Author: Chris Higgins

What’s in nail polish? And can you make it in your kitchen? Chemist George Zaidan answers both questions in this delightful Ingredients video posted by National Geographic.

Nail polish is an inherently complex substance, full of contradictions. The liquid has to be thin enough to make an even coat, but it can’t be drippy (or it’ll fall off the applicator brush). It needs to be resistant to washing off…but also easily removable with nail polish remover. Oh, and it (usually) needs to be colorful—uniformly, earnestly, brilliantly colorful. So how do chemists make nail polish meet all these requirements? Zaidan digs in, and even tries making it from scratch. Enjoy:

If you’re curious about the citations, check the YouTube description for more.

Blue Man Group is one of those rare acts that lives up to the hype. The first time I saw them in Las Vegas, I was surprised that the act included plenty of humor, impressive messiness, feats of dexterity, and actually good music. That last one was the biggest news for me, since I had never actually thought of Blue Man Group as a band…but of course they are. They’ve released a bunch of albums. They also happen to be into performance art.

Blue Man Group dropped by NPR recently for a Tiny Desk Concert. Using a variety of instruments, both custom-made and off-the-shelf, the concert is a delight. NPR’s Bob Boilen writes:

Every band that plays the Tiny Desk must work within the restrictions of the space. So instead of installing their entire signature PVC instrument, what ended up behind the desk was about a third of it. On the right side of the desk, their Shred Mill makes its internet debut: It’s a drum machine triggered by magnets that changes rhythm depending where they are placed on the home-made variable-speed conveyor belt. They also invented something called a Spinulum, whose rhythmic tempo is controlled by rotating a wheel that plucks steel guitar strings. …

Read the rest for more details on the instruments involved, including a nice writeup of the Chapman Stick. The Stick is usually the weirdest instrument onstage when it appears, but for Blue Man Group it’s probably the most conventional. Enjoy:

In the Mojave Desert you’ll find California City, a city famous for dreaming big. A huge chunk of it is gridded roads—complete with names, speed limits, and GPS driving directions—with nothing built on the vast majority of those plots.

Incorporated in 1965, California City is a living contradiction. Today it’s a working community with roughly 15,000 residents. But it’s simultaneously enormous, having been planned at a scale to rival Los Angeles. The city has over 200 square miles of land, planned by Nat Mendelsohn as a model city.

In this mini-documentary, Tom Scott visits California City and interviews various city officials. He digs into the city’s storied past, and shows us both what is there and what is not. The city is physically enormous, so it’s certainly possible that one day it will grow to meet its original plan. It might just take a few centuries.

Have a look at the third-largest city in California (by land area, anyway):

Related is this behind-the-scenes video in which Scott explains why he’s interested in California City:

Here’s a riddle. Ten band members have had their musical instruments placed randomly in boxes. Each band member gets five shots at opening boxes, trying to find their own instrument. (Thus, a 50% chance of each individual finding the desired instrument.) They’re not allowed to communicate about what they find. If the entire band fails to find their instruments, they’re all fired…and the odds of them all finding their instruments via random guessing is 1 in 1,024. But the drummer has an idea that will radically increase their odds of success. What’s the big idea?

This puzzle is based on the 100 Prisoners Problem, though it has been simplified just a bit, and lightened up to be about a band (in the original 100 Prisoners Problem scenario, the punishment is death rather than loss of a job). Here’s what the TED-Ed video gives us as the rules:

1. Instruments have been randomly placed in 10 boxes.

2. The pictures on the boxes don’t necessarily correspond to the instruments inside.

3. Each musician can open up to 5 boxes. They have to close all of the boxes they open.

4. All 10 musicians must find their own instruments.

5. The musicians can’t in any way communicate to each other what they find.

Given all this, it seems rather hopeless. But think on it. What could you do if you talked it through beforehand, as this puzzle allows? Watch this video for the setup, and then pause it when it tells you to, in order to have a good long think. I’d like to think I could come up with a solution like this, were my band (or band of prisoners) in a similar situation. Enjoy:

For more on the original 100 Prisoners Problem, check out this nice writeup. There’s also more info from TED-Ed (check the “Dig Deeper” bit for useful links).

It’s not often that I’d describe a spider as “cute,” but this male jumping spider is an adorable little arachnid. He doesn’t spin webs, but he does spin on the dance floor. He even makes a form of music, audible only to spiders, to augment his dance. Deep Look writes (emphasis added):

… If she likes what she sees, the female may allow him to mate. But things can also go terribly wrong for these eight-legged suitors. She might decide to attack him, or even eat him for lunch. Cannibalism is the result about seven percent of the time. …

In this 4K Ultra-HD video, we get to look at jumping spiders getting into the groove. Enjoy:

For more on these spiders (and the studies that inspired this video), check out KQED Science’s blog post on the topic.

How would you like a live HD view of drifting jellyfish? Thanks to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, you’re in luck.

Tuning into the “Jelly Cam” lets you watch Chrysaora fuscescens, the stinging sea nettle, drifting against a beautiful blue background. It’s part of the Open Sea exhibit, and it’s stunning.

The aquarium explains:

Get an up-close look at the delicate sea nettles in our Open Sea exhibit.

Watch as their long tentacles and lacey mouth-arms move smoothly through the water. But don’t let these unassuming invertebrates fool you—their graceful trailing parts are covered in stinging cells used for hunting. When their tentacles touch tiny drifting prey, the stinging cells paralyze it and stick tight. The prey is moved to the mouth-arms and then to the mouth, where it’s digested.

This camera is live from 7 a.m. – 6 p.m. Pacific Time. Tune in and chill out:

For more on the animals you’re seeing, read this page.

Just watch this video first, then read the words. Seriously. Follow the instructions and count how many times a player wearing white passes the ball:

Daniel Simons and Christopher Chabris study how the human mind works. In a series of test videos, they ask participants to perform a task, then at the end you’ll learn how you stacked up.

First is their most famous video, involving basketball passing. As the video explains, you’ll need to watch the players wearing white and count how many times they pass the ball (and note that there are two balls in play!). It takes a surprising amount of concentration. Concentrate and count. It only takes a minute:

How did you do?

Perhaps more importantly, would you like to try out more videos like this? Good, because Simons and Chabris have tons of them. One of my favorites is the movie perception test. Give it a shot:

If you’re into this stuff, check out the authors’ website, and their book about what these tests reveal.

We’ve all seen photos of astronauts wearing those big bulky white space suits on spacewalks. Technically they’re called Extravehicular Mobility Units. What we don’t often see is how astronauts put those things on.

The process involves a lot of layers. You start with a diaper (yes, really), then cotton long-johns, then a liquid cooling suit, then the “Snoopy Cap” with dual microphones, then cotton gloves, onward to miscellaneous pads (including shoulder pads), then finally the actual big white suit (which goes on legs first, then the top part, then the helmet, then the gloves).

It’s a heck of a lot of work.

In this video, Norm from Tested visits NASA’s Neutral Buoyancy Lab to check out the whole process. For bonus points, he checks out a bunch of space tools used to work in zero-G—safely tethered to the astronaut, of course. This is dozens of small steps for men. And women. Behold:

Further viewing: the Tested image gallery featuring NASA’s EMU.

Penn & Teller have plenty of famous illusions, but one of the scariest is their Magic Bullet. In it, they “catch” bullets in their teeth, apparently by shooting them at each other using .357 Magnums.

Now, we all know that this can’t really be happening. What’s fun about the illusion is trying to sort out what might be happening. There are so many layers to this act, so many moments when misdirection could be happening, that it seems to overwhelm the viewer. How does it work? Only Penn & Teller can say for sure.

Behold:

What really gets me is the rifling on the bullets. It sure does seem like they’ve been fired…but how were they retrieved and put in each others’ mouths?

In 1996, Ricky Jay released the TV special that cemented his reputation as a master of card artistry. Ricky Jay & His 52 Assistants was directed by David Mamet (!) and won a pile of awards, including the Lucille Lortel and Obie Awards for Outstanding Achievement.

After the special, Jay took the show on the road:

Subsequent productions were staged at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theater, the Melbourne International Arts Festival, the Tiffany Theater in Los Angeles, The Spoletto Festival in Charleston and the Old Vic in London.

Thanks to the magic of YouTube, the special is online in its entirety. It’s one part history lesson, one part illusion, and fifty parts showmanship. It’s an educational and entertaining way to spend your lunch hour.