Our pressing need to wipe is the result of a significant anatomical difference separating us from the rest of creation
The Straight Dope
Posted inExtras
How did anyone do math in Roman numerals?
Let me toss that question right back at you, Leonard: How do you solve complex math problems?
Posted inExtras
What does it take to get charged with manslaughter when your negligent driving kills someone?
Our laws mostly acknowledge this imbalance—drivers are supposed to be extra careful not to run anyone down but we’re still reluctant to criminalize auto-inflicted deaths
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Is PTSD more common among soldiers now than in the past?
Many other names would be proposed for this condition over the years before the American Psychiatric Association put it in the books as post-traumatic stress disorder in 1980
Posted inExtras
What if I skip going to the dentist?
But when “being a smart consumer” starts looking too much like “avoiding going to the dentist,” it may be time to question your own motives too
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Why would a doctor ever prescribe scopolamine?
Such exotic tales have lent scopolamine a menacing aura and the grabby sobriquet of ‘the most dangerous drug in the world’
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Were there black presidents before Obama?
Contemporary mentions of Abraham Lincoln having “woolly hair” and caricatures of him as “Abraham Africanus the First” are probably better understood as anti-abolitionist race-baiting rather than evidence about his actual lineage.
Posted inExtras
Is gene editing kooky futurist crap, or too expensive for mass distribution?
The CRISPR-Cas9 editing process still looks like the revolutionary development it’s been touted as over the last four years, and research hums along at a remarkable pace. Still, some of the more dramatic projections surely won’t pan out.
Posted inExtras
What laws apply to crimes committed in space?
It’s not like authorities have been reluctant to export earth-style legal thinking into the cosmos
Posted inExtras
How do “odor eliminators” work?
The air-freshener people have been doing their best for decades now, of course: teaching us to feel shame about smells intrinsic to ordinary human existence and peddling a succession of new and improved products designed to obscure them
Posted inExtras
What if the Cuban missile crisis had gone badly?
For a week in October 1962 the whole planet was wondering if Cold War antagonism was about to boil over into nuclear armageddon
Posted inExtras
How would you know if a nuclear war started?
I’m already nostalgic for the days when civilization seemed less likely to end with a bang than a whimper