Category Unexplained

May 20 2010

Particles Destroy Each other on Contact

The seemingly inescapable fact that matter and antimatter particles destroy each other on contact has long puzzled physicists wondering how life, the universe or anything else can exist at all. But new results from a particle accelerator experiment suggest that matter does seem to win in the end.

The experiment has shown a small — but significant — 1 percent difference between the amount of matter and antimatter produced, which could hint at how our matter-dominated existence came about.

The current theory, known as the Standard Model of particle physics, has predicted some violation of matter-antimatter symmetry, but not enough to explain how our universe arose consisting mostly of matter with barely a trace of antimatter.

May 20 2010

Thor’s Hammer Discovered in 1964

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In 1964, archaeologist Thomas E. Lee discovered a 10.8-foot tall, 4,000 pound stone cross on the Arnaud River in far northern Quebec. Lee dubbed this sculpture “Thor’s Hammer,” as he assumed the monolith was of Viking origin.

Although modern scholars are unsure of the sculpture’s true purpose (it appears to point to stone remains nearby) or origin (it could likely be an Inuit inuksuk, or guiding stone), we know this much – it’s big, hammer-shaped, and ridiculously remote. I’d hate to see its prior owner come back to retrieve it.

VIA: -i09-

May 19 2010

Fine line between genius and insanity: study

http://mcaaron.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/crazy-person.jpgThe distinction between psychological illness and creative thinking is wafer thin, new Swedish research confirms, arguing that there is a feasible explanation for why the age-old myth of genius bordering on insanity could in fact be true.

May 18 2010

Mysterious ball lightning may be a hallucination

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Seen something pale and round floating in the midst of a thunderstorm? If it lasted for a few seconds or less, it might be all in your head. Fluctuating magnetic fields, created by a nearby lightning bolt, could trick the brain into “seeing” round glowing objects, explaining at least some observations of mysterious ‘ball lightning’.