INTYUF - interesting yet useless facts

I love knowledge, especially strange, useless and surprising facts. If you love to stun your friends with missing-the-point stuffs, then this site is made for you. Don't hesitate to suggest me more area of knowledge, I will be glad to take your hints into account...

[intyuf]

A FICTIVE FLIGHT ABOVE REAL MARS from Jan Fröjdman on Vimeo.

[did-you-know]

High heels were invented for men, and they weren’t made for walking. For centuries, Persian soldiers wore heels as riding footwear that helped them secure their stance when they stood in their stirrups to shoot arrows. By the 1600s, western aristocrats began wearing heels as a status symbol, because they were so uncomfortable and impractical that they reflected the privilege of the upper class. Source

[intyuf]

[intyuf]

Fascinating floating city shaped like a manta ray would be 100% self-sustaining

French architect Jacques Rougerie has envisioned a giant floating city which bears a striking resemblance to a manta ray, named City of Mériens.

French architect Jacques Rougerie has designed a 3,000-foot-long, manta-ray-shaped vessel capable of hosting 7,000 people. The city of Mériens will be a floating university city for researchers and students.

[sciencesoup]

The Jewel Caterpillar

This bizzarely gelatinous, semi-translucent little creature is sometimes referred to as the “jewel caterpillar”, but it’s actually the larvae of a fuzzy orange moth called Acraga coa. This moth is native to Central and South America and belongs to a family known as Dalceridae. There are at least 84 different species of moths in this family, and all of their larvae are so gooey that they’re often nicknamed “slug caterpillars.” At the moment it’s unclear as to why they’re so strangely and conspicuously coloured—biologist Daniel Janzen at the University of Pennsylvania has raised Dalceridae in captivity and reports that the bright, conscpicuous larvae actually spend a lot of their time hanging out on the tops of leaves in full view, like they don’t fear birds at all. Some caterpillars use colour to indicate their toxicity and therefore warn predators away, but there’s no evidence that the Dalceridae caterpillars are poisonous at all. But they do appear to have one defense mechanism: their gooey, gumdrop-like spines break off easily, just like some lizard’s tails break off upon a predator’s touch. So, perhaps this allows the caterpillars a chance to get away from predators. In an attempt to study this function, insect biosystematist Marc Epstein placed Dalcerides ingenita larvae in the same environment as several ants, which would usually devour caterpillars, but these ants backed right away. The ones that tried to attack became stuck in the larvae’s jelly-like body, so the caterpillars seem to repel predators simply by being sticky and uncomfortable. “Jewel caterpillar” is a pretty fitting nickname, then—look all you want, but don’t touch.

(Image Credit: 1, 2)

[intyuf]

[intyuf]

[intyuf]

[sixpenceee]

Elevated Bus That Drives Above Traffic Jams

China’s traffic jams are legendary. One jam even has its own Wikipedia page dedicated to it (China National Highway 110 traffic jam. Look it up). But the country’s epic gridlock problems might soon be a thing of the past if plans for this amazing elevated bus go ahead.

Take a look at the pictures below to see for yourself what we mean. It’s known as the Transit Elevated Bus (TEB) and it could very well be the future of public transport. It’s only a concept for the moment but a working mini model was recently presented at the 19th China Beijing International High-Tech Expo. The bus will be able to carry up to 1200 passengers and will take them to work and back by literally driving over the traffic. It’s a brilliant idea that could potentially alleviate congestion and reduce pollution in the world’s most populous country. If approved it could also be ready in as little as one year’s time. (Source)

[intyuf]

[intyuf]

Are we smart enough to really understand how smart animals are?

Animals when judged on a scale of human behaviors often don't do very well. But when you measure their intelligence and cognition against skills they are supposed to have, some do extraordinarily well.

In his book   "Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?" the primatologist Frans de Waal shed a new light on the so called animal intelligence. 

too often scientists haven’t done animals the courtesy of testing them in their own environment. Why do we always want to compare animals to us and we need to come out as the smartest of them all?

As an example, take the experiment about monkey’s ability to recognize faces. For a long time, scientists said they couldn’t, until they stopped using human faces and confronted monkeys with other monkeys. And why did they learn ? Monkeys do have facial recognition abilities !

For de Waal, most of the studies about animal intelligence suffer the same bias. By a shift of methodology, we could learn amazing things and who knows, maybe we are not the smartest of all human creatures after all.

[intyuf]

Mashrou’Leila

Ever heard of them ? 

This Lebanese band, whose music has been called the “soundtrack to the Arab Spring”, is a great rock band with deep and controversial lyrics. Moreover, two of its members are openly gay.

Here is one of their songs, djin, with the english subtitles. The name is clearly a word play between the beverage (gin) and the evil spirit known as Jinn (djinn) by the muslims.

Liver baptized in gin I dance to ward off the djin Drown my liver in ginIn the name of the father and the son

Tomorrow I rise with the night And the reckoning bell tolls But hangovers hurt far less than these woes

[complete translation]

The band made the news a few days ago, because it was banned from performing their concert in Jordan. The official reason ? “the performance would have been at odds with what the ministry of tourism views as the ‘authenticity’ of the site”, despite the fact that they already played there twice. 

Of course, the real problem is elsewhere. As they explained:  “We also have been unofficially informed that we will never be allowed to play again anywhere in Jordan due to our political and religious beliefs, and endorsement of gender equality and sexual freedom.” [src]

[intyuf]

You might soon be able to log in with sound from your skull

Researchers in Germany are working on SkullConduct, an authentication system that uses a bone conduction speaker and mic on your head to identify you.

Hooked up to a modified Google Glass, the SkullConduct works by playing a one-secong-long audio clip through its speaker and then captures the sound after it’s traveled through the user’s skull. It analyzes the unique frequency to identify the wearer.

[intyuf]

Ever hear of the Pharaoh’s snake ? If not, have a look at the video, it is stunning.

the Pharaoh’s snake is a reaction of the mercury thiocyanate to heat. Quoted from wikipedia:

Mercury thiocyanate was formerly used in pyrotechnics causing an effect known as the Pharaoh's serpent or Pharaoh's snake. When the compound is in the presence of a strong enough heat source, a rapid exothermic reaction is started which produces a large mass of coiling serpent-like solid. An inconspicuous flame which is often blue but can also occur in yellow/orange accompanies the combustion. The resulting solid can range from dark graphite grey to light tan in color with the inside generally much darker than the outside.

Even as cool as it is, mercury thiocyanate also has downsides. MIT chemist Tenney Davis reminds us that “the sale of the mercuric thiocyanate Pharaoh's Serpents [...] is now forbidden by law in several of the states, for the vapors from these toys are poisonous, and, more serious, children have been known to eat them with fatal consequences” [src].

[intyuf]

extrait de : “les questions con”.

[intyuf]

Extrait de “les questions con”

[srsfunny]

The Original Motto Story