This week: one cosmic mystery that turned out to be real, and one fantastic forgery that very much did not. Also, a physicist that is totally judging you on his own genius scale. We’re not revealing our score…
Here’s what’s cooking:
The self-certified level-2 genius
This week’s Limited Rare is Lev Landau - known to his friends as ‘Dau’. He started university at 14, spent a year in a Stalinist prison for having opinions, and casually invented a scale to rank other physicists' genius from 0 to 5. Newton scored a 0 (the top). Einstein got 0.5. Bohr, Heisenberg, Dirac and Schrödinger all landed at 1. Landau ranked himself at 2. Hey, we love a modest king.
How to hedge your emotional bets
In 1975, Stephen Hawking bet Kip Thorne that Cygnus X-1 wasn't a black hole – despite having spent years arguing black holes existed. If he was right, his life's work went up in smoke. If he was wrong, he owed Kip Thorne a subscription to Penthouse magazine. He lost. He paid up. Kip's wife was outraged, the scientific community was vindicated, and Hawking made a lot of peace with being wrong.
Fun fact of the week
Somewhere in Gosford, New South Wales, 300 Egyptian hieroglyphs are carved into a rock. Discovered in 1975, they'd have been fascinating and challenged everything we know about history... except one glyph names the pharaoh Khufu using symbols invented after his death. Others are backwards. And they kept multiplying for years afterwards. Whoever the forger was, they simply couldn't stop themselves.
Coming your way this week…
This week, prepare to dig up the Ancient Creatures, salute the Pioneers of Science, and hop about with the Amphibians. You’ll be gazing up at the Wonders of Construction, putting pen to paper for The Write Stuff, and reckoning with the Forces of the Universe.
Energy Rules:
Featured Collections:
Ancient Creatures
Pioneers of Science
Amphibians
Wonders of Construction
The Write Stuff
Forces of the Universe
As always,
Keep it CUE!
This week: one cosmic mystery that turned out to be real, and one fantastic forgery that very much did not. Also, a physicist that is totally judging you on his own genius scale. We’re not revealing our score…
Here’s what’s cooking:
The self-certified level-2 genius
This week’s Limited Rare is Lev Landau - known to his friends as ‘Dau’. He started university at 14, spent a year in a Stalinist prison for having opinions, and casually invented a scale to rank other physicists' genius from 0 to 5. Newton scored a 0 (the top). Einstein got 0.5. Bohr, Heisenberg, Dirac and Schrödinger all landed at 1. Landau ranked himself at 2. Hey, we love a modest king.
How to hedge your emotional bets
In 1975, Stephen Hawking bet Kip Thorne that Cygnus X-1 wasn't a black hole – despite having spent years arguing black holes existed. If he was right, his life's work went up in smoke. If he was wrong, he owed Kip Thorne a subscription to Penthouse magazine. He lost. He paid up. Kip's wife was outraged, the scientific community was vindicated, and Hawking made a lot of peace with being wrong.
Fun fact of the week
Somewhere in Gosford, New South Wales, 300 Egyptian hieroglyphs are carved into a rock. Discovered in 1975, they'd have been fascinating and challenged everything we know about history... except one glyph names the pharaoh Khufu using symbols invented after his death. Others are backwards. And they kept multiplying for years afterwards. Whoever the forger was, they simply couldn't stop themselves.
Coming your way this week…
This week, prepare to dig up the Ancient Creatures, salute the Pioneers of Science, and hop about with the Amphibians. You’ll be gazing up at the Wonders of Construction, putting pen to paper for The Write Stuff, and reckoning with the Forces of the Universe.
Energy Rules:
Featured Collections:
Ancient Creatures
Pioneers of Science
Amphibians
Wonders of Construction
The Write Stuff
Forces of the Universe
As always,
Keep it CUE!
