# Cool phenomena that are actually real **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 9, 2006, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942 "2006-08-09T00:35:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/21 "2006-08-09T18:40:00Z")
Well, the [goggles that allow the human eye to make use of its residual IR vision capability](http://www.amasci.com/amateur/irgoggl.html), as mentioned in [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=382816), look to be pretty cool. And one of the links of the IR goggles pages, if you plough through it long enough, claims that [human retinas are sensitive to ultraviolet light](http://www.4colorvision.com/files/photopiceffic.htm) and even have a fourth set of light-sensitive structures to detect it, inherited from the ancestral chordate stock. It’s the _lens_ that doesn’t pass the UV. It goes on to say that there is some residual UV sensitivity in the 300-nanometre wavelength area, above the area blocked by the structure of the eye (350-500 nm). Time to check all this out with some IR and UV LEDs… if it checks out, it’ll be cool indeed. ---
**Author:** ![Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8c91f0/32.png) [@Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bam_Boo_Gut)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/22 "2006-08-09T18:52:53Z")
[QUOTE=Ender\_Will] [Levitation](http://homepage.mac.com/cheilman1/images/photos/101/superconductor.jpg) [/QUOTE] Gather 5 people together. One sits in a chair. The other four using index and middle fingers of each hand try to lift the person sitting in the chair. Two people left and right put their four fingers under the leg of the sitting person and the other two do the same under the arm of the person. Ok - it doesn’t work now does it? Now, palms down first person places their hand a few inches above the sitting persons head, follow around each person putting their hand a few inches above the hand before. Stay like this for a few moments then gently remove each hand one by one, as if trying not to disturb the air. Do this part again: Two people left and right put their four fingers under the leg of the sitting person and the other two do the same under the arm of the person. You’ll believe a man can fly! Why does this happen? I have no idea. The lighter the person, the higher they go. I hope I’ve explained it properly, it is amazing. ---
**Author:** ![MLS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/23 "2006-08-09T18:55:09Z")
[QUOTE=Robot Arm] I once met a guy who claimed to have seen the Green Flash. > **[Green flash](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_flash)** > > The green flash and green ray are meteorological optical phenomena that sometimes occur transiently around the moment of sunset or sunrise. When the conditions are right, a distinct green spot is briefly visible above the Sun's upper limb; the green appearance usually lasts for no more than two seconds. Rarely, the green flash can resemble a green ray shooting up from the sunset or sunrise point. Green flashes occur because the Earth's atmosphere can cause the light from the Sun to separate, via... [/QUOTE] A group of people in my tour group to the total solar eclipse in Libya this year saw it. In fact, the last two pictures on [this page](http://www.eclipsetours.com/lresults.html) prove it. ---
**Author:** ![Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8c91f0/32.png) [@Bam\_Boo\_Gut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bam_Boo_Gut)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/24 "2006-08-09T18:56:33Z")
Oooops - after “under the arm of the person” please add TRY TO LIFT THEM UP, both times - the second time they’ll go up much easier! ---
**Author:** ![BoxofNothing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e19b73/32.png) [@BoxofNothing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoxofNothing)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/25 "2006-08-09T19:07:12Z")
What of triboluminescence? I’ve heard it can spark when one crunches a dry wintogreen life saver, but I doubt it. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/26 "2006-08-09T19:21:48Z")
There are many rare, cool cloud phenomena: [Nacreous](http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/08/images/060804-ice-cloud_big.jpg) ,[mammatus](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v248/walker66/looming-presence.jpg) and [noctilucent](http://lasp.colorado.edu/noctilucent_clouds/) being three of the coolest (two of them literally). ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/27 "2006-08-09T20:40:27Z")
The double slit experiment is pretty cool. And maybe I’m morbid, but if the wasps that capture spiders to lay eggs inside their paralyzed bodies weren’t real, somebody would have to make them up. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/28 "2006-08-09T23:21:22Z")
The Krell mind expander. Okay, not quite. But still amazing. [http://www.cognitiveliberty.org/neuro/TMS\_NYT.html](http://www.cognitiveliberty.org/neuro/TMS_NYT.html) ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2006, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/29 "2006-08-09T23:28:31Z")
[QUOTE=BoxofNothing] What of triboluminescence? I’ve heard it can spark when one crunches a dry wintogreen life saver, but I doubt it. [/QUOTE] The sparks generated by Wint-o-Green Lifesavers is definitely real. I’ve seen it with my own 2 eyes. ---
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/30 "2006-08-10T01:11:58Z")
The Brown Mountain Lights were the ones the professor studied. ---
**Author:** ![cornflakes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@cornflakes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cornflakes)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/31 "2006-08-10T03:43:56Z")
[QUOTE=Robot Arm] I once met a guy who claimed to have seen the Green Flash. > **[Green flash](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_flash)** > > The green flash and green ray are meteorological optical phenomena that sometimes occur transiently around the moment of sunset or sunrise. When the conditions are right, a distinct green spot is briefly visible above the Sun's upper limb; the green appearance usually lasts for no more than two seconds. Rarely, the green flash can resemble a green ray shooting up from the sunset or sunrise point. Green flashes occur because the Earth's atmosphere can cause the light from the Sun to separate, via... [/QUOTE] Would this count as a third? Years ago, I was riding on a highway. At first light, the dewey fields that I was riding through begain to become visible, then were lit to a pale emerald green for a few seconds. Could the green flash shine brightly enough to color the landscape? ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/32 "2006-08-10T03:53:42Z")
[QUOTE=Cervaise] The double slit experiment is pretty cool. [/QUOTE] What’s truly bizarre about the Young experiment is that even if you only shoot ONE particle at a time at the slits (and one would tend to assume that it can only go through one slit or the other), you will still get the interference pattern after enough particle interactions have occured. As if it the particle passed through BOTH slits. And in some sense, it probably does. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/33 "2006-08-10T03:59:45Z")
Look out the window and what do you spy? Rain falling out of a sunshiney sky It’s turning to hailstones that weigh half a ton With seven live frogs hopping out of each one It’s not the Last Judgment, stop wailing of sin! It’s only the gods at wine-tasting again! So drink, drink, to [Charlie Fort’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Fort) memory Marvelous doings and marvelous sights Drink, drink, we may as well join them The gods are not crazy, they’re higher than kites! – [Leslie Fish](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leslie_Fish) ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/34 "2006-08-10T04:03:21Z")
I’d almost say fireflies count, if we weren’t so used to them. Actually, there are a lot of phenomena that are so everyday we forget how cool they are: spiderwebs, magnets, rainbows, electricity… ---
**Author:** ![picunurse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@picunurse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picunurse)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/35 "2006-08-10T05:37:23Z")
[QUOTE=Robot Arm] I once met a guy who claimed to have seen the Green Flash. > **[Green flash](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_flash)** > > The green flash and green ray are meteorological optical phenomena that sometimes occur transiently around the moment of sunset or sunrise. When the conditions are right, a distinct green spot is briefly visible above the Sun's upper limb; the green appearance usually lasts for no more than two seconds. Rarely, the green flash can resemble a green ray shooting up from the sunset or sunrise point. Green flashes occur because the Earth's atmosphere can cause the light from the Sun to separate, via... [/QUOTE] I’ve seen the green flash. Flash is used in the sense of quickness, not brightness. It’s more cool to be able to say you’ve seen it, than the actual seeing. ---
**Author:** ![coffeecat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/coffeecat/32/3405_2.png) [@coffeecat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coffeecat)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/36 "2006-08-10T06:39:49Z")
[Vagina dentata](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=266040) ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/37 "2006-08-10T06:47:43Z")
I always found hermaphrodites and pseudohermaphrodites very interesting. Hermaphrodites really are both sexes at once and will have the sex characteristics of both unless surgery is done to correct some of the ambiguity. Pseudohermaphrodites have a genetic sex but the sexual differentiation process gets screwed up in one of several ways and they end up with some mix of brain, body, and genetic sex. Unfortunately, this can be a very traumatic condition but it tells us a sexual development, gender identity, and the role of sexual development in the brain. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 10:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/38 "2006-08-10T10:20:52Z")
I saw a book at Borders once—I think it was [Weird Weather](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0316791792/103-4562859-9371811?v=glance&n=283155)—that had a number of (documented, as I recall) odd weather incidents. Including luminescent tornadoes. Other odd events… [The Vela Incident](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vela_Incident). (Not a natural, or continuing event, but hey…weird’s weird.) [Limnic Eruptions](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limnic_eruption). (You know when you open a can of soda, and there’s a surge of bubbles as the CO2 comes out of solution? Imagine that happening with a _lake_.) [Cryovolcanos](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryovolcano). (Doesn’t happen on this planet, though.) [Natural nuclear fission reactors.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oklo_reactor) (Haven’t been around for about a billion and a half years, though. That’s not a figure of speech, either—it’s been about 1.5 billion years.) ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/39 "2006-08-10T10:25:52Z")
[The Penglai Mirage](http://en.chinabroadcast.cn/811/2006/05/07/421@85556.htm) ---
**Author:** ![interface2x](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c0e974/32.png) [@interface2x](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/interface2x)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2006, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942/40 "2006-08-10T12:51:35Z")
One thing that I want to see in person before I die - wet salt flats after a rain ala [this picture](http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.bukima.com/Overland/Images/walking%2520on%2520water%2520salt%2520flats.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.bukima.com/Overland/SouthAmerica/AndesInterior.php&h=200&w=280&sz=22&hl=en&start=24&tbnid=NW4zkusxN6_ZYM:&tbnh=81&tbnw=114&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dsalt%2Bflats%26start%3D20%26ndsp%3D20%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DN). I can’t imagine how cool this has to look in person. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cool-phenomena-that-are-actually-real/367942.md?page=3)