Round the bend
FLAT-Earth adherents are facing an uphill battle to convert new followers to their cause. Partly, of course, that is because of the NASA-led conspiracy to keep them quiet, but mostly it is down to a lack of evidence supporting their claims. As the saying goes: you can drive a planetary scientist over the edge, but you can鈥檛 make her fall off.
Beyond the Curve, a documentary now available on Netflix, shows one group鈥檚 attempt to solidify their case. Per the globist mainstream, Earth turns 360 degrees in a day, or 15 degrees every hour 鈥� movement that would be revealed by a gyroscope, a navigational tool with a tendency to spin in the same axis regardless of what happens underneath it.
Advertisement
The team spent $20,000 on an ultra-precise ring laser gyroscope, which they placed on the ground. The apparatus recorded鈥� Earth drifting at 15 degrees per hour.
Reasoning that 鈥渉eaven energies鈥� were confounding their expensive instrument, they encased it in a 鈥渮ero gauss鈥� steel chamber, where it still recorded a 15-degree-per-hour drift. Next stop? Encasing it in a heaven-energy-proof bauxite chamber.
鈥淎rms out, loosen knees, and shuffle! Richard Hammond鈥檚 local health unit in Canada recommends 鈥渨alking like a penguin鈥� to prevent falls in icy conditions鈥�
All of which just goes to show that there are no failures in experiments, only discoveries you weren鈥檛 expecting.
A bridge too far?
THERE are some mistakes so calamitous that the human mind, having made them once, reconfigures itself on a molecular level so as to never make them again. Mistakes such as touching an electrified fence, walking across LEGO bricks or jokingly suggesting to a bridge player that their beloved card game is, in fact, not a sport.
It was officially recognised as such in 1995, and bridge players are held to the same high standard as all their fellow athletes. It should therefore come as no surprise that the world鈥檚 leading player has been suspended after failing a drugs test. Norwegian Geir Helgemo tested positive for synthetic testosterone and the fertility drug clomifene at a World Bridge Series competition in Florida in September, and has subsequently been stripped of all his 2018 titles, making it the biggest drama in Scandinavian bridge since Scandinavian drama .
Bad seed?
MEANWHILE, French authorities are warning gastronomes to swear off poppy seed bread, after several loaves tested positive for dangerous levels of morphine. In modern France, it seems, bread is the opium of the masses. The Telegraph reports that alarm bells rang when staff at several companies returned positive drug tests, which they were no doubt only too keen to blame on a bad batch of seeded bread.
Toxicologist Jean-Claude Alvarez told the paper that a single sandwich made with the dopey dough could contain as much as 4 milligrams of morphine, half the dose given as pain relief on cancer wards. Whether the news encourages citizens to steer clear of the pain-killing pain, or rush to baguette high, .
Losing on a coin toss?
YET another jetliner in China has been grounded after a passenger threw coins into the aircraft鈥檚 engine. The custom, intended to secure good luck, is so elegantly self-defeating that Feedback had to restrain an impulse to elect the passenger UK prime minister.
According to the South China Morning Post, the man, who admitted throwing the coins, may be far more than a few yuan out of pocket, because the airline involved, Lucky Air, is seeking to recover 楼140,000 (拢16,000) in costs.
Ruff justice?
VETERAN Feedback readers will be aware that we are enthusiastic fans of pets with qualifications. The state of Kentucky is understandably less warm on the idea, and passed new rules in February to prevent dogs certifying as welders.
This oddly specific injunction came after Adam Barker and Henry Wolfe both registered to work in the state as welders, despite being very much of the doggy persuasion. The pair of good boys were certified in an attempt to highlight lax state regulations, which appears to have succeeded. Law-makers have now passed a bill requiring welders to demonstrate their skills with their own hands 鈥� .
Bogus bunny?
PROMPTED by reports of an octopus haunting the country lanes of Devon (2 March), Paul Wood writes that while he was an undergraduate at the University of Manchester in the 1960s, 鈥渁 lecturer read to us a police report that a driver near the Wirral had reported seeing a 4-foot-high rabbit jump across the road in front of him鈥�.
A true man of science, the lecturer, one Derek Yalden, made a trek around the area and collected the droppings of the giant rabbits. In doing so, he 鈥渄iscovered a population of wallabies that originated with zoo escapees from the second world war鈥�.
Elements of science
AND finally, Anthony Young supplies a brace of nominative determinisms from the annals of science:
Methods for collection and analysis of water samples by F. H. Rainwater et al, and The Vegetation of the Peak District by C. E. Moss.
You can send stories to Feedback by email at feedback@newscientist.com. Please include your home address. This week鈥檚 and past Feedbacks can be seen on our website.