Superman is strong enough to squeeze coal into diamonds. Spider-Man can throw a handy web to swing from. The Invisible Woman has the power of... well, you know. These superpowers are just another day at work for some of nature's creatures. In another installment of his True Facts series, Ze Frank gives us the rundown on animals with the powers of transparency, constriction, and slime flinging. There are no spiders, because we know what they can do. We even named a comic book superhero after them. Flying isn't even considered a superpower among animals, since most insects and birds do it, and even some mammals. I guess you could say flying is downright pedestrian, but that would be a joke in itself. Still, there are limits and some drawbacks to each of these superpowers. There's a one-minute embedded ad at 3:45. Don't you just love it when a commercial is interrupted by another commercial?

YouTube member Epentibi uses artificial intelligence programs to create realistic news broadcasts from the 1960s through the 1980s in worlds gone terribly wrong. I gather that Epentibi is inspired by the strategy video game Hearts of Iron IV, but it's not necessary to know that game to appreciate good alternate history.

What would the world of the 1960s be like if the Axis won World War II? Eventually, as American newscaster Walter Cronkite explains in 1963, the Nazi governance system would lead to civil war.

The authors of the book "The Exorcist Effect" looked at the way horror films and culture shape each other as well as the dangers of simply pinning the blame of horrific real-life cases on supernatural beliefs without addressing the underlying causes or getting down to the truth of the matter, as what happened in the trial of The West Memphis Three.

Another example they gave which might be interesting was how serial killers like David Berkowitz (the Zodiac Killer), and Jeffrey Dahmer had used the film The Exorcist as a means of stacking up a defense for the horrible things they had done. Or the fact that Ed and Lorraine Warren, who were the inspiration for the film The Conjuring, had argued that Arne Johnson was not guilty of murder because he was possessed.

With this book, they are not trying to debunk supernatural beliefs or advocate for censorship in horror media, but rather, they want to urge people to use critical thinking when looking at real-life scenarios, instead of immediately jumping the gun on someone simply because they looked like a member of a cult or an occultist. -via The Daily Grail

(Image credit: Tarik Haiga/Unsplash)

The US' involvement in WWII had been much debated during the time and its detractors had much to say why the US should stay out of it. History tells us that the US did enter the fray and through the combined efforts of the Allied Forces successfully defeated the Axis Powers. However, what would have happened had the US lost in WWII? The map above shows how the states would have been divvied up in that scenario.

The map shows portions of the west coast, Hawaii, and Alaska in yellow. New York would become an international free port while the rest of the east coast, highlighted in red, will be split up among the Axis Powers. Right next to that, in blue, is a "buffer state" referred to as the "corridor of death" with its trove of steel, coal, and cotton. 

On the other hand, part of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona will also be stripped from the US, presumably going to Mexico. Meanwhile, a green zone in the north comprising of Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, Connecticut, and Rhode Island along with parts of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan will be given to one of the Axis Powers.

That leaves the rest of the area in the middle under the control of the US. The map was published on the Chicago Herald and Examiner on November 28, 1937. Thankfully, this alternate history didn't happen, as we can only imagine how the world would have been had that been the reality.

(Image credit: Vivid Maps)

I will never recover from this student email. pic.twitter.com/Jzj5nyGKsa

— John Penniman (@Historiographos) November 28, 2023

This viral tweet posted by John Penniman, an associate professor and chair of religious studies at Bucknell University, is hilariously gut wrenching when you realize how the turn of the century or even the turn of the decade can make us all look ancient in the eyes of young'uns.

Posted about a day ago, the tweet has already received over 19 million views, 253k likes, and 29k retweets, with almost 3k comments, many of which were pointing to that part of the email which makes the 1990s sound as if it were ancient history. I was born in the late 1900's, mind you, and referring to that period as the late 1900's makes me sound like an artifact.

Many people chimed in with some funny responses, and I especially liked Lawrence Krubner's comment posting a picture of King Arthur saying that was him in 1994.

This is an actual photograph of me from 1994. I know what you’re thinking: why was my hair so long? Was I a hippie? Well, the real answer is that I was going through a difficult time, a Dark Ages, you could call it. pic.twitter.com/LKoHekAzqp

— Lawrence Krubner 🇺🇦 (@krubner) November 28, 2023

This and more funny comments from this thread on The Poke.

(Image credit: Historiographos/X; Krubner/X)

We all know that Australia is home to the deadliest and most dangerous animals on earth, but sometimes new discoveries from Australian species can provide levity to this grim side of the land down under. A couple of scientists recently found a species of Australian mosquito that fed only on frogs' noses.

Initially, the scientists, John Gould and Jose Valdez, were studying frogs but then, after taking several photographs of different species of frogs in their natural habitat, they noticed that when there were mosquitoes biting the frogs, they did so through the nose.

From this observation, they looked into this behavior by the mosquito Mimomyia elegans, and found that this species of mosquito always went for the snout and nowhere else. Even though the mosquito may land on other parts of the frogs' bodies, it would work its away up to the snout.

Why this mosquito targets the nose is still a mystery and needs further research, but this observation is crucial as there are frogs such as the Litoria aurea which are almost extinct, and these mosquitoes might be transmitting deadly fungal diseases to these frogs.

(Image credit: Ethology (2023). DOI: 10.1111/eth.13424)

If we were to talk about the unsung heroes during World War II, then we must not be remiss in giving credit to the librarians and researchers whom the US government recruited to become, essentially, the first intelligence officers and agents before the establishment of the CIA.

And if the British had Alan Turing who helped intercept German messages, the US had Adele Kibre among the cadre of librarian recruits to gather Nazi publications which proved crucial in gathering vital information during the war. It is said that her acquisition of periodals such as Zeitschrift für Physik and Die Naturwissenschaften helped the scientists involved in the Manhattan Project to develop the nuclear bomb ahead of the Nazis.

Apart from this, the librarians and researchers of the Interdepartmental Committee for the Acquisition of Foreign Publicatioins (IDC), developed networks and ties with other resistance forces throughout Europe which helped them smuggle the periodicals to the US. After publications were ceased, they turned to human sources by interrogating prisoners of war and other Allied sympathizers.

Joining forces with the British army, they rummaged through abandoned Nazi territories and bombed-out bookstores, as well as confiscating books that could have been used to spread genocidal messages, or to harbor other information such as military weaponry. In the end, all these materials had become US properties where they were stored in universities and other cultural organizations.

(Image credit: Smithsonian Institution/Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons)

Traditional medicine has often been set aside in favor of modern technology and medical advancements because we find that modern medicine has undergone rigorous research and testing that proves the effectiveness of treatments and medication in curing diseases.

It was quite surprising, then, for Ronald Quinn, a professor emeritus at Griffith University and a member of the Griffith Institute for Drug Discovery, to hear how John Watson used the bark of a mudjala mangrove tree as a painkiller when a crocodile bit off his finger. This began the 30-year quest to research this ancient painkiller, and turn it into a commercial drug that could benefit Australians.

Knowledge about the mudjala's medicinal properties was quite common among the Nyikina Mangala people as Watson had quickly searched for the tree, and created a makeshift analgesic dressing for his bitten finger until he got to the hospital.

In their years studying the mudjala, Quinn and his team found that the bark of the mudjala contained two active compounds which ease inflammation and nerve pain. Furthermore, Quinn and Watson believe that it is ten times stronger than morphine.

To create a commercial over-the-counter drug from the mudjala, the team received funding from the Jacka Foundation for Natural Therapies and they are hoping to formally launch the product in the 2032 Brisbane Olympics.

(Image credit: Steve Fitzgerald/Wikimedia Commons)

When Chinese laborers built the transcontinental railway from the western side in the 19th century, they brought a traditional pain relief oil with them made from Chinese water snakes. Snake oil was an intriguing idea, and Clark Stanley saw an opportunity. He bottled his own snake oil liniment and sold it for decades. The medicine was eventually analyzed and found to consist of mineral oil, beef suet, red pepper, and turpentine. Not only was it ineffective, there were no snakes involved at all! That's how the term "snake oil" came to be used for anything fake or deceptive. For his deception, Stanley was fined $20.

There's also the story of the man who convinced people that rubbing expensive metal objects on their bodies would relieve pain, the woman who passed herself off as a princess of a fictional country, the doctor who sewed goat testicles into mens' scrotums, and other charlatans from history profiled in a list at Mental Floss.

Want to see how your Christmas tree started out in life? This guy who goes by Boxlapse at YouTube bought a pine cone at the supermarket last year and decided to grow a stone pine tree (Pinus pinea) in a pot. This video is a time-lapse that covers 300 days of his experiment. As you can see, it rather dramatically went from a pine cone to a recognizable tree in less than a year. I was expecting a slight touch of tinsel to be added at the end, but I guess that might limit the shelf life of the video. Add six more years to this story, and you'll have the cut trees that are being sold for Christmas decorations right now. He says he is continuing the experiment, so we may see further growth of this same tree next year. -via Digg

Theodore Gray has a new book out called Tools: A Visual Exploration of Implements and Devices in the Workshop, which is full of everything you need to know about tools. Gray made quite a splash over the last twenty years or so with his many iterations of the Periodic Table of Elements, so his publisher had the idea to make a periodic table of tools to accompany the book, with photographs by Nick Mann.

The Periodic Table of Tools in interactive form has its own website. You can see that the table is headed by hammers on one side and driver bits on the other. Click on any of the cells and pull up more examples and information on that tool. Rearrange the table by groups and see how each type of tool relates to other types of tools, although some allowances were made, like giving "toy tools" and "antique tools" their own cells in fairly random places. If you look at each photograph closely, you will find some surprises. The Periodic Table of Tools is available for sale as a 36" x 20" poster. It would look good in your workshop. -via Metafilter

For most Americans, Napoleon Bonaparte's dealings with the United States began in 1800 when he acquired the Louisiana territory from Spain, and then while depressed about the Haitian Revolution, turned around and sold it to the US for $15 million, or about three cents an acre, in 1803. It was a huge acquisition, but the only part the Spanish or the French really controlled was New Orleans, with the rest being Indian country.

Whichever country controlled New Orleans, it was filled with Napoleon fans. And as the French emperor went on to bigger battles in Europe, he retained the never ending loyalty of New Orleans residents. After Elba, after Waterloo, Napoleon considered returning to New Orleans for his retirement. His brother had already emigrated to America, and Napoleon confided in others that moving to the U.S. would bring him the dignity he deserved. In fact, he was trying to arrange his own passage to America when he was captured by the British and sent to St. Helena in 1815. Read about Napoleon's retirement plans, and the city that wanted him, at BBC Travel. -via Messy Nessy Chic

(Image credit: Infrogmation)

The earliest version of Cookie Monster appeared on a snack commercial in 1966. Jim Henson brought him to Sesame Street just a few years later, where he has remained ever since. He is among the most successful Muppet characters of all time whose appeal has lasted for generations.

This is, I think, because Cookie Monster speaks to the primal nihilistic urge of modern man to consume and be consumed by the universe. The real Cookie Monster is always inside of us, seeking to satisfy a hunger from which we can never escape but nonetheless are destined to seek.

This leads us to the inevitable question: what are those cookies that Cookie Monster devours so ravenously, as though they were the children of Cronus?

Sopan Deb writes in the New York Times (sorry, it's a paywalled article) about his quest for an answer to this question. They are made of pancake mix, puffed rice, Grape-Nuts, instant coffee, and water. The chocolate chips are made of colored glue.

Muppet wrangler Lara MacLean, who has worked for the Jim Henson Company since 1992, bakes them at home. She prepares the cookies so that they crumble in Cookie Monster's mouth at just the right consistency, letting him feel every crumb of defeat fall from his mouth to the amusement of his young audience.

Cookie Monster's muppeteer, David Rudman, comments, "The more crumbs, the funnier it is."

-via Super Punch | Photo: Smithsonian Institution

The video is just a few seconds long, but it contains multitudes. The little girl wants to pet the dog, but she can't because that's a bear! Her confusion may be funny, but I would have scooped the child up and had her in the door before she got the phrase out. Would it make you feel any better to know that the joke isn't real? The audio is from an earlier, unrelated TikTok video. That might make it less funny, but it's still dangerous to have a small child that close to a bear. Let's assume that the little girl was not eaten by the juvenile bear, and that she has learned to avoid such encounters in the future. The lesson is, don't believe everything you see on the internet, but there's nothing wrong in enjoying the funny fakes. Therefore, let the musical remixes commence!



The newest is from pianist Brandon Ethridge. -via Boing Boing

Venus is the hottest planet in our solar system and that's one of the reasons why we haven't been able to send a lander that could last long enough to probe much of the planet. Due to the dense atmosphere on Venus' surface, much of the sun's heat gets trapped and the temperatures could go up as high as 464 degrees Celsius (867 degrees Fahrenheit).

One lander, Venera 12, successfully lasted about 110 minutes and several of its predecessors and successors were able to take a few photos and audio from Venus. The last lander on Venus was Venera 14 which landed on March 5, 1982. No other landers have been sent since, however, space agencies have been planning to do further studies on Venus' atmosphere with Roscosmos intending to revisit the surface.

Despite similarities to Earth in size, composition, and density, Venus' surface temperature caused by its atmosphere have made it uninhabitable. -via The Daily Grail

(Image credit: ESA/Don P. Mitchell/Venera 13)