The Straight Dope - Can static electricity kill you? News Features
In winter I’ve gotten big shocks from static electricity when getting out of my car, and once saw a video where a crewman touching a race car during a pit stop was thrown back several feet, I presume from static charge built up as the car circled the track. This gotten me wondering: Have there been instances of injury or death from static discharge?
— Mike
Yes, many — and if you’re not...
| more...The Straight Dope - Does cutting taxes create jobs? News Features
Is there any evidence to support the mantra that cutting taxes stimulates job growth? I’m old enough to remember the Reagan years, and it seems most of those tax cuts went into the pockets of the wealthy, and what trickled down was pink slips as jobs went offshore. Was that an anomaly, or par for the course as tax cuts go?
— Keynes Friedman Locke Jr., Greenspan, Minn.
Touchy subject. The...
| more...The Straight Dope - Will using expired drugs kill you? News Features
The Straight Dope - Is excess American body fat a potential energy resource? Plus: Why is prostitution called the oldest profession? News Features
With the population of the United States growing ever more obese and oil becoming scarcer, I wonder if the government has started taking into account the energy its population is storing in body fat. Hypothetically, how much would this add to the nation’s energy reserves?
— John Prokos, Kathmandu
John, you know I admire outside-the-box thinking, and this is about as out there as it gets....
| more...The Straight Dope - Is color blindness an evolutionary advantage? News Features
I heard about a soldier who had been a spotter in helicopter patrols because, being color-blind, he could pick out camouflage from background foliage more easily. I vaguely remember reading about a study linking color blindness in animals to selective pressure. Is there an evolutionary advantage to being color-blind?
— Luke, via the Straight Dope Message Board
This may seem counterintuitive,...
| more...The Straight Dope - Are scientists trying to clone a woolly mammoth? News Features
A friend insists a team of scientists is dedicated to cloning a woolly mammoth. I’d love to believe this is true, and if it is, what are the plans for these critters? Zoos? Releasing them into the wild? Farming? Or a pet for the billionaire that already has everything else? Also, why start with woolly mammoths and not something smaller and hopefully easier, like passenger pigeons?
— Michael...
| more...The Straight Dope - Why are eco-fascists trying to ban incandescent bulbs? News Features
Please comment on the global energy-conservation insanity surrounding the incandescent light bulb, i.e., initiatives around the world to ban it. (Some call the instigators of these measures “eco-fascists.”) How good are energy-saving fluorescent or halogen light bulbs really?
— Ivona, Chicago
You want a comment? I’ll give you two:
1) Although halogen bulbs don’t offer much of an energy...
| more...The Straight Dope - Why video games are good for you News Features
What is the influence of video games on the human mind?
— Brian
Why, they’re the greatest boon to intellectual development since the invention of movable type.
Not everybody thinks this. The common view from President Obama on down is that video games rot your mind, sap your strength, and probably give you acne and bad breath.
I don’t claim video games have been 100 percent beneficial. The...
| more...The Straight Dope - Are blue states smarter than red states? News Features
Is there a difference between red (Republican heartland conservative) states and blue (Democratic coastal liberal) states in terms of IQ? The Republicans certainly seem dumber than a bag of doorknobs — for example, any of the current batch running for president. The Democrats seem smarter, if just as crooked. For the record, I’m a registered independent.
— Arthur Weissman
We need to talk...
| more...The Straight Dope - What’s the best animal to slice open and crawl inside to stay warm? News Features
In The Empire Strikes Back there’s a scene where Han Solo must cut open his tauntaun and climb inside the steaming corpse with Luke. They do this to avoid what appear to be Arctic conditions on the ice planet Hoth. My questions: If I were to find myself in
similar conditions on Earth, what would be the best animal of similar size (300 to 600 kilos) to slice up and crawl inside, and how long...
| more...The Straight Dope - Why can’t we use lasers as ray guns? News Features
The Straight Dope - Know any good recipes for endangered prehistoric fish? Plus: Do caribou like the Alaska oil pipeline? News Features
I’ve been reading about the coelacanth, the fish thought to have gone extinct 65 million years ago that turned up in an Indonesian fish market. Do you know any good coelacanth recipes? Seems like this would be a nice change from a Filet-o-Fish. — Jim, Pawhuska, Oklahoma
I hear you. Every so often you think: right now a tasty morsel of endangered species would really hit the spot. However, one...
| more...The Straight Dope - Should I worry about bugs in my Christmas tree? News Features, 5 Things to Do, 5 Things Featured Item
The Straight Dope - Is setting yourself on fire a good way to treat snakebite? News Features
There’s a common belief that “sucking the poison out” is an effective snakebite remedy. I also heard journalist Stephanie Nolen talk about a man in Sudan who set his foot on fire after a snake bite, which he claimed saved him from the poison. Is either of these treatments effective?
— Dyer
I treasure questions like yours, Dyer, because of the insight they give me into the human mind....
| more...The Straight Dope - Why is there no blue food? News Features
Why is there no (or at least, so little) naturally occurring blue food? Nature seems to have provided us with edible substances of every other hue, but the only blue food to be found in the supermarket is invariably artificially colored. Even blueberries aren’t really blue. How come?
— Matt McElligott
If we’re going to study the ancient texts, Matt, we need to have those texts in front of us....
| more...The Straight Dope - Is there a God (revisited)? News Features
The Straight Dope - Can we fight global warming with artificial global cooling? News Features
In your recent column on conspiracy theories about the government injecting chemicals into the atmosphere, you disparaged the idea of geoengineering, or at least using sulfur dioxide to counter global warning. But you don’t defend your position. Is it a good or bad idea, and why?
— Rob, via the Straight Dope Message Board
One problem at a time, muchacho. First I had to explain why it was...
| more...The Straight Dope - What’s that smell right before it rains? Plus: Will spinning around too much kill you? News Features
What’s that smell in the air (some people like it, others don’t) right before it rains? I’ve lived all over the country and there’s no variation ... when you smell it, you know rain is on its way.
— Nicky, Mount Prospect, Ill.
The smell is called petrichor, the scent of rain falling on dry earth. It’s caused by a couple of compounds in the soil, one of them known as geosmin, “earth-smell,” a...
| more...The Straight Dope - Is there such a thing as death by halibut? News Features
The Straight Dope - Is there a God? News Features
Have you ever addressed the question of God? It would seem like a fairly important question in the fight against ignorance, yet I couldn’t find anything like “Does God exist?” in the archives. Was there ever an article about this or some equivalent topic?
— Bldysabba, via the Straight Dope message board
Nope, I’ve never written about this. Nobody ever asked. That all you wanted to know?...
| more...The Straight Dope - Is the stench of massed zombies toxic? News Features
The Straight Dope - Are poor spellers stupid? News Features
The Straight Dope - Whatever happened to that plan to grow square trees? News Features
The Straight Dope - Is the government spraying stuff into the atmosphere to protect us? News Features
On the History Channel’s “Ancient Aliens” series, they said aliens came to earth to mine gold in order to protect their atmosphere. On radio’s “Coast to Coast AM,” they said our government is shooting gold into the atmosphere to protect us from gamma rays. How do they get the gold to stay up in the sky and not fall back down to earth?
— Jean Brown, Savannah, Georgia
Please watch the movie...
| more...The Straight Dope - Could I take down a T. rex with my Beretta 9mm pistol? News Features
Would I be able to take down a fully grown T. rex armed only with my Beretta 92FS 9mm pistol and a full clip? What about with a 12-gauge shotgun?
— Jeramie Powers
At a meta level, the research department was impressed with your question, Jeramie. What with tsunamis, tornadoes and looming sovereign debt default, Little Ed observed, the past year has taught us to be ready for anything. Sure,...
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