Loser Mountain The greatest joy of researching topics for this project invariably comes from unexpected confluences. Sometimes a string of articles will arrive thanks to one investigation hole; other times a new connection to a previous subject springs forward. These overlaps provide mind-sparks that remind us everything is linked on our rocky haven of life […]
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Loser Mountain Nearly ubiquitous with mountaineering in Europe are the Alps. This massive range dips into eight countries: Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Slovenia, and Switzerland. More than a quarter of the Alps rests inside Austria, which is quite the statistic since that nation is slightly smaller than Maine! According to PeakVisor, Austria contains more
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Manhattanhenge The clock that stands still is right twice per day. Over the years, in our studies of the seasons and equinoxes, we’ve encountered various human-made edifices with connections to the Sun. The ancient Irish sepulcher Newgrange features an aperture that aligns with the rising star on the winter solstice, dripping light into the funerary passageway. Famously,
Dumbo Octopuses Walt Disney Productions began an American institution in 1937 with the creation of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Their initial animated feature still ranks tenth all-time in inflation-adjusted box-office gross, selling over 109 million tickets. Disney’s next two films, though now considered classic animations – Pinocchio and Fantasia – failed to provide the company with significant profits,
Jerrie, Queen of the Clouds All right, I will. — Jerrie Mock We’ve noted many times the power of role models during our examinations of exemplary humans, most recently during the biography of Mae Jemison. Trailblazers open the minds of young people and expand their palette for what is possible. In the World War interregnum, Amelia Earhart was
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Doyle’s Delight – Belize’s High Point An English name for a Central American High Point might seem a bit out of place, but Doyle’s Delight is not a translation from a Spanish moniker. Of the seven nations between Mexico and Colombia, all but one feature Spanish as an official language. Belize, the odd-country-out, achieved independence from the
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Fossilized Lightning Lightning must hover near the top of any list of the most ephemeral phenomena. The discharge of static electricity during storms is so fast we use it in one of our most cliched idioms: lightning quick. On the other end of the spectrum are entities that persist for long durations, such as rocks or
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The Ship of Theseus Now this body of mine consists completely of the flesh of another person. Do I truly have a body now? Or do I have no body? If I think I have a body, what I have is completely a body of another; if I think I have no body, now I actually do
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Etna Vortex Rings One of the planet’s most famous and active volcanos sits on the island of Sicily, where the African and Eurasian Plates converge. Mt. Etna currently rises 11,014 feet (3,357 meters) above the Ionian Sea. It gains this altitude in under 12 miles from the water! The word “currently” must reside in the
Dinanthropoides Nivalis It showed up dark against the snow, and as far as I could make out, wore no clothes. –N.A. Tombazi, Royal Geographical Society photographer Many ancient Tibetans worshipped a being known as mi rgod, a term that translates to “wild man.” The Lepecha people of the Himalayas called him chu mung, which means
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