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The Hindu Milk Miracle

On September 21, 1995, something strange started happening in India: statues of Hindu gods began to drink milk. One worshipper offered a spoonful of milk to a statue of Lord Ganesha, and the milk apparently disappeared as if the statue was drinking it. News spread across the nation (and then the world), with Hindus flocking to temples and feeding milk to statues. The event was widespread in temples around the world, but, oddly enough, seemed to end within a matter of hours -- in most places, it stopped... READ ON

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Howard Rheingold on Cooperation and Competition

Howard Rheingold gave a TED talk in 2005 discussing the nature of cooperation, and how it contrasts with classical views of competition as the driver of progress. Discussed: The Prisoner's Dilemma (and how he suggests eBay solves it), Tragedy of the Commons (and how humans create social structures to overcome it), The Ultimatum Game, Wikipedia, Bittorrent, and finally Rheingold's proposal for a Cooperation Project to embrace a cooperative form of economic progress. This video is worth a look for... READ ON

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6 Restless Corpses

This article has nothing to do with the supernatural; it's about real bodies that just can't seem to rest in peace, or at least had to wait for their chance.A couple of recent cases raise the question of how much respect a dead body should be given. The mummy of King Tut was taken from his tomb in 1922 after 3,000 years. Since then, it's been robbed, dismembered, scanned, and finally displayed to the public last year. Padre Pio was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 2002. Now, the... READ ON

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Victory Mail: WWII's Patriotic Post

Stationed overseas? Want to send a love letter to your sweetheart, or check up on the farm back home? Currently reading this blog via some kind of time-travel wormhole to World War II? If you answered 'yes' to all of those, it sounds like you need V-mail (and quite possibly a visit to the Chaplain.) For three years in the early 1940's (June 15, 1942 through April 1, 1945) the U.S. operated a V-mail service to military posts around the world. The service was based on the British Airgraph system, and... READ ON

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4 Strange Greenpeace Moments

Greenpeace has been at the forefront of political and environmental activism since its inception in 1971. While opposing nuclear testing and supporting environmental causes, Greenpeace has routinely been in the media spotlight, and often seeks out media coverage to promote its cause. Here are a few funny (and a few sad) moments in Greenpeace history. 1. Mister Splashy... READ ON

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8 Historical Crossdressers: Women in a Man's World

You may be familiar with the stories of Joan of Arc and Hua Mulan, but they are far from the only women who crossdressed in order to fill roles historically reserved for men. 1. Ann Bonny and 2. Mary Read Ann Bonny and Mary Read were 18th century pirates of the Caribbean. Irish-born Ann married a brigand named James Bonny as a teenager and moved from her home in South Carolina to the Caribbean, where she eloped with another pirate, Calico Jack Rackham. She dressed as a man to join his crew. Read was... READ ON

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4 Things You Didn't Know About Johnny Appleseed

Here are four fascinating facts about Johnny Appleseed (aka John Chapman), who brought apples to the American frontier in the 1800's. 1. The Apples Were for Booze Because apples don't "grow true" from seeds, most apple trees that grow from seeds produce sour, inedible fruit. Only a very rare tree actually sports edible, tasty apples. All the apples you see in grocery stores come from clones of an original tree, grown by grafting pieces of the original tree onto healthy bases of the inedible trees. So... READ ON

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8 Nuclear Weapons the U.S. has Lost?!

By mental_floss contributor Erik Sass During the Cold War the United States military misplaced at least eight nuclear weapons permanently. These are the stories of what the Department of Defense calls "broken arrows" - America's stray nukes, with a combined explosive force 2,200 times the Hiroshima bomb. If you don't have enough to make you lose sleep at night, read... READ ON

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Phone Call to the 14th Century

I'm a little behind the curve on this one (by about a year), but I'm sure you'll let that slide. I just discovered the hilarious Phone Call to the 14th Century, a faux game show by the Kasper Hauser comedy group (iTunes link: Kasper Hauser podcast). The rules of "Phone Call to the 14th Century" are simple: You all know the rules of the game: you get one phone call to impart as much knowledge as you can to the people of the 14th Century. The one who imparts the most walks away with the BIG one.... READ ON

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5 Tubby Monarchs We Love

Whether because of abundant food or lack of exercise, historical monarchs have been plagued with largeness of girth (a true hardship). Here are just a few of the largest kings and queens on record. 1. Itey (ca. 1490 BCE) Sort of an ancient Egyptian punch line, this corpulent queen ruled over the mysterious land of Punt, located somewhere in East Africa. So how exactly do we know of the great monarch's girth? Well, the Egyptian pharaoh Hatshepsut launched a trade delegation to Punt, and carvings on... READ ON