Category: Science

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This Fluffy Galaxy Captured by the Hubble Telescope’s Camera Is Truly Amazing

Space is full of different shapes, sizes, and colors. There’s the vibrant blue of Earth’s oceans, the cheese-like exterior of the moon, the octopus-esque tentacles of galaxies — the list goes on and on.

Scientists also use the word “flocculent” to describe some galaxies, including one recently captured by the camera on the NASA?ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Translated into English, flocculent basically means fluffy.

Yes, that’s right, the world’s pre-eminent researchers and scientists just described a galaxy as fluffy! And just look at how adorable this fluffy little guy really is:

Photo Credit: ESA/Hubble & Nasa, J. Lee and the Phangs-Hst Team

This striking photograph shows a galaxy that goes by the name NGC 2275. It’s far, far away from us here on Earth, located 67 million light-years away. It’s situated within the Cancer constellation.

NASA noted its “delicate, feathery nature,” which you can see super clearly from this crisp image. Those spiral arms are made up of millions of young stars, contrasted with lanes of dark space dust. The stars are young and hot, which makes them appear blue.

According to NASA….

“Complexes of these hot, blue stars are thought to trigger star formation in nearby gas clouds.

The overall feather-like spiral patterns of the arms are then formed by shearing of the gas clouds as the galaxy rotates.”

The space agency says that the fluffiness also indicates relatively quiet star formation in the galaxy.

NASA says,

“There is virtually no star formation in the central part of the galaxy, which is dominated by an unusually large and relatively empty galactic bulge, where all the gas was converted into stars long ago.”

How cool is that? The Hubble telescope has really opened up our ability to analyze and understand space, including these interesting little details.

What’s your favorite element of space? Do you have a particular planet or feature that you’re particularly partial to for some reason?

We’d love to hear from you!

Let us know in the comments!

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People Who Claim to Be Adults but Know Nothing About Human Anatomy

It’s really surprising, some of the things people can make it all the way to adulthood without knowing. Sometimes it’s little stuff, and it sort of makes sense that you might not know, or like, maybe you just zoned out in high school history class (who didn’t?).

But when it comes to totally blanking on the human anatomy as an adult (sometimes with kids?) it can be stunning, and not in a good way.

These 15 people had some major fails in that area. Like, yikes.

15. The second one legit cracked me up. A pocket.

When I was 16 I had a guy friend put his hands on either side of my stomach and ask me if he squeezed hard enough would all of my period come out at once and be done with for the month.

The following year I was at the mall with a different guy friend and it happened to be the Victoria’s Secret Semi-Annual Sale where they put all the panties in big boxes separated by size and you kind of rifle through to find the style you like. We were both going through boxes and he held one up and goes, “This one has a pocket!” He was taking about the crotch lining.

14. This guy definitely doesn’t know how anything female works.

A guy in my year saw me buying stuff for my period when i was about 15 years old. He looked at me and muttered slut under his breath… unsure if he really understood what a period was???

13. I don’t know why this is supposed to be embarrassing?

Don’t know if this counts, but a couple friends and I were getting out of the pool, and of course it got cold, so my nips were noticeable, and a male friend commented on it like I could somehow change this fact as we were heading back to the room (from his perspective he didn’t want me to be embarrassed since we were still kind of in public, and he wasn’t sure if I had noticed my own body; of course it had the opposite effect, and of course I know they are noticeable). My other friend was like “dude, why point hers out when she didn’t say anything bout yours.”

12. That’s not how cancer (or cervixes) work.

Recently my aunt got cervical cancer. My uncle wasn’t feeling well and thought he may have gotten cervical cancer from her.

11. Um but yes I’ll go home early.

My boss offered to send me home early because he saw the tampon (fresh out of the box, still in wrapper) and got uncomfortable. Like, thanks and all but I live with this shit for a week every month, I’m all good.

10. It’s surprising how many people don’t know how many holes there are.

I was told once that women should “clean out their vagina before sex in case there’s pee in there still”, obviously thinking we pee from the same hole. And forgetting men DO pee from the same hole.

Should note that we all received decent sex Ed at the time but most of the lads sat at the back of the class giggling and making rude comments whenever female anatomy came up so they learned nothing.

9. Okay let’s all quit I’m game.

“Wearing bras gives you breast cancer.”

Yeah. Thanks dad. You could have just told me you didn’t want to take me bra shopping that day.

8. See also: can’t you just hold it in?

“just pee out all the blood and finish your period”

7. Ohhhhh this is sort of adorable but also wut.

Not a female and telling on myself here, but when my wife was pregnant with our first child, I stupidly asked how old he’d be before his eyes were going to open (due to the fact that I had only had dealings with puppies and kittens being born at that point in my life). That was 13 years ago and still gets brought up whenever I get too sure of myself on any unrelated subject matter.

6. This is a grown man who has procreated.

I was visiting my father when I got my period when I was around 13-14, it was the first time I had been staying at his place when it happened to I had nothing there and wasn’t prepared so I had to ask him to take me to the store. SO we go to the store down the aisle and he grabs a box of pads but I was use to using tampons, so I just said “no no dad i actually use these” and grabbed a box of tampons and up to the register we went. Then we get into the car and we sit, he doesn’t start it, just sits there, sighs, and then looks as me completely serious and goes “I thought you had to be a non-virgin to use tampons!?” hahaha No Dad, You don’t have to be a “non-vigrin” to use tampons, never let him live it down,

5. I hate all of this story except the last bit.

My ex asked me how I knew my period was over. He was 21 at the time. Now, that wouldn’t have even been that bad, but I started to explain how the flow gets lighter until it eventually stops and he cut me off. Said it was gross and he regretted asking.

He also thought any pubic hair on a woman was gross. I get wanting it tidy, but he thought all women should be shaved/waxed all the time. And no, his pubic area was never hair-free.

My only regret was not breaking up with him sooner.

4. Can HE control HIS headaches?

A friend told me that once she made a comment about having cramps and a headache to her boyfriend and he got all disgusted and said “Well can’t you control that? Like make it stop?”

Not the main reason she dumped him but I’m sure it didn’t help.

3. That’s definitely not how any of this works?

I know a man who assumed that smaller girls must have tiny vaginas & would break in half during sex with a large penis but big girls had huge vaginas and it would take a huge man to even please them. He was 28 years old…

2. Like he thought she’d never used them before then?

My ex commented that my tampons were “huge”….Because he had no idea that there is an applicator involved..

To be fair, it was very endearing on a different occasion, when I came home after asking him to pick up a box of tampons for me and he had the little instruction pamphlet spread out on the kitchen table like a road map and greeted me with a dead serious “ok, so here’s what we have to do!”

1. Bless his little pea pickin’ heart.

I’ve known more than one man who believed that women need to pee after sex to push the cum out in order to reduce chances of pregnancy – and would get suspicious of me if I didn’t immediately go pee.. like I was intentionally trying to get pregnant despite having been on birth control at the time.

Just HOW, you guys? I really need to know!

Have you ever encountered a moment like this? We want to hear about it in the comments!

The post People Who Claim to Be Adults but Know Nothing About Human Anatomy appeared first on UberFacts.

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Enjoy These Quality Facts That May Teach You Something

Surprises are great!

And our amazing fact sets are always full of them, so be sure to read through a bunch of other ones that we have on our site.

Are you ready to learn some new facts that we’re pretty sure you didn’t know before?

Let’s take a look!

1. They will really wear you down.

Lay off of those things!

Photo Credit: did you know?

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2. Makes sense to me!

To heck with the cold weather.

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3. Get it on!

And make it good! It’ll be beneficial for everyone involved!

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4. Does this sound familiar?

I feel like I’m here this a lot lately…

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5. No proof…yet…

But maybe someday…

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6. That’s pretty crazy.

Here’s to new discoveries!

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7. At greater risk.

They go hand in hand.

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8. Casualties of war.

Sounds like a terrible way to die.

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9. This is awesome!

These folks were real badasses.

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10. Suffering from OCD.

What a strange life he had.

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Some great facts in there, no doubt about it!

Now we want to hear from you.

In the comments, please share something interesting that has surprised you lately.

We can’t wait to hear from you!

The post Enjoy These Quality Facts That May Teach You Something appeared first on UberFacts.

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These People Can Make “Leather” Out of Cactus Leaves to Help Save the Environment

If scientists all over the world are to be believed, the environment is tanking in a hurry. The bad news is that the majority of international leadership doesn’t seem to be able to hear the alarm bells, but the good news is there are citizens everywhere are stepping up in myriad ways to solve different sets of problems.

One of many issues that’s leading to trouble with our planet is the stress that so many herd cattle put on our resources, and the amounts of methane their poop releases into the atmosphere. Those are just two of the reasons vegans prefer not to eat beef or buy things – like leather – that are also by-products of raising cattle for slaughter.

Two entrepreneurs from Mexico, Adrián López Velarde and his friend, Marte Cázarez, came together from separate industries to solve the problem of leather production…with cacti.

The friends left their jobs in fashion and furniture automotive to dedicate a few years to come up with the idea and the process for transforming cacti into usable vegan leather. It took two whole years before they came out with something they felt was marketable in 2019.

Cacti are a good choice because they don’t put much strain on the environment – they don’t require much water to grow and can thrive in a wide range of temperatures. They’re also very prevalent in Mexico, where the two live.

They call their vegan leather “Desserto,” and it’s the first environmentally friendly organic material made from the Nopal cactus. It’s highly sustainable and doesn’t contain any toxic chemicals, comes in a wide variety of colors, thicknesses, textures, and honestly looks and feels like the real thing.

The cactus “leather” is made by cutting mature leaves from the plants before cleaning, mashing, and drying them under the sun for three days. Then the material is processed into their patented (and secret!) formula.

Anything that’s normally made from cow leather can be made from Desserto. It’s elastic, breathable, highly customizable, and honestly, I don’t see one single reason this can’t take the place of cow’s leather completely in the future.

If you’ve got an idea on how to help save the environment, one issue at a time, follow in Adrián and Marte’s footsteps, will you?

Because it’s looking more and more like the citizens of the world are going to have to save the planet ourselves.

The post These People Can Make “Leather” Out of Cactus Leaves to Help Save the Environment appeared first on UberFacts.

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Great Facts That Will Arouse Your Curiosity

It’s important to be curious about our planet and to always want to learn more about this special place that we inhabit.

That’s why I like to call myself a “lifelong learner.”

And I think it’s something that we should all strive for! Don’t you?

Let’s keep the train a-rollin’ with another great set of facts that will make you think and will definitely arouse your curiosity.

Enjoy!

1. Let’s bring it over here!

I love a good nap!

Photo Credit: did you know?

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2. A sign of wealth.

We need to make this happen again.

Photo Credit: did you know?

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3. Does this describe you?

Let’s be friends, okay?

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4. They don’t work.

And they never will.

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5. Can’t do both.

She was a wild child.

Photo Credit: did you know?

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6. Public Enemy Number One.

He was a true gangster.

Photo Credit: did you know?

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7. Across the universe.

That’s pretty wild.

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8. This is amazing.

“The ones who help humans.”

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9. I sure hope so…

This is good news!

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10. That makes me sad.

I hope they don’t have too many problems…

Photo Credit: did you know?

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Those facts are great, don’t you think?

Now we’d like to hear from you.

In the comments, please share an interesting fact or a fascinating article or story that you’ve seen lately.

Thanks in advance!

The post Great Facts That Will Arouse Your Curiosity appeared first on UberFacts.

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Great Facts That We Think Will Impress You

It takes a lot to impress people with all the information we’re bombarded with on a daily basis.

But our fact sets have gained a reputation as solid, interesting, and dependable because we do our best to cultivate the most interesting things out there.

We love to give you the good stuff!

And here’s another set of facts that we’re confident will impress you mightily.

Enjoy these 10 facts and feel free to share them with your family and friends!

1. That’s why they’re called that?

Did you know that?

Photo Credit: did you know?

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2. Join the club, Mr. Jefferson.

So many people have this fear.

Photo Credit: did you know?

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3. Meteor town.

This is really cool.

Photo Credit: did you know?

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4. Never been one case.

Light it up and puff, puff, pass!

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5. This makes sense.

Does this fact describe YOU?

Photo Credit: did you know?

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6. Flatter than a pancake.

It’s true! Here’s the proof!

Photo Credit: did you know?

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7. A total accident.

Thankful for this mistake.

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8. They were this close.

Imagine what the world would be like.

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9. Ancient warnings.

Going back centuries.

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10. Another reason to like them!

They really are great dogs!

Photo Credit: did you know?

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Color me impressed!

Okay, now we want to hear from all the readers out there.

In the comments, please share something that you’ve seen or learned lately that has impressed you.

It could be a fact, an article, a story, etc.

Thanks in advance!

The post Great Facts That We Think Will Impress You appeared first on UberFacts.

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This Woman’s Bra Cup Design Turned into the Popular N95 Mask

Sometimes, the best innovations come out of nowhere. In the case of the N95 mask, that’s exactly what happened.

This particle-filtering mask has become even more popular due to the coronavirus pandemic. Due to its ability to block out 95 percent of airborne particles, it’s a staple in surgeries and other medical areas.

However, did you know the inspiration for the N95 mask came from a woman who originally designed a bra cup?

Meet Sarah Little Turnbull.

Turnbull worked for the 3M company back in the late 1950s. During that time, she worked with Shapeen, which is a non-woven material made of polymers typically used for decorative ribbons. She utilized this material to create the first-ever pre-made bows used for wrapping gifts during the holidays.

A true innovator, Turnbull came up with a ridiculous number of ideas. She presented 3M executives with a lengthy overview of her lineup. They liked her work enough to get Turnbull started on designing a molded bra cup.

However, with three sick family members, Turnbull spent a ton of time in medical environments. She realized that medical workers needed a better solution than the thin masks they often worked with.

So, she came up with a solution.

Mental Floss explains more:

By 1961, they introduced a non-woven lightweight medical mask based on her concept, with elastic bands instead of strings, an aluminum nose clip, and a form-fitting “bubble” shape. (The bra patent was approved in 1962.)

Though innovative, the mask couldn’t block pathogens for medical use and was marketed for dust filtration instead. An improved respirator hit the market in 1972 that was suitable for other industrial purposes. As the mask’s filtration evolved, so did its usefulness.

In 1995, the N95 respirator was introduced in the health care field, fulfilling Turnbull’s original ambition.

Sara Little Turnbull passed away in 2015. But during her lifetime, she proved to be a creative thinker who inspired a key piece of protective gear utilized more than ever today.

If you could create a new design to help fix a problem, what would it be? Tell us about your creative ideas in the comments below!

The post This Woman’s Bra Cup Design Turned into the Popular N95 Mask appeared first on UberFacts.

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People Share What Happens When You Hallucinate Because You’re So Sleep-Deprived

I used to work a job with a crazy schedule. Once, we worked five days a week from noon until 6 a.m. for FIVE WEEKS. That’s 18 hours a day for those of you keeping track…

As you can imagine, it was totally exhausting and sometimes by the time I was heading home when the sun was coming up, I feel like I started seeing things and my reaction time was slowed WAY down.

I can’t really say I was hallucinating, but it was probably the closest I’ve ever come to it.

In this AskReddit article, people talk about what happened when they were so sleep-deprived that they hallucinated.

Buckle up!

1. Time to make the donuts.

“In college, I tried to hold down a donut delivery job while taking a full credit load.

I got up at 4:30 AM to deliver, and often was up until midnight or even later. After a particularly busy week with almost no sleep, I hallucinated a man crossing the street right in front of me while delivering and I slammed on my brakes to avoid hitting him.

When I realized that there was no one in the crosswalk — and no one anywhere in sight — I finished my deliveries and immediately quit my job.”

2. Don’t do meth.

“I had a meth problem several years ago. I think my longest stretch was 4 days.

Past a certain point you just don’t know which way is up. Sure meth can make you weird, but in my experience I think the sleep deprivation is actually what makes you lose your marbles after long enough. When I made sure I slept and ate regularly, it was almost like an energy drink. But when I binged and had my junkie weeks, oof.

Once I thought I was hearing music playing loudly somewhere outside. I was convinced it was a soundtrack to a big music festival I had attended a few weeks before that someone had also attended, and was now playing loudly in the middle of the night. (The whole musics festival? Multiple bands had a soundtrack? Bruh.) I couldn’t hear it when I listened for it, but while distracted I could plainly hear it. Dead of the night and no music was playing.

Another time I was sketching in my room at like 3am. I had a friend over who was just chilling with me, asking questions every so often that would lead to discussions. Slowly they responded less and less until I looked at them and they were just looking at me. Asked what was wrong, looked down, looked up waiting for the answer, and they were gone. Never there. They hadn’t talked to me in months after they found out I was using.

So many shadow people. And those took a long time to go away after sobering up.

Whispers, hearing someone talking to me, my name being called, hearing someone talking about me. Even though I was by myself lol.

Sometimes I’d be driving and cars would suddenly be coming straight at me, lights blinding and everything, only to sort of “come to” and realize I’m driving on a back road and I’m the only car for miles.

By no means am I saying any weird mental shit had nothing to do with the meth. But in my experience not sleeping for days had a much more horrifying effect.”

3. Pills are bad, too.

“One time I stayed up for 2 days straight off some pills that mixed with meth. By the second night I wanted to go to sleep so I took unisoms to see if it would help. I started hallucinating an hour after taking it and was seeing people and things with my eyes that weren’t there in reality.

It was a strangest feeling in the world knowing what I was seeing wasn’t real but not being able unsee. For example, I was looking out my window at my car. I visually saw three men next to my car.

I would turn my head away, say it wasn’t real and look back only to see the men differently positioned. I visualized them popping my hood, removing my headlamps, and opening my doors. But none of it was real.

Trippy.”

4. In the desert.

“Very calm as far as hallucinations go.

I had driven for 20+ hours and was in the Arizona/California desert. It was the middle of the night, it had been dark for hours and only other car lights and stars where visible. Started seeing things out of the corner of my eyes, just kind of objects off a distance on the side of the road. Then it was things in the road ahead. T

hat got my attention. After a bit I started seeing fantastic meteor/light showers in the sky. Wasn’t scary or anything, didn’t stop driving.

To be young, dumb, and invincible again.”

5. Tunnel vision.

“I drove across country from NY to California when I was 18. I was on a 2 lane highway in Kansas and got bad tunnel vision. But the thing about tunnel vision is you don’t know it’s happening when it’s happening. The road was straight, flat, and there were no cars going by me, in front of me, or behind me.

I ended up getting pulled over. When I saw the flashing lights behind me I pulled over immediately but wasn’t sure how fast I was going or even if I was being pulled over for speeding. The first thing the officer asked me was why it took me so long to pull over.

This was confusing since I pulled over right away. He told me he had been following me for almost 5 minutes with his lights and sirens on and that I had been going well over 100 mph.

He checked out my info, didn’t give me a ticket. Told me to stay more alert, take frequent breaks, and to slow down.”

6. Is this real?

“While deployed overseas with lack of sleep for like 70+ hours, I would black out and re-experience/dream completely different scenarios that happened days prior. It was crazy. Like Deja Vu, but for like an hour.

I’d snap out of it and be completely confused for like 30 seconds, wondering which experience was real.”

7. No sleep at all.

“When I was in university, immediately after my father died (OD’d on Christmas Eve after I threw him out), I pretty much quit sleeping. Maybe 3-4 hours a night. Went through lots of counselling, lots of medication (7 different sedatives and SSRI’s) but basically just couldn’t sleep.

We had a home birth for my niece so even when the grief wasn’t overwhelming, the newborn baby kept me up.

Anyways, I knew it got bad when I started microsleeping. I’d be in class listening to a lecture, blink and police officers would be standing beside me explaining what had transpired, then blink and I’d be back listening to class. Maybe mentally be out of it for 5-10 seconds but felt entirely lucid other than time dilation.

The psychiatrist at the time said I was dropping into REM because I was so sleep deprived. Happens with new moms when babies are cluster feeding. I wasn’t driving or anything so not dangerous that way but honestly lived in a fog for years.

Just like snap of the finger – perfectly lucid horrible moment of my life – snap of the finger back.

During this period I had a thing where I quit talking to people at school to see how long they would go without chatting to me. Literally had week stretches where not a word was said. Then came finals, started vomitting with anxiety when I tried to enter the exam rooms which was an autofail for my classes.

So academic probation, the opportunity to protest if I would speak in front of the university Senate, which I clearly couldn’t do, and eventual complete failure. There were times where I was hitting the student food bank after hours because I literally couldn’t walk into a grocery store because my anxiety was so severe.

So definitely can happen but for me was pretty extreme situation.”

8. Back to reality.

“It was the weirdest thing.

I was taking notes on an extremely boring video in theology but then words started appearing on their own without me writing anything. They were dancing around for a bit and I found it completely normal for a bit but then I realized that words aren’t suppose to dance.

Then I snapped back to reality with nothing on my paper.”

9. Sounds rough.

“For context, this happened during some military training. Laying down in the woods desperately trying to stay awake, usually the plants turn into people. Like you’ll see a figure walking around out in front of you, and then “come to” and realize it was just a sapling or a bush or something.

Happened surprisingly more during the day than the night.”

10. Is that a vending machine?

“Favorite Ranger School story: two dudes pulling security in a patrol base. B

een going for days on end with no more than two hours of sleep a night. One of them stands up out of nowhere, starts walking into the woods. The one still on the ground asks the dude walking off where he’s going. The guy points out into the woods and says, “Vending machine. Gonna get some Doritos.”

His buddy on the ground thinks for a minute and replies, “Get me a Snickers, man, I’ll cover you!”

Both of them were so loopy that the one guy was seeing a vending machine out in the middle of the woods, and the other guy didn’t even question the logic of the scenario, he immediately jumped to what he wanted out of the vending machine.”

11. Overworked.

“Used to overwork myself to the point of hallucinations fairly regularly.

Most were auditory; I’d hear someone talking nearby (usually saying my name or just a couple of muffled syllables), bits of songs; like having an ear worm except louder, lol. A distant ringing telephone was also common. Less commonly I’d hear something loudly falling somewhere.

Visually, I’d mostly see flashes of color or blackness in the periphery of my vision. Like when someone walks by and you just barely see them out of the corner of your eye. Tall figures in the room (such as a coat on a rack) would also briefly appear to be a person standing there.

Those were probably the most startling to me.”

12. My bad…

“When I had a new baby, I was in target with the baby and got a call from an officer.

Turns out I had left every single door of my car open. He thought it was a break in.

It was not… just me sleep deprived!!”

13. Scary stuff.

“It’s honestly scary, like one time I was on the verge of falling asleep and I thought I felt somebody run their finger across my cheek.

When i snapped upright into a sitting position, nobody was there. I live alone btw. I’m sure I hallucinated it but that shit is scary regardless.”

14. Didn’t really happen…

“I used to have episodes of insomnia as a teenager. Once, while walking home from school, I saw a car driving in my direction. It suddenly veered onto the sidewalk, continued toward me, and swerved back onto the road moments before hitting me.

I thought it was real, but I was so out of it from exhaustion that I didn’t even flinch. I realized a few days later that the curb of the sidewalk was too high for a car to have possibly driven over.”

15. Hearing things…

“They were auditory, but I heard sirens in the distance and just kind of weird sounds, not really voices or anything distinguishable.”

Ugh…for me personally, being extremely overtired makes me the most miserable person on the planet.

How about you?

Have you ever been so tired that you actually hallucinated?

If so, tell us about it in the comments!

The post People Share What Happens When You Hallucinate Because You’re So Sleep-Deprived appeared first on UberFacts.

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Scientists Believe Human Eggs Attract the Sperm They Want to Make a Baby With

This seems like common sense to me – if you buy into the idea of evolution and selecting offspring based on what traits best help them survive to procreate themselves, then of course the eggs of biological females have the ability to choose “better” sperm, right?

Well, now there’s a study and evidence and stuff to back up what seems like the obvious.

New research out of Stockholm University found that eggs emit different chemical signals that attract the sort of sperm they want to partner with to create a human.

Image Credit: Pixabay

Said John Fitzpatrick, one of the professors involved in the study…

“Human eggs release chemicals called chemoattractants that attract sperm to unfertilized eggs.

We wanted to know if eggs use these chemical signals to pick which sperm they attract.”

Non-human animals have been observed picking up on an array of visual, acoustic, and chemical signals that help them choose the best mate, but this is the first study that’s really shown that our bodies can continue to accept or reject those advances after sex is over.

Scientists haven’t yet learned how the process actually works, only that it does.

The researchers examined how sperm responds to follicular fluid, which surrounds eggs and contains chemoattractants for sperm. The samples were obtained from couples undergoing IVF, and sperm was tested against follicular fluid from both partners and non-partners to see how it would respond.

Image Credit: Pixabay

Said Fitzpatrick,

“Follicular fluid from one female was better at attracting sperm from one male, while follicular fluid from another female was better at attracting sperm from a different male.

This shows that interactions between human eggs and sperm depend on the specific identity of the women and men involved.”

Basically, eggs from a female do not always attract their partner’s sperm, and it has little or nothing to do with the sperm being capable of fertilizing an egg.

“Research on the way eggs and sperm interact will advance fertility treatments and may eventually help us understand some of the currently ‘unexplained’ causes of infertility in couples,” said Professor Daniel Brison, the scientific director of the Department of Reproductive Medicine at Saint Marys’ Hospital.

Image Credit: Pixabay

This is all brand new information, so expect more research to come. If it holds up, this could change the way doctors approach infertility in couples, and hopefully lead to more people getting those babies they’re dying to hold.

As a woman, it is kind of cool to realize that perhaps our eggs have had some say in it all along – and those babies that came so easily are just really happy genetic matches, maybe.

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Years of Negative Thoughts Could Increase Your Odds for Contracting Alzheimer’s Disease

Alzheimer’s Disease is one of the most awful illnesses that families go through – you’re often forced to mourn the loss of your loved one while they’re still alive, and to steel yourself to go into a room with a parent, aunt, grandparent, who no longer knows you from Adam or Eve.

The good news is that the disease has a decent amount of funding and research, and this most recent study things they may have a lead on what makes people more susceptible.

The research concludes that persistent worrying about the future, or an inability to let go of past regrets, can have a detrimental effect on cognition of all types later in life – including an increased risk for dementia and/or Alzheimer’s disease.

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Scientists largely accept the idea that our thoughts can and do influence our physical health, even though there’s little understanding as to how and why. Still, the Cognitive Debt hypothesis, which states that certain negative thoughts and mental states somehow contribute to the risk of cognitive decline and dementia, exists for a reason.

Researchers conducting this most recent study spent two years analyzing the mental states of 360 people over the age of 55, mostly following their tendency to fall into repetitive negative thinking (RNT). They were also screened for depression and anxiety.

High levels of RNT were strongly associated with cognitive decline in a wide range of areas, including episodic memory and global cognition, which are two big predictors of a person’s likelihood to develop Alzheimer’s.

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In the patients who consented to brain scans, a harmful buildup of protein plaques in the brain was also associated with high levels of RNT – more specifically, a protein called tau was increasing in the entorhinal cortex, which also is an early indicator of dementia.

Another protein, amyloid-beta, was found to present in higher amounts in the brains of people who tended to have negative thought patterns; it’s strongly associated with Alzheimer’s disease, especially.

Author Natalie Marchant clarified their findings in a statement.

“Chronic negative thinking patterns over a long period of time could increase the risk of dementia.

We do not think the evidence suggests that short-term setbacks would increase one’s risk of dementia.”

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There’s no concrete evidence as to how repetitive negative thought patterns can damage cognition so thoroughly, though they posit that high stress levels could be to blame. High blood pressure and the repetitive release of hormones like cortisol have been shown previously to stimulate creation of the harmful proteins.

Basically, maybe your hippie yoga friends are really onto something – some meditation and yoga might be just what the doctor ordered.

Therapy is also awesome, I’ve heard, or just a stiff drink now and then.

Pick your poison, as they say. But it looks like it’s in your best interest to choose one that helps you chill the eff out.

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