Many groups and organizations practice some type of hazing as an initiation rite. Military units, gangs, and sports teams are just a few of the groups known to have inflicted hazing rituals on their prospective members. However, it is university fraternities that are most often associated with hazing. Usually, hazing consists of a couple pranks

According to the idea of the “butterfly effect,” even the smallest causes can have large, unforeseen consequences. The term itself came courtesy of MIT meteorology professor Edward Lorenz. He used a computer program to simulate weather patterns with a dozen variables over long periods of time. Lorenz noticed that just rounding off one variable from

A common motif in art of the Middle Ages is that of the Wheel of Fate. A spoked wheel is shown with a king sitting at the top. As the wheel turns, the king is toppled from his place and shown as a beggar crushed by the turn of fate. Of course, the other side

Everyone likes to receive a gift every now and again, especially if it’s from someone we love. With the exception of cats bringing dead prey that we probably aren’t going to eat, animals aren’t exactly known for their gift-giving skills. But as we will see here, it appears that many animals are fond of giving

When it comes to making discoveries, the public has a huge advantage over professionals—they are everywhere. Every day, people work and play outside in every imaginable environment. Tourists and hikers explore difficult corners of the world, and homeowners dig more trenches than archaeologists. The latter make the headlines more often. But ordinary civilians frequently stumble

Eat your vegetables. Sleep eight hours a day. Exercise. There are so many truisms about staying healthy that we sometimes don’t use due diligence in determining if the advice given to us is even true. Then there are the old wives’ tales, passed down from one generation to the next, that often disregard the difference

Children think differently than adults. They don’t fully understand how the world works yet, so they see things in a completely different light. This, however, doesn’t last long. It’s believed that by around the age of 11, children have most of the mental abilities of adults; they just lack the experience or knowledge to put

Beer is at least 10,000 years old, with ancient tablet inscriptions discussing it as far back as 3400 BC. Obviously, people have been getting drunk for an incredibly long time. In fact, the history of beer provides us with both a fun and fruitful window into long-dead cultures of the past and how they behaved.