Why Do Addresses Skip Numbers?

For example. You don't see houses numbered 12345, 12346, 12347, 12348... Why?

Well first off, the odd numbers and even numbers are on alternate sides of the street. Just in case you weren't aware. That should help you find houses if you have no clue where you are going. But then why not go from 12345 to 12347 to 12349?

Well, not that construction... people are constantly trying to squeeze a house in between two others, but if an issue ever arises where a house needs to get knocked down and rebuilt, or a cul-de-sac gets added, or anything along those lines, then that's why there is a sort of cushion in address numbers. Instead of going up by two every house (odd and even on different sides), whoever is in charge of giving a house its address doesn't have to redo the entire block, they can just use one of the skipped numbers.

JT Surge

Bibliography (Don't judge my sources):
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090921143621AAqp2Av

Why Is Smell The Sense Most Strongly Connected To Memory?

The olfactory bulb, or the part of the brain that receives and interprets scents and odors, is part of the brain's limbic system. The limbic system is closely associated with memory. The olfactory bulb also deals a lot with the amygdala, the part of the brain that processes many types of emotions, along with the hippocampus, which is responsible for associative learning.

When you first smell something, you link it to something almost instantaneously, whether it be a person, place, event, etc. This link is forged between the smell you encounter, along with a memory. Many people associate chlorine with summers at the pool, or the smell of lilies with a funeral. This is why smelling chlorine in the winter can instantly remind you of a pool, or being near lilies can upset a person for seemingly no reason.

JT Surge

Bibliography:
http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/human-biology/smell3.htm

How Does Caffeine Work?

Caffeine is classified as a stimulant because it stimulates the central nervous system. "The stimulated nerve cells release the hormone epinephrine, a.k.a. adrenaline, which increases heart rate, blood pressure, and blood flow to muscles. It also decreases blood flow to the skin and organs, and it causes the liver to release glucose." It can also increase dopamine levels in the brain, which is how your body experiences pleasure (the release of dopamine in the brain, as well as serotonin.)

Caffeine is also produced naturally in plants, included coffee beans and tea. It is intended as a natural pesticide to paralyze or kill insects trying to feed on the plants.

A normal dose for humans is about 100mg, people typically consume 300mg daily, and a lethal dose could be as high as 19 grams. So, while you can die from drinking coffee, you would have to drink A LOT of coffee.

JT Surge

Bibliography:
http://chemistry.about.com/od/moleculescompounds/a/caffeine.htm

Why Do People Have Moles?

Many people can tell you that moles are typically associated with cancer, especially if you're older and it's growing, looks abnormal, etc. But some people are born with them, or they just kind of have them. Well what are they? Do they serve a purpose? Or are they just a batch of unusual skin cells? Like who are they? Where do they get off?

Moles are simply a cluster of skin cells that didn't spread themselves out as well as they should have. They darken in the sunlight and it is common to get a dozen or two (by themselves or in groups). You shouldn't worry about moles being cancerous unless they begin to change color and shape, and even that doesn't typically happen until after you turn 30(ish).

So to sum up, they're just there. They don't do anything. They aren't harmful or beneficial, they just chill and look awkward.

JT Surge

Bibliography:
http://www.webmd.com/skin-problems-and-treatments/guide/moles-freckles-skin-tags (Gross pictures included)

Why Do So Many People Need Glasses?

It has become a rarity in our modern world, to find someone who doesn't need contacts or glasses. It blows my mind that it's almost assumed that everyone has a pair of one or the other. However, way back when, when early versions of homo sapiens wandered about, they didn't have access to corrective lenses. Did people in early civilizations just put up with terrible eye sight? Or did something happen over the course of our evolutionary history that led to a majority of the population needing contacts or glasses?

There are several theories as of to why this is the case, but the most common one is that people have always had some members of the population that had a hard time seeing. Before we had glasses, these people would die before being able to reproduce, and were selected against from an evolutionary stand point. So for a while, most people had decent eye sight. Eventually, however, this genetic "defect" was accommodated with corrective lenses, and people with poor eyesight were able to reproduce, pass their genes along, and now we have a bunch of people who can't see anything. And instead of dying, they make babies and pass their bad eyesight genes along.

JT Surge

Bibliography:

http://everything2.com/title/Why+do+so+many+people+wear+glasses%253F

Why Do People Have Accents?

Some people are very good at picking up on accents. When speaking to someone else in English, I can usually tell that they're from Australia, or Germany, or Ireland, or even places like Boston or the Southern US. But why am I able to tell where a person is from just by hearing the way they speak in my language?

I'm going to use America and England as an example. Back in 1776, the British and American accents were nearly indistinguishable. However, back in England, the wealthy social classes developed what is called non-rhotic speaking in an attempt to be different and thus, "better" than lower classes. Non-rhotic speakers seem to ditch "R" sounds. Example: Rhotic speakers (such as Americans) would say "hard winter," while non-rhotic speakers (such as present day English) would say "hahd wintuh." This new way of speaking eventually spread and over the next 200+ years, led to what we now know as the English accent.

Different countries however, and even regions within a country can be influenced by different languages. For example, the southern US has parts of the French language along with the English language, while the northeast mainly has English influence. So after taking from one or more languages and developing over several hundred years, the result is an accent!

As of to why people can pick up on them and others can't, that will remain a mystery.... FOR NOW. (I haven't looked into it.)

JT Surge

Bibliography:

http://www.livescience.com/33652-americans-brits-accents.html
http://sciencefocus.com/qa/why-do-people-have-accents

How Do Bugs Stick To Seemingly Any Surface?

I work as a research assistant in an Entomology lab, and as I was doing whatever it is that I do, I picked up a lady beetle (it took forever to get used to not saying lady bug) on a toothpick. I watched it crawl 360 degrees around the toothpick, defying gravity. And I really wanted to know why they can do that. Is it just because they're light? Do they have some sticky things on their feet so they can crawl up or land on walls?

Apparently, there are three things that insects have that helps them stick to all types of surfaces:

1. To stick to really smooth surfaces, they use a mucous-y membrane that is like tiny little suction cups. To illustrate how bugs would do that, imagine slapping a wet piece of paper onto a wall or window.
2. They have what are essentially tiny claws that help them hang onto to rough surfaces.
3. Insects can also use tiny little hairs to stick to surfaces. The membranes, mentioned in "1." can get the sticky mucous on these little hairs, and with more parts of the legs coated in this sticky substance, the bug is more able to climb walls, or my toothpick.

So now you know how flies stick to walls or lady beetles (still weird) can cling to pieces of grass.

JT Surge

Bibliography:
http://www.ccmr.cornell.edu/education/ask/?quid=652

Why Do People Eat And Enjoy Spicy Food?

As it turns out, there are a lot of theories as of to why people in different cultures eat spicy food and enjoy it... Or don't. One theory is that the spiciness deters mammals from eating them, but encourages birds to eat these spicy foods, such as hot peppers. This is because birds are better at distributing seeds than mammals, so the plants evolved to appeal to birds. So, this explains why many people don't like spicy foods, because they aren't supposed to. But why do people go against this evolutionary result and eat them anyway?

It's usually people who live in cultures that have hotter climates that enjoy spicy foods. A theory that suggests why this is, is because it encourages sweating, which is what the body does in order to cool down. This is likely why cultures in hot climates enjoy foods that are as hot as the temperature.

But why do some people actually enjoy the taste of hot foods? Not looking at evolutionary purpose, or advantages, some people genuinely like spicy food, while others don't. The most probable theory is genetics. Some people are born as "super tasters," which simply means that they perceive tastes much stronger than others, and they're less likely to enjoy spicy food. There are other contributing factors, including cultural influence (people grow up eating it, and grow to enjoy it) and thrill-seeking personalities (they like the increased heart rate and the fight or flight response to hot foods). All of it influences a person's preference for spicy foods, or lack thereof.

All of that being said, I'm not a huge fan of spicy food. Sorry.

JT Surge

Bibliography:

http://www.mindthesciencegap.org/2013/03/20/some-like-it-hot-part-1-why-do-some-people-have-a-preference-for-spicy-foods/

http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/15sbtb/why_do_people_like_spicy_food/

Why Do Solar Systems Rotate On A Single Plane?

For a while, I wondered why pictures of galaxies in space formed rotating disks. Using the Milky Way as an example, we can see everything laid out on a flat, 2D surface, more or less. And for a long time, I wondered why this was the case. Why weren't different solar systems scattered around the galaxy in the shape of a sphere, for example? Well, as it turns out, the answer is simple.

Everything in space is spinning. REALLY fast. The Earth spins at about 1675 kilometers/hour. The Earth rotates around the sun at 30 kilometers/second. The Sun circles the center of the galaxy at 250 kilometers/second, and our galaxy is moving through the universe at about 600 kilometers/second. So, things are always spinning away from each other, but they're anchored by gravity in the middle.

But why does it form a 2D disk? Well, imagine you're holding two buckets of water, one in each arm. If you start spinning (in an open area, safety first!), your arms will raise themselves and start spinning in a circle, and as long as you continue to spin, the buckets will stay elevated, following the path of this flat circle. In this example, your body would be the Sun, the buckets of water would be planets, and your arms would be the gravity keeping them all together.

So, gravity holds everything together, but the spinning is pushing everything away from each other. The natural result, just as with spinning the buckets of water, is that disk shape as shown in the link to the Milky Way Galaxy earlier.

JT Surge

Bibliography:
http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/answers/971028e.html
http://www.universetoday.com/26623/how-fast-does-the-earth-rotate/

What I Wonder

Hello,

Every day, I have a ton of random thoughts, most of which are just curiosity. With this blog, I want to explore questions that I have while thinking every day, and share what I find, explaining it in the simplest terms.

Some of the questions I've wondered include:

1. Why are pictures of solar systems on a 2D plane instead of scattered around on a more 3D shape?
2. Cats have pupils that shift from slits to open circles, where as humans have pupils that simply shrink or expand. Do these serve the same purpose? Or does the slit have a different function for cats?

I'll explore these first, and I'll share answers to other questions I have as they arise throughout my day.

I realize this isn't the greatest intro, and I expect future posts to be more simple and what I wanted this blog to be for.

Thanks,

JT Surge