incrackandwhite - Tumblr blog

[incrackandwhite]

Idk how people got "you're supposed to feel bad about Oppenheimer:'c" from the Nolan movie. Mee and my friends left the theater with the idea that he was a terrible person who did horrible things, if you're incapable of analyzing a movie critically and need to be spoon fed "this character did a bad" then it's not the fault of the movie

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How did the snakes we know now get so small compared to the titan boa

that question is actually a little backwards- only once in their entire 65+ million year history have snakes EVER achieved the massive size of the titanoboa, and a couple of unlikely factors had to align absolutely perfectly for it to happen!

first, there had to be an open niche for a gigantic superpredator without any competition at all to allow the tiny existing snakes time to evolve into the role- and this happens less often than you think! an opening this size requires major ecosystem disruption to produce, but luckily (?) for titanoboa, its stars aligned somewhat literally when a meteor descended from the heavens to wipe out the competition and murder not only the nonavian dinosaurs, but most of the other contenders that could have quickly evolved to fill the newly-vacant superpredator niche had they not all died in a horrific fiery world-ending catastrophe! 

“oh shit! my ecological niche!” <art src: Donald E Davis>

(snakes, by the way, survived due to their ability to burrow and hibernate through the worst of it. when in doubt, snooze it out!)

and second, it turns out that in order to produce a 50-foot snake, you need a LOT of heat and humidity- and the titanoboa evolved during a period in earth’s history when the environment was much warmer and wetter than it is now. just an absolute sauna. (with giant snakes in it, watch out)

these two factors combined to produce a once-in-a-hundred-million-years event and allowed the titanoboa to evolve and reign absolutely supreme over its humid rainforest environment... until the climate crashed again just a couple million years later and brought an abrupt and chilly end to the age of the giant snakes.

au revoir, you beautiful bastard.

<art src: DarrenPepper>

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Where do humans rate on the “big animals” scale? Are we big or small

this may surprise you but humans are in fact Very Large, verging on Megafauna! 

humans are actually the second-largest of the great apes, outmassed only by gorillas! you yourself, dear reader, are statistically likely to outmass an adult male chimpanzee. in case that was something you were curious about.

(that’s a jealous face if I ever saw one)

but also, most of the animal life on our planet is cat-sized or smaller! sure insects are throwing the scale off, but the fact of life is that small creatures outnumber the large ones by several orders of magnitude. animals above the 100-pound range need a LOT of resources, so there are naturally pretty few of them around compared to the millions of smaller creatures living their quiet lives in the undergrowth!

...unless you happen to be a human, in which case you can share your smugness about your stature with 7 billion of your closest friends.

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so the megalodon is most definitely extinct? how do scientists know?

well, the thing about large predators is that they leave an impact on an ecosystem big enough that you can tell they’re there, even if you never observe one directly. in this case, we know they’re definitely extinct because of the behavior of whales! whales used to max out at about 50 ft long and were fast and agile, entirely because of predation by megalodon!

but about 2 million years ago, our whales began to rapidly increase in size until we ended up with real monsters like the blue whale. this pretty directly lines up with the extinction of megalodon, and the removal of the pressure they were putting on large whale populations.

basically, large whales can get away with being gigantic, slow tanks in the oceans today because there simply isn’t a predator big enough to take them on anymore. if megalodon still existed, we would be seeing its impact on whale populations! whales would be smaller, and a hell of a lot more skittish than they are.

everything in a given ecosystem is connected, and you can often get important information about the unknown parts by observing the behavior of other parts of the ecosystem.

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Are bears just.... undomesticatable

My friend and I were talking about it today, how humans will pet anything and domesticate anything even remotely friend shaped...so what happened with bears?

I mean we tamed wolves and big cats (domesticated themselves but ya know) oxen, deer and birds, wild boar....why never did we make tiny lovable bears?

well, the shortest answer to that is that domestication isn't really something we did TO animals, it's a process that happens over time that requires work from both ends! it's a two-way-street, so to speak.

see, for domestication to really work, the domesticated species has to actually need something from humans that they then get when they enter a partnership with us.

for dogs? companionship, food, shelter, safety of the group, and assistance with child rearing and territory defense.

for cats? access to a steady food supply, shelter and safe places to rear their young, companionship.

for horses? protection, safety and shelter, healing of injuries and illnesses, and a constant sense of reassurance.

for livestock animals like cows, pigs, and goats? guaranteed safety, healing of injuries and illnesses, assurance of producing young in a safe place, and an eventual swift mostly-painless death free of the agonies of the wilder food chain.

but bears?

bears don't want anything from us. bears don't NEED anything from us. they'll eat our trash, but they're just as happy pulling salmon out of a river somewhere.

they don't have any use for human protection or shelter. they'll eat you if they think it's a valid option on the table. (pun intended)

so no, no matter how much you might like a domesticated grizzly to cuddle up to on cold nights, they're just not interested and so it will never happen.

and that's okay! there are some animals that we just don't have anything to offer to, and it's good to acknowledge that.

bears belong in the wild.

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Cool wolf facts?

arctic wolves are very chill animals, literally! these bad boys can tolerate winter temperatures as low as -70 F, which is especially impressive since they stay active the whole time and don’t hibernate.

*slaps roof of wolf* AND IT COMES WITH ALL-WEATHER TREADS, TOO

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taylor swift albums + text posts

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sometimes i think about how after her first record came out taylor swift would open for big country musicians and stay till the middle of the night in the venues to say hi and give autographs to anyone who wanted to meet her. sometimes i think about taylor swift on her first headlining tour looking out for kids in her merch, literally stopping her car to greet them. sometimes i think about how a kid met her at a grocery store but had no camera so taylor took a picture of them herself and then mailed it to her. sometimes i think about how she never held a paid meet and greet in her entire career. sometimes i think about how in the macy's meet and greet when wonderstruck came out a little kid got too nervous to go up to her in the little stage that was set up for taking pictures so taylor came down to say hi. sometimes i think about taylor swift being understandably uncomfortable about people waiting outside her home to meet her but being kind and taking pictures when there's small children because they're not responsible for their parents' invasion of privacy. sometimes i think about taylor swift telling “shut up” and standing up to her security team to say hello to fans

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this is the first time i've felt the need to confess

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eras tour setlist (detailed)

miss americana & the heartbreak prince (NOT full song)

cruel summer (chorus, bridge, chorus)

welcome/she's so happy to be on stage again + spoken introduction into

the man (full song)

you need to calm down (verse 2, chorus, bridge, chorus)

longer welcome speech, eras tour night 1, thanking fans for showing up & celebrating opening acts. telling crowd we're doing one era at a time!!!!

lover (full song) acoustic guitar

the archer (full song) + electric guitar solo for costume change

fearless (full song)

you belong with me (full song)

love story (full song)

video interlude - showing woods/trees - for costume change

'tis the damn season (verse 1, chorus, bridge, chorus)

willow (full song)

marjorie (verse 1, chorus, bridge, outro)

speech/ it's been so long that she's toured and so much has happened since (new albums + rerecordings) & she's missed us. says she loves evermore despite what people on tiktok think

champagne problems (full song) acoustic piano

introduction of new keys player

tolerate it (verse 1, chorus, bridge, 2nd chorus, outro)

snake video/visuals for costume change

...ready for it (full song)

delicate (full song)

don't blame me (intro, verse 1, chorus, bridge, chorus, outro) + extended outro leading into lwymmd

look what you made me do (full song)

snake visual + abstract pink/purple colors + enchanted audio intro for costume change

enchanted (verses 1 & 2, chorus, bridge, chorus, outro)

video interlude with red audio snippets

22 (whole song)

we are never ever getting back together (full song)

i knew you were trouble (verse 1, chorus, bridge, final chorus)

speech about the red album & taylor's version

all too well (full 10 minute song) acoustic guitar

interlude: spoken wildest dreams lyrics/spoken seven lyrics - for costume change

invisible string (full song)

speech talking about folklore album & wanting to do something different than autobiographical albums

betty (full song) acoustic guitar

the last great american dynasty (full song)

august (full song)

illicit affairs (bridge repeated twice, outro)

my tears ricochet (full song)

cardigan (full song)

interlude for costume change

style (verse 1, chorus, bridge, chorus)

blank space (full song)

shake it off (full song)

wildest dreams (verse 1, chorus, bridge)

bad blood (chorus, pre-chorus & chorus, bridge, final chorus)

interlude for costume change

speech - introducing surprise song & her goal is not to repeat any of these songs on tour

surprise song: mirrorball (full song) acoustic guitar

another speech at piano (my live cut out though so idk what she was talking about)

tim mcgraw (full song) piano acoustic

interlude - water/crashing waves turning into clouds

lavender haze (full song)

anti-hero (full song)

midnight rain (full song)

vigilante shit (full song)

bejeweled (full song)

mastermind (full song)

final song: karma (full song) + farewells & final bows

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"oh my god you know this one" baby girl i could recite your discography backwards and forwards in my sleep what are you talking about

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gold rush || surprise song #2 || philly night 1 (may 12, 2023)

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while i understand why a lot of sci-fi has humans being shitty to AIs while the AIs are like “i am just existing what the fuck” I think it’d be fun to do the opposite. Homo “will packbond with anything” sapiens DESPERATELY trying to get the favor and friendship of an Artificial Intelligence that is mostly indifferent to them. They want the ship’s computer to like them sooooo fucking bad!!

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have you guys heard about this new video game? it’s called microsoft outlook and it fucking sucks 👍