Caterpillar, a big company that manufactures big construction machines (and lots of other stuff), released this intentionally peculiar safety video in 1980:
Tag: danger
Is Facial Hair Biologically-Hazardous When a Pandemic Looms?
As a newly discovered corona virus spreads through an increasingly anxious world, advice is being offered—and sometimes mocked—about the mundane-seeming question of facial hair. The basic safety question was investigated more than fifty years ago—and that investigation was honored ten years ago with an Ig Nobel Prize. Also: Today the Trump administration took a new […]
Brief versus Thong Hygiene in Obstetrics and Gynecology
Does thong underwear present heal hazards? A new study addresses certain aspects of that general question. The study is “Brief versus Thong Hygiene in Obstetrics and Gynecology (B-THONG): A survey study,” Alyssa A. Hamlin, Jeanelle Sheeder, and Tyler M. Muffly, Obstestrics and Gynecology Research, vol., 131, May 2018, 108S ff. (Thanks to Gwinyai Masukume for […]
Selfies and sharks, and statistical dangers
Comparisons of selfies and sharks, and of pretty much any pair of things, come out differently depending on how careful you are in making — or judging — the comparison. Gary Smith, of Ponona College, explains: We are now told that selfies are more than dangerous than sharks, with 8 deaths this year from shark […]
An empirical investigation of dance addiction
Dancing is mentally dangerous, suggests this new study, which is a further advance in our understanding the threats posed by addiction: “An Empirical Investigation of Dance Addiction,” Aniko Maraz [pictured here], Róbert Urbán, Mark Damian Griffiths, Zsolt Demetrovics, PLoS ONE 10(5), May 7, 2015, e0125988. (Thanks to Neil Martin for bringing this to our attention.) […]
The Dilemma-Zone Calculation
Yellow traffic lights posed and provided an opportunity for applied mathematicians. Witness this study, published more than a half century ago: “The Problem of the Amber Signal Light in Traffic Flow,” Denos Gazis [pictured here, reportedly thrilling an audience], Robert Herman, and Alexei Maradudint, Operations Research, vol. 8, no. 1, 1960, pp. 112-132. The authors, […]
Evidence that Synthetic Marijuana May Be More Dangerous then Real
We are hoping to discover the significance, if any, of the publication date of this medical paper: “Smoking synthetic marijuana leads to self-mutilation requiring bilateral amputations,” K.A. Meijer, R.R. Russo and D.V. Adhvaryu, Orthopedics, vol. 37, no. 4, April 1, 2014, pp. e391-4. (Thanks to investigator Ivan Oransky for bringing this to our attention.) The […]
Comparative death counts: Marijuana vs. water
There’s news about the literally grave danger that a feared drug might pose for someone somewhere some day. Details are in a new study. The study describes two persons who died from no obvious cause, and who—the doctors conclude — therefore must have died from the unknown amounts of marijuana that they are likely to […]
Colonic cleansing has a dark side, they hint
Colonic cleansing has a dark side, according to this monograph, which looks at the inside story: “The dangers of colon cleansing,” Ranit Mishori [pictured here], Aye Otubu, Aminah Alleyne Jones, Journal of Family Practice, 2011 Aug;60(8):454-7. The authors are at Georgetown University. BONUS: Christina Frangou’s take on the matter. BONUS: Self-Serviced Coffee Self-Enemas BONUS: The prince of colonic cleansing. […]
Testing pumpkin-carving knives on cadaver arms
The knifing of pumpkins, an innocent-seeming yet carefully planned act of mutilation, sometimes results (accidentally or otherwise) in sprays, bits and smatterings of human, as well as vegetable, gore. In such cases, blood –human blood – flows, drips and coagulates. A hands-on experiment, or rather, an experiment on hands, in 2004, tried to determine the […]