The View from the Atom is Gorgeous This Time of Year

In 1958, Brussels was home to the first World's Fair Exposition to come after World War II. The event was super-saturated with post-war optimism and futurist ideas, and despite that more than fifty years has past since the Fair took place, those ideas can still be seen as embodied by the Atomium; a 335-foot tall structure inspired by the iron atom. Consisting of eight enormous steel spheres joined by sixteen tubes, the Atomium dominates the landscape like an alien spaceship. Each sphere is nearly sixty feet across and they house exhibit halls and (at one time) a restaurant. Sadly, due to safety concerns the three top-most spheres are off limits to the general public.

The building was intended to be demolished at the completion of the fair, but it proved to be such an iconic work of architecture that it was allowed to remain. Currently, it's the most popular destination in the city and a holdover to a unique period in history.


Would you like to know more?
-Visit the official Atomium site

The Tree of Crime Bears Bitter Fruit

As the need for new sources of energy becomes ever more painfully obvious, enormous quantities of money are being invested in the development of bio-diesel fuels. While the sustainability of these fuels is questionable, that hasn't stopped scientists from analyzing countless different plants in search of viable sources of bio-diesel. One such member of the vegetable kingdom is the Pong-Pong Tree, known by the scientific name Cerbera Odollam. The Pong-Pong Tree makes its home in India and Southeast Asia, and produces green mango-sized pods. However: fruit fans take caution! The seeds that these pods carry contain a poison, cerberin, that causes a deadly disruption of the heart-beat. The poison seeds have been used for centuries by the inhabitants of India and Madascar for various sinister pursuits. The easy to conceal seeds, combined with the difficulty of detecting cerberin in autopsies, makes the Pong-Pong fruit ideal for murderers everywhere. People have also commonly used it to kill themselves, leading to the ghoulish nickname of "The Suicide Tree."

Would you like to know more?

-Read this article from New Scientist

-Feeling brave? Read this technical proposal on Pong-Pong bio-diesel extraction

The New Wavelength

Reject your hi-def, widescreen plasma television! True technological elegance can only be achieved through bakelite dials and pine molding!

Modern Times For Modern Men

Anti-Radiation Suit circa 1914

How Things Work Part VIII: Exterminator in the year 3000

Space Junk

China has recently supplanted Japan as Asia's largest economy and it stands just beneath the United States in the ranks of the biggest economies in the world. Its emergence as an economic superpower is basically without precedent; the product of an industrial revolution and relentless national drive. However, it has come at a considerable cost. The damage to China's environment is every bit as extreme as its recent financial success.

Power plants and factories belch out sulfurous fumes, resulting in a poisonous haze that continually cloaks China's cities. 300,000 die annually due to pollution-induced lung cancer. The smog can only be cleared away by the rain (which is usually of the acidic variety) but it invariably returns. Rivers run thick with detergents, pesticides, and chemical fertilizers. Clean water has become an increasingly precious commodity, and 500 million Chinese citizens are left wanting. This number is comparable to 62.5 New York Cities.

In 2003, China became the third nation in Earth's history to send men and women into space. Since then, Chinese taikonauts have gone on several more missions and multiple satellites have been launched. This achievement was also executed at a severe expense. Those villages unlucky enough to lie beneath the rockets' flight-path have have been blanketed by carcinogenic fallout and boulder-sized pieces of debris. 2 million people are thought to have been contaminated over the course of 50 launches, and plummeting scrap metal has damaged homes and administrative buildings.

It is now common for space launches to be accompanied by mass-evacuations and subsequent clean-up operations. Most recently, farmers from the province of Guangxi were paid to search for debris in the mountains and forests, despite that this material is effectively toxic waste. Meanwhile, the Chinese government struggles to counteract their ever-worsening problems with pollution, but the damage is so extensive that it seems impossible to reverse.

Would you like to know more?
-Read this article from the Guardian
-Read this article from the New York Times

Cold Blood

While October has long since been consigned to the void, the Chefs of the Hyper Kitchen neglected to post that month's installment of our world-famous Monster of the Month series. Many of our staff were mobbed by outraged fans and coarse language was used. Fearing for our lives, we got to work.

And so, just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water, meet Gustave the Crocodile. Gustave is thought to have attacked and eaten more than one hundred people, in addition to a fully-grown hippo and several wildebeests. Hailing from Burundi, where crocodiles are a common sight, Gustave is estimated to weigh in at one ton and said to stretch for twenty feet, making it the largest crocodile ever found in Africa. No one has ever gotten close enough to make exact measurements, as Gustave has defied capture for nearly ten years after his first official sighting. For a crocodile, Gustave has demonstrated unusual cunning. It's avoided traps and has survived hails of machine-gun fire, although sustaining several scars in the process.

Despite having come to prominence in 1998, Gustave is thought to be around sixty years old judging by its size. Its notoriety has ensured his place in the folklore of the Lake Tanganyika region. The already considerable body-count has been exaggerated to legendary levels, and it is common to hear stories of Gustave having eaten more than five hundred people. Fisherman insist that the crocodile deliberately seeks out humans to eat. Some even assert that it no longer kills merely for food, but actually stalks and slays men and women for pleasure.

Gustave was given its name from Patrice Faye, a Frenchman and self-educated wildlife expert who had been living in Burundi and heard the stories of the killer crocodile. While he was initially skeptical of these claims, Faye came to agree the Gustave was something more than an ordinary crocodile and this has earned him derision in some circles. Nevertheless, Faye is perhaps the leading authority of Gustave and has made several attempts to capture or kill the beast. Faye's quest has earned him unkind comparisons to Captain Ahab, though his struggle against the creature does have a certain epic quality to it.

Last spotted in January, 2009, there hasn't been an attack recorded for some time. Perhaps Gustave died and its massive body is crumpled on some shore somewhere. Maybe it departed for other waters, having grown weary of its battle with Faye. Or maybe it's just lying in mud, waiting for some unlucky fisherman or swimmer.

Would you like to know more?

-Visit Nation Geographic's page on Gustave

-Read this BBC article

-Watch this short video featuring Patrice Faye

All Tomorrow's Architects

After the watching his construction company go bankrupt, losing his home, and finally losing his daughter to spinal meningitis, Buckminster Fuller spent much of 1920's drunk. He considered killing himself, but somehow found the resolve to continue living. He decided to transform his own life into an experiment; an attempt to determine how much positive change a man could bring to the world. While this experiment was hardly traditional, the results indicate even one man can have considerable, lasting impact.

Fuller, a certified machinist, had a lifelong interest in design and engineering. As a child, he had assembled small boats and even attempted to construct "flying machines" (although none of the latter met with success). Despite his scientific aptitude, he was expelled from Harvard twice.

After getting a job as an interior decorator at a restaurant, Fuller began work on a scale model of a futuristic home. The house (which resembled a hybrid of air-stream trailer, teapot, and flying saucer) was designed for ease in assemblage and energy-efficiency. Searching for a unique name for the design, Fuller consulted an advertising expert who helped him develop the catchy term Dymaxion (for Dynamic Maximum Tension). Fuller displayed his model at the restaurant, which caught the eye of architect Isamu Noguchi. The two men became friends and together the developed a design for the three-wheeled Dymaxion Car. Meanwhile, Fuller was commissioned by the Army to build Dymaxion homes.

By 1945, Fuller was an established, if unorthodox, figure in the world of engineering and earned a living as a lecturer. He became interested in the architectural potential of the geodesic dome, building his first prototype at Bennington College of Vermont. Subsequent models proved the dome's structural strength, and won more attention from the Army. Within a few years, geodesic domes became a common feature in architecture all over the world.

Fuller, meanwhile, went on to become an early proponent of sustainability and alternative energy, while famously declaring war to be "obsolete." He was also unflinchingly eccentric in a time when it could damage one's career. He created his own distinct vocabulary, wore three watches (each set to a different time-zone) and often wore pages of newspaper between shirts to keep warm during long airplane flights. All of this endeared him to many counter-culture figures, particularly the inhabitants of the Drop City commune.

In addition to his design work, Fuller devoted much of his time to an experiment that expanded upon a journal he had started back in 1915. It was called the the Dymaxion Chornofile, and it consisted of an meticulous, comprehensive record of his daily activities, which he updated every fifteen minutes under optimum conditions. The Chronofile contained copies of letters, receipts, newspaper clippings, invoices, and design notes and sketches. He added to the Chronofile until his death in 1983, suffering a fatal heart attack while visiting his cancer-stricken, comatose wife. By that point, the Chronofile had grown to a total length of 270 feet and it remains the most complete record of a human life ever created; a record of curiosity and innovative thought.



Would you like to know more?
-Read more about the Dymaxion Chronofile here.
-Read about Fuller at the Synchronofile.

The Monster Museum

The Vrolik Museum is housed in the Medical Center of the University of Amsterdam and contains nearly 500 animal and human specimens on display. Every specimen has some anatomical abnormality; congenital deformities that rendered the majority unable to survive past their birth. The various warped forms, usually floating in preservative fluid, are astoundingly varied. At the museum, one can see microcephalics, conjoined twins, ancephalics, dysmeliacs, and all the rest. The study of such developmental defects is called teratology, which literally means "the study of monsters."

Still, this is no mere freakshow. This collection (largely amassed by the father and son team of Professors Girard and Willem Vrolik) has supplied biologists and medical scientists key information about the morphological development.





Would you like to know more?
-Visit to University of Amsterdam's page for Vrolik Museum
-View this set of photos of Vrolik exhibits.

Phase IV has come at last

We're back. We'd never really leave you, you know.

Plus, we've learned some mighty interesting things. For instance, did you happen to catch the discovery of a new global superorganism? We'll give you the run-down.

The Argentine Ant (which as you may have surmised originates from South America) has been transported all over the globe by unwitting humans. They're chiefly known for two things: 1). their aggression towards native insects and 2). their titanic colonies. There are colonies in Europe, America, and Japan that have a combined size of more than four-thousand miles in length. There is no solidarity amongst the Argentine Ants. These are fiercely tribalistic insects and inter-colony cooperation is non-existent.

However, recent observations by Japanese scientists suggests that the largest Argentine Ant colonies are in fact components of an even larger mega-colony. By taking ants taken from several different locations across the world and putting them in the same chamber, they found that the ants did not display the customary belligerence, as if they were all close relatives. The implication is that this insect society is considerably vast and comparable to human society in planetary scope.

We'd best be vigilante.

Would you like to know more?
-Read this BBC article
-Watch this scientific analysis of the ant mega-colony


Lease Holder Addendum: This is post number 88, which is the same number of keys on a piano. Good to know.

Better living through chemistry

WD-40. An essential item for toolboxes across America. It's perfect for loosening up hinges, lubricating joints, and cleaning off rust and dirt. It also has countless other uses around the house, garage, and workshop. Additionally, small quantities have been shown to cure the rickets. Despite its utility and ubiquity, few would guess that this product owes its existence to the space race.

During the days of the Mercury space missions in the early fifties, the Atlas rockets used in those launches were highly vulnerable to rust.

Norm Larsen, a self-taught chemist from Chicago, was one of many who attempted to fix the problem. After trying out 39 variations of a chemical water displacer, Larsen concocted a successful formula on the 40th try and founded the Rocket Chemical Company to market his product. General Dynamics, the manufacturer of the Atlas rockets, was soon using Larsen's creation. It was called WD-40, for "Water Displacer-40."

Sadly, the Rocket Chemical Company changed it's name to the far more prosaic WD-40 Company in 1969. To this day, the exact composition of WD-40 remains unknown, much like the secret recipe for Coca-Cola.

This may be more than coincidence.

Would you like to know more?
-Listen to this BBC World Service report
-Visit WD-40's homepage and behold the 2000 uses of this fine product.

Megadeath

You're looking at the man with the highest IQ ever measured. His name was Herman Kahn. Joining RAND in 1947 (two years after the detonation of the first atomic-bombs) Kahn worked with scientists such as Edward Teller and Hans Bethe to develop more-powerful nuclear weaponry, ultimately producing the H-Bomb. When it became clear that the growing conflict between the United States and Soviet Union could escalate into a nuclear exchange, Kahn was one of the many minds enlisted by the American government to develop strategy for such an exchange. His job entailed contemplating scenarios of unspeakable destruction with clinical detachment and professionalism.


In 1960, he wrote a book on the subject called On Thermonuclear War. The principle assertion of the book was that a nuclear war was not only likely, but basically unavoidable given the escalating conflict between the superpowers. But Kahn insisted such a prospect was not as apocalyptic as one might think, and indeed a nuclear war could be be a winnable war. Kahn believed that while the devastation would be beyond human comprehension, (with many millions of people dead or poisoned and entire cities reduced to ash) mankind had previously endured torturous eras and emerged strong and stable. The medieval Black Plague was cited as an example. His projections of post-nuclear America depicted a nation where fallout was a daily inconvenience and deformed, irradiated babies were an unfortunate part of ordinary life. Such horror, according to Kahn, "would not preclude normal and happy lives for the majority of survivors and their descendants."

Despite reasoning that can only be called at best spurious and at worst insane, On Thermonuclear War was highly influential in shaping America's nuclear policy. Kahn emerged as one of the most prestigious cold war minds, working for various think-tanks in the ensuing decades. He died in 1983 of a massive stroke. While his name is not widely known amongst the public, he has an appropriate cultural legacy, providing the main inspiration for the frenzied Dr. Strangelove.


Would you like to know more?
-Read Kahn's "The Nature and Feasibility of War and Deterrence"
-Read this New Yorker review of "The Worlds of Herman Kahn"

SCIENCE!

The chefs of the Hyper Kitchen are doing a yeoman's job of making this blog the very best of the internet. We have quite a few things simmering away, and the management thought it'd be a good idea to offer a taste of things to come. So, harnessing the power of Science, we have sundered the fourth-dimensional veil and reveal the shadowy specter of Things to Come.

Expect these special features:

-The History of TV Creature Feature Hosts!

-The world's smartest man, and why we're all doomed!

-The full story behind the missing 7,600lb nuclear bomb!

-Stan Ridgway: how David Lynch and Yogi Bear inspired this famous musician!

-Radio doctor John Brinkley and his promise of extended life and vitality through xenotransplantation!

-The man with three ears!

-Maila Nurmi: the life of a Hollywood vampire!

-The imminent technological singularity (or "Robopocalypse Now")!

-How Superman ended World War II!

-The cinematic car-accident that is Blood of Ghastly Horror!

-What is the mystery of...KLEE?!

And so much more! Tell your friends and neighbors!

Be prepared.

This Is All Very Scientific

The Hyper Kitchen will return after a brief commercial break.

"Plague Doctors" or "It Weren't Called the Dark Ages for Nothin"

The Black Plague was one of the most lethal diseases that mankind has encountered. Not only was it responsible for the deaths of those it infected, but it also indirectly contributed to terrible famines as those millions who suffered from the plague were unable to work the fields. The total death toll was astonishing.

Medicine was woefully primitive and muddied with arcane practices born out of superstition and alchemy. Despite this reliance on crude mysticism, even the doctors could comprehend the danger of the plague and the majority fled for their lives. In their absence, groups of volunteers dedicated themselves to studying the disease, treating the victims as best as they could, and fighting further contamination. They were called Plague Doctors.

The beak-faced figure to the left may seem like he crawled out of a nightmare, but his outfit was actually the world's first Hazmat suit. Although the nature of the disease was not understood, the Plague Doctors sought to protect themselves as best as they could. Underneath their heavy black robes, they wore leather aprons, along with boots and gloves of leather. The bizarre bird-like mask was stuffed full of aromatic herbs and spices, in hopes that it would filter out infectious elements (as well as cover the ghastly odor of plague-ridden Europe). The wide-brimmed hat was like a policeman's helmet: alerting others to the Plague Doctor's presence and authority with its distinct design. Frequently they carried canes to prod dead bodies and use as levers to move the cadavers aside.

The Plague Doctors were severely ill-equipped to deal with the crisis, but tried to save as many lives as possible, while their own ranks were progressively ravaged by the plague. As that hellish era eventually came to a close, medicine was changed forever in Europe. The arcane procedures of the pre-plague era were cast aside as witchcraft, and a more practical approach was adopted. While this new generation of doctors were only slightly less ignorant of pathology than their predecessors, it was an important step towards the development of medical science. Despite limited effectiveness, the innovation of the Plague Doctor's protective costume was undeniable, and the modern Hazmat suit has its roots in this Dark Age get-up.

Now it Can Be Told

Knowledge is power!

God is Electromagnetic

Over the course of human history, countless people have tried to commune with the Supreme Being of their choice. In a time when Jesus has apparently decided to make guest-appearances on slices of toast, it seems that more and more people are experiencing the mystical. But there remains that sad minority of people who, try as they may, just can't seem to muster up a religious vision or "out of body" event.

Worry no more! At last the rest of us can gossip with the godhead! Even today's man-on-the-go can be Born Again, thanks to a miraculous new device invented by a Canadian scientist named Michael Persinger. Persinger was already controversial for his claims that UFO experiences are hallucinations produced by electromagnetic waves emanating from shifting tectonic plates. Through this research, he began investigating the similarities between UFO sightings and hierophanies. He noted that temporal lobe epileptics had reported seeing Saints during seizures.

To test his theories, Persinger created a device that stimulated the parietal and temporal lobes in the right hemisphere of the brain using magnetic fields. The original apparatus was installed into a customized snow-mobile helmet, although subsequent versions were far more hi-tech. 80% of those who took part in Persinger's experiments claimed to have perceived an ethereal being in the room, felt a connection to another intelligence, or felt as though someone that they knew had died.

Persinger had received earlier criticism during his UFO work for slipshod testing procedures and leaping to conclusions. His new brain experiments drew much of the same criticism, but he still had his supporters. Susan Blackmore, an English writer on the subjects of psychology and memeplexes, agreed with Persinger's conclusions and reported having an "extraordinary" experience while using the machine. This could, however, be attributed to her documented pre-existing interest in the paranormal and her "extraordinary" experience could very well be a manifestation of the Observer-Expectancy Effect. Swedish researchers attempted to duplicate Persinger's experiments, making sure to use double-blind conditions. They decided that the results were inconclusive, especially after failing to induce potent religious feelings in famed atheist Richard Dawkins. Persinger countered that the Swedes had not followed his complete procedure, and that the subjects were not sufficiently exposed to the magnetic waves.



Is the machine holy or is it a mere hoax? Is god an hallucination? Regardless, the Hyper Chefs conclude that the device is ultimately unnecessary, and that people will believe anything in the right circumstances (or with the application of the right drugs). If you will permit us a Soap-Box Moment: extraordinary claims always require extraordinary proof, and no claims are more extraordinary than those made by religion. Such things should never just be given the benefit of the doubt. We assert that all evidence indicates it is mankind who writes the recipes, and that there is no celestial Chef de Cuisine breathing down our necks. Without such cultural and conceptual restraints, people can be free to cook up whatever they want.

For better or for worse.









Further Reading
-The Telegraph's articles on the subject
Wired Magazine's article on Michael Persinger
-The BBC's assessment of the Dawkins test

Attack of the Vampire Squids from Hell

Yesterday, the sun and moon were side-by-side, hanging low in a blood-red sky. Earlier, a two-headed calf was born in Swanton. It rained frogs in Bradford for a full hour. These omens can only indicate one thing. It is time once again for the Monster of the Month! For those of you who are new to the Hyper Kitchen (and god bless you, sirs and madams!), every month we serve up a new monster for your approval. This March, we descend into the dark realm of teuthology to bring you the infamous Vampire Squid from Hell. For fans marine biology or H.P. Lovecraft, this little oceanic freak ought to be a interesting find.

The Vampire Squid from Hell (known by the scientific name of "vampyroteuthis infernalis") is a deep-sea cephalod first discovered in 1903 by a German biologist named Carl Chun. Chun was undoubtedly inspired by the squid's black flesh and red eyes when selecting a name. Additionally, the squid's tentacles are connected by webbed membrane, visually similar to the membrane of a bat's wing.

The Vampire Squid from Hell dwells in some of deepest parts of the ocean, an ebony environment referred to as the Oxygen Minimum Layer. Though it is called a squid, it is actually a relative of both octopi and squids, belonging to its own distinct order called Vampyromorpha. They utilize ear-like fins to propel themselves through the water, and attract their pray with bioluminescent strands.

Unfortunately, the Vampire Squid from Hell falls somewhat short of its undeniably fearsome name. It does not drain blood, nor convert other cephalopods into Vampire Squids from Hell. They only grow to be around a foot long, so they could never wrap their tentacles around some unfortunate submarine. The eerie jet black skintone of some specimens is not even the norm, and others have been observed to be a pinkish-orange.

Still... you wouldn't want to encounter one on some dark evening.




What to learn the full biological specifications of the Vampire Squid from Hell? Look no further.

How Things Work

Pictured: one Kaled mutant and accompanying travel machine (top), and one fire-breathing monster turtle (bottom)