Did you Know This?

• Ostriches do not hide their heads in the sand when faced with enemies.

• The average human body has ten times more bacteria than human cells.

• Bananas do not grow on trees. Banana plants are flowering herbs. 

• The word theory, as in the Theory of Evolution, does not imply doubt, as the scientific use of the word theory is different to theory used in ordinary usage.

• Human adults have 206, but children have 300 bones because as they grow some of the bones fuse together. 

• Humans did not evolve from chimpanzees. Humans and chimpanzees shared a common ancestor.

• In the Bible, the forbidden fruit mentioned in the Book of Genesis is commonly believed to be an apple, and yet, the Bible does not say what type of fruit it is.

• The final drafts of the United States Constitution, the U.S. Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights were written on vellum, which is treated animal skin.

• One online poll found that 34% of psilocybin mushroom ("shrooms," or "magic mushrooms,") users had homosexual thoughts after using the drug. Many psilocybin mushroom users report seeing penises in their hallucinations.

• Italians did not invent pasta, it was introduced by Arabs from Libya, during their conquest of Sicily in the late 7th century.

Books To Read

Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them, by Joshua Greene - the modern world has pushed disparate tribes of people into a shared space, resulting in the clash of values along with unprecedented opportunities.

Religion, Spirituality and the Brain

Studies of damaged brains have allowed scientists to gain incredible amounts of knowledge about the human brain. Damage to, removal and atrophy of, certain brain structures, has shown certain behavioural correlations. Damage and atrophy to certain parts of the right brain show correlations with patients being “hyper-religious.”

Other research has found that those claiming to be "born again", whether Protestant or Catholic, have significantly greater hippocampal atrophy than those who are non-religious.

Flickr wonderlane

University of California in San Diego neuroscientist VS Ramachandran, has concluded that "there is a neuronal basis for religious experiences", by studying patients suffering from temporal lobe epilepsy. Those who have seizures situated near the left ear have more spiritual experiences.

Other research has found that there is a connection between the level of religiosity and a lack of 5HT-1A receptors in the brain. Theses serotonin receptors were correlated with people self-reporting as religious, or spiritual, using brain imaging techniques. People with less 5HT-1A receptors are also more likely to experience more anxiety and depression, and so, may use religious beliefs and practices as a comfort mechanism.

Magic mushrooms, which contain Psilocybin, induce intense spiritual experiences and are being studied (see here). Magic mushrooms are used in many indigenous cultures with the belief that they provide access to the sacred world. Psilocin has a high affinity for the 5-HT2A serotonin receptor in the brain and it increases the concentration of the neurotransmitter dopamine in the basal ganglia by indirect means.

However, scientists believe that a number of structures in the brain need to work together to help us experience spirituality and religion. The majority of people tend to follow the religion which they were raised, but there also appears to be a significant genetic component is your level of religious intensity.

Radio Lab  Has a segment about spirituality and magic mushrooms.



Books To Read


Beyond the Body: An Investigation of Out-of-the-Body Experiences, Susan Blackmore

Why Do I Get Crazy When I Fancy Someone?

Your eyes meet, you notice that sexy smile, and suddenly, your heart starts beating fast and your cheeks feel hot and flushed and your hands feel sweaty.

Flickr CourtyCarmody

Lust is driven by testosterone and estrogen. These sex hormones cause us to be looking about and noticing those we fancy. But lust, when it happens, kind of makes us crazy and once our brain's pleasure centres get all fired up by that sexy beast or babe in front of us, a whole load of things start buzzing in the brain and body.

The main neurotransmitters released up by lust are:

Dopamine- which brings a pleasure rush and less need for sleep and food. Dopamine is also released by cocaine and nicotine.

Adrenalin- Lust activates the stress response, making your heart race and your hands sweat when faced with your object of lust. Your mouth may also go dry, making it hard to speak.

Serotonin- Serotonin is low, while dopamine is high. This causes the obsessive tendency to keep thinking about the person you lust after.

If you develop an attachment with your love interest then other body chemicals come into play.

Oxytocin- Is called the cuddle hormone, as it is released by cuddling, having sex and giving birth. Oxytocin increases attachment.

Vasopressin- Is also released by sex and it increases long-term commitment. (more info)


The Brain On Love

Scientists have also found the neurological difference between love and lust. Lust and love activate part of the brain called the striatum, but lust activates the area of the brain that responds to pleasure; while the part of the striatum involved in processing love, is involved in attaching value to the things that give us pleasure. This brain area is also involved in drug addiction.

Our eye gaze may also differentiate feelings of love from feelings of desire according to research in the journal Psychological Science, as research has shown that people tend to visually fixate on the face when images elicit feelings of romantic love; but when images stimulated sexual desire, the subjects’ eyes moved from the face to fixate on the rest of the body.


Books To Read

The Brain that Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science, by Norman Doidge -a book on neuroplasticity by psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Norman Doidge.

An Experiment With a Live Severed Head

After a head is severed from the body, its function continues for a few minutes more. A Russian scientist, Doctor Sergei S. Bryukhonenko, in some controversial experiments attempted to keep a dog's head alive for an extended amount of time after it had been lopped off and was clinically dead.

You can watch the film that was made of the experiment and see the head with four tubes connected.

Lungs, which sit in a tray, are oxygenated by bellows. A primitive heart-lung machine called the autojektor supplies the canine head with oxygenated blood.

The film is disturbing and freaky, watch it if you dare.                      

Is the Universe a Hologram?

The study of black holes by scientists suggests that our universe is perhaps a hologram -a mere representation of another universe.

All An Illusion?

Leonard Susskind and Nobel Prize winner, Gerard ‘t Hooft, say that the information from black holes suggests that our universe and everyday experiences might be something like the holograms on credit cards, which are 2D but become 3D due to the light reflection. ( "Our world may be a giant hologram", New Scientist).

So perhaps our lives and our perception of the universe is all an illusion?

In one striking example of a holographic universe, Juan Maldacena of the Institute for Advanced Study constructed a mathematical model of a “soup can” universe; where what happened inside the can, including gravity, is encoded in the label on the outside of the can, where there was no gravity, as well as one less spatial dimension. If dimensions don’t matter and gravity doesn’t matter, how real can they be? New York Times

So, what we think of as a three-dimensional universe, maybe only a holographic projection coming from the particle horizon around 13.7 billion light-years away.

Theoretical physicists from the University of Southampton believe they have found signs that our Universe is an illusion by studying the cosmic microwave background (CMB) – radiation left over from the Big Bang. The latest study, published in the journal Physical Review Letters, contains the first proof, the researchers say, that the universe is actually an illusion, or a hologram.

Chickens Are Pretty Clever, Actually

Chickens are smarter than you think. Australian researchers from Macquarie University have found that chickens actually have a sophisticated communication system and can "talk" to each other.

Roosters tend to vocalise about food in order to attract hens. However, if another rooster is nearby, they keep quiet and use gestures and body language to attract the hens' to the food; showing evidence of high-level decision making. Chickens have around 30 different vocalisations, which they use in order to communicate such things as warning calls, summoning their young and announcing the presence of food. Their vocalisations also differentiate between different types of predators. 

Chickens are Related to Dinosaurs

 Humble Chickens are also the closest living relative to the extinct Tyrannosaurus Rex. However, modern chickens were domesticated from Asian jungle fowl around 6000 years ago. By using DNA data from archaeological chicken bones combined with statistical modelling, scientists have found that important genetic changes occurred in the domestic chicken during the Middle Ages; notably, THSR gene variants that helped the chickens to cope with living in close quarters to one another and also, for faster egg laying and a reduced fear of humans. 

The driving factor behind these changes was probably Christianity, as religious dictates of the times enforced fasting and excluded the eating of four-legged animals. Eating chickens and eggs were permitted during fasts and this drove up demand and the resulting genetic changes.

Books To read

Fairy Tales, Fairly Told, Barbara Mervine. It is the second critical thinking/skeptic children’s book.

Social Conservatives Won't Like It

Social conservatives won't like it as it appears that homosexuality is fairly common and natural in many animals. Male black swans will often bring up baby swans together and grey whales have "slip-and-slide" orgies which involve lots of belly rubbing.

Females are not left out of the fun. About one-third of Hawaiian albatross pairs are both female. These birds can live for up to 70 years, forming strong monogamous pair bonds. Female koalas, also, form same-sex liaisons and may try to mate with up to five other female koalas at a time. And then what about the female Kobus kob, a kind of antelope, which engage in a bit of oral and stroking action together.

There are published claims that 94% of male giraffe sexual activity is same-sex, which is incredible! And, nearly all bonobo monkeys are bisexual. Bonobos also share about 98.7% of their DNA with humans.

In sheep (Ovis aries), around 8–10% of rams are exclusively homosexual and around a further 18–22% of rams are bisexual.


Books To Read

The Men Who Stare at Goats, by Jon Ronson is about the U.S. Army's exploration of New Age concepts and the potential military applications of the paranormal.

The Amazing Technology of the Ancient Greeks. Opa!

We tend to think that we are a clever lot today, with our mobile phones and assorted technologies. We may dismiss ancient cultures as primitive, but is this really true? Let's have a look at some of the technologies that those canny ancient Greeks were working on. Many of these can be viewed at the Museum of Ancient Greek Technology, a museum in Katakolo, Elis, Greece.

Plato (428 B.C.E), the famous philosopher, appears to have invented the first wake-up mechanism in history. Water clocks were commonly in use in Plato's lifetime, to control the passage of time. Plato's clock, however, had an added feature, it was set to chime once in the early evening and once at dawn.

Heron of Alexandria, a Greek mathematician and engineer, invented a means to automatically open the temple gates after a sacrifice on its altar. The heat from a fire, lit by the city's temple priest, allowed atmospheric pressure to build up in a brass vessel and this caused water to pump out into holding containers. These holding containers acted as weights for a series of ropes and pulleys, which would open the temple's doors.

Also invented by Heron of Alexander was an entirely mechanical theatre, "puppet show", which was almost ten minutes in length. This automatic theatre was powered by a binary-like system of ropes, knots, and simple machines operated by a rotating cylindrical cogwheel. The sound of thunder was produced by the mechanically-timed dropping of metal balls onto a hidden drum.

In the 3rd century BCE, Philon of Byzantium invented what was probably the first working robot in history. Made in the form of a life-size woman, this complex device automatically poured wine and then water, when a cup was placed in the robot's left hand. The water and wine were stored in metal jugs suspended inside the figure.

First robot

On Your Mark

Another wonderful innovation was the hysplex, which was a starting gate which was used in ancient Greek horse and foot races. Each racer stood behind his own hysplex and all of the strings which were centrally connected behind the runner were held by a referee. At the start of the race, the referee released all the strings, which allowed the starting gates to fall at the same time, releasing the runners.

Hysplex, 4th century BC, Greece

Books To Read


The inventions of the ancient Greeks, by Kostas Kotsanas.