Hello people!
Not been around these parts much lately - life has rather got in the way of my b3ta and general internet habit. Glad to see not much has changed here though.

Recently science and scientific discoveries of the last one hundred years have become fundamentally important to my everyday life.
What's your favourite scientific discovery of the last one hundred years?
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:46, 74 replies, latest was 16 years ago)

My penis
(Well, I discovered it through rigorous experimentation)

Hello, Mme Poulet. How's tricks?
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:48, Reply)

Hello!

Not bad ta. Must learn the one where you pull the tablecloth out from under the china - now that would be a good trick to perform. I would of course have to invite the local vicar to tea in order to astound him and then I could beat him (or her) with the POWAR of science.
Haven't worked out quite how I'm going to do the beating with science bit yet.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:55, Reply)

If I were you
I'd just invite Richard Dawkins round to punch the vicar in the face.
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:57, Reply)

That would work
but it would have to be after I'd done my tablecloth trick.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:58, Reply)

"More tea, vicar?"
V: "Hmm, yes please, Ms Chickenlady."
CHICKENLADY grabs end of tablecloth
CL: "Huzzah!"
CHICKENLADY gives a firm tug (fnar fnar) which removes tablecloth from table and scatters china crockery liberally over the living room. Some 90% of the buttered, breaded goods previously resting upright on their tray have landed buttered-side-down on the recently cleaned carpet, proving some theory or other. The VICAR starts to laugh
V: Well, whatever did you do that for?
CL: Don't laugh at me! I have the POWER OF SCIENCE!
Enter RICHARD DAWKINS
RD: SCIENCE! LOGIC! ROARRRR! FUCK OFF, GOD-BOTHERER!
RICHARD DAWKINS punches the VICAR in the face
CL: Ta, Richard
RD: My pleasure, Chickenlady.
CL: Will you stay for some tea?
RD: I would, but I'm afraid I must away, for SCIENCE needs me! Plus you appear to have emptied the teapot over the floor.
CL: This is true...
RD: Better luck next time. And now - TO THE SCIENCEARIUM!
RICHARD DAWKINS strikes a triumphant pose and then wanders over to the coatstand before picking up his attire and politely leaving via the front door.
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:07, Reply)

You're like a modern-day Chaucer, Crowers old bean.

( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:09, Reply)

Ta kindly
It's a pleasure to be able to share these flashes of inspiration with you all. (At least, it's better than sharing a flash of my "inspiration" with the all-female office round the corner from mine...)
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:14, Reply)

This is exactly how I imagined it
except perhaps with more cake.

Fantastic.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:25, Reply)

LSD.
Wotcha.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:51, Reply)

Bonjour!
Drugs are a wonderful invention, aren't they?
Not too keen on the hallucinogenics myself, but plenty of drugs are just fab.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:56, Reply)

Too fucking right.
I love hallucinogens, personally. I was scared to go near them for about 20 years but having got back on that horse again I'm well into them.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:06, Reply)

The speaker and the reproduction of recorded sounds

(Cancer Joy was short lived, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:57, Reply)

Certainly an improvement on string and tin cans
Or listening to my mother.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 16:59, Reply)

Wasn't that invented longer than 100 years ago?
(I'm not saying it definitely was)
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:00, Reply)

Ok, the reproduction of PHAT recorded sounds, woofer style.

(Cancer Joy was short lived, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:02, Reply)

Woofter style?

( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:10, Reply)

Harry Hoofter!

(Cancer Joy was short lived, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:13, Reply)

Both much older.

( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:02, Reply)

The structure of DNA.
Its amazing how many modern scientific discoveries were actually made before 1910, and only put into practical use this side of that date.
( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:01, Reply)

Yes DNA and lots of other medical ones are astoundingly recent
Amazing any of us are here really.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:06, Reply)

Quantum mechanics were better understood after 1910,
But without doubt, medicine has made the greatest number of unknown things known, over the last 100 years.

Technology to exploit most discoveries lags far behind the initial discovery
( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:14, Reply)

i quite like the idea
that time travel isn't actually forbidden by the (currently known) laws of physics. even if it is horribly impractical...
(beanojam isn't really Ricardo Flange, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:04, Reply)

Okay...I know I'm going to regret asking this but...
How?
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:07, Reply)

something to do
with connecting two ends of a wormhole together to create a 'closed timelike curve' that would theoretically enable you to travel back into your own past. however, as has been pointed out below, the realities of actually achieving this are frankly beyond all known technology and are likely to stay that way for quite some time (read: several thousands of years!).
(beanojam isn't really Ricardo Flange, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:32, Reply)

Ah....
Wormholes...I'm not going to find them in my garden am I?
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:35, Reply)

From the few conversations I've had with the sort of physicists who deal with the quantum and particle-type stuff
"Not actually forbidden" isn't quite the same as "Possible in theory"
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:09, Reply)

My father is hugely into that stuff
and from what I gather in real terms it might as well be declared impossible. Shame though.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:11, Reply)

Does he drive a DeLorean?

( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:19, Reply)

Ford Mustang last time I was over there, the midlife-crisis cock-end.

( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:25, Reply)

That is quite poor.
I imagined that he would import an MGB and drive that around.

Have a word with him will you.
( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:27, Reply)

How funny.
When he moved to the UK that was the first car he had.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:28, Reply)

I'm in your brains.

( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:29, Reply)

brains poop chute

sigh
( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:30, Reply)

My father in law to be has a beautiful MGC
He has two daughters so I'm tapping him up to leave it to me!


Like so: www.mgownersclub.co.uk/images/1967-mgc-roadster.jpg
( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:29, Reply)

Can't he just leave you both daughters?

( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:31, Reply)

Yeah
Flog the rougher of the two to an Arab once you've 'finished with her', then buy a car with the money.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:33, Reply)

Sounds like a plan, but I thought in teh Arab world
it is women for babies boys for fun?
( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:37, Reply)

And goats for ecstacy*, I believe.
* Not a bartering system.
(Cave Duck, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:55, Reply)

As long as it's a classic "Bullet era" Mustang

( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:28, Reply)

Yeah, but driven round at less than 70mph. It just aint right.

( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:30, Reply)

70 was probably it's top speed, old cars are fairly rubbish
but very beautiful
( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:30, Reply)

Its not the speed that's important,
Its the rubbish handling. No brakes, crap steering, terrible road noise. It takes bottle just to get it to 70.
( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:35, Reply)

Exactly and always make sure not to mix radial and crossply tyres

( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:35, Reply)

Isn't that like remembering not to cross the streams?

( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:38, Reply)

Oh they've not been 'playing firemen' in the urinals again, have they?
FFS.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:39, Reply)

That's how you get cock AIDS

( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:40, Reply)

I think it is. Fucking old anyway.
I know precisely zero about cars, and care about them slightly less than that.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:31, Reply)

The way it was summed up for me
-and this was coming from a bloke who, last time I bumped into him, was due to head off to CERN, so I presumed to trust his judgement -

was, "Strictly speaking, the laws of quantum mechanics contain nothing to forbid the universe spontaneously rearranging itself into a giant daisy, it's just that the probability of that happening is so ridiculously tiny it's not worth considering."
(LongJohnBaldry, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:22, Reply)

This is very true

( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 18:16, Reply)

I think the most amazing thing the internet has brought us has to be Google Earth
The fact that a huge percentage of the earth is has been mapped and is at our fingertips is incredible. A feat beyond belief a hundred years ago.
(Cancer Joy was short lived, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:21, Reply)

Google Earth horse porn
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:25, Reply)

Especially all the nude sunbathers

( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:27, Reply)

Two ends of the smutty reply spectrum right there ^^^

( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:27, Reply)

Birth Control Pills.
Ah the freedom.
(porkylips looks better as the sun goes down., Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:30, Reply)

But,
you look like you are pregnant. Did you forget to take them?
( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:33, Reply)

It's his 'retired man senility pills'
They bloat him up like nobody's business.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:38, Reply)

Who the fuck are you?
Pleased I don't have alzheimers.
Monty old man, spiffing to see you.
Come, sit upon my knee. In any order.
(porkylips looks better as the sun goes down., Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:41, Reply)

'are you the nice man from the Post Office?'

( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:45, Reply)

I see,
Water retention.

Have a good piss mate.
( Bartleby A dead man on vacation, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:42, Reply)

freedom creampie porn
( Naked Ape call me Caitlyn, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:36, Reply)

Yes! The pill.
Amazing how that's altered society and given women freedom that they'd never had before.
Fantastic invention.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:37, Reply)

Exactly.
Such a big effect from such a tiny thing.
(porkylips looks better as the sun goes down., Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:42, Reply)

Bit like your knob, Porkles old boy.

( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:45, Reply)

It ain't what you do it's the way that you do it.
That's what get's results.
(porkylips looks better as the sun goes down., Mon 26 Apr 2010, 17:57, Reply)

Bananarama
And the Fun Boy Three.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 18:15, Reply)

Breasts

( broadsword, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 18:20, Reply)

The integrated circuit
best known to the layman as the 'silicon chip' despite the fact the first one was actually made of germanium.

Without it, we'd have no computers with any useful power which were smaller than a 3 bedroom semi.
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 18:27, Reply)

Made of geraniums?
What is it with all you scientist types and flowers?

Geraniums and the universe turning into a giant daisy...whatever is the world coming to, a giant allotment?
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 19:16, Reply)

Evening chickenlady
I refute the existence of science, it's all smoke and mirrors. Much like bumderism doesn't exist, it's just a term for blokes that have led a sheltered life in a catholic church school and think women have stubble and a funny lump on their throat. Or something. I'll ask Monty, he'll know.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Mon 26 Apr 2010, 19:26, Reply)

Monty knows everything
*nods sagely*
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 20:35, Reply)

The pedegg.

( girlinthehole, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 19:28, Reply)

Did you just try and ring about 15 minutes ago?
Just missed the phone and it was a number withheld.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Mon 26 Apr 2010, 19:31, Reply)

Nope!
Just having dinner and then settling down to ring and get my gossip head on.
( girlinthehole, Mon 26 Apr 2010, 19:32, Reply)

Ah right.
Must have been someone trying to sell something then. They can fuck right off.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Mon 26 Apr 2010, 19:34, Reply)