Tag: science

Are humans just mutant animals?

Have you ever wondered what animals think of humans?  We take it for granted that we are many times more intelligent than our pets, but what do they think about us?  Your dog might think you’re a mutant with super powers.  You can do things that transcend his understanding.  Imagine it from his perspective…

Now some scientists think that we may have super powers compared to other animals, that humans are mutants and a “copyediting error” in the brain is what separates us from other animals.  To that I say, “WHATEVER”.  God designed us this way.  Although even if you believe in evolution, does that account for mutants with super powers?  If so, I wasn’t taught that in school.  Science and biology classes would’ve been a lot more interesting if we’d talked about how to get super powers.

It’s impossible to know how an animal would think of all this.  Although it’s probably safe to say that if you were born a cat instead of a human, you wouldn’t be thinking about these things, nor would you even be aware that such a discussion could exist.  Your life would center around eating, sleeping, and playing.  Although I reckon that’s what a lot of humans focus on, not making much use of our superior intellect.  To each their own.  Actually, on second thought, eating a big mound of nachos and taking a nap sounds pretty good right now, super powers or not.

you can help us prevent hurricanes

A while back I wrote an article about how to prevent hurricanes.  It’s been a really popular post lately, and for good reason — Hurricane Isaac was recently causing a swath of destruction along its path through the southern U.S.

Hurricane Isaac in 2012

The article explained some ways to prevent hurricanes, but there has been a noticeable lack of funds coming in.  So obviously investors either haven’t found it, or they didn’t take it seriously.  I realize the presentation could’ve been made in a more “professional” manner.  It started off with some rambling (also known as digressing), and some of the ideas were intentionally over-the-top for fun.  But I make no apologies for the format — this is a humor blog, after all.  Even when legitimate ideas are released into the blogosphere, they are accompanied with humor.  That’s just how I roll.  (Well, I do have a serious blog, and it could’ve went there, but then I would’ve had to edit out the randomness, and what’s the fun in that?)

The last idea was actually somewhat viable, though.  It could make a difference in so many ways.  Obviously we wouldn’t cover the entire Sahara desert with solar panels, but we’d have to make only a something-eight percent difference to improve the current status quo.  And as the post explains, this would reduce global warming AND save money from hurricane damages AND be a clean, green, unlimited, renewable energy solution.  So what’s the problem?  All we need is appropriate funding (and by appropriate I mean a LOT, like billions of dollars), but it would pay for itself many times over.

There may be some people who worry about tampering with Mother Nature, and there are valid concerns to address, but we’ve been doing it for years already.  If things do change for the negative somehow, people will just blame labels like “Global Warming” and “Climate Change” (partly because it gives them political power and enables them to raise taxes with the cleverly named “Cap and Trade”, but I’d better not rant on that or I will surely digress).  Besides, there are solar panels already installed in the southwest U.S., and nobody complains about that changing the weather.

It’s important that we focus on the key initiative here, and that is to solve numerous global problems at once.  Well, that and make billions of dollars in profit.  But as the saying goes, it takes money to make money.  And it takes money to save the world, unless you’ve got super powers like Superman.  However none of us are Superman, and as far as I know, no one on the Buffet o’ Blog staff has any of the super powers of Superman (or we’d know, because it would be awesome to use them).  So we need investment funding, which is another way of saying “send us your money”.  We’ll send you an official certificate saying you contributed to saving the world.  Plus you’ll feel all warm and toasty inside, and you’ll help extend the life of the Earth, and you can’t put a dollar value on that.

Are dinosaurs extinct because of their farting?

In the news recently, British scientists (“boffins”) have announced that dinosaurs’ reckless farting might have led to their extinction.  Read for yourself:

Dinosaurs may have farted themselves to extinction, according to a new study from British scientists.

The researchers calculated that the prehistoric beasts pumped out more than 520 million tons (472 million tonnes) of methane a year — enough to warm the planet and hasten their own eventual demise.

Until now, an asteroid strike and volcanic activity around 65 million years ago had seemed the most likely cause of their extinction. …

“Our calculations suggest these dinosaurs may have produced more methane than all the modern sources, natural and human, put together.”

“Not the momma!”

Yeah, I called it reckless farting.  (Have you ever heard those two words together before?)  It’s bad enough to just fart whenever you want, but when the air becomes unsuitable for life, it’s time to change policy.  I realize they’re just animals, but you’d think they could’ve figured it out.  Even animals can learn by conditioning (like Pavlov’s dogs).  Here, you’d think after millions of years, they’d figure out a disturbing pattern.  Por ejemplo: [fart]  “Whew, that stinks.”  [fart again]  “That’s some stank-terribleness.”  [fart again]  “I can hardly breathe…”  [fart again]  “I’m about to die!”  The pattern is obvious.

Doesn’t it seem odd that there are people who get paid to calculate how much dinosaurs passed gas?  Imagine meeting new people and they ask you what you do — “I study dinosaur farts.”  You’d get some weird reactions, I’m sure.  But you’d be a hit at the elementary school on bring-your-parent-to-school day.  🙂

boiling water, freezing air, & thundersnow

If you take boiling water and toss it into the air when it’s -22 degrees outside, it evaporates into steam before it hits the ground.  Here’s a video of it.  Looks neat. At first it looks like it’s instantly turning into snow, but it’s in fact steam.

I remember hearing that hot water can actually freeze faster than cold water.  Turns out that’s only sometimes true — according to science, water at 100 degrees C will freeze before water warmer than 60 degrees C but not before water cooler than 60 degrees C.  Although if you put hot water and cold water in the freezer at the same time, the hot water can freeze faster because the bottom part of the hot water can start freezing while the top is still warm (and no convection is occurring).  Further explanation is beyond the scope of this article, but you can read more here if you’re feeling particularly nerdy today.  (It’s actually called the Mpemba effect.)

Also on the page right now is a video of Jim Cantore of The Weather Channel getting surprised by “thundersnow“.  It’s basically just thunder and lightning, but it’s more rare in a snowstorm.  His reaction is interesting, which is why this video has been making the rounds on TV.