An Adorable Ice Age Puppy and More Wild Stories
Wait What?! Wednesdays
Look at you, dear reader, an explorer of cool internet shit - you’re reading the very first Wait What!? Wednesday!
But before we get into that, we have another sponsor!! They are (drum roll please….) Mud Pie Podcast!! If you like to explore and discuss all fringe topics ranging from conspiracy, alien/ufo, alternate history, archeology, cryptids and much more (which we know you do, otherwise why would you be here?), then check them out! They’re also looking for researchers into these fringe topics to come on and have a conversation with them next year. So show them some love and subscribe to their pod! You just might stumble on a new topic you love.
And speaking of fringe topics we love...we’re going to catch you up on some of what we’ve been reading all week. Check out the mysterious, the weird, the cool…in the first Wait What?! Wednesday below:
An nonhuman industrial society may have existed on earth
Could there have been a nonhuman society long before human beings appeared? Scientists who study the Anthropocene (the proposed epoch of Earth’s geologic history in which humankind’s activities dominate the globe) say… maybe. The crux of their evidence: the temperature rises in the past look a lot like today’s patterns, and if today’s patterns are caused by an industrial society….you get it. The evidence isn’t remarkable, to be sure, but as Penn State astronomer Jason Wright says in the article, “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.”
A new take on urban farming
These urban farms going up in Brooklyn are nuts. They’re one of quite a few projects by Framlab, a design studio a buddy of mine showed me this week. The way they build these allows them to fit in nicely anywhere, which is what makes them perfect for big cities. The studio says: “all required energy is harvested through integrated, translucent photovoltaic cells; a rainwater collection system stores, purifies, and pumps the water-mixture through feeder lines to mist nozzles in each production module; an outer layer of Titanium Oxide enables the structure to combat pollution through extraction of pollutants from the air.” Plus, let’s be honest, they look cool as hell.
There’s a pattern to Earth’s mass extinction events and we’re doomed (but not for awhile)
Paleontologists have recently found that mass extinctions follow a pattern - every 27 million years or so, land-dwelling animals on earth go extinct, usually due to asteroid impact or volcanic activity. But wait, aren’t asteroids, well...random? Not exactly. See, our solar system passes through the “crowded” part of our Milky Way galaxy every ~30 million years. And when that happens, Earth is far likelier to be hit by large impacts. But don’t worry, the next pass through isn’t expected for another 20 million years.
An ice age puppy was discovered with an unusual snack in its belly
Yeah, a puppy apparently snacked on what is known as a “wooly rhino” (pictured above; also dibs on that band name - Wooly Rhino And the Ice Age Puppies). It’s apparently rare to find a well-preserved sample of an animal inside another animal, but that’s exactly what happened recently, according to an announcement in the journal of Current Biology. Since both animals were preserved so well in permafrost, the research team was able to find out a lot about the daily life of this little pup.
Have you been reading anything this week that tickled that ‘spicious nature in you? Let us know in the comments!
We’ll chat again Friday when we drop this week’s Nibble on the insane autopsy of Gloria Ramirez.
As always,
Stay ‘spicious
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