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Cool Finds

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The Olympics Are Over and Here Are the Best Infographics

While athletes were setting world records, designers and journalists were building graphics and games to track them. Here are the best ones.

Great Wall of China Collapses After Torrential Rains

Flooding fueled by heavy rains brought down a 36 meter long stretch of the Great Wall of China

Celebrating 80 Years of LEGO

Children and hobbyists rejoice - today is Lego’s 80th birthday

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Why People Won’t Leave the Town that Has Been On Fire for Fifty Years

For the residents of Centralia, Pennsylvania, the fire that has been burning beneath their town for fifty years is part of what makes it home.

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The Olympic Salute We Don’t Use Anymore Because it Looked too Much Like Heiling Hitler

Saluting Hitler and saluting the Olympics look basically identical, which is why you never see anybody saluting the Olympics anymore.

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Fly Through a Gigantic 3D Model of the Universe

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Mining Company to Start Digging up the Ocean Floor

Dubai’s man-made Jumeirah Islands.

If We All Lived Like UAE Citizens, We’d Need 5.4 Earths

Tim De Chant’s Per Square Mile answers through infographics: How much land would 7 billion people need to live like the people of these countries?

How Olympic Bodies Have Changed Over Time

From 1929 to now, how do former Olympic champions compare to today’s athletes?

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These People are Turning Themselves into Cyborgs in their Basement

At the intersection of body hacking and transhumanism is a group of people trying to enhance the human body. And they’re doing it in their basement.

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Old School Games Make a Comeback – How Arcades and Rubik’s Cubes Are Becoming Cool Again

In Brooklyn, you can drink beer while you do just about anything at some themed bar. Shuffleboard, darts, pool, mini-golf, horror movies, steampunk, old school arcade games; you name it and you can find it. And now the hipsters have an unlikely ally: Rubik’s cube obsessives. Together, this not-so-odd couple is bringing back the games […]

Sagan with a model of the Viking lander.

Long Before Curiosity, Carl Sagan Had Something to Say to Kids About Mars

In a lectures series for children, Carl Sagan educates us all on the history and exploration of Mars.

Faces created using Phil McCarthy’s Pareidoloop.

Facial Recognition Software Makes Art from Random Noise

An interactive infographic tracks the flow of small and light arms and ammunition around the world.

In 2010 $600 Million in Guns and Ammo Were Exported from the US

In 2010, $607 million dollars worth of small and light arms left the United States, headed to buyers around the world

The Campi Flegrei caldera lies to the west of of Naples in southern Italy. (Naples is the giant city on the right).

Italian Supervolcano Could End Eurozone Crisis the Easy Way

Deep underground in southern Italy, just outside the city of Naples, the Campi Flegrei supervolcano has been resting for the past 500 years

In 1956, Two Kittens Crossed the Atlantic on a Raft

On a wooden raft two kittens (and three sailors) traveled from Canada to Cornwall

Down and down and down it goes. Arctic sea ice extent, 1979 to 2012.

Everything You Need to Know About Arctic Sea Ice Melt, in One 10-Second Animated Gif

The Arctic is melting,

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Man Wears Artificial Uterus for Science & His Wife

In rural Southern India, a husband has embarked upon perhaps the most chivalrous mission ever: designing an affordable menstrual pad for local women

“The Energy-Water Collision”

41% of Water in the US is Used for Power Generation

The Union of Concerned Scientists describes how warming and drought can cause problems for power generation

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How to Recognize and Avoid Fake Health Food

It’s no surprise that many of food health labels stray from truth, but how can we cut the rubbish and identify the things that are actually good for us?

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