Don’t worry, it’s not literally a land made of Swiss cheese. Within a few weeks, a weird phenomenon has occurred in different villages in north-east Croatia. Sinkholes of varying depths and sizes have popped up suddenly and without warning in the villages of Mečenčani and Borojovići. While an earthquake happened before the appearance of the sinkholes, experts were still baffled as almost 100 sinkholes materialized a month after the earthquake: 

Sinkholes are not the most common consequence of powerful seismic shocks but they do occur, especially in the areas with hidden underground cavities. After the devastating earthquake near the Italian city L'Aquila in 2009, two sinkholes immediately opened on roads in the old part of the city. Experts at the time suspected that a previous excavation of vertical trenches for a sewage conduit weakened the conglomerate roof of the underground cave, contributing to the collapse.

"The real anomaly in Croatia's case is a very high number of sinkholes with significant dimension," says Italian geologist Antonio Santo at University of Naples Federico II.

Image credit: AFP/Getty Images

The new MCU film Black Widow opens in theaters this weekend. This post has nothing to do with the Avengers, but the movie opening is a good excuse to learn something about the real black widow spider. As with many of the earth's creatures, our common knowledge about them turns out to be less than true.

Black widows earned their name because scientists witnessed the females eat their mates after copulation. But research has shown that in a related species, redback spiders, females only cannibalize their mates about two percent of the time, so experts suspect that American black widows have similar rates of cannibalism in the wild.

The widows’ cannibalistic behavior was first observed in the lab, where males had nowhere to run away from their larger, hungrier counterparts. But in the spiders’ natural habitats, males have the opportunity to make an escape.

Male black widows also have strategies to avoid riskier sexual encounters in the first place; for instance, research suggests they can tell whether or not a female is hungry by her pheromones, so they can avoid potential mates who seem a bit peckish.

Learn more about the black widow spider at Smithsonian.

(Image credit: Ken Thomas)

Well, hopefully the lynx doesn’t accidentally destroy it, right? Surprisingly enough, when wildlife ecologists conducted a study on a Canada lynx, the mic they used wasn’t smashed into smithereens! Researchers delved deeper into the lives of these elusive predators through safely attaching a small microphone to lynx collars: 

Much to our excitement, these recorders were very effective at capturing the behavior of the lynx: “cats being cats” (grooming, sleeping); social behavior (aggressive interactions, purring, long-distance social calls); and hunting behavior (chases, kills, feeding).

Over the five years of our study in the Yukon’s Kluane region, we collected over 14,000 hours of audio recordings from 26 individual lynx. After using various methods of data processing, we were able to identify kills by Canada lynx with 87 percent accuracy — an impressive feat.

Previously, to know that a single kill had been made often required a full day of intensive snowshoeing and tracking during the short winter days in the Yukon. But by recording multiple lynx, we could collect information 24 hours a day, while we warmed our feet by a wood stove in a rustic cabin.

In addition to audio recorders, we also attached accelerometers — small devices that measure activity over time like you would find in a FitBit. Together with GPS tracking devices, these “biologging technologies” provide unprecedented insight into the complex behaviors of these cats.

Image credit: Zdeněk Macháček (Unsplash) 

Titus Poplawski’s analog photos invoke a sense of nostalgia, longing, and mystery. His photos are full of character, and as The Phoblographer states, ‘his analog photography is some of the best we’ve seen.’ You know what, they’re absolutely right. Looking through his images, from the composition to the colors, these photos make you conjure a story for each of them. Check out the Phoblographer’s full interview with the photographer to learn about him and his works here! 

Image credit: Titus Poplawski 

The Slinky is an amazing toy. It's just a metal spring, but you can do so many things with it! The guy from Action Lab shows us how weird slinkys are when you drop them vertically, thanks to slow-motion video. Someone in the comments compared the slinky's behavior to a Loony Tunes character, recreated in the real world where physics is a thing. -via Digg

Lady with an Ermine is a commissioned portrait that is a classic example of High Renaissance portraiture. The artwork is mostly unheard of or forgotten as it preceded the better-known Mona Lisa. However, Lady with an Ermine is an excellent display of Da Vinci’s fixation with anatomical realism. In addition, Da Vinci uses the ermine as a symbol with meanings related to the subject of the portrait. Check out My Modern Met’s full analysis on the oil painting here! 

Image via wikimedia commons

Australian photographer Danny Huynh has an amazing hobby. He builds remote control animatronics based on pop culture characters. They are works of art, but the real magic takes off when they move!



Sadly, Huynh's creations are not for sale. Continue reading to see more.

It's a mistake to think that if you have enough money, you can travel anywhere. Quite a few places are forbidden, some to outsiders, others to any human beings at all. The reasons are varied. Some locations don't want visitors because they hold precious treasures, fragile artifacts, or delicate ecosystems. Others are dangerous due to volcanoes, radiation, or animals. The rest are top secret for one reason or another. The Island of Surtsey is both volcanic and a delicate ecosystem.

In the 1960s, an undersea volcanic eruption created a brand-new island off the coast of Iceland. It’s not every day that scientists get to study an island from the moment it emerges, so they decided to make the most of the opportunity. The island, named Surtsey, has become a case study for how ecosystems develop without any interference from humans. (Other than the ideally noninterventionist scientists who study the island, that is.) Some of the lifeforms that have found their way to Surtsey include molds, fungi, at least 89 bird species, and, supposedly, one plucky tomato plant.

In 1969, an Icelandic scientist named Ágúst Bjarnason was asked to make a trip to Surtsey to identify a mysterious plant, which he identified as a tomato. Bjarnason looked into the situation a bit further; as he later recalled, “Someone had done their business … and this beautiful tomato plant … had grown out of the feces.”

Read about seventeen other places you can cross off your vacation list at Mental Floss. The list is also available as a video. Strangely, North Sentinal Island is not among them.

(Image credit: Bruce McAdam)

How weird and wonderful can a Thai commercial be? Producers in Thailand are always pushing the creative envelope and this 2019 chocolate bar ad is no exception. It's called "The Secret" because the young lady in the ad is hiding something from her boyfriend. But thanks to a Voiz Waffle Chocolate Bar, it won't be an obstacle in their relationship.

-via Dave Barry

As we've said before, people will take any activity at all and make a competition out of it. Joey Chesnut won the annual Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest (again) this past weekend by downing 76 dogs- a new record. Competitive eating has been in the news for about three decades now, but it was also a thing around the turn of the previous century, which grew out of Fat Men's Clubs (FMCs), fraternal organizations in which men could be proud of their girth and socialize with each other. And, of course, eat.

FMCs did not invent eating contests — like most modern social phenomena, the history of competitive eating reaches into mythology — but they certainly popularized them in American culture. When the Manhattan FMC held an all-you-can-eat contest at their East Third Street clubhouse in 1909, several reporters were present to watch Frank Dotzler, a 380-pound alderman, devour 275 oysters, 8 pounds of steak, 12 rolls, 11 cups of coffee and 3 pies. He won $50 and eternal glory.

The considerable media attention enjoyed by these clubs says a lot about the era in which they prospered. “In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,” Laura Doan wrote in an engrossing article about Texas FMCs, “attitudes about fat bodies were remarkably different than they are now … As fat men’s clubs were at their peak, people positively associated men of a larger size with wealth and affability.”

Read about the rise of Fat Men's Clubs and their gastronomic achievements at Inside Hook. -via Digg 

Here’s a good reason to pick up Skyrim again! Thanks to modder Cooleoj’s efforts, Skyrim’s dungeons are being enhanced and resized to provide more ways to have fun in the game. The mod, called ‘Dungeons Revisited,’ adds a “lot of new paths, rooms, and enemies”, and new “confusing” elements to the game’s dungeons. While not revealing a lot about the mod, Cooleoj assures that both veteran and new players will get lost playing through the new modded dungeons: 

All of the changes are in harmony with the themes of the base game’s dungeons, as Cooleoj says they want the enhancements to be both lore-friendly and indistinguishable from the experiences Bethesda crafted.

The dungeons enhanced so far include some fan favourites, like Bleak Falls Barrow, which looms over Riverwood and plays host to one of the game’s early main quests, and others. The list “thus far” is Ustengrav, Embershard Mine, Steepfall Burrow, Halted Stream Camp, White River Watch, and Hillgrund’s Tomb – though it sounds like the modder’s planning to revisit more.

If you’re keen to grab the mod for yourself, you can find it at Nexus Mods here. As ever, mod with caution, and be sure to check out our rundown of the best RPG games and best Skyrim mods on our home platform.



Image via PCGames

Have you ever written a full paper for a subject without much effort at all? Alternatively, have you defended your position (whether in a personal conversation or in a more academic setting) through purposefully convoluted arguments that really aren’t that good? Well, it seems that our ability to bullshit through real life events is a sign of intelligence. The proof lies in a study published in Evolutionary Psychology: 

The researchers measured respondents’ intelligence through a cognitive ability test, and tested their ability to bullshit through a verbal exercise that required them to explain 10 concepts (like general relativity), only the catch was that some concepts didn’t even exist. The researchers found the skilled bullshitters who satisfyingly and persuasively tried to explain completely made up theories and concepts.

Unsurprisingly, those who tested high on the bullshit scale also tested well on the cognitive ability test, thereby proving that sometimes, you can actually fake it till you make it.

Maybe bullshitting is just another way of finding connections, or maybe it’s a sign of a charismatic persona. Either way, we now have further proof that bullshitting can make you smarter—or at least make you look smart.

Image credit: Paramount Pictures 

Now this application is very convenient! Brickit is an app that uses an AI camera to scan your LEGO bricks and suggest projects you can build with your current inventory. The application uses machine learning to scan your entire spread of bricks to recognize as many bricks as it can. In addition to taking inventory of your collection and suggesting potential projects for it, Brickit can also show you exactly where the necessary bricks are in your messy pile. Isn’t that amazing? 

Image via PetaPixel 

Four years after the release of the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild for the Nintendo Switch, players are still finding new ways to exploit the game or find hidden items buried in the game’s files. MrOrdun has achieved something that no player has done before. The player shared a video on Twitter of them opening an ‘impossible chest,’ a chest that the game recognizes but the player can’t reach in the overworld: 

As spotted by Kotaku, the video shows how they were able to uncover the “impossible” chest found 80 meters below the ground at Aris Beach in the game. According to the player, “it has never been opened prior to this moment”.

As the player mentioned in the tweet, the chest despawns after seven seconds of sinking from loading into the game, so they had to intercept the chest along the way.

The player takes multiple steps in order to collect the chest, including using a game bug that lets you fall through the ground as well as utilising Breath Of The Wild‘s multiple Sheikah Slate abilities to reach it.

The full YouTube video, which goes through the entire process, reveals that the prize within the impossible chest was, after all this time, just a piece of amber.

Image credit: Nintendo

People shooting off fireworks in Toledo, OH turned their neighborhood into a war zone when their performative patriotism (or just stupidity), turned their neighborhood into a war zone after the U-Haul truck they rented exploded with the fireworks inside. pic.twitter.com/EQguCzpZWY

— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) July 5, 2021

A block party in Toledo, Ohio, was the scene of a major fireworks mishap Sunday night. A group of teens were seen throwing some kind of incendiary devices into a U-Haul truck filled with fireworks. The truck exploded, and ignited a stack of fireworks that had already been unloaded. Four people were injured. A longer video shows that the explosions went on for several more minutes (linked video contains NSFW language). -via Fark