25 Quirky And Ridiculous Stories About Inventors And Their Inventions

Where would we be if it weren’t for inventors? They are the ones that move us forward. Their genius and novel ways of looking at the world create new technologies and generate easier ways of doing things. Usually, however, inventors are some of the most eccentric people you will ever meet. They don’t think like the rest of us. Instead of living in the here and now, they are usually daydreaming about ways to improve existing technologies or thinking up new ways to do things. This eccentricity, while good for the purpose of inventing and being creative, can also lead to some interesting side effects. Well, in some cases those side effects can be downright hilarious…and in other cases they can be quite terrifying. You are about to read about some of the strangest, craziest, and most intelligent people to ever have walked the Earth. Many of the things, including the computer, tablet, or phone you are using right now were made possible by great minds such as these. Every generation would build on the discoveries and findings of the generation before it which managed to create the world in which we live today. These are 25 quirky and ridiculous stories about inventors and their inventions!

• Robert Chesebrough, the inventor of Vaseline, ate one spoonful every day.
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• Nobody knows who invented the fire hydrant because the patent was lost in a fire.
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• Clara Lazen, a 10 year old from Kansas City, accidentally discovered a new molecule during science class (tetranitratoxycarbon).
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• Modern credit cards were invented by Frank X McNamara when he was supposed to pay for a dinner but forgot to bring cash.
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• Charles Richter, the man who invented the Richter scale for measuring earthquakes, was a nudist.
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• Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, and Thomas Edison have something surprising in common – none of them have a college degree!
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• Adolf Hitler considered Henry Ford an inspiration and even kept a photo of him on his desk.
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• In 1903, Thomas Edison electrocuted an elephant to show that Tesla's AC current was dangerous.
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• Leo Fender, the man who invented two of the most famous guitar models in history (Stratocaster and Telecaster) never learned to play guitar.
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• The man who invented diesel engines, Rudolph Diesel, killed himself in 1913 because he thought his invention had failed.
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• Mikhail Kalashnikov, inventor of the AK-47 recently quoted, "I'm proud of my invention, but I'm sad that it is used by terrorists". The former Soviet officer later said that he wished he had invented something more benign, like a lawnmower.
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• Kalashnikov's comment is reminiscent of Einstein's statement after seeing the destruction of the nuclear bomb ("If only I had known, I should have become a watchmaker").
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• Tea bags were invented by accident. In 1904, Thomas Sullivan thought it would be better to send tea samples to customers in small silk bags rather than in boxes. Customers thought they were meant to be dunked in water and soon Thomas was inundated with requests for his "dunking bags".
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• Richard Gatling, a doctor during the American Civil War noticed that most soldiers died of disease and not bullets. He is famous for saying "if I could invent a machine – a gun – which could by its rapidity of fire, enable one man to do as much battle duty as a hundred, that it would, to a large extent supersede the necessity of large armies, and consequently, exposure to battle and disease would be greatly diminished". He went on to develop the Gatling Gun, which was the world's first machine gun.
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• When Peter M. Roberts invented the quick-release ratchet as a teenager, he came to Sears and the company offered him $10,000 for the patent saying it had no value. Sears went on to make nearly $50 million off of quick-release wrenches.
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• Edwin Armstrong, inventor of FM radio, was bullied by numerous powerful AM radio supporters (NBC and AT&T) until he committed suicide in 1954 thinking that FM radio was a failure.
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• Ruth Wakefield, the inventor of chocolate chip cookies, sold her invention to Nestle in return for a lifetime supply of chocolate.
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• When Anders Celsius proposed the Celsius temperature scale, he initially put the freezing point at 100 degrees and the boiling point at 0 degrees. One of his colleagues, Carl Linnaeus, waited until Anders's death to switch the scale around which facilitated more practical measurements.
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• James Naismith, the inventor of basketball, is the only coach in University of Kansas history to have a losing career.
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• The upside down ketchup bottle earned its inventor, Paul Brown, $13 million.
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• After Thomas Jefferson invented the swivel chair, he sat on one while writing the Declaration of Independence.
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• B. F. Skinner, an American psychologist, once invented a temperature controlled crib. He called it the "heir conditioner".
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• Gunpei Yokoi, the inventor of GameBoy, was working as a maintenance man at a Nintendo factory when he impressed the CEO with a toy he had created while the CEO happened to be passing by one day. His career quickly changed directions.
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• When Volvo introduced the three point seat belt, it gave all other car manufacturers a free license to use it. Today, the company can proudly say that "there is a little bit of Volvo in every car".
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• Whoopee cushions were first invented by Elagabalus, a 14 year old Roman Emperor and he would often use his invention on guests. He was assassinated at the age of 18.

Article published on http://list25.com/

25 Insane Trivia About Genetics And The Human Genome

Genetics is one of the fastest growing fields of science out there. It wasn’t until the 19th century that genetics even began. The field was started by Gregor Mendel. Mendel was a scientist and a friar who studied trait inheritance, that is the way that traits are passed down from their parents to their offspring. His observations led him to conclude that organisms inherit traits by way of “discrete units of inheritance”. In this way he basically came up with the idea of genes. These days the field has advanced almost unbelievably. Geneticists now study the function of genes across a wide array of disciplines. In fact, thanks to genetic engineering, millions of lives around the world have been saved. By creating higher yield crops by way of selective breeding, farmers in developing countries have actually managed to feed populations that would otherwise have starved. With all of these incredible advances as well as the mapping of the human genome, we now know more about the blueprint for human beings than ever before. Genes define the way your cells act and your cells define the way you act. Get ready because these are 25 insane trivia about genetics and the human genome!

• One group of 55 chimps in Africa has two times the genetic variability as all of humanity put together.
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• Europeans aren't the only people with blond hair. South Pacific islanders also evolved a gene for blond hair.
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• Our bodies may not be "allowed" to live very far beyond 120 years due to genetic caps regarding how many times our cells can divide.
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• Bananas are actually genetic hybrids. Thousands of years ago, humans crossed two strains to come up with today's tasty and sweet fruit.
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• Scientists have recently discovered huge viruses called Pandoraviruses. A vast majority of their genes cannot be traced back to anything so some scientists have suggested creating another domain of life.
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• Elizabeth Taylor's dark eyes were due to a genetic mutation that gave her double lashes.
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• When two sets of identical twins procreate with each other, their children are all siblings (genetically speaking).
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• In Vitro Fertilization allows you to choose the sex of your child.
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• Researchers at Liverpool found that the plagues of the Middle Ages made roughly 10% of Europeans genetically resistant to HIV.
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• When scientists kept fruit flies in total darkness for 57 years, their descendants showed genetic adaptations that were useful for survival in such conditions.
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• Roughly half of the DNA in our GI tract has no correlation to anything (animal, plant, bacteria, etc). Scientists have labeled it "biological dark matter".
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• One in every 4 million lobsters is born blue. They typically don't survive very long though.
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• Sickle cell anemia is a genetic mutation that is actually advantageous to people living in malaria infested regions.
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• There is a genetic mutation that makes your bones extremely dense. One man had bones that were more than 8 times as dense as a normal human. Needless to say, he would sink like a stone whenever he tried to swim.
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• Blue eyed people share a common ancestor who lived about 10,000 years ago around the Black Sea.
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• Cheetahs were nearly wiped out in the last ice age but a small population interbred and survived. For this reason, most cheetahs on Earth today are very, very close genetically.
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• Some women have a genetic condition that makes them tetrachromatic. This means they can see 100 million colors. Most people can only see 1 million.
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• All people share a common genetic line that can be traced back to one woman who lived nearly 200,000 years ago. She has been dubbed "Mitochondrial Eve".
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• A genetic disease known as Laron syndrome makes you shorter, gives you a longer life expectancy, and makes you all but immune to cancer or diabetes.
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• Monsanto Company has been producing seeds that become sterile after the first generation so that farmers can't replant them (yes, this has caused some outrage).
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• Only about 10% of cancers are due to genetics. The other 90% are typically caused by environmental factors.
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• A condition known as methemoglobinemia caused by inbreeding resulted in the Fugates, a blue skinned family from Kentucky.
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• Although we mentioned earlier that the "lifespan cap" is around 120 years, the longest living human was Jeanne Calment of France. She died at 122 years old.
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• We still don't know the function of more than 80% of our DNA.
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• Your genes will determine whether you find the chemical phenylthiocarbamide to be tasteless or bitter. This is the chemical that gives brocolli and cabbage its taste.

Article published on http://list25.com/

25 Deadliest Diseases In Human History

As violent as we can be towards one another, throughout history the biggest executioner of the human race has been deadly disease. Whether it was the Black Death in 14th century Europe or Ebola in present day Africa, the loss of human life and cost to society has been astronomical. These are the 25 deadliest diseases in human history.

Cholera - This infection of the small intestine is transmitted primarily by drinking water or eating food containing the feces of an infected person. Worldwide about 5 million people are affected and over 100,000 die from Cholera every year.

Smallpox - After the vaccination campaigns of the 20th century, smallpox has become one of two infectious diseases that have been declared as completely eradicated (the other being rinderpest). Throughout history, however, small pox has claimed numerous lives and just in the 20th century, prior to vaccination, the death toll was estimated at nearly 500 million.

Yellow Fever - Transmitted by the bite of female mosquitoes, this disease is found in Africa and South America. It typically involves fever, chills, anorexia, nausea, muscle pain (with prominent backache) and headache, but in most cases subsides after several days. Due to warfare and social disruption across Africa, there has seen a resurgence since the 1980s.

Tuberculosis - Usually attacking the lungs, this disease is spread by airborne saliva. The classic symptoms of active tuberculosis infection are a chronic cough with blood-tinged sputum, fever, night sweats, and weight loss. Today some estimates put nearly one third of world down as having some form of tuberculosis.

Influenza - Commonly known as the flu, influenza is usually transmitted through the air like tuberculosis but sometimes through direct contact with contaminated surfaces. Because the virus can be inactivated by soap, however, frequent hand washing reduces the risk of infection.

Lung Cancer - On a world wide scale lung cancer is the most common cancer related death in men and women, responsible for 1.38 million deaths annually.

Diarrhea - A common cause of death in third world countries and the second most common cause of infant deaths worldwide, the loss of fluids through diarrhea can cause dehydration and electrolyte disturbances such as potassium deficiency or other salt imbalances.

Perinatal Complications - Each year, about 500,000 women die worldwide from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth, including severe bleeding/hemorrhaging, infections, unsafe abortions, obstructed labor and eclampsia, and more than 90 percent of maternal deaths occur in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

Whooping Cough - Technically known as Pertussis, this highly infectious disease is known in some countries as the “cough of 100 days”. It is estimated that the disease currently affects 48.5 million people yearly, resulting in nearly 295,000 deaths.

Ebola - Deriving its name from the Ebola River in Republic of the Congo, where it was first found, its victims typically suffer fevers, muscle weakness, and other symptoms that progress to severe bleeding, both internal and external, that eventually causes them to bleed to death. Unfortunately there is no treatment as of yet. Currently, we are experiencing what some are claiming to be the deadliest and worst outbreak of the disease in history.

Avian Influenza (Bird Flu) - Although we’ve already covered influenza as a whole, certain strains adapt to a particular host, in this case birds. Most human contractions of the avian flu are a result of either handling dead infected birds or from contact with infected fluids. For this reason there have been large outbreaks in heavily agricultural parts of Asia and Africa.

Tetanus - Tetanus is a medical condition characterized by a prolonged contraction of skeletal muscle fibers. Infection generally occurs through wound contamination and often involves a cut or deep puncture wound. As the infection progresses, muscle spasms develop in the jaw (thus the name “lockjaw”) and elsewhere in the body.

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease - Often abbreviated as COPD, this disease is caused by noxious particles or gas, most commonly from tobacco smoking, that trigger an abnormal inflammatory response in the lung. Worldwide, COPD is projected to become the fourth leading cause of death by 2030 due to an increase in smoking rates and demographic changes in many countries.

Ischemic Heart Disease - Basically a fancy way of saying heart attacks (or at least the factors that predispose individuals to them), by some estimates 1 in 3 people are said to die from heart disease.

Meningitis - Meningitis is inflammation of the protective membranes covering the brain and spinal cord. The inflammation may be caused by infection and less commonly by certain drugs. The most common symptoms are headache and neck stiffness associated with fever, confusion or altered consciousness, vomiting, and an inability to tolerate light or loud noises.

Influenza A-H1N1 (Swine Flu) - Although it has been declared by the WHO as officially over, swine flu was yet another deadly and contagious strain the influenza virus.

Syphilis - This sexually transmitted disease is believed to infect roughly 12 million people annually, with greater than 90% of cases in the developing world. Symptoms include everything from rashes to heart problems and sometimes it can be difficult to diagnose in its early stages.

Lower Respiratory Infections - There are two types of lower respiratory infections, bronchitis and pneumonia. Some common symptoms of these infections are runny nose and sneezing, headache, and sore throat. Although in most western countries these diseases are not fatal, in the developed world a lower respiratory infection can easily be lethal.

Cerebrovascular Disease - Basically a fancy way of saying stroke, this happens when blood flow to a part of the brain is interrupted because a blood vessel is blocked or bursts open.

Bubonic Plague - Known as a zoonotic disease, circulating mainly among small rodents and their fleas, without treatment the bubonic plague kills about two thirds of infected humans within 4 days.

SARS - A viral respiratory disease in humans, the last known case of the outbreak occurred in June 2003. SARS is not claimed to have been eradicated, however, as it may still be present in its natural host reservoirs (animal populations) and may return to the human population.

Leprosy - This chronic disease has had a long history of making its victims social pariahs due to the way it deforms the surface of the skin. Although these days treatments have been discovered, in many parts of the developing world leper colonies are still very prevalent.

Measles - Measles is spread through respiration and is highly contagious as roughly 90% of people sharing living space with an infected person will catch it. While the vast majority of patients survive measles, complications occur fairly frequently, and may include bronchitis, and panencephalitis which is potentially fatal.

HIV - The virus behind AIDS, a condition in humans in which progressive failure of the immune system allows life-threatening infections and cancers to thrive. Since its discovery AIDS has cause over 30 million deaths.

Malaria - This mosquito born infectious disease causes symptoms that typically include fever and headache, which in severe cases can progress to coma or death. It is found primarily in the tropics and as of yet there is no effective vaccination.

Article published on http://list25.com/

25 Odd And Bizarre Facts About Sex

Most psychologists and marriage counselors will agree that sex is an extremely important part of every romantic relationship—arguably the most important—even though few wouldn’t dare admit it openly. Sex is something you engage in with your partner that you don’t do with anyone else. Of course, you can also embrace, talk to, and kiss your partner to express your love, but you usually do these things with your mother, your siblings, and even your friends. Sex, on the other hand, is the definitive act that draws the line between the kinds of relationships we have with people. Further, sex as a unique expression of intimacy appears to have numerous benefits for one’s life and health, as many studies have shown: it’s a stress reliever, it reduces the risk of cancer (especially prostate cancer in men), reduces pain in many cases, improves sleep and can even cure insomnia in some instances, it even enhances skin and overall health. Most importantly however, sex between a man and a woman is the natural means of reproduction, perpetuating the human race. In other words, one could claim that sex is life. These are 25 Odd and Bizarre Facts About Sex You Probably Didn’t Know.

• According to The State University of New York study, semen can help fight depression. Semen contains chemicals that elevate mood, increase affection, and induce sleep. It also contains cortisol, which is known to increase feelings of affection in the brain.
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• Researchers at Rutgers University used MRI imaging to find out exactly what happens in your brain when you’re aroused. What they found is that different regions of the brain become activated in response to stimulation of the vagina, cervix, clitoris, and nipples.
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• The average female orgasm lasts twenty seconds—fourteen seconds longer than the male orgasm.
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• During sexual intercourse, in addition to the genitals and breasts, the inner nose also swells.
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• -321° F is the temperature at which sperm banks store donor semen. At this temperature semen can be stored indefinitely.
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• While giving birth, some women have been known to experience orgasm.
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• Besides humans, bonobos (a type of chimp) and dolphins are the only animals that have sex for pleasure.
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• It takes two tablespoons of blood to get the average penis erect.
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• Despite many people using it as a common excuse to avoid sex, sex can actually relieve a headache since it releases the tension, which restricts blood vessels in the brain.
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• Studies have shown that eighty-five percent of men who die of heart attacks during intercourse were cheating on their wives. Hmmm, guilty consciences I suppose.
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• Greek couples have sex an average of 138 times a year, placing them at the top of the world sex league. Japanese couples have sex just forty-five times a year, which puts them in last place.
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• During an average man’s lifetime, he will ejaculate approximately seventeen liters of semen, which amounts to about half a trillion sperm.
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• When a man ejaculates, the initial spurt travels at twenty-eight miles an hour—faster than the world record for the 100-meter sprint, which currently stands at 27.49 miles an hour.
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• For both men and women the heart rate averages 140 beats per minute at orgasm. That’s considered a tachycardia.
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• Marilyn Monroe, the most celebrated sex icon of the twentieth century, confessed to a friend that despite her three husbands and a parade of lovers, she had never had an orgasm.
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• A teaspoon of semen contains approximately five calories. Half an hour of intense sex burns off an average of one hundred to two hundred calories.
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• The vibrator, a common sex toy for women, was originally designed in the nineteenth century to fight the anxiety-related symptoms of hysteria. There was even a play about it, In the Next Room (also known as The Vibrator Play), performed in 2009.
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• A chicken egg could accommodate the number of female ova necessary to repopulate the earth to its present population.
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• The earth could be repopulated to its current level using the amount of sperm that could fit in an aspirin capsule.
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• In the Aztec culture avocados were considered so sexually powerful that virgins were restricted from contact with them.
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• Chocolate contains phenylethylamine, the same feel-good chemical responsible for the ecstatic high people experience in sexual attraction and love.
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• Researchers have repeatedly observed female penguins exchanging sexual favors with male penguins that aren’t their mates in exchange for pebbles they will use to build nests for their babies. Yep, female penguins engage in a bizarre form of prostitution.
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• The earliest known illustration of a man using a condom during sexual intercourse is painted on the wall of a cave in France. It is dated between twelve thousand and fifteen thousand years old.
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• In ancient Greece the common slang for oral sex was “playing the flute.
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• During World War I members of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) discovered you could use semen as invisible ink. They stopped using it after they realized how badly it smelled when it got old.
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Article published on http://list25.com/