Dreams are flaky enough, and nightmares are worse. But even if you have nightmares, are they bad for you? They could be. In an article “Nightmares Are Scary. But Are They Bad For Your Health?” by Markham Heid (http://time.com/5287932/are-nightmares-bad-for-you/?), Michael Nadorff, an assistant professor of psychology at Mississippi State University and director of the school’s
If you are a bird lover, you may have marveled at how great flocks of starlings move in unison. There are several excellent examples on YouTube, like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eakKfY5aHmY . So how do they do it? Science has been wondering the same thing. It’s only been recently that we’ve had the tools to observe
What if I told you that spiders, those universally reviled members of the bug world, are really valuable and should be protected? Matt Bertone, Extension Associate in Entomology at North Carolina University, makes that point in “A Case Against Killing Spiders” ( http://earthsky.org/earth/case-against-killing-spiders? ). He says spiders are important to both indoor and outdoor ecosystems. What’s more,
Recently, I’ve been working with two women who are expecting babies this summer, and naturally part of the conversation always involves baby names. Which is why a recent article caught my eye — New Zealand has forbidden 21 baby names. Is this a good idea? New Zealand is one of many countries that have some
Something else you might have wondered about in your spare time — how do large flocks of birds seem to move in perfect synchronization? Are they following a leader? No, the reaction time would simply be too short. The best explanation is what scientists call a “maneuver wave.” Wayne Potts, a zoologist who published in
Something I heard on the radio today — the world’s oldest spider’s death has been announced. The exact date is unknown, but it was sometime in 2016. Known to science as Number 16, this female trapdoor tarantula somehow lived an incredible 43 years. Its home was in Western Australia’s Central Wheatbelt region and it should’ve
If you grew up with Play-Doh, you might be surprised to learn about its original purpose — it was invented as a wallpaper cleaner. In an earlier time, coal was the preferred home-heating method. But burning coal produces soot, which sticks to wallpaper. So Kroger was looking for a product that would clean wallpaper. In
Can you imagine a time when there were no traffic lights? They really weren’t needed until the appearance of automobiles. Roads were crammed with horse-drawn carriages, trolleys, bicycles, and pedestrians, and suddenly you had a vehicle that could go 40 miles an hour. According to an article in the May 2018 issue of Smithsonian magazine,
What do you really know about our galactic neighborhood? An article entitled “10 surprises about our solar system” by Larry Sessions on the EarthSky website lists some thing you probably haven’t realized. For instance, The hottest planet isn’t the closest one to the sun. Mercury is closest, of course. But the hottest planet is actually
This was a surprise to me — in an article entitled “More than half your body is not human,” James Gallagher writes that there is a “hidden half” to all of us. It’s our microbiome, and it makes up 57% of our total cell count. In other words, only 43% of our body’s cells are