Downlo

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This is L’Inconnue de la Seine, the death mask of an unknown woman found drowned in the Seine in the late 1880s. Photographs and reproductions of the death mask were very popular in France after 1900 and there was a literary fashion in creating stories to match her Mona Lisa smile, her mystery and her tragic end, usually stories involving suicide after disappointment in love. Even Nabokov wrote a poem called L’Inconnue de la Seine.

Remarkably, eerily, bizarrely, the face of Resusci Annie, the mannequin you use to practice CPR is modeled on the death mask:

http://www.laerdal.com/docid/1117082/The-Girl-from-the-River-Seine

Radiolab also did a great podcast about her. Listen here

(Source: conorhoughton, via shitty-best-teacher)

Tags: radiolab science curiosities death masks

January 11, 2012

26 notes

Photo

Orchis italica, photo by Ana Retamero Olmos:

These two little pink men arm in arm are actually the flower heads of the Mediterranean orchid Orchis italica. The English name “naked man orchid” describes the shapes of the blossoms very well indeed. After I took some photographs of the whole plant, I kept going into more and more detail until I finally found these two blossoms. I placed them in the centre and tried to arrange the surrounding flowers in a way that would make them appear like mythical creatures flying around the pair.

Tags: flowers botany science photography

December 29, 2011

255 notes

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Why women need fat

An interesting interview with Steven J.C. Gaulin, an evolutionary biologist, and William D. Lassek, a retired doctor of public health at the University of Pittsburgh. The two authored a book called Why Women Need Fat, which points out how androcentrism in medical science can lead to problematic health advice for women:

Many M.D.s have bought this fallacious line that the optimal weight for women in terms of their health is what M.D.s call normal weight, a BMI between 18.5 and 25. And they have thought this to be true because women with higher BMIs exhibit a series of physiological measures that are indeed risk factors for disease in men. But they are not systematically risk factors for disease in women. If you actually look at the data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and data from studies done in other countries, the optimal weight for women who have had a kid is what doctors currently call “overweight.”

Tags: gender health medicine science weight public health

December 22, 2011

43 notes

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Today is the winter solstice, which means the days will be getting longer now. I’m really looking forward to the day when the sun doesn’t set at 3 in the afternoon.

image credit: Danilo Pivato/via

Tags: winter solstice winter photography science news astronomy

December 22, 2011

11 notes

Photoset

catsandscience:

themoderatelyambitiousscientist:

lesbohontas:

this is one of the few types of chocolate i would love getting.

These are gorgeous, but I would feel so weird eating Uranus.

I thought these were models at first and I was excited! I feel slightly sad that you’re expected to eat them. THEY ARE PURTY.

These are gorgeous!

(Source: aria-to-aria)

Tags: candy food design chocolate astronomy science

December 21, 2011

58,598 notes

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ticklemejesus: