Thursday Things: News from the Sky Edition
16 January 2020. Vol 2 No 3. By Dan McGirt. #23
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Photo by Faruk Kaymak on Unsplash
A newly discovered papyrus contains an eye-witness account of the gathering of materials for the Great Pyramid. Sadly, no ancient aliens were involved. But if ancient feats of engineering and construction interest you, then have a look a the journal of Merer, a construction manager on the job. “It’s the only eye-witness account of building the Great Pyramid that’s ever been found.” (And that’s because the aliens shredded all the rest. Merer is part of the alien cover-up. Obviously.)
Look to the skies! The sky will be very busy this year, with a jam-packed schedule of celestial events in 2020, including:
February 18 — The Moon Passes in Front of Mars
April 27 — Venus Shines Brightest in the Sky
June 21 — Annular Solar Eclipse
August 12 — Perseid Meteor Shower
December 14 — Total Solar Eclipse
Additional concert dates to be announced. Don’t miss it!
Another reason to keep an eye on the sky — it is full of giant meteors that could strike the Earth and obliterate entire regions, if not life as we know it. Case in point — “About 800,000 years ago, a monster space rock struck the Earth hard and fast. The impact of the 1.2 mile-wide (1.9 kilometre-wide) meteorite flung debris across 10 percent of the planet's surface.” The debris from this meteor strike is scattered all over in the form of tektites (glass blobs fused by the tremendous heat of the impact) but the impact crater was only recently located in Laos. Is another monster space rock on the way? Inevitably. This is why we need Space Force!
Welcome to the future, where the awesome power of the internet can … entertain your dog while you’re at work. Spotify launches playlists for dogs left at home. “The Swedish audio-streaming business company said it has launched a podcast featuring soothing music, "dog-directed praise", stories, and messages of affirmation and reassurance narrated by actors to alleviate stress for dogs who are home alone.” You had to know this was coming. I mean … SPOTify? Good dog!
Summer is months away — except for our Happy Subscribers in the southern hemisphere, where summer is now! — but regardless of whether you’re sweating or freezing right now (or enjoying some unseasonal balmy spring-like weather, which I am) the heat will come for you eventually. So you might be interested in this item: Engineers design on-skin electronic device providing a personal air conditioner without needing electricity
Unlike similar products in use today or other related concepts, this breathable and waterproof device can deliver personal air conditioning to a human body through a process called passive cooling. Passive cooling does not utilize electricity, such as a fan or pump, which researchers believe allows for minimal discomfort to the user.
"Our device can reflect sunlight away from the human body to minimize heat absorption, while simultaneously allowing the body to dissipate body heat, thereby allowing us to achieve around 11 degrees Fahrenheit of cooling to the human body during the daytime hours," said corresponding author Zheng Yan, an assistant professor in the College of Engineering. "We believe this is one of the first demonstrations of this capability in the emerging field of on-skin electronics."
Right now the device is a small patch, but researchers hope their work could lead to smart textiles that could cool your whole body. The study, "Multiscale porous elastomer substrates for multifunctional on-skin electronics with passive-cooling capabilities," was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Very cool!
What your dog probably does all day when you leave the Spotify Dog Channel on:
And this is why dogs howl along to music:
One reason for howling is the modern dog’s connection to his ancestor, the wolf. In the wild, wolves howl to communicate with one another. They do it to let other pack members knows where they are or to warn off other animals encroaching on their territory. They also do it to assemble the pack and assert a group identity. It’s similar to the domino effect that happens when one dog in the neighborhood starts to howl, and every other dog joins in. Your canine companion may not even know why he’s howling, but the behavior is deeply buried in his genetic code.
In fact, research suggests that canines actually have a sense of pitch. For example, as more wolves join in, each one changes its tone, and recordings have shown that each wolf is howling a different note. Your dog, too, can differentiate pitch and tone. Dogs also pick up higher frequencies than the human ear, so they may be howling along to something you can’t even hear. Your dog may deliberately join in at a completely different pitch or note just to individualize his howl.
Howl if you want to! And thank you for reading Thursday Things! See you next Thursday!