owen!uke

jtotheizzoe:

The Genius of J.S. Bach’s “Crab Canon” Visualized on a Möbius Strip

Holy harpsichord.

We know J.S. Bach was a genius composer. Certainly among the top two or three that have ever lived by most measures. Even knowing that, I was not prepared for the awesomeness you are about to see.

This is the first canon from Bach’s Musical Offering, known as the “crab canon”. The first level of awesome is when you find out that it was designed to be played backwards and forwards. But lots of people have done that … big deal, right?

Then you find out that it was written to be played backwards and forwards at the same time. That’s pretty amazing, but again, since it’s not that long I wouldn’t classify it as an Earth-shattering epiphany.

BUT THEN … graphic artist Jos Leys (who made the video), show how this Bach piece is basically the musical version of a Möbius strip.

Mind. Blown.

(Read more at Open Culture)

The Pokemon of the sea…

jtotheizzoe:

abluegirl:

Living Color: Toxic nudibranchs—soft, seagoing slugs—produce a brilliant defense.

They’re like Pokémon, but super-deadly.

I mean, if you didn’t know these were real, you’d be all “Yeah right!” Endless forms, most beautiful … indeed :)

The ‘powerful, musty odour’ of science…

jtotheizzoe:

Bats, Flowers, Tongues and Why “Necessity Is the Mother of Evolution”

If my tongue was as long as the tube-lipped nectar bat, it would be over 9 feet long. It’s only 5 cm long, but has a 9 cm tongue! This uniquely-outfitted creature was only discovered in 2005, and its feeding captured here for the first time by National Geographic cameramen.

By the way, did you know that bats constitute the second largest order of mammals after rodents?! More than 1,200 separate species have been identified.

The tube-lipped nectar bat and its favorite flower food source, C. nigricans, are an amazing example of coevolution. Here’s how it likely worked:

If you’re a flowering plant, your whole goal is to get pollinated. So a nectar-producing flower wants to make its nectar hard enough to reach that a pollinator (like the bat) has to really try to get at their snack, maximizing the potential for rubbing up against the flower and getting a good dusting of pollen. But the flower can’t make it so difficult to reach that the bat goes elsewhere for food. So evolutionary pressure says you might make your nectar tube as long as the bat can reach.

If you’re a bat, your goal is to eat. That means that in addition to learning how to hover like a bird (which is a big deal in itself), you need to possess a tongue that’s long enough to reach down and get your food. Pollen? You don’t eat pollen. You don’t care about pollen. But you just happen to get some on your head while slurping up dinner, and maybe you drop it in the next flower you visit. Evolutionary pressure says that you will be driven to have a long enough tongue in order to reach down into the flower as well as a head that fits inside the flower opening.

That’s exactly what we see here!! Two species triggering change in the other species based on selective pressures. And it’s stunning to behold.

(via Why Evolution Is True)

thekhooll:

Pin Art By Philip Karlberg

Photographer Philip Karlberg has just created a unique shoot for Plaza Magazine, sculpting famous faces by simply using clever lighting and carefully arranged wooden pins. “A couple of months ago I came up with an idea I have had in mind for years. I just did not know what I could use it for. But then I did a test with sunglasses, and it really turned out great. So I sent an image with the test to Plaza Magazine, and a week later I started shooting. It was a real challenge to ‘sculpt’ the faces of some classic wearers of sunglasses. It took me 6 days to shoot the 6 faces, and around 1200 sticks were used.”