Now that audiences are used to state-of-the-art effects and high quality film delivery, movies that are decades older suffer by comparison. Watching a horror film from the 1970s today, we are distracted by the obviously fake blood that doesn't look at all like the real thing. To understand what filmmakers got away with back then, we need to run through the history of fake blood. The most popular formula was that of Nextel Simulated Blood, developed by 3M and sold by the gallon.   

The distance between Nextel’s blood and the real stuff didn’t go unnoticed. Reviewing Argento’s Deep Red for The New York Times, Vincent Canby called the film “an English-dubbed Italian-made bucket of ax-murder-movie clichés thoroughly soaked in red paint that seems intended to represent fake blood. I don’t think that Dario Argento, the director, meant to distance us from the action in this way. He’s simply a director of incomparable incompetence.” History has largely sided with Argento over Canby, at least when it comes to the overall quality of the director’s classic films. Argento’s blood, however, is another matter. “I was watching clips of Deep Red last night,” Shostrom says, “and it was the same thing. … Even as a kid, I’m thinking, ‘God, didn’t these people ever cut themselves and try to make something that matched?’” If you’re wondering whether Shostrom is joking, he’s not—Smith’s guide actually advises doing this very thing.

Filmmakers will argue over whether realistic blood is necessary or even desirable for a horror film, but you have to admit it looks more real in newer movies. Read the history of fake blood and the cost of authenticity at the Ringer. -via Digg

If 1994 was an important year in your life, you will love The Hood Internet's new mashup of 60 songs from that year. If not, you'll enjoy revisiting at least some of the songs. As for me, video clues made me listen carefully for certain NSFW lyrics, which did not show up. I wish they had included more of "Black Hole Sun." Even if you don't recognize any of the songs, the groove is nice to listen to.

While artificial intelligence is getting better all the time, its bizarre shortcomings still can make us laugh. Janelle Shane (previously at Neatorama) attempted to train a neural network to generate Halloween costumes before, with mostly disappointing results, because the concept is quite broad. This year, she added a 2020 dimension to the experiment to include social distancing, meaning the costumes must be designed to be seen at a distance. While the algorithm kind of "got" what she was going for, the results are still quite odd.

These are only a small sampling of the strange Halloween costume ideas generated by AI that you can read about at AI Weirdness.

We know that exercise does wonders of the body, but did you know that it can also help you fight cancer? Yes, you’ve read it right. Not only does exercise help you to be fit and strong; it also helps you in fighting the dreaded disease. This study sheds more light on the matter.

This new study focused on a particular immune cell called a cytotoxic T cell. Also known as killer T cells, these are the body’s cancer-killing agents. The hypothesis underpinning the research was that exercise produces certain metabolites that enhance the function of these cancer-killing cells.

Through a series of animal tests the new study reveals these killer T cells are indeed positively influenced by exercise. One experiment even transferred T cells from exercising mice to untrained mice and saw improved tumor reduction responses.

Another reason for us to stay physically active, I guess.

Learn more details about this study over at New Atlas.

(Image Credit: intographics/ Pixabay)

This is the A la Ronde, a house built by cousins Jane and Mary Parminter in 1796. With its numerous windows scattered across its walls, this house never fails to see the light of day, literally!

On the outside, the house looks rather strange. But on the inside, it is magnificent.

The house… [consists] of 20 rooms distributed in three floors. The ground floor originally housed the staff quarters, the wine cellar, a strong room and the kitchen, while the first floor was for the ladies. At the center of the house is an octagonal hallway with eight doors leading into as many rooms arranged radially. The rooms are connected with each other so it’s possible to make a complete circuit of these rooms without entering the octagon itself. This was important, because Jane and Mary liked to move about from one room to another following the warmth of the sun. They would start with breakfast [in] the east-facing room and then move around to finish with tea in an oval room on the west in the evening.

But the house isn’t the only thing amazing in this story. How this house was passed on to its next owners was amazing, too.

Jane Parminter died in 1811 and was buried in the tiny chapel on land adjoining A la Ronde. Mary continued to live at A la Ronde until her death in 1849. Her will specifically stated that the property must be inherited only by “unmarried kinswomen”.

Until 1991, there was only one man who got to own the house, and that was when a woman named Stella Reichel made legal changes to the will, which allowed her brother, Reverend Oswald Reichel, to co-own the house. After that instance, the house went back once again to female hands.

Learn more about the A la Ronde over at Amusing Planet.

(Image Credit: xlibber/ Wikimedia Commons)

Cats have always been our overlords, perhaps ever since the beginning of time. Because they are our lords, they deserve our time, our love, our worship, and our service. They also deserve glorious homes, and those were just what these people gave to them.

See the majestic cat castles made out of cardboard over at Sad and Useless.

(Image Credit: Sad And Useless)

We think that life in outer space is nothing but a faraway dream. However, there are some humans who live in outer space thanks to the International Space Station (ISS). The ISS hovers over Earth and gives life support to people who are working in space every day since November 2, 2000. National Geographic details the long history of life and work on the ISS. Check the full piece here. 

image via National Geographic

Suzanne Brewer, an architect, designed this amazing wheelchair for her son, Jarvis. The idea came to her when a man using a wheelchair in a bar couldn't get high enough to reach a drink from a bartender. What if the chair itself could lift up?

The Walking Wheelchair is the result of her search for a solution. Although young Jarvis isn't drinking in bars (as far as I can tell), he can now reach high objects that were previously inaccessible.

-via Nag on the Lake

Sometimes the ‘inspirational quotes’ we see all over social media sites can be annoying. From the daily ‘good quotes’ your relatives may share on Facebook to the different motivational words from famous people you see in other sites. Do they always hit you and motivate you for the rest of the day, or do they just annoy you with how cliche they are? Well, if you’re annoyed, here’s a new set of quotes that may give you a laugh: pessimistic quotes. BoredPanda lists some few of these ‘unspirational’ quotes from Instagram. Check the full piece here. 

Image via BoredPanda 

The answer? Nobody knows. But maybe this image from the American Museum of Natural History, which was created via computer simulation, might help us to at least visualize how this unknown substance is spread across the whole Universe.

The gravity of unseen dark matter is the leading explanation for why galaxies rotate so fast, why galaxies orbit clusters so fast, why gravitational lenses so strongly deflect light, and why visible matter is distributed as it is both in the local universe and on the cosmic microwave background.

[...]

In this frame from a detailed computer simulation, complex filaments of dark matter, shown in black, are strewn about the universe like spider webs, while the relatively rare clumps of familiar baryonic matter are colored orange. These simulations are good statistical matches to astronomical observations.

It’s kind of cool, and at the same time scary, to see how our universe is filled with, and is influenced, by an unknown substance.

What are your thoughts about this one?

(Image Credit: Tom Abel & Ralf Kaehler (KIPAC, SLAC), AMNH)

For people who had one of their arms or legs immobilized, it is to be expected that the immobilized limb would become tinier than its active counterpart, due to loss of muscle mass (also called muscle wastage) in the immobilized arm. But it seems that we can reduce muscle wastage in an immobilized limb. How? By exercising the active limb.

New research from Edith Cowan University (ECU) has revealed that training one arm can improve strength and decrease muscle loss in the other arm -- without even moving it.

The findings could help to address the muscle wastage and loss of strength often experienced in an immobilised arm, such as after injury, by using eccentric exercise on the opposing arm.

Learn more about this study over at ScienceDaily.

(Image Credit: honka13/ Pixabay)

Many toy companies have sold us Baby Yoda toys, but it seems that the public’s thirst for the merchandise isn’t quenched yet. And now comes along another Baby Yoda toy. This time, it’s remote-controlled. That’s right, you can now have The Child walking around your house, and at a reasonable price, too!

Available this fall for $70, the Star Wars: The Mandalorian the Child “Real Moves Plush” stands 11 inches tall, so it’s slightly smaller than the animatronic figure used in the series. Mattel still managed to stuff it full of electronics, including authentic sound effects and motors to bring it to life.

The Child’s head can turn from side to side, and look up and down while it’s giant ears wiggle, and all the mechanisms are hidden under a flexible outer skin, which makes sense when you say it, but out of context feels like a horrifying thing to say about a baby. His tiny, snuggly robes can also be further adorned with an included Mythosaur skull pendant, like the one gifted to him by Din Djarin at the end of the first season.

Would you buy one?

(Image Credit: Mattel/ Gizmodo)

It’s an entirely different experience to play a horror game than to watch a horror movie, and I believe that the former is a more terrifying experience than the latter. In a horror movie, you just watch the story unfold. In a horror game, the experience is more immersive — you get to participate in the story as the character. The result is something more intense than what horror movies can offer.

Over the years, various developers have released their respective horror games on the market, and many of them have become hits. 

Kotaku has interviewed a few gamers and asked them the question: “what’s a game that really scared you?” For some, it was Resident Evil. For others, it was Silent Hill. 

More about this over at the site.

How about you? What game scared you the most?

(Image Credit: QuinceCreative/ Pixabay)

Steven Novak of Dallas, Texas, went all out with his Halloween decorations this year, turning his front yard into the scene of a gruesome multiple murder. Several bodies plus disembodied parts are laid out among puddles of blood and gore, while zombies are at the window, trying to get out.

“I’m most proud of the wheelbarrow tipped over by the street full of Hefty bags, looking like a failed attempt to dispose of the dismembered bodies in the middle of the night.” Novak says. “A kid walked by and asked me what happened to them; I said they ate too many Skittles.”

Officers from the Dallas Police Department have gone to the home numerous times, responding to calls from those who drive or walk by. He said the cops are cool with it, but they have to respond to each call. Read more at the Dallas Observer. You can see additional pictures at Facebook here and here. -via Boing Boing

(Image credit: Steven Novak)

Scientists have grown human brain tissue from stem cells, producing tiny clumps of tissue called organoids. Neuroscientist Alysson Muotri is among many scientists who have used such organoids for all kinds of research.

But one experiment has drawn more scrutiny than the others. In August 2019, Muotri’s group published a paper in Cell Stem Cell reporting the creation of human brain organoids that produced coordinated waves of activity, resembling those seen in premature babies1. The waves continued for months before the team shut the experiment down.

This type of brain-wide, coordinated electrical activity is one of the properties of a conscious brain. The team’s finding led ethicists and scientists to raise a host of moral and philosophical questions about whether organoids should be allowed to reach this level of advanced development, whether ‘conscious’ organoids might be entitled to special treatment and rights not afforded to other clumps of cells and the possibility that consciousness could be created from scratch.

Now ethicists are trying to create guidelines for lab-grown brain organoids. Some scientists would welcome the possibility of producing a conscious brain from stem cells, while others shudder at the moral implications. How developed can a brain get before it is unethical to use it for experiments? And how do you measure consciousness when a brain has no way to communicate? How do we even define consciousness for this purpose? Read some deep thoughts about lab-grown brains that may or may not have their own deep thoughts at Nature. -via Damn Interesting

(Image credit: Fabio Buonocore)