On July 11, 2021, high over the New Mexico desert, Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo detached from its mothership and ignited its engines, rocketing billionaire Richard Branson and five crewmates past the edge of space. The 15-minute suborbital hop made Branson the first person to fly into space aboard his own privately-built spacecraft and officially ushered in the age of commercial space […]
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Laura A. asks: What exactly do Scientologists believe? Oh boy, we can already tell that the comment section for this one is going to be a ton of fun, so let’s just get straight to it. The Church of Scientology has a reputation as an infamously secretive and litigious organisation that hides its inner workings far from the prying eyes of […]
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Australia is infamous for its abundance of absurdly dangerous wildlife. From highly-venomous brown snakes and funnelweb spiders to giant saltwater crocodiles and great white sharks, nearly everything that slithers, crawls, or swims in the Land Down Under seems perfectly designed to inflict the most horrible death possible. But one Aussie creature stands above the rest, its sting so painful its […]
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On 3 December 1967, South African surgeon Christiaan Barnard made medical history by performing the first successful human heart transplant, transferring the heart of accident victim Denise Darvall into 65-year-old Louis Washkansky. While Washkansky died 18 days later of pneumonia, the pioneering surgery heralded a new era of medicine, giving thousands of people a new chance at life. Today over […]
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One day in the summer of 1963, Spanish neurologist José Delgado stepped into a bullring outside Córdoba and prepared to perform an audacious experiment. Armed only with an experimental radio transmitter, he prepared to face off with an angry Spanish fighting bull, bred specifically for strength and aggression. Delgado waved a flag to set the bull charging, but before the […]
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In the winter of 1944-45, the people of the Netherlands teetered on the brink of starvation. As the Allied advance through the south stalled in wake the ill-conceived Operation Market Garden, the Dutch Government in Exile ordered a nationwide railway strike in an attempt to cripple the occupying German Army. In retaliation, the Nazis cut off food shipments to the […]
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One day in April 1929, a Moscow newspaper editor was handing out assignments when he noticed that one of his reporters wasn’t taking any notes. The editor pulled the reporter aside to question him, only for the man, one Solomon Shereshevsky, to reveal that he never took notes because he had a perfect memory. Then, before the editor could argue, […]
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If I were to ask you to picture “radioactive waste,” the image that would likely spring to mind is that of a rusty metal barrel leaking glowing, neon-green sludge. It is an image which has appeared in countless movies and TV shows, yet, as we saw in our previous video How Does Nuclear Waste Disposal Work, real nuclear waste looks […]
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It is a scene which has played out in countless medical dramas. A patient flatlines, the long, piercing tone of the heart monitor announcing to the audience that they have shuffled off this mortal coil. But our team of intrepid medical heroes isn’t ready to give up just yet. As one doctor pounds on the patient’s chest and applies the […]
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Over the past two years, the SARS-COV2 virus, better known as COVID-19, has wreaked havoc around the globe, infecting more than 346 million people, causing 5.58 million deaths, shutting down entire industries and nations, and completely changing our way of life. It is humbling to think that humanity has been brought to its knees by a pathogen so small it […]
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Mithridates VI, also known as Mithridates the Great, was the ruler of the Kingdom of Pontus, a region of northern Anatolia in what is now modern-day Turkey, from 120 to 63 BC. In 120 BC Mithridates’ father, Mithridates V, was assassinated by poison, allegedly as part of a conspiracy lead by his wife, Queen Laodice VI. Throughout his life, the […]
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June 26, 1995 is a day the residents of Golf Manor, Michigan will never forget. On that day, hazmat-suited agents of the Environmental Protection Agency descended upon the quiet suburb and began systematically dismantling the garden potting shed of one Patty Hahn. When interviewed about the incident, most residents believed there had been some kind of chemical spill. But the […]
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Looking back at the long and storied history of literature, film, and other narrative art forms, one trend becomes abundantly clear: writers love mental illness. From depression to bipolar disorder to schizophrenia, psychiatric disorders have been used by artists for hundreds of years to heighten drama, make heroes more heroic, villains more villainous, and allow actors to flex their acting […]
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Jean D. asks: Why do we need oxygen to live? Take a deep breath. Now repeat. Do this about 16 times per minute and you usually get all the oxygen your body needs. Every wonder why you need oxygen to survive in the first place? All life as we know it occurs because of how atoms and molecules interact with […]
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Ashley K asks: How dangerous are rubber bullets? Utilised the world over, rubber bullets and stun guns are controversial additions to the arsenals of police forces and militaries due to their tendency to do the exact opposite of what they’re designed to do, rather than be non-lethal, occasionally killing the people they are leveled at. But how dangerous are they […]
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“It’s as easy as riding a bicycle” – so the old saying goes. And indeed in the wide world of transportation few vehicles are as mechanically elegant as the humble bicycle, which at its most basic consists of little more than a tubular frame, two wheels, a steerable fork, a seat, pedals, and a chain drive. This basic configuration has […]
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At the end of James Cameron’s 1989 underwater thriller The Abyss, oil rig diver Bud Brigman, played by Ed Harris, dons an experimental diving suit in which instead of air he breathes a special oxygenated liquid. This allows him to avoid the lethal effects of extreme water pressure and descend to the bottom of a deep ocean trench to defuse […]
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At 10AM on August 23, 1973, Jan-Erik Olsson, a convict on leave from prison, walked into the Kreditbanken Norrmalmstorg bank in Stockholm, Sweden. Dressed in a wig with his face painted black, as he entered the bank lobby he pulled a submachine gun from under his coat, fired into the air, and yelled out: “The party has just begun!” Thus […]
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