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Obdicut posted:I've seen this guy referenced all the time, and it never explains how. I wish there was an illustration of him holding a gun so we could see how the gently caress he pulled it off. Or some description at all of how he could do poo poo. Did you not see the poster with all the sweet action shots
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 16:58 |
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# ? May 16, 2024 17:58 |
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Gabriel Pope posted:Did you not see the poster with all the sweet action shots Now I'm kind of hoping that the truth is he couldn't do poo poo but he was an awesome liar.
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 18:03 |
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"No, no, I painted all of these portraits using my enormous wang as a paint brush! Then I had the Queen of Austria, just cause!"
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# ? Jan 8, 2016 18:14 |
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The quoted Wiki says he was born without hands or lower legs, not that he was a quadriplegic.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 18:31 |
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This isn't the same? Oops
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 19:13 |
The bottom center picture explains a lot about how he was able to grasp objects.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 19:25 |
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Alkydere posted:I like how he mentions if he put it on a piece of ice it would spin the other direction. Stirling engines can literally work off of a source of cold, it just needs a temperature difference, which is pretty loving cool from an engineering standpoint. So I could build one with one end in a cold creek and one end exposed to the sun and it could run a small water pump. That would be awesome for a low volume irrigation pump.
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# ? Jan 9, 2016 19:39 |
Before he became a revolutionary Fidel Castro tried his luck in Hollywood. He got a line in the movie Havana After Midnight but his scene was cut. Shortly after that he returned to Cuba to join the revolution.
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# ? Jan 10, 2016 12:28 |
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System Metternich posted:Matthias Buchinger was a German quadriplegic who was born in 1674 as the youngest of nine children. Normally this would mean that a short and hard life would be laid in front of him, if even that at all. But Buchinger persevered, and even more: he proved to be one of the most talented artists, magicians and even illustrators of his age, touring at first Germany and then even Europe. In the 1720s he moved to Ireland, where he soon become famous and well-respected. Buchinger was not only a talented showman and artists (some of his illustrations are extremely detailed, which becomes even more remarkable when you remember, well, no arms) but reportedly also a great marksman and musician. Besides his work he had two hobbies: building ships in bottles, and loving. He had at least 14 children by four different women (all of them, especially the last one, beat him up on the reg though) and may have had even more, noone knows for sure. In 1726 a poem was written about him and his exploits, titles "The Greatest German Alive" . Buchinger died in 1740 after a long and eventful life. It doesn't get much more badass than this, imo. Lil' Brudder can make it all on his own.
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# ? Jan 10, 2016 17:49 |
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The word "barbarian" is technically onomatopeia: it was what the Greeks thought those dumb foreign peoples sounded like, walking around making dumb "bar bar bar" noises in their unintelligible bushit languages.
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 19:27 |
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Gabriel Pope posted:The word "barbarian" is technically onomatopeia: it was what the Greeks thought those dumb foreign peoples sounded like, walking around making dumb "bar bar bar" noises in their unintelligible bushit languages. what about barbers?
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 19:29 |
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Barber comes from Latin barba, "beard" (which comes again from PIE bʰardʰeh₂), the similarity is coincidental. The onomatopoetical origins of "barbarian" are better visible in the first instance it's been attested: pa-pa-ro in Mycanean Greek.
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 19:46 |
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sout posted:what about barbers? Don't know if you're being serious, but I was curious so I looked it up. I always assumed they were from the same root, which made sense in my head because the stereotypical Roman is clean-shaven versus some big bearded Germanic barbarian, but apparently they're separate - barba, the Latin for beard, is thought to be from Proto-Indo-European bhardh-a while barbarian is indeed from Greek onomatopoeia and seemingly unrelated. However, barb and barber are related - the barb on an arrowhead is supposed to be like a beard. As for a cool historical thing to contribute, I've always been fascinated by sweating sickness. It's a disease that used to kill thousands of people in England on a regular basis, and we have no idea what caused it, or why it disappeared. e;f,b
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 19:48 |
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Gato posted:Don't know if you're being serious, but I was curious so I looked it up. I always assumed they were from the same root, which made sense in my head because the stereotypical Roman is clean-shaven versus some big bearded Germanic barbarian, but apparently they're separate - barba, the Latin for beard, is thought to be from Proto-Indo-European bhardh-a while barbarian is indeed from Greek onomatopoeia and seemingly unrelated. I wasn't being serious but I'm still glad you posted this haha, having had some high school education in latin helps to reverse engineer the etymology of words in interesting ways.
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 19:51 |
In 256 b.c. Li Bing constructed the Dujiangyan irrigation system using mostly bamboo. It is still in use today.
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 20:22 |
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Suck it, Gilligan!
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 20:29 |
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Alhazred posted:Dujiangyan Surprisingly, it is a pretty nice place to visit.
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 20:36 |
The symbolism of viking weapons: The sword: The Norse word for sword, sverð , literally means penis. It was connected to Freyr who amongst other things was the god of fertility. It was believed that sword amulets improved your virility. The ax: The ax symbolized strength and health. It was connected with Tor. The spear: It was believed that Odin started the first battle by throwing a spear. The spear was therefore considered a royal weapon and vikings would often start the battle by throwing a spear. The shield: The shield was considered a bit feminine because its connection with Freya. Like a mother protecting her child the shield would protect the warrior.
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 20:41 |
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Medieval/renaissance merchants used bills of exchange to create a covert form of moneylending, where the remitter was a moneylender who drew interest on the exchange of currencies. The process was hideously complex and hard to explain, but it eventually developed into creating fictional transfers of money to disguise loans with interest. Richard A. Goldthwaite posted:In 1417 Antonio di messer Francesco Salutati, at the time an employee of the bank of Giovanni di Bicci de Medici in Florence, copied out a merchant manual of an earlier date in which exchange is treated extensively, and at the very end he added his own comment that he who deals in exchanges and he who deals in merchandise is always anxious and beset by worries. I will instead give you a recipe for lasagna and macaroni. He proceeds to do so and then concludes: Let him who wants to draw on Bruges and remit to Paris do it. I, for my part, prefer to enjoy supper with my companions. Amen.
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 22:08 |
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So what's the recipe?
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 22:14 |
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Ichabod Sexbeast posted:So what's the recipe? Not included
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 22:15 |
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Alhazred posted:The symbolism of viking weapons: Vikings (and probably other groups) would also take the swords of defeated enemies and bend them before burying them, to prevent their ghosts from taking revenge
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# ? Jan 11, 2016 23:50 |
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Don't know if this one has already been posted, but this is one of my favorites: JFK, Lee Harvey Oswald, and Jack Ruby all died in the same hospital.
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 01:41 |
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Humboldt Squid posted:Vikings (and probably other groups) would also take the swords of defeated enemies and bend them before burying them, to prevent their ghosts from taking revenge There's also definitely an element of "Ha ha! I broke your penis!" involved.
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 01:53 |
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Some vaguely early rock and surf music related factoids: When the Ventures recorded Walk, don't run in 1960, their drummer, one Skip Moore, chose to be paid a lump $25 (About $200 today) instead of royalties, and left the band. (I Imagine him being all smug and buying a nice radio or something with the proceeds of a weekend's work on a doomed single) The song was a million seller and the band later sold over 100 million records. Another early drummer eventually became a general in the USAF. Miserlou by Dick Dale (I guarantee you've heard it before, maybe in Pulp fiction) is an adaption of an Egyptian folk song that he created when challenged to come up with a song that could be played on only one string of his guitar. Wipeout was written as an afterthought (See also Paranoid by Black Sabbath). It is a 'flipped disc' - The B-side filler of a single that supplanted the intended A-side. Jan Berry had a hit in 1964 with Dead man's curve, about a street race between a Corvette Stingray and a Jaguar XKE. Two years later, he nearly killed himself in his own Corvette Stingray by crashing into a truck, a couple of miles from the curve he sang about. I was made for loving you by KISS was written at least in part to prove how easy it was to create a hit song using the disco formula. (OK, so not so early rock.)
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 03:30 |
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Jaguars! posted:Some vaguely early rock and surf music related factoids: "Heh, idiots"
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 09:51 |
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Gato posted:Don't know if you're being serious, but I was curious so I looked it up. I always assumed they were from the same root, which made sense in my head because the stereotypical Roman is clean-shaven versus some big bearded Germanic barbarian, but apparently they're separate - barba, the Latin for beard, is thought to be from Proto-Indo-European bhardh-a while barbarian is indeed from Greek onomatopoeia and seemingly unrelated. What about Berbers?
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 10:27 |
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AgentF posted:What about Berbers? That's just where you get your hair cut in Liverpool.
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 16:50 |
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AgentF posted:What about Berbers? From what i heard the Romans got super salty for losing North Africa to the Vandals and locals so from the fall of Carthage to the Vandals they started calling that area literally "barbarian land". Then the Arabs came, saw the name and kept calling them Berbers because isn't that what the Romans kept calling this area? Then let it be!
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 19:56 |
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Jaguars! posted:Some vaguely early rock and surf music related factoids: Haha this pretty much happens in "Inside llewyn Davis." I wonder if it's a direct reference.
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 20:59 |
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Mans posted:From what i heard the Romans got super salty for losing North Africa to the Vandals and locals so from the fall of Carthage to the Vandals they started calling that area literally "barbarian land". So are Berbers really Numidians?
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 21:22 |
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Kanine posted:Haha this pretty much happens in "Inside llewyn Davis." I wonder if it's a direct reference. Maybe, wouldn't be the first musician to get ripped off like that. Their previous single sank completely and there's only two known copies of it left. The band also has toured japan every year since 1965. (And I checked, they were still touring there last year.) Link Wray's 1958 tune Rumble, was banned in NY due to fears that it would incite gang violence, despite being an instrumental. To be fair, it is a very menacing, ominous song. He must be one of the first people to poke holes in his speakers to distort the guitar tone, a trick popular in the punk rock age.
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# ? Jan 12, 2016 22:23 |
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North Africa used to be home to elephants. It's where the Carthaginians got them. They supposedly went extinct because Romans used them too much for bloodsports.
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 11:00 |
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:North Africa used to be home to elephants. It's where the Carthaginians got them. Romans actually drove a lot of things into extinction. Silphium was one of the most interesting, actually; it probably went extinct before 100 B.C. and is really a prime example of "loving humans never learn, do they?" Apparently it had a ton of uses. It was a spice as well as just plain edible by itself. It was used to treat all sorts of stuff from coughs, sore throats, and stomach maladies. It was also apparently useful as a contraceptive. A reliable contraceptive. How much of it was true and how much of it was bullshit? All told we don't have a freaking clue beyond "it was used as medicine" and "Romans ate it." No traces of it have been found and nobody is entirely sure exactly what it was. The theory is that it was a large fennel related to some other plants that have traits similar to what was ascribed to it. There's a scientific suggestion based on studies that silphium existed and was at least close to what was recorded in usefulness but really it's impossible to be 100% sure because it just plain doesn't exist anymore. There is a vague idea of what it looks like because it was so important to the economy in and around Cyrene they put that poo poo all over nearly every coin they minted at the time. Over harvesting and over consumption are obviously at play but one of the big theories is that it declined suddenly because of livestock. Apparently feeding it to animals gave them some desirable trait or another which led to people grazing animals on the land which...hosed it up completely. Humans, being humans, wanted to keep consuming the stuff so it was eventually driven into nonexistence.
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 12:25 |
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ToxicSlurpee posted:Romans actually drove a lot of things into extinction. Silphium was one of the most interesting, actually; it probably went extinct before 100 B.C. and is really a prime example of "loving humans never learn, do they?" Apparently it had a ton of uses. It was a spice as well as just plain edible by itself. It was used to treat all sorts of stuff from coughs, sore throats, and stomach maladies. It was also apparently useful as a contraceptive. A reliable contraceptive. It may have also been the origin of our heart symbol for love in the shape of its seeds! quote:There has been some speculation about the connection between silphium and the traditional heart shape (♥).[17] Silver coins from Cyrene of the 6–5th century BCE bear a similar design, sometimes accompanied by a silphium plant and understood to represent its seed or seed pod.[18]
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 14:23 |
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There's also a legend that the very last silphium plant was given to Emperor Nero. He ate it.
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 14:36 |
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When did "conservation" actually become a thing that the majority of people got behind? Was it sometime in the 1800's? I'd love to know when we went from "Boy, you don't see too many of these animals anymore.....pass me the rifle so I can shoot and eat it," to "Boy, you don't see too many of these animals around....we should stop shooting them."
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 16:45 |
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Solice Kirsk posted:When did "conservation" actually become a thing that the majority of people got behind? Was it sometime in the 1800's? I'd love to know when we went from "Boy, you don't see too many of these animals anymore.....pass me the rifle so I can shoot and eat it," to "Boy, you don't see too many of these animals around....we should stop shooting them." The passenger pigeon had attempts to protect it in the 1800s, but weren't taken seriously. The last one died in 1914.
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 17:31 |
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Solice Kirsk posted:When did "conservation" actually become a thing that the majority of people got behind? Was it sometime in the 1800's? I'd love to know when we went from "Boy, you don't see too many of these animals anymore.....pass me the rifle so I can shoot and eat it," to "Boy, you don't see too many of these animals around....we should stop shooting them." You got me curious so I looked it up and it seems that the origins of the movement go all the way back to 1662. Didn't really gather much steam until the late 18th/early 19th century though. Wikipedia posted:The conservation movement can be traced back to John Evelyn's work Sylva, presented as a paper to the Royal Society in 1662. Published as a book two years later, it was one of the most highly influential texts on forestry ever published.[2] Timber resources in England were becoming dangerously depleted at the time, and Evelyn advocated the importance of conserving the forests by managing the rate of depletion and ensuring that the cut down trees get replenished.
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 17:49 |
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# ? May 16, 2024 17:58 |
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After Denmark lost its navy to England in 1807, there came a lot of laws on forestry (the navy had right of first refusal on any oak, and new ones were planted several places). Of course a lot of the then-planted oaks didn't become useful for ship building until ships were made from steel.
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# ? Jan 15, 2016 18:42 |