Day 50 The Great Pyramids are not in fact the shape of a “pyramid”. It was discovered in 1940 that the pyramids are intentionally concaved on every side so that the pyramid is actually 8 sided and not 4 sided. Why did it take so long to discover something as simple as that? ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-07-28 16:35:57Jul 28 16:35 |
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Day 51 Norton’s Dome is a thought experiment in Newtonian physics where a particle sits atop a specially shaped frictionless dome. According to the laws of motion, the particle can either stay at rest forever or spontaneously start moving at any time without a cause. This breaks the usual expectation of determinism in classical mechanics, where the future is uniquely determined by initial conditions. The dome’s shape leads to a mathematical equation with multiple valid solutions, showing that Newtonian physics can allow indeterminism in idealized cases. ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-07-16 15:55:33Jul 16 15:55 |
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Day 52 Synesthesia is a neurological condition where stimulation of one sense involuntarily triggers another, like seeing colors when hearing music or tasting words. It affects about 4% of people and is usually genetic. Common types include associating letters or numbers with colors (grapheme-color) and seeing sounds as colors (chromesthesia). This happens because of extra connections or cross-talk between sensory areas in the brain. Synesthesia is consistent and automatic for those who have it, often enhancing creativity and memory. Famous synesthetes include artists and musicians who use it to inspire their work. ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-07-16 15:56:03Jul 16 15:56 |
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Day 53 The Overjustification Effect describes when rewards, often money, can stifle motivation. This is especially true in tasks requiring creativity, problem-solving, or deep thinking. When people focus on the reward, they commonly become less interested in the task itself, leading to reduced performance. Studies show that larger incentives can increase anxiety or narrow focus, which hinders performance in most tasks. Instead it is curiosity, pride, or purpose that tends to produce better, more sustained results. So when it comes to complex tasks, more reward can sometimes mean worse outcomes. ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-07-28 16:32:28Jul 28 16:32 |
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Day 54 Aphantasia is a neurological condition where a person is unable to voluntarily visualize mental images. People with aphantasia do not see pictures in their mind’s eye, even when trying to imagine familiar objects, faces, or scenes. Despite this, they can still recall facts and information, and their memory, creativity, and intelligence are typically unaffected. Aphantasia exists on a spectrum and may go unnoticed until someone realizes others visualize differently. It can affect dreaming, memory recall, and emotional processing, though experiences vary. The condition is not considered a disorder and often doesn’t interfere with daily life. ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-07-16 15:56:50Jul 16 15:56 |
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Day 55 Butterflies can retain memories from when they were caterpillars. Scientists found that trained caterpillars avoided certain odors even after becoming adults. Thia indicates that even after thier brain and body have become literal goo, that their memories can survive this amazing transformation. |
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Day 56 MKUltra was a secret CIA program launched in the 1950s to study mind control, brainwashing, and behavior modification. It involved unethical experiments on unwitting subjects, using drugs like LSD, hypnosis, and sensory deprivation. Victims included prisoners, hospital patients, and civilians, many of whom were drugged without consent. The program aimed to develop interrogation and espionage techniques during the Cold War. Most records were destroyed in 1973, but investigations in the 1970s exposed its abuses. MKUltra remains a notorious example of government misconduct and sparked debates over human rights and informed consent in scientific research. |
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Day 57 Operation Paperclip was a secret U.S. program after World War II that brought over 1,600 German scientists, engineers, and technicians—many with Nazi ties—to America. The goal was to gain an edge in the Cold War, especially in rocketry, weapons, and aerospace. Notable figures like Wernher von Braun, who developed Nazi Germany’s V-2 rocket, later helped lead NASA’s space efforts. The U.S. government often hid the Nazi affiliations of these individuals to bypass immigration laws. While it advanced U.S. technology, the operation remains controversial due to its ethical compromises and connection to former Nazis. |
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Day 58 Operation Mockingbird was a covert CIA program alleged to have begun in the late 1940s to influence media both in the U.S. and abroad. The CIA recruited journalists and placed agents in major news outlets to spread propaganda, shape public opinion, and suppress unfavorable coverage. Though full details remain classified, Church Committee hearings and some declassified documents confirm that journalists were used for intelligence purposes. The program raised serious concerns about press freedom and government manipulation of information. It was reportedly phased out in the 1970s after public scrutiny and growing distrust of intelligence agencies. |
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Day 59 The USS Liberty, a U.S. Navy intelligence ship, was attacked on June 8, 1967, during the Six-Day War between Isreal and numerous other Arab states. Israeli forces attacked the ship in international waters, killing 34 Americans and wounding 171. Israel claimed it was a case of mistaken identity, believing the ship was Egyptian. The U.S. government accepted the explanation. Survivors from the attack and even some officials disputed this official reasoning, believing the attack was an intentional attempt to force the US to get involved in the war. The survivors cited clear markings on the ship and even claimed to be surveilled by Isreali surveillance plans before the attack. Multiple investigations followed, but controversy remains over whether the attack was deliberate. The incident continues to raise questions about military accountability and transparency in U.S.-Israel relations. ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-07-28 16:29:02Jul 28 16:29 |
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Day 60 COINTELPRO was a secret FBI operation (1956–1971) aimed at surveilling, infiltrating, and disrupting U.S. political groups considered “subversive.” Targets included civil rights leaders, anti-war activists, and groups like the Black Panthers. Tactics involved wiretapping, spreading false information, forging documents, and encouraging internal conflict. Martin Luther King Jr. was notably harassed, including with a letter urging him to commit suicide. The program was exposed in 1971 by activists who stole FBI files. Subsequent investigations found it to be illegal and unconstitutional, violating First and Fourth Amendment rights. It remains a symbol of government overreach and political suppression. |
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Day 61 Bohemian Grove is a private, highly exclusive 2,700-acre campground located in Monte Rio, California. It’s a private, all-male club based in San Francisco. Every July, the club hosts a two-week retreat that brings together some of the most powerful men in the world — including business leaders, government officials, artists, and other elites. Former U.S. Presidents like Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton have reportedly attended. Famously Alex Jones infiltrated and filmed a ceremony there called “Cremation of Care” involving a giant owl. Richard Nixon was caught on tape saying this about the Grove: |
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Day 62 The number 1⁄137 is represented as the “fine-structure constant” or “α”. It’s a special number in physics that tells us how strong the electromagnetic force is — the force that makes electricity, magnetism, and light work. This number shows up in how atoms behave, how light interacts with matter, and how chemical elements bond together. If it were just a little bigger or smaller, atoms might not hold together, stars might not shine properly, and life as we know it couldn’t exist. That’s why it’s considered a “finely tuned” number in nature. What makes it even more interesting is that it has no units — it’s just a pure number, like π or e. Scientists don’t know why it has this exact value, and many have wondered if there’s a deeper reason or theory behind it. The famous physicist Richard Feynman called it “one of the greatest damn mysteries of physics.” |
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Day 63 David Hilbert, a prominent German mathematician in the early 20th century, famously said that mathematics would ultimately have three key properties: Complete – Every true mathematical statement can be proven within the system. Consistent – No contradictions can arise; you can’t prove both a statement and its opposite. Decidable – There exists a mechanical procedure (an algorithm) to determine whether any given statement is provable. When talking about the future of math, he said the following: “We must know. We will know” Kurt Gödel, in 1931, proved that math is incomplete Alan Turing, in 1936, proved that math is undecidable The third rule, consistency, does not appear to be able to be proven false or true due to Gödel’s Second Incompleteness Theorem (1931): Any sufficiently powerful and consistent formal system cannot prove its own consistency. |
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Day 64 Research suggests at least 30% of people do not experience an inner monologue. An inner monologue typically refers to the internal voice that narrates your thoughts, like silently talking to yourself in complete sentences. But not everyone experiences thoughts this way — some people think in images, abstract concepts, or emotions instead. A key study that brought attention to this was conducted by psychologist Russell Hurlburt, who found that: Only about 26% of participants reported having an inner monologue frequently. Others reported thinking more in pictures, sensory experiences, or non-verbal abstract thoughts. Most of the time a person who doesnt have an inner monologue does not realize that they are a minority or different than most people who do have one. |
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Day 65 Humans usually reach conclusions emotionally or intuitively, then use reasoning to justify, not discover, their beliefs. In short, humans aren’t naturally objective thinkers. We’re more like lawyers defending a client (our belief), not scientists seeking the truth. Our brains prioritize coherence, identity, and emotional comfort over pure logic. Psychologically, humans most often form conclusions first, then build beliefs and opinions to justify those conclusions. This process is driven by motivated reasoning — we interpret information in a way that supports what we want to believe. Emotions, instincts, and social identity often guide our initial reactions, and logic comes in afterward to defend them. For example, someone might instinctively dislike a political idea. Rather than evaluating it neutrally, they’ll find reasons to support that gut reaction — even if those reasons are weak or selective. This is confirmation bias: we seek, interpret, and remember information that confirms our preferred view. Cognitive dissonance also plays a role. When our actions and beliefs conflict, we often change our beliefs — not our behavior — to reduce psychological discomfort. Research by psychologist Jonathan Haidt illustrates this with moral decisions. He argues that we make moral judgments intuitively, and reasoning is like a lawyer that justifies a decision already made. |
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Day 66 The speed of light in one direction is something that not only do we not know for certain, but we may never know. This is mildly confusing because we do know the average speed of light when light goes both forwards and backwards. We just assume light travels at the same speed in both directions. But we have never been able to develop a test to be able to test the one directional speed of light. An interesting thing about this is that if the one directional speed were different, all of our known physics would still work in exactly the same way |
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Day 67 Its possible to build a purely wind powered vehicle that can travel faster than the wind. This was proven in 2010 with a vehicle named Blackbird that traveled at 2.8 times the speed of the wind, directly downwind, powered only by the wind. |
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Day 68 The appendix was long considered a useless vestige of evolution—an organ left over from ancestors who ate a diet rich in tough plant matter. Since people could live without it and it often caused problems like appendicitis, many scientists believed it had no real function. However, modern research has challenged this view. Studies now suggest the appendix plays a role in the immune system, especially in early life, by helping the body recognize and respond to pathogens. More importantly, it appears to serve as a “safe house” for beneficial gut bacteria. During infections like diarrhea, when the gut is flushed out, the appendix may help restore healthy bacteria to the intestines. |
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Day 69 The falling chain paradox finds that when a chain, or chain equivalent, is falling perpendicular to the ground that the chain will start to accelerate faster than the “expected” 9.8m/s² once the chain hits the ground. This is especially cool when you see a side by side comparison when one chain will hit a table and the second chain will continue to free fall past the table. |
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Day 70 Your body is a superorganism — a complex ecosystem made up of both human and microbial cells. For years, scientists believed microbial cells (like bacteria) outnumbered human cells by 10 to 1. More recent estimates suggest it’s closer to 1:1, meaning you’re roughly half microbe by cell count. Most of these microbes live in your gut, especially in the large intestine, but they’re also found on your skin, in your mouth, and other areas. They play crucial roles in digestion, immune system regulation, nutrient production (like vitamin K), and even mental health through the gut-brain axis. Genetically, the difference is even more dramatic: your microbiome contains 100 times more genes than your human genome. In essence, your body isn’t just you — it’s a collaboration between human and microbial life. Disruptions in the microbiome (from antibiotics, diet, or illness) have been linked to conditions like obesity, depression, autoimmune diseases, and more. That’s why some scientists call the microbiome our “second genome” or even an essential organ. Far from being just passive passengers, microbes are active participants in your health, shaping everything from your digestion to your mood. Some people have estimated the winner of the most cells, human vs bacteria, is changed after a good poop. |
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Day 71 Gabriel’s Horn is a famous geometric figure that highlights the strange behavior of infinity in calculus. It’s created by rotating the curve y = 1/X around the x-axis for X ≥ 1. Despite stretching infinitely far and having an infinitely long surface, its volume is finite. You could fill the horn with a finite amount of paint (volume), but you’d need infinite paint to coat the inside (surface area). This defies physical intuition and is a prime example of how infinite objects can behave unexpectedly under calculus. |
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Day 72 Infinities can be different sizes. For example, the set of natural numbers (1, 2, 3, …) is infinite, but you can list them one by one. This is called countable infinity. Now consider all the real numbers between 0 and 1 (like 0.1, √2, π/4, etc.). There are so many that no list can ever include them all — even if you try forever. This is called uncountable infinity. Mathematician Georg Cantor proved this using a clever trick called the diagonal argument, which shows that for any list of real numbers, you can always create a new number not on the list. This means the infinity of real numbers is larger than the infinity of natural numbers. What does it even mean for one infinty to be larger than another infinity? |
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Day 73 Monotremes are mammals that do not give birth to live young, and instead still lay eggs. There are only two known living species of monotremes, that being the platypus and some echidnas. Both of these living monotremes are weird in other ways as well such as they do not have nipples. Instead they sweat milk through their skin for their young to eat. Also, they have cloacas, like reptiles and birds — which is a single opening for excretion and reproduction. The platypus also has electrolocation, the ability to detect electric fields, which their prey generates in their muscles when they contract. Platypus sense this in their bill. Further, they are the only mammal that has venom. The males will have venomous spurs on their hind legs. ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-08-05 16:37:36Aug 5 16:37 |
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Day 74 All locusts are grasshoppers. The key difference lies in behavior and phase state rather than species classification. Grasshoppers and locusts are the same species biologically but behave differently depending on environmental conditions. Grasshoppers are typically solitary, mild-mannered insects that live and feed alone. Locusts, on the other hand, are grasshoppers that have entered a “gregarious phase” due to environmental triggers like overcrowding and abundant food. When conditions are right, solitary grasshoppers undergo physical and behavioral changes, a type of metamorphisis—becoming darker in color, growing longer wings, and forming large, fast-moving swarms. These swarms can travel vast distances and devastate crops, causing major agricultural damage. The shift from grasshopper to locust is reversible and is driven by population density and serotonin levels in the insects’ brains. The last locust swarm documented in the US was in 1877, and the largest swarm documented was in 1875 with a swarm estimated at 3.5 to 12.5 trillion insects spanning roughly 198,000 square miles. ❧ Edited by vzJustice at 2025-08-06 16:23:06Aug 6 16:23 |
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Day 75 70 is a weird number. A weird number is a number with two strange properties: first, it’s abundant, meaning the sum of its proper divisors (numbers less than it that divide evenly) is greater than the number itself. Second, it’s not semiperfect, meaning no combination of its proper divisors adds up exactly to the number. Its proper divisors are 1, 2, 5, 7, 10, 14, and 35. If you add them all, you get 74 — that’s more than 70, so it’s abundant. But try as you might, there’s no subset of those numbers that adds up to 70. That’s what makes it weird. Weird numbers are rare and mysterious. Mathematicians have proven that there are infinitely many of them, but they’re scattered and hard to find. Even more strange, no odd weird numbers have ever been discovered, and we don’t know if any exist. |
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Day 76 Invisible fire is a type of flame that burns without being easily seen, especially in daylight. It usually comes from clean-burning fuels like methanol, ethanol, or hydrogen. These substances produce flames that are blue, pale, or even completely clear, making them nearly invisible to the human eye. Despite their appearance, these fires are just as hot—and often more dangerous—because people may not realize a fire is present. For example, methanol fires are common in racing (Ricky Bobby) and in labs. They can burn at high temperatures, but the flame may only be visible in the dark or by the heat shimmer in the air. Hydrogen, used in rockets and industry, also produces a nearly invisible flame, requiring special sensors for detection. |
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Day 77 The empty vacuum of space is not empty. We define the quantum vacuum is the lowest energy state of a quantum field, but it’s not truly empty. Due to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, energy can briefly fluctuate even in “empty” space. These fluctuations cause virtual particles—particle-antiparticle pairs—to constantly appear and vanish. This invisible activity has real effects. The Casimir effect, for example, shows that two metal plates in a vacuum attract due to suppressed vacuum fluctuations between them. Similarly, spontaneous emission of light from atoms and the Lamb shift in hydrogen spectra are caused by interactions with these vacuum fluctuations. In quantum field theory, every type of particle is a vibration of a field that exists even in a vacuum. So, the vacuum isn’t nothing—it’s filled with fields and zero-point energy, which might even be linked to dark energy driving the expansion of the universe. In short, the quantum vacuum is a seething, energetic background that underlies everything. It’s not “nothing,” but a dynamic foundation for the physical universe. |
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Day 78 Hawking radiation is a theoretical process by which black holes slowly lose mass and energy over time. Proposed by physicist Stephen Hawking in 1974, it arises from quantum effects near a black hole’s event horizon. In empty space, virtual particle pairs constantly pop into existence and annihilate each other. Near the event horizon, however, one particle can fall into the black hole while the other escapes into space before they annihilate. To an outside observer, it looks like the black hole is emitting particles—this is Hawking radiation. The particle that escapes becomes real, and the one that falls in has negative energy relative to the black hole, causing the black hole to lose mass. Over an extremely long time, this radiation could cause the black hole to shrink and eventually evaporate completely. Hawking radiation links quantum mechanics, general relativity, and thermodynamics, suggesting that black holes have temperature and entropy. Although it’s never been observed directly (the effect is too weak for current instruments), it’s a major theoretical breakthrough that changed how physicists view black holes—not as eternal traps, but as objects that can emit energy and eventually disappear. |
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