This is the first of this year’s collections of links to items you may have missed the first time round – and didn’t know you wished you hadn’t!
As usual we’ll start with the harder science stuff and then it’s all downhill.
Science, Technology, Natural World
Let’s start in the middle of nowhere … Poles of Inaccessibility are just that: places furthest from anywhere.
Most know about John Conway’s Game of Life, but there’s been a long-standing puzzle about periodically repeating patterns which has now been solved. [££££]
Still with mathematics, Kit Yates talks about the way in which we are all too often deceived by our training that things are linear.
Changing tack, here are ten odd creatures that washed up on beaches during 2023.
There are times when one wonders where scientists get their research ideas! These guys investigated the vibrations caused by indigenous instruments the bundengan and didgeridoo.
![Didgeridoo and clapstick players performing at Nightcliff, Northern Territory [Wikipedia]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Didgeridu_and_clap_sticks.jpg)
On to a weirdness in the heavens … astronomers have discovered a megastructure which is challenging our understanding of the universe.
Back on our planet, Earth’s wobble creates problems for astronomy, cartography and climate. [££££]
Health, Medicine
Now here’s an interesting approach to understanding anatomy … the body is just bags within bags within bags, all the way down. [££££]
We all know about the placebo effect, but here are half a dozen things you maybe didn’t know about it.
OB/GYN Dr Jen Gunter has written a new book on menstruation: Blood: The Science, Medicine and Mythology of Menstruation; here’s a review.
On the other side of the divide, it seems that sperm counts are falling across the globe and scientists are trying to find out exactly why. [LONG READ] [££££]
In 1889 there was a pandemic caused by Russian flu. Here’s a piece outlining why it is unlikely it was actually due to a coronavirus.
Scientists are worried about permafrost, or rather the increasing lack of it: they’re finding, in melting permafrost, ancient microbes which are still viable, and worry there may be some which could cause a devastating pandemic if they get released.
I’m not sure whether this final item in this section should be here or under history, but here goes … Archaeologists looking at ancient DNA have found the first known ancient case of Turner syndrome, a condition where the subject has just one X chromosome, rather than the normal two.
History, Archaeology, Anthropology
So let’s come on to history proper, and start with ten amazing finds from 2023.
Not included in the above is the 2000-year-old “celestial calendar” which has been found in an ancient Chinese tomb.
Also about 2000 years old is a knife engraved with what are thought to be the oldest known runes in Denmark.
Slightly more recently, the medievals seemed to have this thing about fighting snails – but historians can’t agree why.
Back with ancient artefacts, archaeologists in Switzerland have found an intact medieval gauntlet.
In Scotland, the oldest known tartan, uncovered in a peat bog, has been recreated.
Now we’re almost right up to date … the UK’s intelligence agency, GCHQ, have released previously classified images of the code-breaking compute COLOSSUS to mark its 80th anniversary.
London
Last month we mentioned the lovely Tudor map of London and the coloured version being created by Matt Brown … well here’s Part 2. [££££]
Lifestyle, Personal Development, Beliefs
So how, and why, is it that every coffee shop looks much the same right across the world? [LONG READ]
Shock, Horror, Humour, Wow!
And finally here’s a selection of trailblazing tattooed ladies from earlier times. [LONG READ]
