A new computer model solves a pair of Jovian riddles.
via the Big Think blog by Robby Berman
Jupiter, right in the middle of everything. (Christos Georghiou/Shutterstock)
- Astronomers have wondered how a gas giant like Jupiter could sit in the middle of our solar system's planets.
- Also unexplained has been the pair of asteroid clusters in front of and behind Jupiter in its orbit.
- Putting the two questions together revealed the answer to both.
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Carol Tavris surveys a range of new approaches to the old problem of old age [Times Literary Supplement via Arts & Letters Daily]
“Age only matters while one is ageing”, said Picasso, at the age of eighty. “Now that I have arrived at a great age, I might as well be twenty.” Well, bully for him. From where I sit, far more people at eighty feel they might as well be seventy-eight. Or ninety-eight. Carl Honoré’s Bolder: Making the most of our longer lives tells us that Michelangelo finished the Pauline chapel at the age of seventy-four, Frank Lloyd Wright finished the Guggenheim Museum in New York at the age of ninety-one, and Benjamin Franklin invented bifocals at the age of seventy-four. Well, bully for them, too. Anyone can continue creating great things all their lives if they are Michelangelo, Lloyd Wright, or Franklin. Besides, their creative work began decades earlier, probably around the age of eight.
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Fossil of ancient four-legged whale with hooves discovered
via the Guardian by Hannah Devlin Science correspondent
The latest specimen proves that early whales could swim for days or possibly weeks at a time while retaining their ability to rove around on land. Photograph: A. Gennari/CellPress
An ancient four-legged whale with hooves has been discovered, providing new insights into how the ancestors of the Earth’s largest mammals made the transition from land to sea.
The giant 42.6m-year-old fossil, discovered in marine sediments along the coast of Peru, appears to have been adapted for a semi-aquatic lifestyle. Its hoofed feet and the shape of its legs suggest it would have been capable of bearing the weight of its bulky four metre long body and walking on land. Other anatomical features, including a powerful tail and webbed feet similar to an otter suggest it was also a strong swimmer.
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via the Guardian by Hannah Devlin Science correspondent
The latest specimen proves that early whales could swim for days or possibly weeks at a time while retaining their ability to rove around on land. Photograph: A. Gennari/CellPress
An ancient four-legged whale with hooves has been discovered, providing new insights into how the ancestors of the Earth’s largest mammals made the transition from land to sea.
The giant 42.6m-year-old fossil, discovered in marine sediments along the coast of Peru, appears to have been adapted for a semi-aquatic lifestyle. Its hoofed feet and the shape of its legs suggest it would have been capable of bearing the weight of its bulky four metre long body and walking on land. Other anatomical features, including a powerful tail and webbed feet similar to an otter suggest it was also a strong swimmer.
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via the OUP blog by David W. Deamer
“Butterfly Nebula in narrow band of Sulfur, Hydrogen and Oxygen” by Stephan Hamel. CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia.
How did life begin? We will never know with certainty what the Earth was like four billion years ago, or the kinds of reactions that led to the emergence of life at that time, but there is another way to pose the question. If we ask “how can life begin?” instead of “how did life begin,” that simple change of verbs offers hope. It does seem possible we can demonstrate a series of obvious steps toward the origin of life, perhaps leading to a synthetic version of life in the laboratory. We will then be able to provide a satisfactory answer to the second question: How can life begin on the Earth and other habitable planets?
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Scarborough Fair
via Newton Excel Bach, not (just) an Excel Blog
Scarborough Fair is a very old song, according to Wikipedia dating back at least to 1670, and probably much earlier. Here are three versions from the mid-sixties.
The first from Martin Carthy was released in 1965, on his first album:
The second,from Marianne Faithfull, was released in 1966 on the album North Country Maid:
The third, from Simon and Garfunkel, was released later the same year, and of the three is by far the best known:
Personally I prefer the Marianne Faithful version!
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Medieval peasant food was frigging delicious
via Boing Boing by Seamus Bellamy
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It was a sprawling civilization
via the Big Think blog by Matt Davis
- Near modern-day St. Louis, Missouri, you can find towering mounds of earth that were once the product of a vast North American culture.
- Cahokia was the largest city built by this Native American civilization.
- Because the ancient people who built Cahokia didn't have a writing system, little is known of their culture. Archaeological evidence, however, hints at a fascinating society.
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via About History
OriginsThe sword is a kind of bladed weapon with a straight blade intended for a chopping or a piercing blow. In the broadest sense, “sword” is the collective name of all long bladed weapons with a straight blade.
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via the Guardian by Sam Leith
We shouldn’t worry when a word falls into obscurity. There’s usually a good reason, and a new one will always fill its place
‘You might as well try to lash the wind, as Samuel Johnson said.’ Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo
Conservationists are all around us, forever appearing on our televisions with their pleas for this noble, endangered mountain lion or that cute, imperilled subspecies of vole. But 70-year-old Edward Allhusen is one of a slightly different stripe. Instead of trying to prevent creepy-crawlies going extinct, he is trying to save the lives of words. In a new book, Betrumped: The Surprising History of 3,000 Long-Lost, Exotic and Endangered Words, he has included a sort of highly endangered list of 600 vocabulary items, culled according to no more systematic criterion than personal preference, from Johnson’s Dictionary of 1755.
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via Boing Boing by Rob Beschizza
Cephalopod intelligence is widely known, but scientists struggle to understand why it evolved. The New York Times’ Carl Zimmer reports on one of zoology’s most fascinating questions.
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The small corner of Instagram dedicated to temporary wallpaper is uncommonly magical
via ResearchBuzz Firehose: Nicole Gallucci in Mashable
“Nearly every piece of wallpaper I’ve seen since then has been a real eyesore, so for most of my adult life I’ve remained confident in my opinion. Until the day I was scrolling through Instagram and a bold floral print atop a subtle blush background caught my eye. In an instant, everything changed.”
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