The Sciences

These are our favorite notes and links on the sciences.

“Difficulties exist to be surmounted.“ — Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Science Bloopers

The following are all quotes from 11 year olds' science exams:

Medicine

• "For a nosebleed: Put the nose much lower then the body until the heart stops."
• "For drowning: Climb on top of the person and move up and down to make artificial perspiration."
• "For asphyxiation: Apply artificial respiration until the patient is dead."
• "For fainting: Rub the person's chest or, if a lady, rub her arm above the hand instead. Or put the head between the knees of the nearest medical doctor."
• "For dog bite: put the dog away for several days. If he has not recovered, then kill it."
• "For head cold: use an agonizer to spray the nose until it drops in your throat."
• "Before giving a blood transfusion, find out if the blood is affirmative or negative."
• "To remove dust from the eye, pull the eye down over the nose."

  Biology

• "When you breath, you inspire. When you do not breath, you expire."
• "Three kinds of blood vessels are arteries, vanes and caterpillars."
• "Blood flows down one leg and up the other."
• “Artificial insemination is when the farmer does it to the cow instead of the bull.”
• "The body consists of three parts - the brainium, the borax and the abominable cavity. The brainium contains the brain, the borax contains the heart and lungs, and the abominable cavity contains the bowls, of which there are five -- a, e, i, o, and u."
• "The skeleton is what is left after the insides have been taken out and the outsides have been taken off. The purpose of the skeleton is something to hitch meat to."
• "A permanent set of teeth consists of eight canines, eight cuspids, two molars, and eight cuspidors."
• "Many women believe that an alcoholic binge will have no ill effects on the unborn fetus, but that is a large misconception."
• "A fossil is an extinct animal. The older it is, the more extinct it is."

• "The pistol of a flower is its only protection against insects."
• "Mushrooms always grow in damp places and so they look like umbrellas."
• "Germinate: To become a naturalized German."
• "Rhubarb: A kind of celery gone bloodshot."
• "To keep milk from turning sour: Keep it in the cow."

  Chemistry

• "H2O is hot water, and CO2 is cold water"
• "To collect fumes of sulphur, hold a deacon over a flame in a test tube"
• "When you smell an odorless gas, it is probably carbon monoxide"
• "Nitrogen is not found in Ireland because it is not found in a free state"
• "Water is composed of two gins, Oxygin and Hydrogin. Oxygin is pure gin. Hydrogin is gin and water."
• "Dew is formed on leaves when the sun shines down on them and makes them perspire."
• "A super-saturated solution is one that holds more than it can hold."

  Physics

• "Liter: A nest of young puppies."
• "Magnet: Something you find crawling all over a dead cat."
• "Momentum: What you give a person when they are going away."
• "Vacuum: A large, empty space where the pope lives."

  Geography

• "Planet: A body of Earth surrounded by sky."
• "Equator: A managerie lion running around the Earth through Africa."
• "The moon is a planet just like the earth, only it is even deader."
• "The tides are a fight between the Earth and moon. All water tends towards the moon, because there is no water in the moon, and nature abhors a vacuum. I forget where the sun joins in this fight."

Multi-Disciplinary Science Resources Invention camps for kids in grades 1-6 Intel Science Talent Search for high school seniors Davidson Fellows Award for kids who have completed a “significant piece of work” in science, technology, mathematics, or the humanities. DuPont Challenge Science Essay Awards for high schoolers writing about a scientific or technological development, event or theory that has captured your interest and attention. The Nobel Prize Christian KidsNet. The X-Files Maricopa has good links. So does Science Links. Science is Fun PBS Science. Scientific American Magazine. PBS Kratt's Creatures features brothers Martin and Chris Kratt tackling fascinating and funny "creaturnalities" of creatures in exotic lands using interactive games, activities, jokes, trivia and opportunities for children to create their own submissions. Did God create the universe? After all these years since the Scopes “monkey trial”, the debate continues. But new research points more and more toward the Theory of Creation

Biology Sound: Medical beep Sound: Burp Multilingual Glossary of Medical Terms in nine European Languages as commissioned by The European Commission DG III. Calculate your Life Expectancy based on your lifestyle. Legacy Interactive Software, home of the cool Emergency Room simulation CD. The Yuckiest Site in the Universe Kristin M. Baer's Physiology Site Carl Linnaeus's organization of plant species. Fishcam -- Netscape Programmer Lou Montulii's fish tank. Slices of the human body Science Why - The Body JFK Health World children's health education museum and learning center. Yellow stains in the underarm area of shirts is caused by a chemical reaction between the body and aluminum in deoderants and anti-perspirants. It doesn't happen to everyone. So basically, you need to look at the contents of deoderants and anti-perspirants--and avoid any with aluminum. Most pharmacies and health sections of stores carry "natural" sorts of deoderant/anti-perspirants. Those types usually do not have aluminum. — J. HEGLAND Search through the AMA database by name or speciality for doctors' location, medical school, year of graduation, residency, and board certification.

Chemistry The Table of Periodic Elements is presented by Mark Winter and as a point-and-click database and with spectral analysis. Order chemicals from Fisher Scientific. Chemicool Jokes: A neutron goes into a bar and asks the bartender, "How much for a beer?" The bartender replies, "For you, no charge." Two atoms are walking down the street and they run in to each other. One says to the other, "Are you all right?" "No, I lost an electron!" "Are you sure?" "Yeah, I'm positive!"

“God is subtle, but he is not malicious.” —Albert Einstein

Earth and Space Science The NASA/JPL/Caltech Solar System Simulator generates a color image of your favorite planet or satellite as seen from a location and time point of your choosing. The CG even includes orbit trace lines! Life imitates art: NASA's Payload and Orbiter Tour done in Star Trek motif. Top Space Science News Stories Spacecamp! and Astro Camp. The SPAACSE George R. Faenza $1000 Scholarship is for the graduating American high school senior who write an essays that best describes “Why the United States Needs a Space Program”. Earth's moon has a diameter of 2,160 miles, 27% of the Earth's 7,926.68 mile diameter. Its orbit is tilted 6 degrees from the plane of the earth's orbit around the Sun. Arctic terns migrate 22,400 miles (36,000 km) from the Arctic to the Antarc and back each year. The Earth moves through space at 66,641 miles per hour. The surface of the Sun is 7,840 degrees Fahrenheit. The atmospheric pressure at sea level is 14.7 pounds per square inch. Astronomers measure the apparent brightness of objects that appear in the sky using the Magnitude scale. The lower the number, the brighter the object. The faintest stars visible under dark skies are around +6. The most brilliant objects have negative magnitudes: The brightest star, Sirius in Canis Major, is -1.4. A full Moon is -12.7. the Sun is -26.7. Planets of the Solar System: Mercury Venus Earth Mars Jupiter Saturn Uranus Neptune Pluto Sedna ?

The Metric System

Now that the metric system is in wide use all over the world, we can see why American have not adopted it:
• Put your best .3 of a meter (foot) forward.
• Spare the 5.03 meters (rod) and spoil the child.
• Twenty-eight grams (an ounce) of prevention is worth 453 grams (a pound) of cure.
• Give a man 2.5 centimeters (an inch) and he'll take 1.6 kilometers (a yard).
• Peter Piper picked 8.8 liters (a peck) of pickled peppers.
• A miss is as good as 1.6 kilometers (mile).