Weird Universe Archive

June 2022

June 15, 2022

The ear as an inverted fetus

From Hugh Aldersey-Williams, Anatomies: the human body, its parts and the stories they tell (2014), p. 158:

Some people believe the outer ear may be significant other than as a sound-gatherer. In the 1950s, a French doctor and acupuncturist named Paul Nogier noted that it resembles a curled human foetus (the lobe of the ear represents the head and the interior fold known as the antihelix the spine of the foetus in this case). The scheme of alternative medicine that he devised based on this resemblance is known as auriculotherapy. The patient's ear is seen as a honunculus or map of the whole body, with stimulation at different points on it being used to treat ailments in corresponding parts of the body.

Tampa Tribune - Aug 13, 1973



More info: wikipedia

Posted By: Alex - Wed Jun 15, 2022 - Comments (2)
Category: Body, Patent Medicines, Nostrums and Snake Oil

Widdershins

Many thanks to longtime WU-vie Gerald Sacks for pointing us towards this neat little steampunk cartoon, whose anachronistic future is decidedly weird.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Jun 15, 2022 - Comments (0)
Category: Science Fiction, Reader Recommendation, Cartoons, Love & Romance

June 14, 2022

Threshermen’s Queen

I'm not sure when the Threshermen began crowning a queen at their annual reunion. But in 1952 they decided to stop the practice. The reason they gave was that, "The local talent has been exhausted and we are going to wait a couple of years for a new crop."

Sounds a bit harsh.

Marshfield News-Herald - Jan 9, 1952



Below is some of the local talent from an earlier year, pre-exhaustion.

The Bloomington Pantagraph - Sep 8, 1950

Posted By: Alex - Tue Jun 14, 2022 - Comments (2)
Category: Awards, Prizes, Competitions and Contests, 1950s

June 13, 2022

Automatic Washing Machine for Dogs

Mario Altissimo was granted Patent No. 4,505,229 in 1985 for his "Automatic Washing Machine for Dogs and Like Animals".

I wonder if anyone has ever created an equivalent type of automatic washing machine for humans.

Science Year 1983





Update: Paul gave me a heads up about this Three Stooges take on a washing machine for dogs. A clear example of prior art!

Posted By: Alex - Mon Jun 13, 2022 - Comments (5)
Category: Bathrooms, Patents, Dogs, 1980s

June 12, 2022

Smelling the Enemy: The Odortype Detection Program

The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) launched the "Odortype Detection Program" in 2002. It had two goals:

The goal of Phase 1 will be to determine whether an exploitable, robust signature corresponding to individual human odortype exists...

The goal of Phase 2 will be to build a detector that can reliably detect the signature identified in phase 1 with high sensitivity and specificity.

By 2007, DARPA had changed the name of the program to the "Unique Signature Detection Program," but its goals remained essentially the same:

to determine, by means of a well-developed scientific methodology, whether there are unique signatures in emanations that can be used to identify and distinguish specific high-level-of-interest individuals within groups of enemy troops or combatants, and if so, to develop enabling technology for detecting and identifying those specific signatures. The program consists of an interdisciplinary team of performers using state-of-the-art techniques to evaluate the statistical, biological and chemical nature of individual emanations. Once the nature of the chemosignal has been characterized, performers will determine the impact of non-genetic factors (e.g., diet, stress, health, age) on the signal in order to determine whether the signal can be robustly extracted from a complex and varied chemical background. If an exploitable robust signature is identified, the program will then pursue detector development.

I haven't been able to find out what's become of the program since 2007. Though I'd wager that the U.S. government hasn't completely abandoned the idea since being able to identify people by their smell would be a hard-to-defeat surveillance technology. (Assuming that we all really do have a unique 'odortype' that can't be camouflaged with fragrance or by eating stinky food).

However, I did find a report on the program from 2005 that included the interesting detail that they field-tested the technology on seven sets of twins at Williamsburg, VA and Research Triangle Park, NC:

a field study was planned and conducted by RTI. In this study, identical twins and a family member (sibling or parent) were recruited. Each group went to either Williamsburg, VA, or Research Triangle Park, NC, for a four-day stay at a hotel. During this stay, daily sweat samples were collected onto polydimethylsiloxane membranes, as described in earlier reports to DARPA/ARO. A total of seven sets of twins were recruited. The goal was 30 twin pairs. Given the relatively poor response rate and the need for project resources to adequately address the data processing and statistical analysis needs of the overall USD program, the field study was terminated.

Posted By: Alex - Sun Jun 12, 2022 - Comments (1)
Category: Military, Spies and Intelligence Services, Smells and Odors

Petrarch’s Cat

If you make a visit to Italy and visit the museum-home of the author Petrarch, you will get to see the mummified body of his adored cat.

Or so the legend goes. Actually, the cat corpse is a mere four hundred years old, created by the person who owned the house in the 1600s.

Read about it here.



Posted By: Paul - Sun Jun 12, 2022 - Comments (0)
Category: Hoaxes and Imposters and Imitators, Historical Figure, Cats, Europe

June 11, 2022

The Prison Bra Rule

In 1975, Scharlette Holdman, executive director of Hawaii's ACLU, tried to visit a prisoner in an all-male Hawaiian prison, at the prisoner's request. While being searched it was discovered that she wasn't wearing a bra, and so she was denied entry. She sued, and the case went to the Hawaiian Supreme Court which ruled in favor of the prison. As a result, it remains the rule that all female visitors to Hawaiian prisons must wear bras, whether or not the lack of a bra is evident.

The case: Holdman v. Olim (1978)

More info from Dressing Constitutionally by Ruthann Robson:

Scharlette Holdman, then director of the Hawai'i ACLU, sought entry to a prison and was searched by a matron who discovered Holdman was not wearing a bra. The matron denied Holdman entry, relying upon a directive that required visitors to be 'properly dressed,' 'fully clothed including undergarments,' and stated 'provocative attire is discouraged.' Holdman's challenge stressed equal protection, under both the United States and Hawai'i state constitutions, arguing that the requirement that women wear bras while men need not constituted sex discrimination. Writing in 1978, the Hawai'i Supreme Court expressed some consternation about the slight record, but relying in part on deference to prison officials, the court found that dress standards are 'intimately related to sexual attitudes' and 'the omission of a brassiere as a conventional article of women's clothing' has been 'regarded as sexually provocative by some members of society.' ... The fact that Scharlette Holdman's lack of a bra became evident only upon a tactile search was irrelevant: the prison could still find it would be sexually provocative to the male inmates.

Honolulu Advertiser - Feb 3, 1975

Posted By: Alex - Sat Jun 11, 2022 - Comments (2)
Category: Prisons, Underwear, 1970s

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Alex Boese
Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction books such as Elephants on Acid.

Paul Di Filippo
Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1.

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Chuck is the purveyor of News of the Weird, the syndicated column which for decades has set the gold-standard for reporting on oddities and the bizarre.

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