Got Science?

I was just watching Bill Nye on the news, talking about the Gulf oil spill, and he started talking about how we need more of America's youth to go into concrete science, rather than economics or banking or whatnot. And so, I decided that now is a good time to truly discuss what the question box is about, as its purpose, I feel, is beginning to drown amongst the goodie bags, extra credit, and other frilly stuff.

The Question Box wasn't meant as a way for me to get rid of all of my Halloween candy, even if that's what it seems. Nor was it meant as a quick and easy way to boost your grades. It isn't even about the ultra-cool bulletin board that is now wallpapered in pictures and articles. It's about getting you interested in science, and hopefully swaying some of you to pursue science careers in the future. Science isn't boring, even if you fall asleep in science class. It's the field of curiosity, where you think of questions- and try to answer them. It's the field of creation, where our techno-people think of neat gadgets like the iPhone for the rest of us to enjoy. It's the field of solutions, where our greatest minds try to solve the problems of today, like BP's oil spill. I'm not saying that you have to become a scientist or engineer, but that it's not as boring as you think. In fact, here's how E. Robert Schulman put the purpose of science in his comical How to Write a Scientific Paper:

The purpose of science is to get paid for doing fun stuff if you're not a good enough programmer to write computer games for a living (Schulman et al. 1991).

While it's meant to be a joke, that's what scientists do: they research "stuff" that they want to find out, and they get paid for doing it. Just watch the Discovery Channel. Those people are getting paid for living an adventure! No one is more fun, or funny than the Myth Busters and all they do all day is experiment. Having someone pay you to sit around and ask questions is a wonderful career. Want to know why clouds break up? Or why people have a tendency to eat the ears off of marshmallow peeps first? Scientists are the ones who get paid to find the answer: they research the topic, come up with a guess to the answer, and try out their guess in a made up scenario, an experiment. Then, they try to figure out what just happened and whether or not they were right. But you don't need me to tell you this, this is what every science teacher is telling you! Hypothesis: I think people like to eat the ears of marshmallow peeps. Observation: watching people vote on my marshmallow peep poll. Data: The results of my poll (scroll down to see). Conclusion: it's either always or never, but rarely in between. This is what science teachers are constantly telling you, but it's simpler than they make it seem (sorry Sunnyd). This big vocabulary, observation, analysis, etc. is scaring people away from science, if you ask me. And that's what the question box is about: going back to the root of science so that we don't forget the essence of it. It's here to remind you that science is an explanation for simple things in life, facts about our world. And when we put facts together, we come up with all sorts of interesting stuff: the same concept of "convection" that makes the Earth's surface move makes our jello turn solid and makes heating up a house with an oven highly ineffective (Trust me, don't try it. It could cause your oven to break, like ours did). The same concept of gravity that makes the moon go 'round our heads makes apples fall to the ground. And when we try to use these concepts for ourselves, we make life easier: a fan helps cool your jello dessert in time for dinner, a fireplace heats up your house quickly and effectively (relatively speaking), gravity makes bungee jumping all the more thrilling... This is what science is about. And it is ultra-important to your life, my life, and the development of mankind.

That's also why you should do your science homework. :)

Tired out, are you? I'll keep the answer to this week's question brief, because I need to do my homework and I'm sure you do too. We need to sit upright on roller coasters because of G-forces. If we don't, all these G-forces won't be distributed evenly and parts of us would feel heavier than others. I'll come back to this topic later (hopefully) because I need to do more reading. Here are some links about roller coasters:http://www.rollercoasterking.com/thrill-experience/http://www.themeparkinsider.com/safety/http://fun.familyeducation.com/summer/safety/35168.htmlhttp://cec.chebucto.org/Co-Phys.html  And thanks to njguy for the neat video. I don't think I'll ever go on Kingda Ka- way too scary for me.

By the way, if you'd like to comment on anything, feel free to do so.

Pippin's Question Box

Why can't we tickle ourselves? Best

 Thanks to Saffire_Goldstone

Pippin's Question Box

Why are we told to sit upright on roller coasters? (and what happens if we don't?) Best

Got Science?

Answer by Awesome_Spectacular:

I have to say, this week's question was a little hard. We got several different opinions and answers from people. Just a little heads-up: please follow the rules! If you don't do things like write your own answer or provide a link, we can't give you credit for the answer. Sunnyd has clearly stated whoever didn't state a link this week will not get credit, so next for those of you, please make sure you have link next time!

Back to the question. Even though there were many opinions, the one I thought was correct after doing some research (with A LOT of help from Pippin14), the answer I think is correct is that drier air causes clouds to break up into smaller clouds. When drier air gets mixed with clouds, some parts of the cloud break away, or in more scientific terms, evaporate. Basically, this is the way a cloud breaks up into smaller clouds. When answering this, you should have remembered that clouds are little drops of frozen crystals, or water.

In a way, Pizzalover was technically correct in saying that clouds can't break up into smaller clouds because it depends on the size of the frozen droplets of water that make a cloud big or small. But technically, of that cloud, when dry air is mixed, parts of the cloud will evaporate, breaking it up into a smaller cloud.

Links: (mostly a big thanks to Pippin14!)

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/cloud-formation-how-do-clouds-form.html
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=An9r01NVQXbJH6pzcfnmz48azKIX;_ylv=3?qid=20100520140322AAOvHiR
http://www.rcn27.dial.pipex.com/cloudsrus/clouds.html
http://eo.ucar.edu/webweather/cloud2.html
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/wcloud0.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/wlumpwhy.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/weather/resources/askjack/archives-clouds-precip.htm
http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=4898
http://www.livescience.com/mysteries/070329_clouds_form.html
http://science.howstuffworks.com/cloud2.htm

(Note from Pippin: That's a lot of links! On another note, I found a really interesting article about why clouds are lumpy and another Q&A about clouds from scholastic that has some neat factoids, just in case you find clouds interesting!)

Book Chat: Economics

I can honestly say that I'm shocked (and slightly embarrassed to admit) that two books about economics, of all things, would have changed my perspective of the world.  Honestly, you'd think some science book would do that, right?  But alas, in my age of ever-changing perspectives and general teenagehood, books on "the social science of decision- making" rather than "the study of the human brain" have changed the way I think.  Who would have known?

Anyway, all that being said and done, I should talk about the books, shouldn't I?  I'll go from oldest to most recent.  Here are the first two (they're related):

Freakonomics
"A rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything"
By Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner


SuperFreakonomics

"Global Cooling, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance"

By Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

Simply put, Freakonomics and it's sequel has one basic concept in mind: incentives cause people to do things.  Or, to put in one word, it's about incentives.  It's an extremely popular book, and for good reason-it has wonderful examples, shows surprising (but logical) points to make, and talks about some controversial issues. Even kokopelli1015 has read excerpts, but hasn't read the entire thing.  I do talk about Freakonomics in this post, but I know few of you will read that post, so quick review- has some controversial issues about discrimination and abortion as a heads up, and talks a lot about crime, and obviously, the role of incentives in the crime.  It also talks about a lot of other things, so even if none of those seem appealing to you, there's a whole lot of hidden treasures in that book that's worth reading for.  SuperFreakonomics is the one I read recently, though.  Another heads up: there is inappropriate content in the first chapter, but it doesn't look at it in a you-know-what light, but in more of an analytical view- looking at data and whatnot.  Still, get it checked out by an adult if you want before you read it to be safe.  It's been a little while, but I do know that this book doesn't focus all that much on crime as Freakonomics, but talks about other subjects as well.  It's got a pretty extensive chapter on global warming and some (easy) ways to combat it.  My personal favorite chapter is the last one, on monkeys (that's where the question box came from! I forget what my family and I were talking about to get to monkey hair...).  Both books, though, are honestly quite amazing and will change the way you look at things.  Really.  It did that to a hard-core science fan, and I'm sure that most people will find it a wonderfully fascinating read.  There's even a really interesting blog for Freakonomics that I'd recommend to read as well.

Trade-Off
"Why Some Things Catch on and Others Don't"
By Kevin Maney

This book was amazing.  Really.  It's all about a simple concept that's behind which products catch on- and which don't.  This basic concept is fidelity (quality) vs. convenience.  A product will go off well in the market if it either has super high fidelity or super high convenience.  It is impossible to have both- and trying to make a product have both is chasing the "fidelity mirage," which sounds all too possible but is a fool's errand.  This, along with other spin-offs of the fidelity vs. convenience trade-off is more thoroughly explained in the book.  There are tons of real, vivid, examples of products that have failed- and succeeded wildly.  While some may not be as well-known to us, like the company Tesla Motors, others we are all too familiar with (e.g. the iPhone and some other well known companies).  I don't think that I'll ever look at anything the same after I read this- especially right after reading this, you keep thinking about whether it's high convenience, high fidelity, or a bit of both.  Ever wonder how the whole revamp of the question box rewards system sprang into being?  Well, this book was part of the answer.  Really, it's a great book, and I'd highly recommend you read it.

Admittedly, these three books aren't quite science related, but they're really great books that puts a spin on your perspectives of things.  Try them out and see what you think, and you may be surprised that non fiction books can be just as interesting as Twilight, in different ways.

Pippin's Question Box

How do clouds break up into smaller clouds? Best

Pippin's Question Box

What makes soda fizz? Best

Got Science

I must say, this was a pretty difficult question to answer! For all those Question Box Answerer's this week, great links!
From what I researched, it pretty much depends on, basically, your body and how tolerant you are. It depends on how many fumes there are, and how much you inhale. If you inhale enough of it, you could possibly get drunk, although you would feel a little dizzy first. This is because the main chemical in alcohol is ethanol. Ethanol is also known as grain alcohol, pure alcohol, or drinking alcohol, along with many other names. Ethanol is one of the oldest recreational drugs. As iluvmusic said, alcohol is not an inhalant, it is still really harmful to your body. If you inhale enough to get you drunk, it will enter your bloodstream, which can be highly harmful to your body.
~Awesome_Spectacular1009


Pippin's comments: I have to wonder though: if you can get drunk on ethanol, couldn't that be a major problem in considering bio fuels? After all, when we go to fill up our tank on gasoline, we smell gasoline fumes. Therefore, if drivers fill up their tank and catch a whiff or two of alcohol, then that will be almost the equivalent of putting (slightly) drunk drivers on the road- and that could be rather hazardous. Wouldn't that mean, then, engineers would have to design a completely leak-proof ethanol dispensing system so as to avoid doing that to drivers? Plus, even our gasoline systems are (clearly) not leak proof, so I highly doubt we'd been able to create an entirely leak-proof ethanol system that every fuel station would embrace and maintain properly. Hmmm... well, just something to think about!


Links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/health-drunk-but-not-a-drop-passed-my-lips-did-you-know-that-you-can-get-tipsy-simply-by-breathing-in-the-fumes-from-other-peoples-booze-rob-stepney-looks-at-the-risks-and-possibilities-of-passive-drinking-1469632.html

Pippin's Question Box

Could someone get drunk by walking into a room full of alcohol fumes? Best

Got Science?

http://www.howstuffworks.com/question100.htm
http://www.ehow.com/facts_5729847_human-vs_-monkey-hair.html

How do Monkeys keep their hair short?

For those of you who didn't get the question, this was a tricky one.  The trick behind the tricky question was that you had to search not monkey hair shortness, but why hair grows to a certain length in general.  (and by all means, you definitely shouldn't have searched for monkey barbershops- that would have gotten you nowhere).  Basically, as Totalmystery and Saffire said, monkeys shed (and we do too).  To be a little more detailed, the parts of your body that grows hair, your hair follicles, have a specific programming, so to speak.  Every hair, first of all, has its own follicle, so this follicle produces new hair cells, pushing the older ones, which we see as hair.  Hair follicles will continue to produce cells for a certain period of time, called the growth period.  Then, the follicles will stop, which is called the rest period.  Once a hair follicle enters this rest period, it stops growing and the hair falls out- thus, once the rest period ends, the follicle can start anew.  This system of grow-rest-grow-rest controls how long hair can grow, so while the hair on your head can grow long enough to cover your face, the hair on your arms won't do much.  Animals that shed coordinate this rest period so that all their hair sheds at the same time, creating a mess in your house at times.  So, monkeys keep their hair short simply because it isn't going to grow any longer (for monkeys with short hair). And that's it for today! Hope you learned something!