Ripley Entertainment Inc.'s Blog, page 263
July 9, 2019
July 8, 2019
Why Scientists Think T. Rex Arms Could Clap
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Dinosaurs are some of the most fascinating creatures to have ever walked this planet. Looking at a specimen in a museum, it’s tough to image these titans as living, breathing creatures, which could have peered right into our top-story windows. But, there’s one species, in particular, that’s truly captivated us: Tyrannosaurus Rex.
Terrifying in Jurassic Park, yes, but what about its particularly benign trait? Those sad, stumpy little arms. Well, it looks like Rexy will get the last laugh, as research suggests those arms may have been much more useful (and dangerous) than once thought.
At the 78th annual Society of Vertebrate Paleontology meeting last October, scientists from Stockton University investigating the limbs of some of these magnificent creatures’ closest living relatives presented some extraordinary findings.
The theory is that those feeble arms were much, much more flexible than we’ve long thought. T. rex (and other theropods) were probably able to rotate their palms upwards and inwards, with a range of motion great enough to allow them to perform a clapping motion. Applause might be a concept lost on dinosaurs (with the exception of Barney, obviously), but this is still super impressive.
Through the complex technique of X-ray Reconstruction of Moving Morphology, the researchers compared the way that alligator and turkey limbs moved. They have more complex elbow joints than humans and other mammals, with both forearm bones pivoting on the joint and moving sideways towards the upper arm with the shoulder movements.
The forearm bones of mammals aren’t capable of these movements, but it seems that Tyrannosaurus Rex was. It may not sound like very much, and it’s speculative, but there’s potential for this to be a huge dino-deal. One possible conclusion to be drawn here is that the ability to rotate the arms and bring them inwards towards the chest actually was key in gripping and delivering bites to prey.
Ever since the noble T-Rex was first excavated, the debate about those arms has raged on. Perhaps they were used to grip partners while mating. Maybe they were vicious slashing weapons (not that it needed another weapon; it’s estimated to have boasted an absurd bite force of 12,800 pounds, among the highest of any land animal ever!). Or maybe they were a means of getting the great beast off the ground from a prone position. Some continue to argue that they were just a vestigial evolutionary feature and literally useless.
Stockton University’s new research isn’t irrefutable proof or disproof of any one possibility, but one thing’s for sure: those arms are clearly much more than just the subject of jokes and inflatable costumes.
Where will this lead next? Will it serve to shed more light on the scavenger/hunter question, seeing that Tyrannosaurus Rex may have been better equipped to hunt than we thought? Next, the team plans to compare the forelimb bones of Allosaurus—another famous theropod—with its modern-day relatives, to better determine how possible all of this is.
In the meantime, it’s astonishing to see that there’s still so much more to learn about these ancient, iconic creatures. Case in point: in early January 2019, researchers from the Universities of Reading and Lincoln determined that there was an animal with a bite force that is, pound for pound, 320 times stronger than that of the mighty Tyrannosaurus Rex.
Which animal? The humble Galapagos ground finch. Clearly, there are many more fascinating truths about dinosaurs to discover (not to mention the awesome, terrifying power of the Galapagos ground finch, which weighs 33 grams).
By Chris Littlechild, contributor for Ripleys.com
July 7, 2019
July 6, 2019
July 5, 2019
Satellite Catches Solar Eclipse And Hurricane Crossing Paths
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
This Week
[June 30-July 6th, 2019] A solar eclipse meets a hurricane, a hearse gets kicked out of the carpool lane, rat meat, and the rest of the week’s weird news from Ripley’s Believe It or Not!
Eclipse-icane
On July 2nd, a solar eclipse raced across South America, giving locals and eclipse chasers a rare sight of the sun nearly blocked out by the Moon. While this eclipse wasn’t particularly long-lasting, it did allow for a unique photo. The position of this eclipse meant that another natural phenomenon was photobombing satellite imagery. A weather satellite captured the eclipse as a dark blob moving across the Earth, while at the same time capturing a hurricane raging in the Pacific.
Hearse Carpool
When Nevada Highway Patrol officer Travis Smaka pulled over a Chrysler minivan for driving in the carpool lane, he had no idea the van had an extra person on board. Used to people posing their pets or even mannequins as passengers, he felt like he’d heard every story in the book. Needles to say, the dead body atop a gurney in the back took him by surprise. The van was acting as a hearse, but Smaka still said it didn’t count. Explaining that the extra passenger would have to be alive to count for the carpool lane, he let the driver off with a warning.
A Cheesy Welcome
Carrie Underwood has been touring the country on her Cry Pretty 360 tour. Welcoming the country star in full Wisconsin style, Underwood received a portrait of herself made from 40 pounds of cheese. The sculpture recreates her album art complete with mascara running down her cheesy cheeks.
View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Carrie Underwood (@carrieunderwood) on Jun 20, 2019 at 3:52pm PDT
Flying 30-Pounds Of Rat Meat
US Customs officials are used to finding contraband in people’s luggage, but agents at Chicago’s O’Hare International were stunned to find 32 pounds of rat meat in one man’s luggage. Hailing from the Ivory Coast, the man was reportedly forthcoming about his rat rations and was let off with a warning. Agents nevertheless confiscated the meat and destroyed it for fear of it spreading disease.
Summer Hail
Temperatures in Guadalajara, Mexico, have hovered in the nineties, which is why residents were particularly surprised when over three feet of hail blanketed the city. Cars and building were buried. As the ice melted, torrents of water filled the streets, whisking away debris and even whisking away vehicles.
View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Miguel Luna (@mike.colima) on Jun 30, 2019 at 10:19am PDT
Source: Satellite Catches Solar Eclipse And Hurricane Crossing Paths
July 4, 2019
The Egg-citing Truth Behind Humpty Dumpty
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
We all know the story of Humpty Dumpty. He sat on a wall, had a great fall, and none of the king’s men could put him back together again. Neither could their horses. It’s one of those classic, beloved nursery rhymes that generations have grown up with.
As with a lot of these iconic old tales, though, things aren’t as they seem here. Not at all. Incredibly, the original Humpty Dumpty wasn’t an egg. “He” was probably a cannon!
The Origin Of The Egg
For the most part, children’s TV shows, picture books and the like continue to depict the character in one of two ways: either as a human with strangely egg-like qualities, or just a plain old anthropomorphic egg. Heck, DC Comics even created a villain named Humpty Dumpty (real name Humphry Dumpler), a nemesis for Batman whose only real crime is a compulsive desire to take apart and “fix” all mechanical items he comes across.
As supervillains go, Humpty Dumpty is less than stellar, and as depictions of the original Humpty Dumpty go, the whole egg thing really doesn’t cut it. If you want to know where the iconic image of Humpty as an egg came from, you’ve got to take a look back at Lewis Carroll’s similarly-beloved novel, Through the Looking-Glass.
The novel was published back in December 1871 and its sixth chapter is simply titled “Humpty Dumpty.” Here’s what happens when Alice meets the character:
“…the egg only got larger and larger, and more and more human: when she had come within a few yards of it, she saw that it had eyes and a nose and mouth; and when she had come close to it, she saw clearly that it was Humpty Dumpty himself. ‘It can’t be anybody else!’ she said to herself. ‘I’m as certain of it, as if his name were written all over his face.'”
Here, then, is the Humpty Dumpty most of us know today: a huge, bizarre, sentient egg. He’s even sitting precariously on a high wall, as per tradition. If you’re familiar with Lewis Carroll’s tales of Wonderland, you’ll know that this is exactly the kind of odd character who would fit in perfectly around here. But there’s the rub: Carroll seems to have created the idea of Humpty as an egg himself!
Humpty Dumpty The… Cannon?
The original story pre-dates Carroll’s take on the character. According to a number of military historians, Humpty Dumpty was the name of a cannon used by the Royalists during the English Civil War.
The conflict raged from 1642 to 1649, and in June of 1648, Humpty Dumpty was stationed on the walls of Colchester. It was one of several cannons erected to try and keep Parliament’s army from taking the city. The next month, however, the Parliamentary forces heavily damaged the walls beneath Humpty Dumpty with their own artillery. You can guess where this is going: Humpty Dumpty had a great fall, and broke into pieces.
As for that business with all the king’s horses and all the king’s men, it seems those lines can be taken literally. The Royalists, or Cavaliers, were very much the king’s men, fighting in support of King Charles I—who would go on to lose the war and his head, pathing the way for Oliver Cromwell’s brief stint as Lord Protector.
An Egg-cellent Theory
This all fits together very neatly, but there’s no decisive evidence that the tale is the origin of the nursery rhyme. In 15th-Century England, “Humpty Dumpty” was a common snarky nickname for somebody who was a little on the large side. Muddling the matter further, it’s also been suggested that Charles I himself was Humpty Dumpty, having been toppled from a great height by his Parliament. Those loyal to him certainly couldn’t put him back in his lofty position, after all!
There were many sudden and dramatic falls from grace over this period of the country’s history, and others have also been put forward as possible inspiration for the story. Richard III’s defeat at the Battle of Bosworth Field, for instance. The Colchester cannon is certainly the most popular theory, though, and what a tale it makes.
By Chris Littlechild, contributor for Ripleys.com
July 3, 2019
The Genius Prosthetics Historians Thought Were A Hoax
Featured in Ripley's Believe It or Not!
For a short time, a photo of a little girl in ornately laced prosthetic legs baffled historians. Some felt that the sophistication of her prosthesis would have been impossible at the turn of the century, but rumors circulated that her legs were the work of a genius shoemaker living in Chard, England.
James Gillingham worked at The Golden Boot in 1864. That same year, a cannoneer named Will Singleton was gravely injured firing a cannon in celebration of future King Edward VII’s wedding. Singleton’s injuries were so severe that his right arm had to be amputated at the shoulder. Prosthetics had been around for hundreds of years at this point, but many were crude and heavy. Doctors said there was no way to fit him with a prosthetic arm, but Gillingham disagreed.
Gillingham offered to make Singleton an artificial limb at no cost. Using techniques he had been developing in secret, Gillingham made a limb from lightweight molded leather. The device was far ahead of its wooden counterparts. Singleton was capable of lifting heavy loads, using a spade, and even driving a wheelbarrow—all jobs necessary for his profession as a groundskeeper.
Singleton using his prosthetic to hold a wheelbarrow.
Gillingham had long been excited to test out his ideas and was able to publish the results of his first foray into prosthetics in the Medical Lancet Journal. He even met the Queen’s surgeon.
Gillingham had great prowess as an engineer and entrepreneur. He kept detailed records of his work and is recorded to have helped thousands of patients by 1910. He felt his process was simple. Instead of trying to sand bits of wood to then be primitively buckled to a patient, he fitted them with leather before heat treating it into the desired shape. To him, fitting the limb was the real work, and had to be done custom for each person.
These leather limbs were then laced on. They were lightweight, strong, and didn’t need repair often. Constructing a limb could take ten days, and stability could be improved by adding steel. Gillingham was obsessed with the practicality of his prosthetics. He created wrist supports, cutlery attachments, mechanical fingers, support harnesses, and padding as needed.
Though he had no medical training, he was described as a philanthropist at heart, often working out payment plans with patients, trying to find a way to help anyone who might need his services.
For Gillingham, it wasn’t just about giving people the bare minimum to survive. One farm laborer wrote him a note in 1880, illustrating the value a good prosthetic had:
“I should be able to scarce do anything without it [an arm]. I can shear 37 sheep a day, for which I get 9s. I can reap the corn with a machine, thatch and rick, pitch hay and corn. I pitched a load of corn from two until six o’clock, 40 stiches on each load, my master gave me 4s for my day’s work. I cannot be too thankful.”
One of the reasons patients like Gillingham’s work so much wasn’t just the utility his devices provided, but the sense of normalcy it returned to their lives. They could walk like everybody else agin. It wasn’t important whether their intricately carved hand was functional, what was important was that they had something that made them look and feel human. This mission is evident in his patient photography. Gillingham photographed every patient himself, and his artistic slant definitely promotes their humanity. These photos aren’t just dry reference photos of his creations, but portraits of the people he helped make whole again.
His family took over the business when he died in 1924. His business became an epicenter for prosthesis in the region, and would eventually become a hub for soldiers injured in the World Wars.
Source: The Genius Prosthetics Historians Thought Were A Hoax
Ripley Entertainment Inc.'s Blog
- Ripley Entertainment Inc.'s profile
- 52 followers
