basaltgranite t1_ja874ml wrote on February 27, 2023 at 3:54 PM

Reply to comment by isawagoose in Anti-war partisans in Belarus claim to have damaged Russian plane | Belarus by Caratteraccio

A lot farther away. At 10 ft, the horizon is ~4.2 miles (6.8 km) away. At 35,000 ft, it's ~230 miles (~370 km) away.

basaltgranite t1_j9x7tk1 wrote on February 25, 2023 at 5:17 AM

Reply to comment by pete1901 in TIL scientists believe people started wearing clothes between 83k and 170k years ago because that's when clothing lice diverged from head lice. by cwood1973

If they're at risk of extinction, will the Endangered Species Act force us to forbid waxing?

basaltgranite t1_j9lf7u0 wrote on February 22, 2023 at 8:45 PM

Reply to TIL The US military once accidentally killed over 6,000 sheep with nerve gas when a weapons test went wrong by Cranyx

Spielberg used stock footage of the event in Close Encounters. ^^/s

basaltgranite t1_j6ja702 wrote on January 30, 2023 at 7:00 PM

Reply to comment by AnalogNightsFM in TIL that the first use of the phrase "son-of-a-bitch" in American literature was in the 1823 book "Seventy-Six" by John Neal about the American Revolutionary War. Seventy-Six was criticized at the time for its use of profanity and was noted for its use of colloquialisms. by vrphotosguy55

More here. I don't find any surviving examples. Maybe all have been renamed.

basaltgranite t1_j6initm wrote on January 30, 2023 at 4:39 PM

Reply to comment by WantToBeACyborg in TIL that the first use of the phrase "son-of-a-bitch" in American literature was in the 1823 book "Seventy-Six" by John Neal about the American Revolutionary War. Seventy-Six was criticized at the time for its use of profanity and was noted for its use of colloquialisms. by vrphotosguy55

It's an ongoing process. For example, "fuck" once had an impact. Now it's a routine vocabulary word. It happens the other way around too. "Piss" was once the normal word for urination. When "piss" became crude, it was euphemized to "pee."

Edit: Another example: In medieval England, "cunt" was tame enough to officially name a street where prostitutes plied their trade "gropecunt lane." Most (not all) of them have been renamed.

basaltgranite t1_j68thdn wrote on January 28, 2023 at 3:56 PM

Reply to can gemstones be melted into a gradient? by Acceptable_Shift_247

The question about amethyst and sapphire has been answered. They won't melt together the way you want.

For a practical alternative, a few gemstones sometimes do have two or more colors within the same crystal. An example is tourmaline, which can form bi-color crystals, typically red on one end and green on the other. The color change can also be concentric, called watermelon tourmaline.