Quirky History facts!

[Moontanman]

Originally Posted by Michaelangelica

What do you think?
true or false?
I know the Poms imported tonnes and tonnes of Egyptian mummies as fertiliser in the 19? 20? C

I think I call BS on that one (it does sound good though) but did you know that Egyptian mummies were once used as fuel in steam locomotives? They are at one time a significant export of Egypt and the burial cloth was used to make paper that was used to wrap meat in butcher shops. That why butcher paper was light brown and continued to be light brown for years even after the practice of using mummy cloth was discontinued. I've often wondered how we kept from spreading some dire disease via this brown paper.

[Moontanman]

Did you know..... The first government study of UFOs concluded they were interplanetary space craft? Oh yes it's true, but the government refused to accept that! And so the many decades of trying to dispute that conclusion came about!

[Michaelangelica]

On 19 September 1893 New Zealand became the first country in the world to give women the right to vote

In 1913 International Women's Day was transferred to 8 March and this day has remained the global date for International Wommen's Day ever since.

During International Women's Year in 1975, IWD was given official recognition by the United Nations and was taken up by many governments. International Women's Day is marked by a national holiday in China, Armenia, Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Vietnam.
International Women's Day 2009

[Michaelangelica]

Goggle today


Samuel Morse's Birthday clever, good, fun

I just caught up with Independence Day last night. The aliens would have won without Morse and his code.

[lemit]

Manure: In the 16th and 17th centuries, everything had to be transported by ship and it was also before commercial fertilizer's invention, so large shipments of manure were common..

It was shipped dry, because in dry form it weighed a lot less than when wet, but once water (at sea) hit it, it not only became heavier, but the process of fermentation began again, of which a by product is methane gas. As the stuff was stored below decks in bundles you can see what could (and did) happen.

Methane began to build up below decks and the first time someone came below at night with a lantern, BOOOOM!

Several ships were destroyed in this manner before it was determined just what was happening

After that, the bundles of manure were always stamped with the term "Ship High In Transit" on them, which meant for the sailors to stow it high enough off the lower decks so that any water that came into the hold would not touch this volatile cargo and start the production of methane.
Thus evolved the term " S.H.I.T " , (Ship High In Transit) which has come down through the centuries and is in use to this very day.

Originally Posted by Michaelangelica

What do you think?
true or false?
I know the Poms imported tonnes and tonnes of Egyptian mummies as fertiliser in the 19? 20? [/B]

Originally Posted by Michaelangelica

C

I think, if you check a dictionary, you might just be able to disabuse yourself of that folk etymology.

I happen to love folk etymologies, like I love pseudoscience. In a way, I'm tempted to continue my co-dependency with those two phantasms, those linguistic and scientific gossamers, but I really really think that spider webs should be called spider webs. I know (as people are always ready to explain to me) that I'm choosing a mundane, unromantic interpretation of the natural world and its beauty. I don't care.

--lemit

[Michaelangelica]

Shit Eh

C
I think, if you check a dictionary, you might just be able to disabuse yourself of that folk etymology.

PE?

I came across something that really amused me in The Australian Newspaper. A Dr. Adam Taor writes a column on Body Parts you've never heard of.
Last week it was the "Rectouterine Pouch". It is a membrane stretched over the lowest part of a woman's peritoneum. It fits in front of the rectum and behind the uterus hence the name rectouterine

So far so good, but what tickled me was where the word came from
"Your rectum was named after the Latin word 'rectus', which means straight; its also the origin of the words rectangle and erection. But your rectum isn't straight; this part of your bowel was named by ancient anatomists who'd dissected only animals whose rectum really was straight"

Of course the Christian church forbade cutting and examining dead human bodies (Till the 15/16Cs?). I think Islamic doctors too were not able to examine human bodies.

[Qfwfq]

Originally Posted by Michaelangelica

What do you think?
true or false?

It's obvious that those ships were used only when the manure originated from bulls.

[Michaelangelica]

The 10 most amazing unexplained artifacts
The 10 most amazing unexplained artifacts | ZME Science

[Michaelangelica]

Interesting scale;
drag the bar up and down the scale to get "Quirky Facts"
NOVA | Absolute Zero | A Sense of Scale | PBS
This they left out

High-temperature superconductors, which are almost always some type of cuprate ceramic doped with a variety of elements, conduct electricity with near-zero resistance at temperatures as high as -226 F.

High-temperature superconductivity in compounds of copper, oxygen and other elements were discovered in 1986 by Swiss scientists, Georg Bednorz and Alex Mьller. Both scientists were awarded the 1987 Nobel Prize in physics "for their important break-through in the discovery of superconductivity in ceramic materials."

http://www.physorg.com/news66994182.html

[Michaelangelica]

A fascinating interview with the guy who knew them all. Last centry's science greats. Names to conjure by.

Sir Mark Oilphant

Listen Now - 06062009 |

Sir Mark Oliphant was one of Australia's most brilliant scientists – he was part of the team that split the atom in 1932 – and a former governor of South Australia.
He spoke with The Science Show's Robyn Williams in 1985.

RN Life And Times - 6 June 2009 - Sir Mark Oilphant