Facts & Quotes™💡

“The big lesson in life, baby, is never be scared of anyone or anything.” – Frank Sinatra #quotes

Whale songs can be used to map out the ocean floor. Fin whales are basically the Barry White of the ocean. The deep, bellowing songs that males use to attract mates are considered to be the loudest of all marine life and can be "heard up to 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) away," according to Scientific American. They can also be used to sonically map out the ocean floor thanks to the fact that the sound can reach depths of 2.5 kilometers (1.6 miles) under the water, which bounces back and provides researchers with accurate measurements. Beyond that, a 2021 study in Science showed how using a fin whale's song can be far more useful and have less of a negative impact on sea life than using a large air gun, which is the typical tool researchers rely on. #knowledge

​​Why is Whale Vomit so expensive? In 2016, three fishermen from the middle eastern country of Oman struck "floating gold" in the form of ambergris, traditionally thought to be whale vomit. (Modern science says the waxy substance is more like a whale gallstone, or whale poop.) Although it sounds pretty repellant, ambergris is actually worth big bucks — the chunk that these guys stumbled upon weighed 176 pounds (80 kilograms) and was allegedly worth nearly $3 million. But why was it so valuable? Ambergris (which comes from a French phrase meaning "gray amber") forms in the intestines of a sperm whale. Scientists have found squid beaks in clumps of ambergris, leading many to surmise the ambergris is something of a protective secretion that protects sperm whales' digestive tracts from the scratching of those hard beaks. Traditionally, scientists believed that whales threw it up because they couldn't digest the substance, but many scientists now lean toward thinking that ambergris is passed out just like fecal matter. When a whale initially expels ambergris, it is soft and has a terrible smell. Some marine biologists compare it to dried cow dung. But after floating on the salty ocean for about a decade, the substance hardens and becomes smooth, waxy and usually rounded. The dung smell is gone, replaced by a scent that has been famous for hundreds of years, probably more. The longer it floats, the better the scent. The smell is so fine that ambergris is a coveted ingredient for fine perfumes. In fact, it's described as being smooth, musky, earthy, sweet or simply "indescribable." Aside from its unique odor, ambergris' vital function is helping perfume scent to bind to the surface of the skin and stick around, instead of quickly evaporating. Ambergris is something of a collector's item, as it is in short supply. No other whales besides sperm whales produce it, and even then it's typically somewhere in the middle of the ocean, so it's a rare find. Ambergris only washes up on a beach somewhere every few years, tops, and is found in less than 5 percent of the sperm whale carcasses that do make it to shore. That makes the product extremely valuable, but not in the way it once was. Chemists have replicated some of the traits of ambergris synthetically, making it a less-necessary component in perfumes. But it's still prized for its rarity, and certain perfume makers certainly prefer it to lab-created ingredients. However, in some countries, including the United States, endangered-species legislation makes it illegal to buy or sell the stuff. Of course, that only makes it more desirable in certain circles. Experts quote the current rate for ambergris at about $35 per gram, depending on its quality, but legal issues can make it difficult to find a buyer.

In India, it's illegal to capture dolphins for entertainment purposes as they're highly intelligent and considered 'non-human persons' whose rights to life and liberty must be respected. #countries

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“The drops of rain make a hole in the stone not by violence but by oft falling.” – Lucretius #quotes

Glaciers and ice sheets hold about 69 percent of the world's freshwater. Just over 96% of the total amount of the world's water is held in its oceans. However, that's primarily saltwater. To find the bulk of the world's freshwater you need to trek to the poles, as 68.7% of it is encased in ice caps, permanent snow, and glaciers. #knowledge

To all our Muslim brethren, I wish you a very happy Eid Mubarak!

Cheetahs are so shy and socially awkward that zoos sometimes pair them with 'emotional support' dogs. #animals

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sometimes, a good listener can solve other people's problems but can't solve their own. #thoughts

Arnold Schwarzenegger was paid approximately $21,429 for every word he said in "Terminator 2" #entertainment

​​What is a Nixie Tube? If you've got a digital alarm clock (or a timer on a microwave oven, VCR, or DVD player), chances are it has blue-green numbers (in which case, it's using a vacuum fluorescent display, VFD) or red ones (which means it's made from light-emitting diodes, LEDs). Either way, you'll notice that it displays each of the digits in the time (10:30 or whatever) by lighting up a pattern of seven quite separate bars, commonly called "segments." You can write all the numbers 0–9 with a seven-segment display and quite a few letters and words as well. Nixie tubes also display the numbers 0–9 but in a completely different way. Look closely at a nixie tube and you'll see it has the ten decimal digits made out of bent wire and arranged in a stack, one in front of the other, inside a sealed glass bulb. Underneath the bulb, there are lots of electrical contacts. Wire these up to an appropriate electronic circuit and you can make the numbers count up in sequence, tell the time, or do all kinds of other neat things. Nixie tubes work a lot like neon lamps (although not exactly like neon lamps, as we'll see in a moment). The bent metal wires that display each number aren't filaments, like the ones in an incandescent lamp. Each of them works as a separate negative terminal (cathode) in what is effectively a gas-discharge tube—so one nixie tube has ten cathodes. The cathodes don't actually touch one another but are kept apart by tiny ceramic spacers. There's also a single positive terminal (anode), shaped like a mesh or grid, that's wrapped around the stack of numeric cathodes and serves all 10 of them. Nixie tubes are very similar to neon lamps. Both look a bit like cathode-ray tubes (old-style televisions), in which electrons boil off a hot metal cathode at one end and race down the tube toward a positively charged anode at the other. But in neon lamps and nixies, the cathodes remain relatively cool (tubes like this are described as "cold cathode," even though they're generally on the warm side—about human body temperature) but the gas mixture that surrounds them is at a very low pressure (perhaps 1/100th of normal atmospheric pressure or even less—so typically less than 1000Pa or 0.01 atmospheres). When a voltage of about 170–180 volts is applied between the anode and one of the cathodes, the low-pressure gas becomes ionized (its atoms or molecules are turned into positively charged ions and negatively charged electrons). When electrons, ions, and atoms collide with one another (and with metal atoms ejected or "sputtered" from the cathode), we get a glowing, fuzzy "coating" of light forming all around the cathode, very close to it, that follows its shape precisely—effectively making it appear as though one of the numbers 0–9 is illuminated. Applying a voltage to a different cathode makes a different digit "light up."

You can remember the value of Pi (3.1415926) by counting the letters of each word in the phrase "May I have a large container of coffee?" #lifehack

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By being pessimistic, you're always either right or pleasantly surprised. #thoughts

Avocados are rich in tryptophan, a precursor to serotonin Eating them can boost your mood. #food

Farting can help reduce high blood pressure and is good for your overall health. #health

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“Freedom is an expensive gift always worth fighting for. Even if it costs us!” – Marck E. Estemil #quotes