Did You Ever Wonder About This?

Between 2005 and 2006 the Transportation Security Administration confiscated 13 million items from passengers' carry-on bags. Liquids in access of 3 ounces are immediately disposed of. Guns and firearms are turned over to local law enforcement. Items of value - electric saws, meat cleavers, 10-pound exercise weights, even a kitchen sink - are donated to state surplus agencies and sold - the states keeping the profits. Bats, clubs, knives and blades are confiscated the most; but instead of legally putting these items in checked luggage or mailing them, 90% of passengers relinquish them - realizing their protests won't fly.

Crickets don't fly, but different species have different calls. It's the males that make the calls and they do it by rubbing their wings together. However, what sounds like a continuous chirp to humans is actually a series of pulses - or rhythm. For example, the snowy cricket's chirp is made up of 8 pulses, which are arranged in a rhythm of 2 beats, 3 beats, 3 beats. The Riley's tree cricket divides its chirp into 11 beats. The different calls enable female crickets to know which calls are from their species. Basically, female crickets are "on call".

For humans musical training can improve hearing. According to studies presented at Neuroscience 2009, serious musicians are better at perceiving and remembering sounds. This is because sounds are interpreted by the brain and experience improves the brain's ability to interpret. Fifteen classically trained musicians and 16 non-musicians were asked to listen to a voice speaking simple sentences amid increasingly loud conversations. Because this experiment is similar to musicians being able to hear their own instruments amid many others, the musicians excelled in the experiment. Music teaches auditory concentration, which improves hearing - which should be music to our ears.

Something else that requires concentration is getting silk from golden orb-weaving spiders - a species that bites. The spiders have to be gently harnessed to a small machine that holds them down. A hand then carefully pulls the golden thread from each spider and wraps it around a spindle for weaving on a hand loom. After about 20 minutes of "silking" the spiders are released back into nature. It took Madagascan weavers 4 years, over 1 million spiders and half a million dollars to weave a one-of-a-kind, 11-by-4-foot tapestry, finished in 2009. Arachnophobiacs, however, might prefer using silk worms. Their silk comes from cocoons.