mind and eye open to all and any new options—but not with the scientific neutrality some think is essential, because that just sees all things as equals, which means nothing stands out for the picking; far better to look with bias, almost to pretend there’s something worthwhile, which you then go on to reject
when you find it insupportable.

Figure 2A

A Subtlety Noticed
Ambling past the same sculptures again, this time with my selectively open mind, I did find    something different: I noticed some of the noses I’d been counting as intact had a slightly different color. A closer look showed a faint line where the color changed.

The explanation was soon obvious: they’d been repaired. For each missing nose, a new nose had been made and fixed (see Figures 2A and 2B).

As these nasal repairs could have made all the difference to my extremity count, I had to go back yet again to examine the noses of the same group of sculptures more closely. But this time I could see that my odd behaviour had been noticed, and that I was being watched by the Vatican staff, who appeared curious about what I might be up to. I wasn’t stopped, but I could see this would have to be my last go! So staring as blandly as I could, now that I was being watched by    the attendants, I  did a final recount of my small sample group of sculptures, and to my delight—never believe a scientist who claims to be unconcerned about what is found—the number of broken noses, if you include those missing and those repaired and replaced, was over 70%, similar to the number of broken-off penises.

Figure 2B

Projecting Extremities
So my assumed penile pathology was spurious. The findings simply show that projecting extremities are more easily broken off than other bodily hunks. Amazing how the obvious becomes obvious only after you recognise it.

Of course projections are likely to be struck accidentally, but a more interesting possibility (and therefore the one to follow even if it is wrong) is that the molecular stress induced in the stone sculpted by hammer and chisel will always be more extreme on relatively narrow, projecting extremities, which will therefore snap more easily than other, less stressed, parts of the sculpted stone. So maybe it isn’t just coincidence that the Satyr’s non-protuberant genital spiral has remained intact but his nose hasn’t.

Author’s Personal Comment
Satisfying though it was to find an explanation of the penile pathology of classical sculpture, sadly its tameness is much less interesting than the discarded theoretical possibilities, and has taken some of the excitement out of sculpture-viewing.

Author’s Addendum
Since this paper was written, it has been reported that in Italian president Silvio Berlusconi’s office in the Chigi Palace, a second-century sculpture of Mars has been given an adjustable plastic penis to stand with the new plastic hand of Venus.

Editor’s Note
Readers may wish to supplement the observations and analysis in the article with the mostly (but not entirely) related data and commentary gathered and performed three decades earlier by another doctor from the United Kingdom, who also conducted independent research in Italy. See Chris McManus’s “Scrotal Asymmetry in Man and in Ancient Sculpture,” Nature, vol. 259, February 5, 1976, p. 426.

A snippet of McManus’s study “Scrotal Asymmetry in Man and Ancient Sculpture.”

There Dr. McManus writes:

“I observed the scrotal asymmetry of 107 sculptures, either of antique origin or Renaissance copies, in a number of Italian museums and galleries. Table 1 shows that although the ancient artists were correct in tending to place the right testicle higher, they were wrong in so far as they also tended to make the lower testicle the larger: we may postulate that they were also using the common-sense view that the heavier ought to be lower. Although Winckelmann’s observations of antique sculpture were correct, his observations of nature are clearly in error.”

In 2002 Dr. McManus was honored for this work, with an  Ig Nobel Prize in the field of medicine.

_____________________

The article above is republished with permission from the January-February 2011 issue of the Annals of Improbable Research. You can download or purchase back issues of the magazine, or subscribe to receive future issues. Or get a subscription for someone as a gift!

Visit their website for more research that makes people LAUGH and then THINK.

Simon Fletcher runs a Tumblr blog with an inspired mission: to point out images of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in noses everywhere. He writes, “God is the artist. I just find the Ninja Turtle in his work.” Michelangelo would approve. The artist, I mean.

Link -via NotCot

Whythenose.com is dedicated to the act of wearing a clown nose, in order to make people smile.

It’s really that simple. In a world filled with distractions and distrust, you’d be amazed at how many people (of all ages) have lost a sense of innocence. Or maybe you wouldn’t…

Wearing a clown nose is fun, it’s childlike, it’s easy and it’s free (if you already have the nose)

You can enjoy the images, send it to someone who needs a smile, or submit your own pictures. Link -via Metafiilter

Nose Pencil Sharpener – $1.95

Back to school is nearly here. Are you still looking for that perfect back to school item? You need the practical, yet highly amusing, Nose Pencil Sharpener from the NeatoShop.  Be sure to tell all your friends how much fun it is to stick pencils up your nose.

Don’t forget to check out the NeatoShop for more Back To School entertainment!

Link

Pig Nose Mug - $7.95

Are you looking for a funny yet discreet coffee mug?  You need the Pig Nose Mug from the NeatoShop.  The mug looks like a plain, white coffee mug until you take a drink. Printed on the bottom is a hilarious picture of a pig nose.  This mug is perfect for the lighthearted worker who is stuck in a stuffy office environment.

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more hilarious Glassware & Drinkware!

Link

Stretch Body Bits – $1.95

Life can be stressful when you are the type of person who is always lending a ear, hand, nose or foot.  Are you looking for a way to put the play back in your day? With the Stretch Body Bits from the NeatoShop stretching yourself thin just became more fun.

Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more fun-tastic Gag Gifts & Pranks!

If you really love your dog, you can immortalize its nose in jewelry! Jackie Kaufman makes these necklaces using a mold of your dog’s nose, which you can do yourself using a kit. Find out more at Pawesome. Link

The study titled “The Smell of Virtue” was unusually simple and conclusive. Participants engaged in several tasks, the only difference being that some worked in unscented rooms, while others worked in rooms freshly spritzed with Windex.

The first experiment evaluated fairness.

As a test of whether clean scents would enhance reciprocity, participants played a classic “trust game.” Subjects received $12 of real money (allegedly sent by an anonymous partner in another room). They had to decide how much of it to either keep or return to their partners who had trusted them to divide it fairly. Subjects in clean-scented rooms were less likely to exploit the trust of their partners, returning a significantly higher share of the money.

Link via Instapundit | Image: flickr user rq?

Everyone knows about Charles Darwin and his theory of natural selection, but did you know that he once ate an owl, just for kicks? Or that he almost didn't make it aboard HMS Beagle because of the shape of his nose? Behold Neatorama's 10 Fun Facts About Charles Darwin:

1. Darwin Once Ate an Owl

Darwin was an inquisitive man. Sure he was curious about nature and all that science stuff, but he's also a guy. So when he saw strange animals, he often wondered what they would taste like. The difference between Darwin and the rest of us is that he actually ate 'em!

While he was at Cambridge University, Darwin joined the "Gourmet Club," which met once a week to eat animals not often found in menus, like hawk and bittern (a type of wading bird in the heron family). His zeal for weird food, however, broke down when he tried an old brown owl, which he found "indescribable."

But that one episode didn't end Darwin's weird gastronomic proclivities. During the voyage of the Beagle, he ate armadillos and agoutis (the rodents were "best meat I ever tasted," he said).

In Patagonia, South America, Darwin ate a puma (it tasted like veal) and an ostrich-like bird called a Rhea. Actually, Darwin had been looking for this particular species of Rhea, only to find that he had been eating one all along. He sent back the uneaten parts to the Zoological Society in London, which named the bird Rhea darwinii after him!

In the Galapagos, Darwin ate iguanas and giant tortoises. He liked it so much he loaded up 48 of them aboard the Beagle, to be eaten on the journey back!

Sources: Darwin's Dinner at Quite Interesting | The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin by Charles and Francis Darwin

2. Darwin Wanted to Be a Doctor, But He Couldn't Stand the Sight of Blood

Darwin attended Edinburgh University in hopes of becoming a physician like his father, but soon abandoned the idea because he couldn't stand the sight of blood. So he decided to study divinity instead and become a rural cleric, which would fit his hobby of being a naturalist just fine (Source).

3. Darwin's Nose Almost Cost Him The Voyage on the Beagle

The Captain of HMS Beagle, Robert FitzRoy, was about to embark on a survey expedition to South America, but he was afraid of the stress and loneliness of such a voyage (indeed, they have driven the previous captain of the ship to commit suicide). So FitzRoy asked his superiors for a well-educated and scientific gentleman companion to come along as an unpaid naturalist whom he could treat as an equal. The professors at Cambridge recommended then 22-years old Charles Darwin for the trip.

At first, Charles' father Robert objected to the appointment - after all, such a voyage would take years and would get in the way of him being a clergyman. But Darwin's uncle was able to persuade him not only to let his son go, but also support him financially.

Darwin and FitzRoy got together well, but later Darwin found out that he almost didn't get picked for the voyage ... on account of the shape of his nose!

"Afterwards on becoming very intimate with Fitz-Roy, I heard that I had run a very narrow risk of being rejected [as the Beagle's naturalist], on account of the shape of my nose! He was an ardent desciple of Lavater, and was convinced that he could judge a man's character by the outline of his features; and he doubted wheather anyone with my nose could possess sufficient energy and determination for the voyage. But I think he was afterwards well-satisfied that my nose had spoken falsely." (Source: Charles Darwin: His Life Told in an Autobiographical Chapter, and in a Selected Series of His Published Letters, by Charles Darwin - 1902)

4. Best Birthday Gift Ever: a Mountain!

Mount Darwin in Tierra del Fuego, Photo: Victory Adventure Expeditions

For Darwin's 25th birthday on February 12, 1834, Captain FitzRoy named a mountain after him. Yup, Mount Darwin. It is the highest peak in Tierra del Fuego.

A year earlier, Darwin and his shipmates were on a small island in the Tierra del Fuego archipelago when a huge mass of ice fell from the face of a glacier and plunged into the ocean, causing a huge wave. Darwin ran to the shore and saved the ship's boats from being swept away. For saving everyone from being marooned, FitzRoy named the area Darwin Sound.

And as if one mountain isn't enough, Darwin got three more named after him: There are other Darwin Mountains located in California, Tasmania, and Antarctica.

5. The Full Title of "On The Origin of Species"

Larger photo: University of Sydney

You probably know that Darwin's most famous work, outlining his theory of evolution, is On the Origin of Species.

But what most people don't know is the full title: On the Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. It was published in 1859, twenty years after his epic voyage (yes, he took his sweet time in publishing his work, which he only did because Alfred Russell Wallace came to the same conclusion of evolution and Darwin didn't want to be left behind). A total of 1250 copies were printed and it went on sale for 15 shillings. It's now valued at around $23,000.

In the 6th edition, the title was changed to The Origin of Species.

6. Darwin Didn't Invent the Phrase "Survival of the Fittest"

That was Herbert Spencer, a philosopher and contemporary of Charles Darwin. After reading Darwin's On the Origin of Species, Spencer wrote Principles of Biology in 1864. He coined the phrase "survival of the fittest" and extended Darwin's theory of natural selection into the realm of sociology, ethics, and economics.

Darwin himself used the phrase in his 5th edition of The Origin and gave full credit to Spencer.

7. Darwin Married His First Cousin

Darwin was a logical man, and he approached the important issue of marriage like he would any problem. In The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, Darwin made careful pro and con list of marriage to his first cousin, Emma Wedgwood:

Image: Cambridge University Library - The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online

Under the title "This is the Question," Darwin wrote in the "Marry" Column:

Children — (if it Please God) — Constant companion, (& friend in old age) who will feel interested in one, — object to be beloved & played with. — —better than a dog anyhow. — Home, & someone to take care of house — Charms of music & female chit-chat. — These things good for one's health. — Forced to visit & receive relations but terrible loss of time. —

W My God, it is intolerable to think of spending ones whole life, like a neuter bee, working, working, & nothing after all. — No, no won't do. — Imagine living all one's day solitarily in smoky dirty London House. — Only picture to yourself a nice soft wife on a sofa with good fire, & books & music perhaps — Compare this vision with the dingy reality of Grt. Marlbro' St.

... and in the "Not Marry" column:

No children, (no second life), no one to care for one in old age.— What is the use of working 'in' without sympathy from near & dear friends—who are near & dear friends to the old, except relatives

Freedom to go where one liked — choice of Society & little of it. — Conversation of clever men at clubs — Not forced to visit relatives, & to bend in every trifle. — to have the expense & anxiety of children — perhaps quarelling — Loss of time. — cannot read in the Evenings — fatness & idleness — Anxiety & responsibility — less money for books &c — if many children forced to gain one's bread. — (But then it is very bad for ones health to work too much)

Perhaps my wife wont like London; then the sentence is banishment & degradation into indolent, idle fool —

He concluded that he should marry, and wrote:

Marry - Marry - Marry Q.E.D.

It is ironic that the man who gave rise to the importance of genetics in natural selection chose to marry his first cousin (Darwin wasn't alone in this - Einstein also married his cousin), but one thing is for sure: Darwin cleverly avoided adding more relatives to visit!

8. How Darwin Lost His Faith in Christianity

Darwin was actually quite a religious fellow when he began his voyage on the Beagle (he was fresh out of divinity school). Aboard the ship, Darwin was known to quote passages from the bible to rowdy sailors on board.

But something happened during the trip that made him less religious. Darwin saw slavery firsthand as well as the wretched living conditions of the natives of Tierra del Fuego and wondered why God allowed such inhumanities to happen (Source). Darwin became skeptical of the history in the Old Testament, yet still believed in the existence of God.

Darwin lost his faith when his daughter Annie caught scarlet fever and died at the age of 10. He wrote "We have lost the joy of the household, and the solace of our old age ... Oh that she could now know how deeply, how tenderly we do still & and shall ever love her dear joyous face." The heartsick Emma filled a small box with Annie's small treasures and kept it until her own death. (Source)

From then on, Darwin continued to help the local church with parish work, but would go on walks while his family attended church on Sundays. When asked about his religious views, Darwin denied that he was an atheist, but called himself agnostic.

In 1915, Lady Hope claimed to have visited Darwin and witnessed his deathbed conversion back to Christianity. This was refuted by his children, who noted that his last words were to Emma: "I am not the least afraid of death - Remember what a good wife you have been - Tell all my children to remember how good they have been to me." (Source)

9. Darwin was a Backgammon Fiend

After his return from South America, Darwin developed a life-long illness that left him severely debilitated or bed-ridden for long periods of time. Darwin consulted with more than 20 doctors, but the cause of his disease was never discovered (Wikipedia has a n interesting list of possible illnesses).

Over the years, with the help of Emma, Darwin developed a strict routine that seemed to help in alleviating the symptoms. AboutDarwin.com has an interesting glimpse into what everyday life was like for Darwin.

Of note is Darwin's strict schedule for playing backgammon. Every night between 8 and 8:30 PM, Darwin would play 2 games of backgammon with Emma. He even kept score of every game he played for years!

10. Church of England Finally Apologized to Darwin

When Darwin's work on the theory of evolution came out, the church attacked him vociferously. Now, 126 years after his death, The Church of England has apologized to Darwin:

Charles Darwin: 200 years from your birth, the Church of England owes you an apology for misunderstanding you and, by getting our first reaction wrong, encouraging others to misunderstand you still. We try to practice the old virtues of 'faith seeking understanding' and hope that makes some amends. But the struggle for your reputation is not over yet, and the problem is not just your religious opponents but those who falsely claim you in support of their own interests. Good religion needs to work constructively with good science – and I dare to suggest that the opposite may be true as well. (Source)

If you like this article, you'll probably love these 10 Fun Facts articles on Neatorama:

• 10 Strange Facts About Einstein
• 10 Fun Facts About Pablo Picasso
• 10 Neat Facts About ... Rick Astley!
• 10 Fascinating Facts about Edison
• 10 Kick Ass Facts About Bruce Lee
• 10 Strange Facts About Newton