We've often posted about medieval art and imagery, particularly illuminations and marginalia that scribes used to decorate manuscripts. We laugh at the ridiculous use of snails and rabbits, but there are oh, so many cats. And they all look goofy, as if they were cartoon drawings plopped down in the middle of careful portraits of people and dogs (and rabbits).

“In the Medieval period, animals were understood to be the mirror of human society,” historian Damien Kempf, who is writing a book on Medieval depictions of animals, told me. “Even though animals were believed to be irrational beings, they were given human traits and characteristics.” Dogs, for example, were lauded for being loyal companions, created to guard the house and assist in the hunt.

Cats? Not so much.

“Sources emphasize the rather unruly nature of cats,” Kempf said. “Unlike dogs, cats cannot be trained to be loyal and obedient. As one author complains, they will go to whoever gives them food.” So that’s one reason cats probably got such an unflattering edit.

But it's not the only reason. Altogether, medieval artists may have something in common with modern meme makers- as funny as cats are, we love to make them funnier. Read more on this subject at Medium, and you'll see some funny cats. -via Digg

Scientists do the most amazing things today. A study on a single specimen of fossil mollusk has determined the length of an each day 70 million years ago. The shell is of the species Torreites sanchezi, described as a rudist clam, which makes one wonder what it did that was so rude.

Like counting the rings of a stump to discern the age of a tree, scientists from the Environmental and Geochemistry Research Group at Brussels University have counted the microscopically thin layers of an extinct mollusk to calculate the length of a Late Cretaceous day. The new paper, published in Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology, shows that, some 70 million years ago, days were around 23.5 hours long and that the Earth rotated 372 times each year, as opposed to the current 365 days per year.

The overall length of the year hasn’t changed since the Late Cretaceous—a total year consisted of 8,760 hours during the Late Cretaceous, just as a year does today. It’s just that our planet’s spin is getting progressively slower, thanks to the gravitational effects of our Moon. Accordingly, the new research, led by Niels J. de Winter, could improve our understanding of the Earth-Moon relationship over time and even the timing of the origin of the Moon.

Scientists had already figured the length of days back then, but this is another source that confirms their calculations. What's really amazing how they did it. The fossil shell is not particularly big, and the daily "growth rings" are actually layers no more than 40 nanometers thick. They counted these, and compared the number to seasonal changes in the shell to figure out how many days were in a year. In a fossil. Read more on this study that shows what you can learn by taking a very close look at tiny things at Gizmodo. 

(Image credit: AGU)

There are multiple ways to  fully enjoy a meal. While it can vary from one person to another, it seems that some people on the Internet agree that the best way you can eat fries, particularly Wendys' french fries, is by dipping it into their Frosty. Wendy’s Frosty is basically soft, melted ice cream. Some like their fries dipped in chocolate, while some like their dipped in vanilla Frosty. What do you prefer? Dipped or not dipped fries? 

(via Diply)

image via Diply

Can a jet ski survive a fall towards a trampoline from 45 meters? The guys at How Ridiculous try to drop a jet ski full of miscellaneous objects from an elevated platform to the “world’s strongest trampoline”, Do you think the jet ski would shatter into pieces? Or do you think the jet ski will survive and bounce on the trampoline like a human? Check the video to see what happens! 

We’ve seen how flat Earthers proclaim their beliefs to other people. While the earth has been scientifically proven to be an oblate spheroid, some people refuse to believe this, claiming that the Earth is flat. From using Bible scriptures to believing that gravity is not real, their beliefs are creative, at best. TruthTheory has a good suggestion on how we can put the flat earthers’ creativity into good use:  

a Reddit user has got the perfect answer: why not make a reality show out of them? Think about the Amazing Race – wasn’t that really great? Now, just replace it with flat-earthers and give them the objective – find the edge of this world. Of course, they are not going to find it, but it would be amazing to watch them try and get to it. They will go to different exotic locations, mingle with people, and have local food. There will be a candid view of how they think and tie different concepts to strengthen their beliefs. They would probably measure the sun angles, try to find out the changes in the sun’s position just like the scientists of yesteryear tried to do. Maybe in due course, they will finally come to understand the falsity of their beliefs and debunk their own theory! At least, that would be something great to watch, as well as a relief.

image via wikimedia commons

Polish dentist Pawel Kozminski has another life besides helping people with their tooth problems. His other life is spent on coding his passion project, World of Horror. World of Horror is a retro throwback RPG inspired by the works of Junji Ito and H.P. Lovecraft. Instead of using custom animation software for the game, he used MS Paint to build the game’s world. Gizmodo has the details: 

The game is set in a small seaside Japanese town just as the “Old Gods are reawakening, clawing their way back into a world that’s spiraling into madness.” It features a series of branching stories helmed by five playable characters, and gameplay involves turn-based combat and “unravel[ing] puzzles and mysteries through spells that sacrifice sanity.”

Usually, game developers save themselves the horror of creating complex works in such a dated program by using custom animation software. Not Kozminski, who told Engadget that he specifically chose MS Paint for its limitations. “Creating art in Paint is actually really inspiring and somehow relaxing. The limits of the program really force you to get creative with it, which is a huge thing. I guess 1-bit black-and-white art is the closest I can get to simulate that comic book feel, too.”

image via Gizmodo

On January 27, police in Bath Township, Michigan conducted a traffic stop that led to a search of the car in question. Inside, they found, in addition to methamphetamine, a vast array of weapons. Among them is a sword that the police inform us is the legendary Ancient Sword of the Meth King.

This venerable blade is not as famous as Arthur's Excalibur, Roland's Durandal, or the Grass Cutter from Japanese legends. But when drawn from a brick of meth, it presents great powers upon its wielder.

In the comments below, speculate as to those magical properties.

-via Ace of Spades HQ | Photo: Bath Township Police Department

Amidst the coronavirus outbreak, work never stops. Some companies are now asking their employees to work from home.

When it comes to working from home, it is much more difficult to be productive. After all, we’re at home, and home is supposed to be a place of rest. And so we try our very best to prove to ourselves (and to our managers) that we are as productive at home as in the office. But as we try to prove ourselves, we usually push ourselves too far that we forget to take care of ourselves.

By day’s end, you’re a shell of your former self: Your hair is greasy, your sweatshirt is covered in bits of the stale tortilla chips you grazed on all day for “lunch,” and your back hurts because you’ve been hunched over your laptop in bed without moving.

It doesn’t have to be this way, however. Vice.com shares to us some tips on how not to feel like a lonely garbage slug while working from home.

See the tips over at the site.

(Image Credit: gracinistudios/ Pixabay)

It is said that pre-literate people can recite poems as long as the Iliad and the Odyssey. We might think that this is too fantastical a notion to be believed, but can this really be true? Can pre-literate people really remember so many lines of poetry? You might not believe it, but they can.

Enter Milman Parry, who burst on the scene in the late 1920s and became a professor at Harvard University in 1929. Parry used textual analysis, anthropology, and field work to show that pre-literate or semi-literate peoples could, in fact, recite long poems. Inspired by the Slavicist Matija Murko, who attended his thesis defense at the Sorbonne, Parry headed to the hills of what is now called Bosnia in the early 1930s. There he used aluminum disks to record pre-literate bards, guslari, who performed epske pjesme, epic oral songs. These bards used “the very same kinds of structures and patterns that Parry had found in the texts of Homer,” according to the late oral-communications scholar John Miles Foley.

Amazing!

(Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

It is without a doubt that many creatures are affected by our plastic waste. One example of these creatures are the sea turtles. These aquatic creatures eat plastic regularly. What makes these turtles lured to eat this dangerous waste? A new study reveals that it might be this “olfactory trap” that makes the turtles keep on eating plastic frequently.

"We found that loggerhead sea turtles respond to odors from biofouled plastics in the same way they respond to food odorants, suggesting that turtles may be attracted to plastic debris not only by the way it looks, but by the way it smells," says Joseph Pfaller of the University of Florida, Gainesville.

More details about this over at New Atlas.

Saddening.

(Image Credit: Brian Gratwicke/ Wikimedia Commons)

If you're going to cut some waves during your lunch break at work, you'll need to bring your board with you. Core 77 informs us that some streetcars in Australia offer this possibility by providing brackets for sliding in a surfboard. These "Flexity 2" cars arrived in Brisbane three years ago.

Photo: Redditor maydaybitch

Dr. Vittoria Dall ’Armellina, of the Ca’ Foscari University of Venice found a sword amongst a collection of objects in a monastery. Dall ’Armellina found a 5,000 year old Anatolian sword in the Mekhitarist Monastery. However, the sword was incorrectly identified as medieval, and was studied by Dall’Armellina and Elena Rova. A new, more scientific study has determined the rare sword to have been forged around 3000 BC, as Ancient Origins detailed: 

Dall’Armellina’s suspicions have now been supported by a new scientific study which has dated the sword to having been forged “around 3000 BC,” making it incredibly rare and one of the oldest swords in the world. And the only reason this newly discovered sword is being called “one of” the oldest swords in the world is because an extremely similar weapon dating to 3000 BC is kept by the Tokat Museum in Turkey that was discovered in the Sivas Province at the eastern part of the Central Anatolia region of Turkey.

The weapon was found to be made of a copper and tin alloy frequently used in Anatolia before the Bronze Age and the specialists have dated the sword to between the end of the 6th and start of the 3rd millennium BC.

image via Ancient Origins

2/ Remember that

Area = Pi r^2

formula for a circle? That’s not really the formula. It should be:

Area = radius x (half circumference),

where circumf=Pi*diameter, so half of that is Pi*radius.

Proof: cut your pizza into small slices and arrange into an r x (C/2) rectangle... pic.twitter.com/VVaj4vWRYb

— Alex Kontorovich (@AlexKontorovich) March 6, 2020

Yeah, Mom always told us not to play with our food, but this Saturday is 3/14, so it's the annual holiday known as Pi Day. Teachers may want to celebrate Friday with this kind of fun demonstration of how pi relates to circles by using pizzas and pizza crust. But anyone can do it, and it's a great excuse to order five pizzas! Alex Kontorovich also invites you to the Pi Party this Friday at the National Museum of Mathematics in New York.  -via Boing Boing

Also: Do you know where your Pi Day shirt is?

Looking forward to it.

Books - https://t.co/OeNAnhakVM#introvert #weekend #selfcare pic.twitter.com/yCkRsVmFrU

— Debbie Tung (@WheresMyBubble) January 31, 2020

Introverts value their alone time. Unlike extroverts who gain energy when around people, introverts get their energy drained when they’re around with many people for long periods of time. With this in mind, introverts would prefer socializing one-on-one with a person, or just be alone entirely.

If you’re an introvert, you might be able to relate to these tweets compiled by HuffPost. And if you are an extrovert, you might be able to understand more about introvert people through these tweets.

Check out the tweets over at the site.

(Image Credit: Debbie Tung/ Twitter)

If you're an #introvert, you know the glorious relief of canceled plans.

— Introvert, Dear (@IntrovertDear) February 15, 2020

February 2, 1970. Three F-106 Delta Darts took off from the Malmstrom Air Force Base (which is near Great Falls in Montana) for a routine training mission. Suddenly, one of the fighter planes — the one piloted by Captain Gary Faust, entered into a flat spin, a phenomenon in which the aircraft stalls and quickly loses altitude while spinning from wing to wing. Once this happens, the aircraft is usually very difficult to recover.

As Gary’s aircraft fell, his team mates tried to help giving him spin-recovery instructions. But when the aircraft dropped below 15,000 feet, Gary decided it was time to abandon his stricken aircraft.

But the unthinkable happened once Gary went out of the plane.

… the reduction in weight and change in center of gravity caused by the removal of the pilot, coupled with the blast force of his seat rocketing out of the plane pushing the nose of the aircraft down, changed the dynamics of the falling aircraft causing it to miraculously recover from the spin.

[...]

From his parachute, he watched incredulously as the now-pilotless aircraft glided down gently and skidded to a halt on a wheat field near Big Sandy, Montana. Gary drifted into the nearby mountains, and was later rescued by local residents.

Truly miraculous.

More details about this story over at Amusing Planet.

(Image Credit: US Air Force/ Wikimedia Commons)