Today I Found Out

February 4th: Mark Zuckerberg Launches Facebook

Daven — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 08:01:53 +0000

This Day in History: February 4, 2004

On this day in history, 2004, Mark Zuckerberg launched a site called TheFacebook, that eventually became just “Facebook” after the company acquired the domain rights to facebook.com for $200,000 in 2005. The site was originally inspired by a project done by one of Mark Zuckerberg’s high school friends, Adam D’Angelo. D’Angelo had developed a simple social networking site called Buddy Zoo at Caltech that was fairly popular in its short run until D’Angelo shut it down. The popularity of this early social site and the implications of such a service on a large scale was frequently discussed by Zuckerberg and his friends, but they didn’t do anything about creating such a service initially.

This all changed when Zuckerberg was reading an article in The Harvard Crimson that mentioned a website he’d created and gotten in a lot of trouble for (FaceMash), including almost being expelled from Harvard. FaceMash was a site that was more or less a Harvard-centric knock-off to Hot or Not. The reason Harvard Administration had a problem with the site was that in order to get it going, Zuckerberg had hacked into Harvard’s student ID picture database in order to get pictures of students at the school in the nine different school dorm houses. He then posted the pictures on his site, separated by dormitory and pitted pictures of people against one another, showing two pictures at a time with people choosing who’s hotter of the two shown.

Over 22,000 votes were submitted on FaceMash before it was shut down after just four hours due to people getting offended from having their pictures posted without their consent to be rated. Once the administration got wind of it, they charged Mark with various things such as copyright infringement, violating people’s privacy, and the like. All the charges were eventually dropped and he was allowed to continue attending Harvard.

In any event, The Harvard Crimson article specifically mentioned:

The potential benefits of a comprehensive, campus-wide online facebook are plenty… Thanks to a little bit of ingenuity and lot of illicit hacking, a Harvard sophomore was able to obtain a great majority of the campus’ photos and compile them on one navigable site. This was an invasion of privacy, and HASCS must insure that its facebook is secure. But it is clear that the technology needed to create a centralized website is readily available; the benefits are many.

When Zuckerberg read this, a light bulb went off in his head and he thought, “I think it’s kind of silly that it would take the University a couple of years to get around to it. I can do it better than they can, and I can do it in a week.” And, in fact, that’s exactly what he did, finishing the initial version in about a week. Granted, during that week he reportedly did almost nothing else, including not sleeping much, nor socializing at all. However, after the week, it was done. This was lucky for him that he finished so quickly because just a few months later he stated in The Harvard Crimson,”If I hadn’t launched it that day, I was about to just can it and go on to the next thing I was about to do.”

From there, it took just one month for half of the school’s students to sign up to TheFacebook. Shortly thereafter, it was expanded to include other universities, initially focusing on Ivy League schools, but then expanding to the majority of colleges in North America. Just six months after it was launched, TheFacebook was officially incorporated and Zuckerberg and co. moved to Palo Alto, California where they received funding from people like Sean Parker (already a wealthy young entrepreneur who, among other things, also helped found Napster) and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel. Shortly before this happened, Zuckerberg stated, “My goal is to not have a job… Making cool things is just something I love doing, and not having someone tell me what to do or a timeframe in which to do it is the luxury I am looking for in my life… I assume eventually I’ll make something that is profitable.”

Since then, Facebook has been growing at an astounding rate both in revenue and number of users. In 2006, just two years after its launch, Facebook earned $52 million. The next year, they earned $150 million; then $280 million in 2008; $775 million in 2009; 2 billion in 2010; and, finally, $4.27 billion in 2011. The user growth rate has been equally remarkable, growing to 100 million users in late 2008. From there, the user base skyrocketed, gaining an average of around 100 million users every 160 days up to today, where they are rapidly approaching 1 billion users with their last reported tally on December of 2011 being 845 million members with 483 million daily active people. They also reported well over one trillion page views per month in late 2011. I guess Zuckerberg can check off from his To-Do list the goal to not ever have to get a job.

Bonus Factoids:

Facebook was not Mark Zuckerberg’s first “big thing” he helped create. In fact, he nearly made his first million while still in High School. At this time, he and Adam D’Angelo decided for a school project to make a program that would monitor what a person likes to listen to, then create playlists for that person, given a variety of factors. Specifically: “It learned your listening patterns by figuring out how much you like each song at a given point and time, and which songs you tend to listen to around each other.” The application they made was in the form of a plugin to WinAmp that was then freely available online. It was eventually featured on Slashdot and soon Zuckerberg and D’Angelo began getting offers from various companies including Microsoft, AOL, and WinAmp for their program for as high as $2 million, even without negotiating. They initially didn’t want to sell it, but once they left for college changed their minds, but at this point it was too late and the companies were no longer interested in their program.
This WinAmp plugin was not only significant because it almost made Zuckerberg a millionaire right out of High School, but also because he had originally not intended to study computer science in college, with his interest being more towards a classics program at Harvard. After helping to write this application, he changed his thinking and decided to include studying computer science.
If his hacking into Harvard’s ID database and stealing pictures then putting them on a Harvard-centric public site seems to you to have been an incredibly idiotic thing to do (given he was guaranteed to get caught), it should be noted that he was apparently slightly drunk when he thought up the idea and began implementing it: “I need to think of something to occupy my mind. Easy enough—now I just need an idea… I’m a little intoxicated, not gonna lie. So what if it’s not even 10 pm and it’s a Tuesday night? What? The Kirkland [dorm] facebook is open on my desktop and some of these people have pretty horrendous facebook pics. I almost want to put some of these faces next to pictures of farm animals and have people vote on which is more attractive… Yea, it’s on. I’m not exactly sure how the farm animals are going to fit into this whole thing (you can’t really ever be sure with farm animals…), but I like the idea of comparing two people together… Let the hacking begin.” He later stated he never intended it to go public when he first shared it with a few friends; he was just wanting their feedback so he could improve on it. At the time, he well knew the controversy that would ensue if it became popular in its initial state. However, it did become instantly popular and he was forced to shut it down before he could get around some of the privacy problems and copyright concerns.
Another early social themed site Zuckerberg made was called CourseMatch, which he made about a year before FaceMash. CourseMatch was intended to allow students to easily find out what classes their friends were taking at Harvard.
Zuckerberg didn’t just get in trouble for FaceMash at Harvard, but also for something he did in the early days of TheFacebook. Specifically, he examined failed login logs for TheFacebook and then took the incorrect passwords and attempted to login to the user’s official Harvard email accounts, which he was successful on at least twice.
The first “major” program Zuckerberg ever wrote as a child was a knock-off version of Risk, based in Ancient Rome with Julius Caesar as the opponent.
As mentioned, Sean Parker helped get Facebook its initial funding and was named company president in the summer of 2004. He currently owns about a 4% stake in the company, compared to Zuckerberg’s 24%. In any event, as a teenager, Parker’s main hobby was hacking into various people’s systems. One particularly fateful night, he hacked into a Fortune 500 company’s network only to have his dad unplug his computer before he could logout and cover his tracks. He was soon tracked down by the F.B.I., but because of his young age wasn’t sentenced, other than having to do some community service.
Sean Parker chose not to go to college because at the time when he graduated High School, through a variety of projects he’d started while in school, he was already making over $80,000 per year. Many of the projects he not only made money on, but also received high school credit for a “foreign language”, convincing the school to count programming languages as a foreign language and allowing him to do independent study in that area.
Parker became involved with Napster thanks to a long time friendship with Shawn Fanning. The two met online when Parker was 15 and Fanning was 14. About five years later, they launched Napster together in 1999, with Parker providing much of the initial funding. His next major project came out just three years later, Plaxo, which was a social networking service that allows people to update their contact information everywhere at once, such as the ability to integrate with Microsoft Outlook, Mozilla’s Thunderbird, Blackberry, etc. Plaxo grew to around 20 million users when it sold to Comcast in 2008. Parker has since help found a variety of other companies and today his net worth is estimated to be a little over $2 billion. He’s currently just 33 years old.
Parker learned of Facebook through one of his roommate’s girlfriends in 2004. He became intrigued by it and contacted Zuckerberg and subsequently unofficially advised him on developing the site until finally offering to facilitate acquiring funding for Facebook in the summer of 2004, getting funding from such as people as PayPal’s co-founder, Peter Thiel. As Zuckerberg said, “Sean was pivotal in helping Facebook transform from a college project into a real company.”
Parker has since been portrayed on the movie The Social Network as extremely cocky and quite a jerk. However, according to Chamath Palihapitiya, the former chief growth coordinator at Facebook, nothing could be further from the truth: “Parker is really the exact opposite of his portrayal in the film.”
In the film The Social Network, Parker was played by Justin Timberlake, who, interestingly enough, just recently purchased MySpace for $35 million in 2010, partnering with Specific Media LLC in the purchase. This is potentially a steal of a deal as even as recent as August of 2011, MySpace received 33.1 million unique U.S. visitors alone and currently is still around the 150th most popular site in the world. However, the steady decline of traffic the last few years, the expensive nature of maintaining it in its current corporate form, as well as the loss of the hype surrounding the company, which Facebook is currently benefiting from in their valuation and MySpace originally benefited from when they sold for over a half a billion in 2005, obviously played a huge role in suppressing the recent sale price, which was a full $70 million less than the originally projected value.
As mentioned, Peter Thiel, was one of the other initial investors in Facebook. He also co-founded PayPal with Max Levchin, and Elon Musk (if you don’t know who this is, go here right now and read about him; one of the more amazing entrepreneurs on the planet). Before becoming an entrepreneur Thiel was a chess master (officially, Thiel was one of the highest ranked under-21 players in the United States when he competed as a youth).
Interestingly, Thiel was a philosophy major at Stanford. He bucked the trend of philosophy majors who go on to simply think deep thoughts about not having a job and instead started helping found companies. Today, his net worth is officially $1.5 billion, but in fact his Facebook stock alone is estimate to be worth around $1.7 billion, once they go public, which is expected to happen soon. Companies Thiel has been involved in include: LinkedIn, Friendster, Yelp, and PayPal, among many others. Not bad for a chess master/philosophy major who is only 45 years old.
Shawn Fanning, arguably the main person behind Napster, originally got his start in the professional programming world thanks to his uncle, John Fanning, who hired him to work in the summers for John Fanning’s internet company, Chess.net. Sean also worked their during Christmas break. During the first Christmas break while he was at College, he and his uncle John completed the initial version of Napster and launched it early the next year with some financial backing from Sean Parker, as stated above. Eventually, after significant legal trouble, they attempted to sell Napster to Bertelsmann for $85 million, but the sale was blocked by a U.S. judge and instead they had to liquidate their assets with Roxio acquiring the company in an auction. Next, Best Buy in 2008 purchased Napster for $121 million and now Napster is owned by Rhapsody when Napster and Rhapsody merged, with Best Buy receiving a stake in Rhapsody as compensation.
Fanning’s most successful venture since Napster was a company called Rupture which was a social tool for gamers. It sold about four years ago for $15 million to Electronic Arts.

Sources and Further Reading:

How a Firefly Glows

Scott — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 21:49:53 +0000

Today I found out how a firefly glows.

The glow from a firefly comes from the lower part of their abdomen. This “lantern” portion has an evolutionary gift in the form of bioluminescence. The light produced by a small layer of cells called photocytes is reflected off several layers of reflective cells and emits a greenish-yellow glow.

Specifically, inside the light producing cells within the firefly is an organelle called a peroxizome. The chemical party that lies within it is what creates the light. Magnesium and ATP combine with an enzyme known as luciferase and the protein luciferin. This combination creates a very excited molecule. When oxygen is introduced into the mix, the molecule goes from “excited” back to a steady state. Think of having to pee extremely badly. You begin to tap dance like Micheal Flatley on crack! Once relieved, you return to a “steady state”. In the case of a photocytes chemical reaction, this energy release is in the form of a photon of light.

The mechanism that turns on and off this light show is still the topic of some debate. The prevailing theory revolves around the firefly’s ability to control oxygen within photocytes. Mitochondria (the organelle that controls ATP production) require large amounts of oxygen. When the firefly decides to light up the sky, it signals “trigger cells” around their air tubes to produce large amounts of nitric oxide. When the mitochondria inside the photocytes become soaked with nitric oxide, it results in extra oxygen available within the cell. It is thought this extra oxygen availability kicks off the chain reaction that produces light.

The process involved in stopping the luminous chemical reaction within photocytes has also yet to be proven. Researchers have found that white light can reverse the effects of nitric oxide on a key respiratory enzyme found in mitochondria. Because of this, it is thought that the “off” button on a firefly could be light itself.

The reason for this evolutionarily driven light show is mating. Fireflies, like most animals that procreate sexually, need to find a way to attract potential suitors. In the case of the firefly, this attraction is accomplished with flashes of visible light. When a hot-to-trot male is ready to put on his Barry White and begin patrolling a specific area for females, he will start his flash-dance in the hopes of being seen by a willing lady. The females usually sit in wait, and once an attractive male happens by that gets her fire going, so to speak, she will signal back. The male also prepares a “nuptial gift” in the form of sperm wrapped in a high protein package, which he then gives to her and the mating ritual of this bright beetle is soon accomplished.

Bonus Factoids:

Not all fireflies use their light to attract potential sexual partners. A type of firefly known as “Photuris” will mimic the light patterns of another type, “Photinus”, to attract the males of that genus class. Once the love-struck male approaches, instead of a booty-call, the Photuris female will seize him and then eat him!
Some firefly species will use blood as a means to ward off predators. The process is called “reflex bleeding”. This blood is toxic to some predators and numerous studies have shown that these predators learn very quickly to stay away from fireflies. These same studies show that these predators will also stay away from perfectly palatable insects if those insects are painted with glowing substances that mimic firefly larva. The femme fatale Photuris firefly is not able to make the toxic chemical. They are however able to gain this poison by eating firefly’s with it. Once ingested, she is able to pass it on to her eggs and larvae.
The light from a firefly is usually in the range of 561-570nm on the light spectrum. This is high green-low yellow for those not in the know.
Fireflies are not “flies”, they are beetles. True “flies” have only one pair of wings, beetles and other insects commonly referred to as flies, like dragonfly or scorpionfly, have 2 sets of wings or four wings altogether. For ease of understanding, when the term “fly” is hyphenated following the common name for the insect, or fly follows the common name, it is, most likely, a true “fly” and has only 2 wings.
Most species of firefly are able to use luminescence as adults, but all known firefly larvae and eggs are able to achieve this feat. There are also related beetles that have bioluminescent abilities. Click beetles and Phenogodid beetles are two.
In the United States, fireflies that glow are not usually seen west of Kansas. The reason for this phenomenon isn’t known, but studies have shown only rare, isolated sightings of luminous fireflies in the western states.
If you live east of Kansas and want to attract fireflies to your house there are some tips to follow. Cut down on lawn chemicals; Allow low overhanging trees, tall grass and other vegetation. This will provide adult fireflies with a place to rest and remain cool during the day. Reduce any artificial lighting around your property, which could interfere with the firefly’s signal and make it harder for most species to locate a mate.
There are currently over 2000 known species of firefly around the world.

References:

The Term “Scot Free” Does Not Come from the Dred Scott v. Sandford Supreme Court Case

Daven — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 23:34:59 +0000

Myth: the term “scot free” has its origins from the Dred Scott v. Sandford U.S. Supreme Court Case.

“Scot free”, also sometimes written “scotfree”, “scot-free” or, incorrectly, as “Scott free” actually pre-dates the Dred Scott Supreme Court ruling in 1857 by a very large margin (having been around since at least the 11th century). Another common misconception is that the phrase has some association with the Scottish. In fact, “scot”, in this case, is from the Old Norse word “skot” meaning something to the effect of “payment” or “contribution”. In English, “scot” initially just meant “tax”.

The phrase scot free was first used in reference to municipal tax levies. Each person in a town would be obligated to pay a share of the scot (tax), which was called their “lot”. In some areas, you also were not allowed to vote unless you paid your lot of the scot. Those who didn’t pay, such as the poor or those wealthy individuals that could get out of it, were then “scot free”.

Thus, initially, the term more or less just implied you got out of paying your taxes. It quickly spread to being used whenever someone got out of paying anything they should have, monetarily speaking. Today, it is also used in reference to non-monetary forms of payment, such as someone who commits a crime, but then gets off “scot free”, without being punished in any way for their crime.

The Dred Scott v. Sandford case has since given rise to the false etymology that it had something to do with this Supreme Court ruling on whether Dred Scot and his family should be free or not. For those not familiar, Dred Scott was a slave, born in Virginia somewhere between 1795-1799 who ultimately played a large role in accelerating the start of the U.S. Civil War and indirectly helped popularize the Republican Party.

Scott originally was owned by the Peter Blow family but was sold to Dr. John Emerson who moved around a lot due to being a doctor in the U.S. army. During this time, Dred Scott found himself living briefly in Illinois (a free state) and the Wisconsin Territory (in present day Minnesota) where slavery was outlawed.

As such, at around 47-51 years old, even though he was at the time living in a non-free territory, he petitioned for his freedom on the grounds that when he was in those free territories, he should then have been automatically free, both by state laws and by the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. He filed suit initially on April 6th, 1846 with the courts to have himself and his wife and two daughters freed. Why he waited so long to do so isn’t known. It is speculated that he didn’t know of the law at the time, so didn’t bring the matter up while living in those free regions.

This first suit was dismissed due to insufficient evidence, but the court allowed Scott to re-file. During the second trial, the jury ruled in the Scott family’s favor and proclaimed them free due to the fact that Dr. Emerson had illegally held him as a slave while Scott lived in free regions. However, this decision was appealed and the Missouri State Supreme Court ruled against the Scotts in 1852. This was particularly significant because it overturned the firmly established “once free, always free” precedent, with Scott and his family having been free during the interim of the jury’s ruling and the State Supreme Court’s ruling.

After another failed suit, the case was brought before the U.S. Supreme Court: Dred Scott v. Sandford (note: the court misspelled Sanford as Sandford). They ruled against him 7-2, stating that as he was of African descent, he had no rights as a citizen of the U.S. and, thus, could not file suit against anyone in a U.S. court. This was contrary to common practice in free states where many allowed freed slaves to become citizens. As such, because the Supreme Court is the highest court in the land, it effectively nullified those people’s citizenship. Their ruling also overturned the Missouri Compromise as unconstitutional because it would allow slave owners to be deprived of their property (slaves) without any sort of due process (if the slave owners traveled through or moved to a territory where slavery was outlawed), which violated the Fifth Amendment.

Needless to say, the Supreme Court’s ruling outraged abolitionists who had recently formed the Republican Party three years before in 1854 with one of their primary goals being to stop the spread of slavery. The ruling became hotly debated throughout the country, polarizing many individuals on the issue of slavery and ultimately bolstering the new Republican Party’s numbers, helping to eventually get Abraham Lincoln elected as President in 1860 as the first Republican U.S. President.

After the ruling, the Scotts were given back to the Blow family, who had originally owned them. The Blows subsequently granted them their freedom in 1857. Unfortunately, Dred Scott didn’t get to enjoy this too long as he died of tuberculosis a year later, but at least his family was free and his court case was pivotal in accelerating the process that would ultimately lead to the freedom of all slaves in the United States.

Bonus Factoids:

One of the earliest known references to the phrase “scot free” comes from the Charter of 1066: “Scotfre and gauelfre, on schire and on hundrede.” Basically: “Scot free and tribute, divide lots by subdivisions within a county” (“hundrede” here refers to a subdivision of a shire or county)
The Supreme Court’s ruling in the Dred Scott case technically still stands to this day (having never been directly overruled by the Supreme Court since then). However, the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments have effectively done the work of overruling the court’s decision in the Dred Scott case. The Thirteenth Amendment outlawed slavery and the Fourteenth Amendment, among other things, provides a citizenship clause which allowed people of African descent (and others) to become citizens of the United States.
Many historians think that Dred Scott’s name was not originally “Dred”, but, rather, “Sam”. He had an older brother named “Dred” that died, at which point Sam chose to take his brother’s name.
Dred Scott’s wife, Harriet, was owned by Major Lawrence Taliaferro and was just a teenager when Dred married her (even though he was nearing his 40s at the time). Scott asked permission to marry Harriet, which was granted, and Taliaferro further agreed to transfer ownership of Harriet to Dr. Emerson so Dred and Harriet could live together.
The Dred Scott ruling by the Supreme Court was only the second instance of the Supreme Court declaring that an Act of Congress was unconstitutional. The first was around 50 years before in the case of Marbury v. Madison.
While it wasn’t the cause, the Dred Scott ruling did help to trigger the Panic of 1857, due to economists being worried over whether the free states and territories would now be slave states and if that would result in anarchy within those regions.
After its formation in 1854, the Republican Party quickly grew to dominate the Northern States, seeing its first party member to become president in 1860, Abraham Lincoln (not a bad turn-around, taking only 6 years from the party’s inception). One of their earliest campaign slogans was “free soil, free silver, free men, Frémont”, which was a slogan used during John C. Fremont’s failed bid for the presidency in 1856. Interestingly, during this time in the South, the Republican Party was branded as a radical group that wanted to break up the nation via a civil war.
The Republican Party being strongly supported by various groups of Christians goes all the way back to its origins where among its strongest initial supporters were the Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, and Quakers, who almost universally supported the party from its inception. Interestingly, despite the overall strong support from the various Christian groups, the Roman Catholic church almost exclusively rejected the Republican Party in its early days, generally supporting the Democratic party instead.

Sources and Further Reading:

February 1: Alexander Selkirk is Rescued After Being Stranded on a Deserted Island for Four Years, This is Thought to Have Inspired Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe

Daven — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 05:22:19 +0000

This Day in History: February 1, 1709

On this day in history, 1709, Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk was finally rescued from a deserted island he inhabited for over four years. The island he found himself on was Más a Tierra, the largest island of the Juan Fernández group of islands, around 400 miles west of South America. Today the island has been re-named to “Robinson Crusoe”. One of the other islands in that group, around 100 miles west of Robinson Crusoe island, has also been renamed Alejandro Selkirk.

Selkirk, who was serving as a Master Navigator at the time, arrived at the island in October of 1704 aboard a barely sea-worthy vessel, the Cinque Ports, that had been damaged in previous battles with the Spanish and was infested with worms that were eating away at the hull. The captain had decided to stop at the island to re-stock their supply of fresh water and food stores. Due to the failing state of their ship, Selkirk refused to get back aboard and tried to convince the others that they should stay and wait for another ship to come along. Everyone else refused to stay and Selkirk found himself on the island alone.

This may sound like a foolish thing to do, but better stranded on a well stocked island with plenty of fresh water and food sources than on a ship that may sink at any moment in the middle of the ocean. In fact, this is exactly what happened to the vessel, with most of the remaining 41 members of the crew (they originally had 90 when they first set sail) aboard dying when the Cinque Ports sunk of the coast of Peru shortly thereafter. Only eight of the crew survived, including the captain. They managed to swim to a nearby island from where the ship sank, but were subsequently taken captive by Spaniards and were imprisoned where “the Spaniards put them in a close dungeon and used them very barbarously.” Only the captain made it away from there alive, eventually managing to return to Britain.

Initially, Selkirk thought a ship would pass fairly quickly that he could hitch a ride on. This obviously didn’t happen. The supplies he had on hand included a musket, gunpowder, a knife, a Bible, bedding, a few tools, and tobacco. Lucky for him though, the island provided his necessities, with plenty of fresh water, goats, seals, shellfish, wild turnips, cabbage, etc. However, the island was also infested with rats. This became a problem for him when he’d try to sleep, with the rats gnawing at his clothing, bedding, and feet. He soon found a solution to this problem, as the island also had a large population of cats. He domesticated many of the cats, providing them regular supplies of food, and the cats took to hanging out around his campsite and sleeping near him, which kept the rats at bay while he slept.

Throughout his time on the island, he lived fairly comfortably. Initially, he hunted goats using his gun, but when gunpowder ran out, he took to chasing the goats. All total, he estimated he’d killed about five hundred goats during his time there to use for food and other purposes. He also began systematically partially maiming young goats so that when they grew older, they wouldn’t be able to run as fast. His father having been a shoe maker and tanner also helped him out significantly as he knew how to make clothing and the like from the goat skins, which was useful once his own clothing wore out.

While on the island, his life was only threatened twice. The first time was when he was chasing a goat and subsequently fell off of a cliff. While he was injured, his injuries may have been even worse except that he managed to land on the goat, who was probably killed on impact. Selkirk himself was knocked unconscious by the fall and did not wake for almost an entire day and according to his account was near senseless for another two days. The second time his life was in danger was when Spanish ships arrived. He initially thought he might be rescued, but upon realizing the people aboard were Spanish, he fled as they shot at him. The Spanish chased him throughout the island, but eventually gave up the hunt. During this time, he hid himself near the top of a very thickly leaved tree for two days. At one point, he reported a couple of the Spanish sailors, not knowing he was there, peed at the base of the tree.

Finally, on February 1, 1709, two ships, which included famed explorer William Dampier and was led by Woodes Rogers, anchored near the island and Selkirk revealed himself to the crews via a signal fire. Several of the crew were suffering from scurvy and Selkirk set about supplying them with needed food. He got so good in the graces of the captain that he was made first mate before they set off, and was given one of the two ships to captain during the remainder of the voyage. A book was subsequently written by Captain Woodes Rogers’, which included the tale of Selkirk: Rogers’ A Cruising Voyage Round the World: First to the South-Sea, thence to the East-Indies, and Homewards by the Cape of Good Hope. Selkirk himself was also interviewed several times about his adventure and gained a certain amount of notoriety for it throughout England.

Bonus Factoids:

The original title of the book now known as Robinson Crusoe was actually: The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un‐inhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strangely deliver’d by Pirates.
Another fascinating castaway was a French noblewoman Marguerite de La Rocque de Roberval. She was accused of having an affair with someone aboard the ship she was on (she was a guest of her relative, the newly made Lieutenant General of New France). The individual she had an affair with was depicted as a low birth individual, but this is thought to have been a lie to protect the man’s aristocratic family from shame. His name was never given. In any event, Marguerite was left on the “Isle of Demons” in the Gulf of St. Lawrence near present day Quebec in 1542. With her was the young man she was supposedly having an affair with and a maid servant (there are conflicting accounts on whether she was left on the island with her servant and her lover jumped off the ship and swam to shore to join her or whether he was left on the island and she voluntarily chose to join him). Whatever the case, both the man and servant died on the island, along with a baby that Marguerite had while their (the baby dying of malnourishment). Marguerite, on the other hand, managed to live through the ordeal, which lasted a few years. She was eventually rescued by a fisherman and managed to return to France where she became a school teacher. Her story became famous throughout France and was included in Queen Marguerite of Navarre’s work: Heptaméron.
Interestingly, William Dampier had also captained one of the ships on the original expedition Selkirk was involved in that got him stranded in the first place. On that expedition, Dampier was captaining the St. George, and Selkirk was serving aboard the Cinque Ports. The two ships parted ways when the Cinque Ports put in on the island Selkirk was ultimately stranded on. Dampier was instrumental in initially getting the crew in 1709 to trust Selkirk.
It has also been proposed that Robinson Crusoe may have also been partially inspired by Henry Pitman, who was once a surgeon to the Duke of Monmouth, but ultimately became a castaway. Pitman wrote a book about his adventures in a Caribbean penal colony, where he took part in the Monmouth Rebellion. Afterwards during his escape, he was shipwrecked on a deserted island. The connection between Defoe and Pitman was that Defoe’s publisher’s father, J. Taylor, published Pitman’s book. Further, Pitman lived above the publishing house in London and it is thought Defoe may have known him and been familiar with his story.
Selkirk initially began his life at sea due to having a bit of trouble with the authorities as a young man. Rather than appear at a trial for “undecent carriage” (basically indecent behavior), he fled, becoming a privateer (basically a legal pirate, that was allowed to attack and rob any ship or person that was an enemy of the UK).
Daniel Defoe was originally named Daniel Foe, but later changed his name, adding the “De”, because it was more aristocratic.
When Selkirk finally returned to Scotland, he brought with him his earnings as a privateer which amounted to £800, which was a very large sum at the time (around 10-15 years worth of wages by the average earnings of a typical low-class worker like his father, a tanner). He eventually went back to a life at sea and died in the Royal Navy of a fever off the coast of Africa.
Selkirk wasn’t the first to be stranded on what is now known as Robinson Crusoe Island (then called Más a Tierra). Another man, named simply Will, was left there after his fellow sailors spotted an enemy ship approaching the island. When they saw it, they all fled back to their ship and sailed away, leaving Will behind as he had not noticed them fleeing until most were back on the boat and he was foraging deep inland. He was stranded there in 1681 and rescued in 1684.
Leendert Hasenbosch was a famous castaway who didn’t survive. He was left on Ascension Island, which is around halfway between Africa and South America, in 1725. He was caught committing the act of sodomy during a stop over in Cape Town and his punishment was to be left on the island until he could find away off via a passing ship or died. They left him with a tent, a survival kit, prayer books, seeds, a musical instrument, writing material, clothing, and four weeks worth of water, as they thought there was no fresh water on the island, though it was fairly large. Hasenbosch searched the island and found no water, but managed to live for six months, drinking the blood of the animals and drinking his own urine. He finally died, presumably from dehydration. Interestingly, there actually are two sources of fresh water on the island, which were previously discovered (in 1701) by other castaways (this time of a ship wreck). One of the sources was significant enough to supply those 60 men with sufficient fresh water after their ship wreck for two full months before they were rescued. It was a stream found high up in the interior of the island. Why Hasenbosch’s story was so famous was that he kept a diary that was found about six months after he died by passing British sailors. This diary was subsequently published in Britain under such titles as “Sodomy Punish’d” and “An Authentick Relaton”. The original diary has been lost and only a few known facts remain about what was in it, such as him continually searching for water and firewood, as well as his remorse for committing sodomy. It is also known that he indicate he frequently thought he saw old friends and also demons while on the island, presumably from being in such a dehydrated state. This level of constant dehydration also may be why he never ventured up to the high elevation parts of the island where there was in fact the one strong stream of fresh water. Accounts of his diary have survived, but they differ from one another, having been embellished in the telling, so hard facts about his time there are difficult to ascertain.
The first known European to become a castaway on an Island in the Pacific Ocean was Gonzalo de Vigo. He was a sailor in Magellan’s fleet, who chose to leave the fleet in Guam in March of 1521. He was found five years later by the Loaisa Expedition.
Today, the island of Robinson Crusoe has an official population of 859 people (525 men and 334 women), with the primary industry being lobster trading, as well as a few hundred people a year coming for tourism purposes, such as scuba diving near the wreckage of the German SMS Dresden.

Sources and Further Reading:

A Dutch Castaway on Ascension Island, by Alex Ritsema
Selkirk’s Island: The True and Strange Adventures of the Real Robinson Crusoe byDiana Souhami
Robinson Crusoe, by Daniel Defoe
Two Extraordinary Travelers
The Mystery of Alexander Selkirk Solved
The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk
Alexander Selkirk
Robinson Crusoe
Daniel DeFoe
Robinson Crusoe Island
Castaway
Marguerite de La Rocque
Leendert Hassenbosch
Image Source

How Porcupines Mate

Scott — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:43:59 +0000

Today I found out how porcupines have sex….very carefully!

Porcupines mate in a very bizarre way. They first begin their ludicrous lovemaking with some nose rubbing. If the female accepts the nose rubbing and, after the initial nose rubbing test, the female is still keen on the male, the male will then stand on its hind legs and the female allows him to urinate all over her body (kinky). This isn’t done in a normal bladder expelling fashion, though. In this case, the urine is ejaculated at high pressure, rather than relying on internal bladder pressure.

Should this golden shower not be up to the female’s standards (she doesn’t like the pheromones), she will shake off the urine and find herself another mate. Should the rain from the main vein be acceptable, she will expose her non-quilled underbelly and allow the male to copulate for 2-5 minutes. If all is successful, approximately 112-210 days later (depending on the species) a little porcupine baby is born.

This mating ritual is not only strange, but also is infrequent. Female porcupines are receptive to sexual advances for only about 8-12 hours per year, much like my ex-wife. This mating typically occurs in late summer or early fall. They do however take full advantage of that time. Females will mate several times with the male of their choice until he becomes sexually exhausted.

Interestingly, unlike many female animals that are frequently raped (such as with ducks where an estimated 1 in 3 mating acts is rape), the female porcupine cannot be raped. All she has to do to deter a potential rapist is to swipe his mating-ready exposed sensitive region with her tail, problem solved. So male porcupines are completely at the mercy of the female when it comes to mating. They also tend to have a tough time of it just to get to mate, generally having to chase off other male porcupines to win the right to mate with the female. This process often results in them getting stuck with quills during the fighting, even if they win.

Bonus Factoids:

Porcupines are the third largest rodent on earth. They range from 25-36 inches long and weigh between 12-35 pounds. Only the beaver and capybara are larger in the rodent kingdom.
Porcupines are in constant need of salt and will stop at nothing to get at it. They are considered pests primarily for this very reason, gnawing on and destroying anything that has salt on or in it. This includes even small amounts of salt, like anything that salty human hands have touched, such as the handles of tools, discarded garbage, or food wrappers. The most common item destroyed by these rodents is plywood. The curing compound used in plywood production is sodium nitrate. The porcupine sniffs this out and will chew relentlessly at any wooden wall, floor, roof, or structure made from it.
Baby porcupines are born with their eyes open and very well developed. Their quills are soft directly after birth (which I’m sure the mother appreciates) but will harden within about an hour. They are dependent on their mother’s milk for about 8 weeks and then begin to eat normally. They can expect a life span of about 20 years.
The warning and defensive method of a porcupine is a threefold system. They will first begin to shake their quills in a visible pattern and send out an unpleasant odor. If you still won’t back off, they will begin to stamp their feet and will also growl and clack their teeth. Should you ignore these first two signs, the porcupine will then turn its back to you and charge at you backwards. Should they make contact, the quills are your Darwin-Award for inattention to warning signs.
A common misconception is that porcupines can “throw” their quills. In fact, this is not an ability they possess (luckily).
Evolution has developed an ingenious method for the release of quills. There is a thick loop of connective tissue that surrounds the follicle and attaches it to the skin. When relaxed, this tissue is soft and only loosely holds the quill in place. When attacked by a predator, a porcupine becomes stressed and the muscles around the connective tissue tighten and cause the quills to become erect. Once erect, the quills can deeply penetrate the skin and the tightened muscles make it easier to detach the quill. Specifically, research has shown that the tightened muscles make it 40% easier to detach the quill then if the connective tissue was loose.
Porcupine quills are just specialized hairs ranging from ½ inch to 4 inches thick. These hairs are coated with a thick layer of keratin (similar to fingernails) with several small layers of barbs at the tip. This will allow the barb to penetrate deeper once embedded. There are about 30,000 of them on any one porcupine. They occupy every part of the body except the face, inner parts of the limbs and the stomach. The longest quills are on the butt, and the smallest are on the cheeks.
Porcupine quills are a good luck charm in many parts of Africa and the hollow portions have been used as musical rattles or containers for gold dust. Don’t think all parts of Africa are in love with this strange rodent though. In 2005, there was such an infestation that the Kenyan people pleaded with the government to control the problem. Local farmers stated they had several years of unusable crops due to porcupines, and local graveyards complained of numerous graves that were burrowed into and used as dens for the creatures. Ever the innovative people, some Kenyans saw this opportunity to make lemonade from lemons and created a new delicacy with the vermin.
The best way to remove a porcupine quill is to take a pair of common household pliers and pull the quill directly out. Be careful not to break off any part of it, but if you do, don’t worry, quill tips are coated with antibiotic fatty acids that help in healing. And don’t worry that the porcupine will be left defenseless by releasing too many quills. They grow back within a month or two.

References:

Why America was Named America

Scott — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 22:31:02 +0000

Today I found out how the Americas got their name.

Like most, I’ve known that the Americas were named after Amerigo Vespucci since my early education. However, the story behind why this is the case is somewhat more interesting and quite a bit less well known. Vespucci was a navigator that traveled to “the new world” in 1499 and 1502. Being a well educated man, he realized that this new world was not part of Asia, as some had initially thought. Vespucci chose to write about his travels and his books were published in 1502 and 1504. Being both entertaining and educational, his accounts of the new world were reprinted in almost every European language.

In 1507, a German cartographer, Martin Waldseemüller, chose to make a new map that included the new world. He and two scholarly partners were aware of Vespucci’s writings and were ignorant of Columbus’s expeditions. As such, they mistakenly thought Vespucci was the first to discover this new land and so named it after him, stating:

But now these parts (Europe, Asia and Africa, the three continents of the Ptolemaic geography) have been extensively explored and a fourth part has been discovered by Americus Vespuccius (the Latin form of Vespucci’s name), I do not see what right any one would have to object to calling this part after Americus, who discovered it and who is a man of intelligence, and so to name it Amerige, that is, the Land of Americus, or America: since both Europa and Asia got their names from women.

When the large new map, approximately 8 feet by 4 feet, was unveiled by Waldseemüller, it had the large title “AMERICA” across what is now present day Brazil. Waldseemüller used Vespucci’s travelogues as a reference for his drawing and so his map had South America as the only part of this new western hemisphere. When North America was later added, the mapmakers of the time retained the original name. In 1538, The famous geographer Gerard Mercator chose to name the entire north and south parts of America as one large “America” for the entire western hemisphere.

Christopher Columbus might well have had the new world named after him, had it not been for two shortcomings. The first was that Columbus was under the mistaken impression that he had found a new route to Asia and was not aware that America was an entirely new continent. The second was that he never wrote publicly about it so the masses were not aware of his discovery. Had he done this, Mr. Waldseemüller and his colleagues might have named it Columba! As it happened, Vespucci did write about it and was the first to call this land the “Novus Mundus” (Latin for “New World”).

Bonus Factoids:

Waldseemüller’s 1507 map was lost to scholars from 1538-1901 when it was discovered inside a German castle. Once found, it was recognized as the earliest map to record the use of the name “America”. Today, that map is on permanent display in the Library of Congress. They purchased it in 2001 for $10 million.
Christopher Columbus and Vespucci were actually good friends. Vespucci was sent to Spain in 1490 by his employers to help in their business venture of fitting out new ships. In that role, he became involved in fitting out Columbus’s fleet for his second voyage and Columbus later wrote the he trusted Vespucci and held him in very high esteem.
Vespucci was also credited for inventing a system of computing longitude. This system was so accurate that he was able to calculate the circumference of the earth, at the equator, to within 50 miles of the actual measurement.
Vespucci was born in March 9, 1454 in Florence. He was baptized, “Amerigho”, named after his grandfather. Remarkable to think that when his parents were picking a name for this baby, they were also picking a name for the Americas. He died February 22, 1512.
Vespucci is thought to have taken four voyages to the new world. His first voyage from 1497-98 has been called in to question, and many scholars believe it might not have taken place. However, there is significant evidence that his second and third voyages in 1499-1500, and 1501-1502 actually took place. It is believed that he might have taken another voyage to the Americas in 1503-04.
Vespucci’s writings, while scholarly, also entertained the masses by his descriptions of the new world. For instance, he wrote in one of his letters about the natives of the land how they would have sex with anybody, including “Mom”.
The first people to inhabit the western hemisphere did so approximately 19,000-23,000 years ago. Mitochondrial evidence shows that all Native Americans come from a single population group around the time of the last ice age, during what is known as “the last glacial maximum”, probably having migrated over from Asia. Over the next 5-8 thousand years there was a large population boom. DNA evidence suggests that this population spread quickly throughout all of the America’s via a Pacific Coast route.
In 1508, Vespucci was appointed “Chief Navigator” also known as “Pilot Major” for Spain. He was in charge of examining and licensing all Spanish ships and voyages. He also made the official maps of the newly discovered lands and the routes that future captains were obliged to take. He maintained this title of distinction until he died.

References:

Why America Was Named After Amerigo Vespucci
Why Its Called America Not Columbusia
History Of The Naming Of America
Mitochondrial Population Genomics
Image Source (warning, 97 MB in size)

10 Food Myths Dispelled

Noreen — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 20:28:05 +0000

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Sources:

January 30: President Andrew Jackson Beats Richard Lawrence with a Cane After Lawrence Attempted to Assassinate Jackson

Daven — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 08:01:58 +0000

This Day in History: January 30, 1835

On this day in history, 1835, Richard Lawrence became the first known person to attempt to assassinate a U.S. President, attempting to fire two guns at Andrew Jackson at close range. His assassination attempt failed only because the guns he pointed at Jackson jammed when he pulled the trigger. Interestingly, when the guns were later tested by police, they proved to be quite reliable, which caused many at the time to believe it was divine intervention that saved the President.

Richard Lawrence was a painter who, at the time of the assassination attempt believed himself to be King Richard III of England (in fact, Richard III, the last King of the House of York, died some 350 years before at the Battle of Bosworth Field, which is regarded by many historians as marking the end of the Middle Ages; this battle also is considered by many to have brought to a close the Wars of the Roses).

In any event, around the time of the assassination attempt, Lawrence found himself out of work, something he blamed President Jackson for, rather than his own insanity. He further thought that the U.S. government owed him a significant amount of money and if he could just kill Jackson, then it would be paid to him. He also felt that money would become plentiful in the U.S. as a result of Jackson’s death. Once he had his money, he planned to return to England where he would take back his throne, as King Richard III.

The actual assassination attempt took place after a funeral that Jackson attended, that of Warren R. Davis, a former Representative from South Carolina. When Jackson was leaving the funeral, Lawrence stepped out from behind a pillar he was hiding behind, pointed his Derringer gun at Jackson from around 13 feet away and pulled the trigger. Reports state the fire arm went off, but the bullet did not leave the chamber. He then quickly discarded the first Derringer and drew out his second and pulled the trigger, this time with Jackson just a few feet away. This second shot reportedly went off like the first, with a loud bang, but with no bullet exiting the chamber.

Jackson didn’t take kindly to this assassination attempt and subsequently attacked Lawrence with a cane. Others around Jackson helped subdue Lawrence, including Congressman Davey Crocket, who incidentally was a staunch political enemy of Jackson, but nevertheless saw fit to help him take down Lawrence. Some reports even state that Jackson had to ultimately be pulled away from Lawrence as he continued to beat him even when Lawrence was down and completely subdued.

Lawrence was subsequently tried, though not convicted, by virtue of his insanity. He was then placed in a variety of asylums for the remainder of his life, dying 26 years later in 1861.

Conspiracy theorists at the time felt that Lawrence’s assassination attempt was actually not Lawrence’s idea, but was instigated by certain of Jackson’s political opponents, including Senator George Poindexter, who had hired Lawrence to paint his home just a few months before the attempt on Jackson’s life. Indeed, enough people thought Poindexter was involved in the assassination attempt that many of his own supporters withdrew their support and he was unable to get re-elected. Jackson himself thought Senator John C. Calhoun was the main person behind the attempt.

Jackson not only was the first known U.S. President someone tried to murder, but also is thought to be the first to be physically attacked while in office. The attacker was Robert B. Randolph and the attack happened about two years before the assassination attempt. Randolph had been in the Navy but Jackson had him dismissed. Randolph later attacked the President, striking him and then running away when people around Jackson attempted to grab him. Randolph ended up getting away with striking the President scot-free as Jackson didn’t press charges.

Sources and Further Reading:

American Assassins: the Darker Side of Politics, by James W. Clarke
Davy Crockett: His Own Story, by Davy Crockett
Presidential Assassinations
Tecumseh’s Curse
List of Presidential Assassination Plots
Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Andrew Jackson
Baltimore Plot
Jackson Escapes Assassination Attempt
Richard III of England
Derringer
Wars of the Roses

Why Cats Like Catnip

Daven — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 01:21:50 +0000

Today I found out why cats like catnip.

Catnip, which is a perennial herb in the mint family, contains a chemical called “nepetalactone” that is released when catnip is crushed. When cats get a whiff of nepetalactone, most will start rubbing themselves against it, playing around with it, sometimes eating it, and generally will act quite bizarrely. It is thought, but not known exactly, that this chemical mimics certain feline pheromones, specifically their theoretical facial pheromones (it isn’t known whether these actually exist, but many researchers think so, which is why cats probably like to rub their faces on various things).

Once cats have been exposed to the nepetalactone for a few minutes, it loses its effect on them and they will usually no longer be interested in it for about an hour or two, at which point the chemical will start to kick in again as they breathe it in and they will once again begin acting bizarrely around it for a few minutes.

Despite the apparent drug-like effect, it isn’t thought that catnip is in any way harmful to cats, nor is it thought that it is addictive. Most researches think that nepetalactone simply triggers something in their brains that causes them to want to rub up against this particular smell, not unlike what dogs often do when they encounter certain smells. That being said, cats can “overdose” on catnip, which will typically result in vomiting or diarrhea. I’ve personally seen a cat that got into a bulk bag of catnip that was about five times the size of the cat. The poor cat was found with catnip all over itself and more or less half buried in it. As a result of this, for whatever reason, she was mostly unresponsive, was twitching and making random noises, and had a significant amount of drool in her fur around her head and mouth. I expect this is something like coming home to an overdosing drug addict. Unlike a person who’s overdosed on a drug, though, once the cat was extracted from her self made catnip bed and washed off (which was much easier to do than normal given her more or less catatonic state), within about 15 minutes of that she was completely back to normal with no residual effects.

Interestingly, not all cats respond to catnip. Whatever genetic quirk that causes them to respond to nepetalactone is inherited and only about 70% of cats out there show a behaviorally difference around catnip. Further, cats under the age of a few weeks old also are not attracted to catnip and some even show an aversion to it.

Not only are very young cats sometimes averse to catnip, but so are cockroaches, mosquitoes, flies, and termites. In fact, nepetalactone extract has been shown to be ten times more effective at repelling mosquitoes than DEET (N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide), which is the chemical traditionally used in mosquito repellant. However, it should be noted that when put on human skin, nepetalactone’s effectiveness as a mosquito repellant decreases quite a bit, so it’s more suitable as a mosquito repellent when sprayed on clothing or the like.

Bonus Factoids:

Only female mosquitoes drink blood. They don’t need the blood for their own nourishment; rather, they need it to be able to produce eggs. Once the female has safely acquired a “blood meal”, she will rest for a few days while her body develops the eggs from digesting the proteins and iron in the blood, producing amino acids which are used as the building blocks for the synthesis of the egg yolk proteins.
Male and female mosquitoes alike get their own nourishment from plant nectar and other sugar sources.
Female mosquitoes detect possible blood sources primarily by detecting emitted carbon dioxide and octenol, which are both contained in your breath and sweat, along with a variety of other compounds which are lesser known in terms of which ones most attract mosquitoes. People who give off more of these compounds, such as people who sweat more, will be more attractive to these mosquitoes. The mosquitoes can typically detect these compounds up to 150 feet away.
Mosquitoes have four stages to their life cycle: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. During the first three stages, they live entirely in water. During the larva stage, they feed on algae and other microorganisms and must frequently bob to the surface of the water to get air. During the pupa stage, they do not eat, but do sit at the surface and breath air through two small tubes. At the end of the pupal stage, the mosquitoes transform into adult mosquitoes and, after crawling to a dry place to rest and dry off, leave the water.
DEET was created in 1940s by the United States Army; they were seeking to make a bug repellent for soldiers. It was first used as a pesticide and later used by soldiers as a repellent in 1946. It was released for civilian use in 1957.
A repellent mixture with only a 23.8% concentration of DEET will protect the wearer for about five hours; 100% concentration of DEET has been found to be effective for about 12 hours. DEET works by confusing the mosquito’s sensors so that they can’t zero in on the location of the compounds stimulating their sensors, such as octenol. Recent research has also shown that mosquitoes, in particular, aren’t just having their senses confused, but also intensely dislike the smell of DEET. DEET also acts on the brains and nervous systems of insects and, in extreme cases, can cause paralysis and eventual death by asphyxiation in the insects.
DEET also works well as a solvent and can dissolve certain plastics, spandex, leather, and works as a nail polish remover.
Another good natural mosquito repellant besides nepetalactone from catnip is menthol from mint. Mint leaves or mint oil containing high levels of menthol will help repel mosquitoes and can even do more than just repel them; it has been shown that mint oil can actually kill the mosquitoes.
A person whose body is more efficient at processing cholesterol is much more attractive to mosquitoes because the byproducts of this processing appear on the surface of the skin and seem to attract them.
Catnip isn’t just good at inducing kitty-crazy, but throughout human history it has been smoked and used in tea and other drinks, even as an alcoholic extract. For medicinal purposes, catnip oil also works well as a mild numbing agent.
You can learn how to extract nepetalactone from catnip at home easy enough by going here: DIY Kitty Crack
The known record for the most kittens born to one cat is currently held by a cat named “Dusty”. She gave birth to 420 kittens in her lifetime and even had a litter at the very old age (for a cat) of 18 years old.
The most kittens in one litter is 14, a feat accomplished by a cat named Bluebell. Amazingly, all 14 kittens survived, which is rare in large litters of kittens.
The smallest adult cat on record was named Tinker Toy. Tinker Toy as an adult cat weighed just one pound, eight ounces and measured in at just 2.75 inches tall and 7.5 inches long.
The heaviest cat in the world was 46 pounds and named Himmy. This cat had a waistline of 33 inches.
The catnip plant, originally found in the Mediterranean, was brought over from Europe to North America.
All-total there are about 13 other chemicals that will produce a similar behavioral response in cats as catnip. The others are: actinidine from Valeriana officinalis, dihydronepetalactone, neonepetalactone, isodihydronepetalactone, epinepetalactone, boschnialactone, boschniakine, dihydroactinidiolide, actinidiolide, iridomyrmecin, mitsugashiwalactone, and onikulactone.

Sources and Further Reading:

Mark Wahlberg was a Drug Dealer and was Charged with Attempted Murder Before Forming Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch

Daven — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 00:39:07 +0000

Today I found out Mark Wahlberg was a drug dealer and was tried for attempted murder before forming Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch.

Wahlberg, born the youngest of nine children all living in a three bedroom apartment, dropped out of school around the age of fourteen and joined a gang. During this time, he was reportedly in trouble with the law around 20-25 times, for dealing drugs and various other offenses. He also claims he became addicted to cocaine during this period. Things came to a head when he was 16 years old and he attacked two Vietnamese men without provocation. He attacked the first with a stick and he punched the second, permanently blinding him in the process. The official record of the event as recorded by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Superior Court is as follows:

Count I:

At approximately 9:00 p.m. on April 8, 1988, Thanh Lam, a Vietnamese adult male who resides in Dorchester, traveled by car to 998 Dorchester Avenue, Dorchester, Massachusetts. At 998 Dorchester Avenue, Thanh Lam left his car carrying two cases of beer. As he crossed the sidewalk, Mark Wahlberg attacked Thanh Lam. Wahlberg was carrying a large wooden stick, approximately five feet long and two to three inches in diameter. Wahlberg approached Thanh Lam calling him a “Vietnam fucking shit”, then hit him over the head with the stick. Thanh Lam was knocked to the ground unconscious. The stick broke in two and was later recovered from the scene. Thanh Lam was treated overnight at Boston City Hospital.

After police arrested Wahlberg later on the night of April 8, 1988, Wahlberg was informed of his rights and returned to the scene of 988 Dorchester Avenue. In the presence of two police officers, he stated: “You don’t have to let him identify me, I’ll tell you now that’s the mother-fucker whose head I split open”, or words to that effect.

Count II:

As a police officer arrived at the scene of 988 Dorchester Avenue, Wahlberg and two other youths who were with him fled up Dorchester Avenue toward Pearl Street.

Shortly after 9:00pm on April 8, 1988, Hoa Trinh, an adult Vietnamese male who resides in Dorchester, was standing several blocks away from 998 Dorchester Avenue, near the corner of Dorchester Avenue and Pearl Street. Hoa Trinh was not aware of the altercation outside of 998 Dorchester Avenue.

Wahlberg ran up to Hoa Trinh, put his arm around Hoa Trinh’s shoulder and said: “Police coming, police coming, let me hide.” After a police cruiser passed, Wahlberg punched Trinh in the eye, causing him to fall to the ground.

Police arrived and Hoa Trinh identified Wahlberg as the person who punched him. Wahlberg was placed under arrest and read his rights. Thereafter, he made numerous unsolicited racial statements about “gooks” and “slant-eyed gooks”. After being returned to 998 Dorchester Avenue, Wahlberg identified Thanh Lam as the person he hit over the head with a stick.

For these attacks, Wahlberg was arrested and initially charged with attempted murder, but it was later reduced to criminal contempt, which carried a maximum sentence of ten years. After pleading guilty, he was given a two year sentence at the Deer Island House of Correction in Boston. In the end, he only had to serve 45 days in the correctional facility.

Unlike most that go through such facilities, the time he spent locked up inspired him to try and turn his life around. “As soon as I began that life of crime, there was always a voice in my head telling me I was going to end up in jail. Three of my brothers had done time. My sister went to prison so many times I lost count. Finally I was there, locked up with the kind of guys I’d always wanted to be like. Now I’d earned my stripes and I was just like them and I realized it wasn’t what I wanted at all. I’d ended up in the worst place I could possibly imagine and I never wanted to go back.” He started his turn-around by reaching out to his parish priest for guidance and support, as well as leaving the gang he was a member of.

Mark Wahlberg’s big break came thanks to his older brother, Donnie. Donnie Wahlberg was already famous at this point with his success as a member of The New Kids on the Block, a band Mark had initially been a member of at the age of 13, but quit before the group became famous. Mark had been working as a bricklayer after serving time when Donnie helped him form Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch, including helping him get a record contract and producing the first record the group made. The debut album Music for the People, released in 1991 when Mark Wahlberg was 19 years old, ended up going Platinum thanks largely to the hit single Good Vibrations and the follow up single Wildside.

After his music career started to hit the tank a couple years later, Wahlberg dropped his Marky Mark persona and decided to take up acting. Despite early skepticism by critics, he made the switch successfully, with his first critical success coming from appearing in The Basketball Diaries, though he had a few roles before this, most notably opposite Danny DeVito in Renaissance Man. Since then, he has become one of the bigger stars in Hollywood, reportedly commanding around $12-$15 million per movie today.

Bonus Factoids:

During his “Marky Mark” fame period, Wahlberg famously worked for Calvin Klein as an underwear model. Somewhat more humorously, he also put out a workout video: Form… Focus… Fitness
Mark Wahlberg’s siblings are: Arthur, James, Debbie, Michelle, Paul, Tracey, Robert, and Donnie. He also has half siblings Scott, Buddy, and Donna who are children of his dad by another woman.
Though all in all Wahlberg has turned his life around quite nicely, especially in recent years where he’s been involved in numerous charitable endeavors, particularly benefiting underprivileged youth, he still had several instances of violence in his post-prison, younger years (around the “Marky Mark” period). For instance, when he was 21 years old, he “viciously and repeatedly kicked the plaintiff, Robert D. Crehan, in the face and jaw” while a friend of his, Derk McCall, held Crehan down on the ground. This resulted in Crehan’s jaw being broken, as well as a claimed decrease in learning ability. Wahlberg also famous had a fight with certain members of Madonna’s entourage (which he states Madonna still owes him an apology over). He also attacked a security guard, which resulted in him having to appear in several anti-bias advertisements. Wahlberg states about his early life: “I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life and I’ve done bad things. But I never blamed my upbringing for that. I never behaved like a victim so that I would have a convenient reason for victimizing others. Everything I did wrong was my own fault. I was taught the difference between right and wrong at an early age. I take full responsibility.”
Wahlberg was originally cast in both Ocean’s Eleven and Brokeback Mountain, but turned both roles down. In Ocean’s Eleven, he was cast as Linus Caldwell, but withdrew and Matt Damon was cast instead. In Brokeback Mountain he states he withdrew due to being uncomfortable with the sex scenes.
Wahlberg and several friends originally had tickets to fly on United 93, one of the planes hijacked by terrorists on September 11, 2001. However, they ended up deciding to instead charter a plane to go attend a film festival in Canada before returning to Los Angeles. Wahlberg has since stated that “If I was on that plane with my kids, it wouldn’t have went down like it did. There would have been a lot of blood in that first-class cabin and then me saying, ‘OK, we’re going to land somewhere safely, don’t worry.’” Obviously this didn’t go over very well with people who lost loved ones on that plane, nor with the general public. Given Wahlberg’s apparent propensity towards violence, even when unprovoked, the first part of his claim isn’t really that far-fetched. However, the passengers of United 93 did revolt once they realized the bomb threat the terrorists were using to control them wasn’t likely true. They learned this after several passengers heard of the planes that hit the twin towers from talking to loved ones on their cell phones. Unfortunately for the passengers, though, the terrorists at this point were obviously the ones flying the plane. Once the passengers had nearly broken into the cockpit, the hijackers made the decision to simply crash the plane, with one recorded as saying ”Is that it? I mean, shall we put it down?” and another responding, “Yes, pull it down.” The pilot then rolled the plane over and began chanting “Allāhu Akbar”, while the passengers continued to fight. The official report states that at the time of impact, the passengers were just seconds from taking complete control. So obviously Wahlberg with his temper and fighting ability being there or not would have made no difference as the hijackers would have put the plane down all the same the second it was apparent a passenger or group of passengers were about to retake the aircraft.
Wahlberg never returned to High School after dropping out at the age of 14, but did eventually get his GED.
Since New Kids on the Block, Donnie Wahlberg also took up acting, appearing in such works as Band of Brothers, the Saw films, and The Sixth Sense. For the latter role in The Sixth Sense as “Vincent Grey”, he had to lose 43 pounds.
New Kids on the Block was formed by Maurice Starr who held auditions in Boston with over 500 boys turning out. The first member selected was Donnie Wahlberg, who subsequently convinced Starr to also add Mark to the group, along with some friends of his.
New Kids on the Block actually almost never were, as far as becoming famous. Their debut album was a flop and their second album initially didn’t do any better. After their first album, the group could only get gigs at school dances and the like. When their second album was released, it also initially flopped with little interest in their first single Please Don’t Go Girl. Finally, the label had decided to drop the group, but at this same time a single radio station in Florida had been playing the song steadily, with it becoming one of the most requested songs at that station. When Columbia Records learned of this, they decided to promote the song more and things took off from there. Interestingly, due to their later success, their debut album ultimately ended up selling four million copies, despite the initial flop. All total, New Kids on the Block sold over 70 million albums.
The original name of New Kids on the Block was “NYNUK”, but upon signing the group, the label, Columbia Records, told them they needed to come up with a different name.
Donnie Wahlberg also has had his share of trouble with the law, such as being charged with first degree arson for setting fire to a hotel hallway in Kentucky (The Seelbach Hotel). The charges were later lowered and he simply had to make a series of public service ads about fire safety, as well as anti-drug and anti-drunk driving ads.

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