Recommended Links of the Week (No. 647)

We're early this week with the Recommended Links of the Week! And being early doesn't make it any less awesome. Because, as always, we have amazing stuff. Things like the largest animal that ever flew, secret documents used as toilet paper, the mustache strike, and the secret of the Dragon. All that and much more below. Don't miss a single pixel!

The largest animal that ever flew jumped almost three meters in the air before taking off: "The Quetzalcoatlus lived 70 million years ago, in the Cretaceous, and it is the largest flying animal discovered by science to date. We discovered it in the 1970s, but until now we knew very little about it. A new monograph on the creature, divided into five different studies just published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, gives us the most detailed picture we have ever had of this enormous flying dinosaur."

How Hawaiian pizza, created by a Greek in Canada, became the most controversial in history: "Hawaiian pizza delights some and horrifies others, and even sparked a presidential outburst earlier this year. On Thursday, its inventor, the Greek Sam Panopoulos, who came up with this recipe in Canada, died at age 83, leaving as his legacy having created the most controversial pizza in history. Panopoulos, who emigrated from Greece to Canada in 1954 when he was 20, died in a hospital in Canada on Thursday."

10 unusual cemeteries of the world: "In the world there are curious places, some of them truly beautiful and others, on the other hand, hair-raising. There are all kinds: churches, parks, beaches, and also cemeteries. Among all the curious cemeteries that exist, some stand out for their strange peculiarities, such as the ghost cemetery of the presidents or the most beautiful cemeteries in the world. However it may be, the fact is that wherever there are living people, there will also be cemeteries. At Supercurioso we made a list of the 10 most curious ones."

There are two types of explanations for why we do what we do: proximate and distal: "But there is another type of explanation that, while not replacing the proximate ones, allows adding an extra layer of understanding: ultimate or distal explanations. This type of explanation takes into account, for example, evolutionary psychology. For example, why do I prefer fat and sugar? Because in the past there was a shortage of food, and those who had a predilection for fats and sugars, which were foods with higher caloric density, were the ones who reproduced more, genetically passing on their preference for this kind of food."

Why facts don't make us change our minds: "Human beings need a reasonably accurate view of the world in order to survive. If your model of reality is very different from the real world, then you have difficulties taking effective actions every day. However, truth and accuracy are not the only things that matter to the human mind. Humans also seem to have a deep desire to belong. (...) Understanding the truth of a situation is important, but so is remaining part of a tribe. While these two desires often work well together, they occasionally come into conflict."

Streetwise, the street children of the Reagan era: "In 1983, it was estimated that half a million minors were engaged in street prostitution in the United States. A pair of journalists gained the trust of kids in this situation in Seattle and recorded their daily lives in Streetwise, now a historic documentary. The girls spoke openly about how they prostituted themselves, listed without flinching the times they had been raped, the boys survived in abandoned buildings and cars. It was the consequence of the oil crises in a country where Reagan cut social services." You can watch the documentary here

Operation Tamarisk: the search for secret documents used as toilet paper by the Soviets in the GDR: "But moreover, the secret services of the mentioned countries discovered that Soviet soldiers did not receive toilet paper, due to the shortage of supplies that East Germans suffered at that time, so they used regular paper, and this consisted basically of letters sent by family, publications... and archive documents considered invalid, either because of their expiration or because they were copies, drafts, minutes, or mere military bureaucracy; in short, material destined for purging."

The largest sailing ship in history: "On December 14, 1907, a great sailing ship was wrecked off the coast of Annet, in the Isles of Scilly, causing the first great oil spill in the world. There were only two survivors. It was the Thomas W. Lawson, the world's largest pure sailing ship, that is, without an auxiliary engine, and the only seven-masted schooner that has ever existed. It had been built by the copper businessman Thomas W. Lawson with the sole purpose of proving to the world that sail could remain competitive in the age of steam."

Alice in Wonderland Syndrome: the disorder that may have affected Lewis Carroll: "It is clear that Alice in Wonderland is much more than a simple children's story. One of its most profound possible readings has a neuropsychological background. The very title of the book gave rise to the name of a condition that, without being harmful, causes distortions in the perception of reality in those who suffer from it. An ailment also known as dysmetropsia or Todd's syndrome, in honor of John Todd, the psychiatrist who defined this disorder in 1955. According to Todd, his patients saw some objects much larger than they really were, and others, on the other hand, they saw smaller."

The mustache strike: "At the end of the 19th century, with facial hair as a symbol of masculinity and maturity, the young gentlemen of good families became determined to mark the difference between themselves and the waiters, demanding that the waiters shave their mustaches. When the restaurants gave in to their suggestions, the waiters united to give a resounding no. The first recorded case was mentioned in British and French newspapers in October 1890. The news was set in one of the best hotels in Vienna, where a young nobleman threatened that he and his friends would stop being customers if the waiters did not shave to avoid being confused with the guests."

The Dragon's Secret: the first firearms in China: "Chinese Taoist monks had been seeking the formula for immortality for many centuries. This quest led alchemists to accidentally discover the composition of gunpowder (a mixture of charcoal, sulfur, and saltpeter that burns on contact with fire). Although there are references from at least the 2nd century, it is considered that one of the first references to gunpowder appears in the year 808 during the Tang Dynasty. However, this mention of the substance is far from its formula for military uses."

Gilgamesh tablet recovered, a 3,500-year-old piece stolen in 1991: "The Gilgamesh Tablet, a 3,500-year-old clay tablet that recounts in cuneiform writing what is considered one of the first epics in history, was presented this Tuesday in Baghdad, after having been stolen from an Iraqi museum in 1991 and recovered and returned by the United States. The emblematic piece was presented along with two other archaeological objects handed over by the US and the UK in a ceremony organized by the Iraqi Foreign Ministry."

Videos

Videos: Plays bass like it's a banjo, a giant LEGO train, more amazing LEGO models, total virtuosity, Earth from its formation to its destruction, the future according to the Tex Avery of the 50s, God of War for PlayStation 1, goose vs elephant, how 4chan changed society forever, Euler's disk, the universe could be full of humans, Star Wars Eclipse, the robot dance, GTA in real life, triple spiral of dominoes, planting 1440 trees in a day, the danger of earthquakes in the east, simulating the Red Baron, San Francisco of the 60s, how to make power metal, which instrument is the saddest, "The Lovecats" by WOOF (The Cure), kangaroo pouch for cats, Kurzgesagt lied to you and the shorts: Contract (Stalker), Bobby Yeah (gore and stop motion), The Dark Times (Star Wars), the sensational third part of Life Beyond

Galleries

Photos of strangers in the past and 40 years later, beautiful classic illustrations by Morgan Weistling, mathematical paintings, the paintings of Daniel Mullen, paper mushrooms, photos of majestic waves, life in Hungary in the year 20, fantasy illustrations, Salvador Dalí's Christmas cards, the Ford Galaxie of the 60s, forced induction, Soviet athletes, the Animated Dump and the Visual Dump of the Week.

That's it. I hope you enjoyed this early edition of Recommended Links. See you next time!