When Ralph Nader wrote the book Unsafe at Any Speed, the US Government sat up and took notice. Highway deaths were unacceptably high, and someone had to do something about it. In the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, a government program actually developed the RSV, a car that had many new safety features. The government tinkered with the design, the features, and tried to sell the idea of a safer car to the automobile industry and the public. What happened to this program? It's a long story, but in the end, the RSVs were destroyed.

Then-NHTSA chief Jerry Curry contended the vehicles were obsolete, and that anyone who could have learned something from them had done so by then. Claybrook, the NHTSA chief who'd overseen the RSV cars through 1980, told Congress the destruction compared to the Nazis burning books.

"Junking those cars was a terrible idea," said Kelley, who now teaches at Tufts medical school. "What is the benefit of keeping anything that's historically important? The future wants to know more about the past, and when you destroy the past, you destroy the future's access to knowing about it."

"I thought they were intentionally destroying the evidence that you could do much better," said Friedman.

Read the complete story at Jalopnik. Link -via Metafilter

Korean designer SungKug Kim made this bicycle and a couple of others which incorporate the shapes of antlers and horns and named the art project Bi-King. http://kitsunenoir.com/2010/05/26/bi-king-by-sungkug-kim/ | Artist's site -via Chris Tackett

How well can you judge how fattening a food may be by looking at it? In this Lunchtime Quiz at mental_floss, you'll be presented with a pair of dishes. All you have to do is decide which one contains more calories. It's not as easy as you might think; I scored only 59%. Link

(YouTube link)

Plattsburg, Missouri police officer Nick Shepherd responded to a call for help involving a dog stuck in a fence. The wire was twisted, and Shepherd cut the fencing to free the dog. He then tried to capture the dog. What happened next makes it worth sitting through the jumpy footage from Shepherd's automatic camera. Link -via Buzzfeed

Although women have been researching and inventing for as long as men have been grunting and hunting, recognition for their accomplishments has been sparse. We think we owe them a few retroactive shout-outs.

Flopsy, Mopsy, and Flammulina Velutipes

Beatrix Potter may be known mainly as the mother of adorable anthropomorphized animals, but the British author and illustrator also used her skills for some decidedly less cuddly work. Around the turn of the 19th century, scientists had no way of photographing images under a microscope, so Potter found herself churning out watercolor paintings of fungi in labs. Pretty soon, she'd become a well-respected mycologist and was one of the first scientists to study lichens. At the time, women were barred from attending scientific meetings, so Potter's uncle had to present her papers for her. Eventually, she had to settle for a more "appropriate" profession, and thus Peter Rabbit was born.

"No Nobel" Burnell

As a graduate student in Cambridge in the late 1960s, Jocelyn Bell Burnell builtr a radio telescope with her thesis advisor, Antony Hewish. While taking readings, she noticed a regularly repeating radio signal from a segment of space. Confused, she and Hewish labeled the phenomenon "LGM" for "little green men". Later, the scientific community renamed them "pulsars," for "one of the biggest astronomy discoveries in modern history". In 1974, Hewish received the Nobel Prize. The ever-observant Burnell, however, wasn't even mentioned during his acceptance speech.

Computational Error

Even though men used to have a hard time sharing their labs with ladies, they seemed more than happy to let women crunch the numbers. In 1946, after John Mauchly and Presper Eckert finished building the world's first electronic digital computer, known as the ENIAC, they solicited the aid of six women to program and run the thing. Kay McNulty, Betty Jennings, Betty Snyder, Marlyn Wescoff, Fran Bilas, and Ruth Lichterman subsequently became the world's first computer programmers. Sadly, their work was considered "clerical", and their station "sub-professional". In 1997, however, those words were amended, and all six women were inducted into the Women in Technology International Hall of Fame.

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The article above, written by Hank Green, appeared in the Scatterbrained section of the September - October 2007 issue of mental_floss magazine. It is reprinted here with permission.

Don't forget to feed your brain by subscribing to the magazine and visiting mental_floss' extremely entertaining website and blog today for more!

The staff at Etali Safari Lodge in South Africa tried to find the leak in the hot tub for weeks, but didn't find out why it was losing water every day until a guest took a picture. An elephant named Troublesome was drinking from the spa! Rangers from the attached wildlife preserve are familiar with the elephant, and say she is very inquisitive.

Susan Potgieter, owner of Etali Safari Lodge, in North West Province, South Africa, said elephants could drink more than 200 litres of water a day so drinking a whole whirlpool bath was no problem.

She said: 'When I first saw the photograph of her drinking I couldn't believe it. And then it dawned on me of course an elephant was drinking it.

'It was something of a relief because we had been trying to work out why the pool had been draining so quickly for weeks but couldn't find a leak anywhere.

The lodge is now providing drinking water for the elephant to keep her out of the pool. Link -via Bits and Pieces

Psychologist Milton Rokeach took three psychotic men, each who believed they were Jesus Christ, and put them together at Ypsilanti State Hospital in Michigan. It was an experiment in identity, since all three men knew there could only be one Son of God. Rokeach chronicled what happened in his 1964 book The Three Christs of Ypsilanti, which is out of print.

In hindsight, the Three Christs study looks less like a promising experiment than the absurd plan of a psychologist who suffered the triumph of passion over good sense. The men's delusions barely shifted over the two years, and from an academic perspective, Rokeach did not make any grand discoveries concerning the psychology of identity and belief. Instead, his conclusions revolve around the personal lives of three particular (and particularly unfortunate) men. He falls back—rather meekly, perhaps—on the Freudian suggestion that their delusions were sparked by confusion over sexual identity, and attempts to end on a flourish by noting that we all "seek ways to live with one another in peace," even in the face of the most fundamental disagreements. As for the ethics of the study, Rokeach eventually realized its manipulative nature and apologized in an afterword to the 1984 edition: "I really had no right, even in the name of science, to play God and interfere round the clock with their daily lives."

Slate has some tidbits from the interaction of the three men. Link -via Buzzfeed

(Image credit: Robert Neubecker)

This dust bunny is one of the many household creatures that bedevil Christoph Niemann in this funny photo essay. You've probably seen some of them in your home, too! Link -via Boing Boing

(vimeo link)

An award-winning story of a man and a digital camera. You might want to get a hanky ready. -via Flotsam

This sea cucumber can't even hide his internal organs, because he is one of ten animals featured at WebEcoist that have one thing in common -they are clearly clear. Transparency is a benefit to animals in some environments because it makes them hard to see, or even invisible to predators. Link

(Image source: Discovery)

The Swedish Bed has a collection of Star Wars knockoffs, television ads, music videos, and parodies made in India, Brazil, Turkey, Japan, China, France, and the Middle East. Link -via Buzzfeed

Martin Refsal created this whimsical artwork in honor of Pac-Man's 30th anniversary. This will make it easier to recognize a Pac-Man ghost when you see one! Link -via Holy Kaw!

Rueben Ayala of Brighton, Colorado had completed three years of high school when he was drafted to serve in World War II. He didn't like to talk about the war, and his children didn't know that he didn't graduate from high school until recently. Sixty-six years later, he has that diploma.

"I'm just so honored, so very honored to be here today," he said as he got ready to walk onto the football field of Brighton High School with the rest of the class of 2010.

It is safe to say that Ayala was likely the only graduate of the day with 13 grandkids and 18 great grandkids.

When his name was finally read, it is also safe to say that Ayala was the only member of the class to receive a standing ovation from the entire crowd.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am honored to present to you Mr. Rueben Ayala, 2010 graduate of Brighton High School," the speaker said.

Ayala slowly walked to the front grinning as wide as is humanly possible. His daughter, Susan Meador, wiped away a few tears.

"I really think this is a dream come true to him, something that he waited his entire life for," Meador said.

Ayala graduated with the help of Operation Recognition - Veterans Diploma Project, which helps veterans whose education was interrupted by the war service. Link

(YouTube link)

Get a whole lot of those new Dyson Air Multiplier™ fans and a balloon, and you could have a swell time! -via reddit

Urlesque got an interview with Jessica, who you saw in the Daily Affirmation video last week. She is twelve years old now, and was willing to discuss how crazy her life became after the 8-year-old video went viral. Link