It’s true. Grapevines love music. At least that’s what some Italian scientists have discovered.
I remember the plant growth results on Mythbusters a while back, although I recall that they tried a wider range of music, including heavy metal, which got the best results in their experiment.
This experiment used classical music, but the effect was still quite clear. The vines grew much better with music than without. Plus the benefit of keeping animals away.
But let’s face it, if you’re talking about wine grapes, the final test is how the wine comes out. Without that, no one is going to care. But I can just see the labels now:
Grown with 24/7 Vivaldi
Technorati Tags: wine, music, plant growth
Oh, that evolutionary family tree! We just can’t figure it out!
A recent discovery has made it clear that Homo erectus was more apelike than previously believed. It also looks like Homo habilis was not the ancestor to Homo erectus.
Guess we’ll have to tell the whole Homo habilis line that they can’t come to the family reunion. Unless of course we’re inviting more extended family, since habilis is more a sister line than an ancestor, by all appearances now.
Technorati Tags: evolution, science
Umm, yeah, don’t give me that look. I haven’t tried them! Certain Chinese villagers, on the other hand…
The report on this is on the Discovery Channel website. The villagers found a bunch of dinosaur bones, decided they were from flying dragons and had medicinal properties, and ground them up. They’ve been using them as medicine for at least two decades.
They do now know that they were dinosaur bones, so they’ve stopped that.
Who could blame them for wanting them to be dragon bones? I’d sure love to find dragon bones.
Just so long as there wasn’t a live dragon near anyhow. But maybe I’m just stuck in my own little fantasy world.
Technorati Tags: dinosaur bones
There’s a story on the Newsweek website about Norman Borlaug. He’s someone you probably haven’t heard of, but considering his accomplishments, you should have.
He’s only saved the lives of an estimated 1 billion people. Indirectly, of course, not personally. He has also received the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal. He’s one of only five people to ever do that.
His work isn’t glamorous. What he has done is to improve farming techniques in poor countries. His planting and soil conservation techniques have helped farmers in many poor countries.
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I found it interesting to read that it now appears that certain species of dinosaurs roamed the Earth at the same time as their ancestral species.
Now, researchers report in the journal Science they have evidence from northern New Mexico that dinosaurs and their precursor species coexisted for tens of millions of years.
This is an interesting demonstration of how evolution works. It’s not always a new species replacing an old one. Sometimes the old one is doing well enough to stick around, despite the divergence in its population to the point that some are an entirely different species.
It makes sense to me. A species does not just evolve into one other species. If it did, we wouldn’t have the sheer range of life around now. It can evolve into multiple species, depending on the conditions each face, and yet the original species may still be viable.
Technorati Tags: evolution, dinosaurs
I ran across these recordings using StumbleUpon. They’re 10 unusual historic recordings.
If you’re up for some torture, see how long you can listen to #3. They mean it when they describe her as the worst singer. Aren’t many who can sing that badly yet get someone to record them. Before the Internet, I mean. You can listen to #8 or 9 if you need further torture, although you can’t really enjoy those in the same way.
After all that, I suggest you listen to #1. It’s the only known recording of a castrato. #2 is also amazing - highest note sung. Frankly, I prefer her voice to the castrato. Maybe that’s just me or the song being sung.
Technorati Tags: recordings, music, unusual
