Question: Beyond the safe cocoon of Earth, how hostile an environment for humans is "outer space"?
Answer: Dark and fierce -- the most unforgiving Himalayan peaks are nursery-school friendly by comparison, says Bob Berman in "Cosmic Adventure." Invisible apple-seed-size meteorites streak through the void at speeds 20 times faster than bullets, able to puncture a space suit like a knife and pass through a body as through a cloud of fog.The sun's searing ultraviolet rays would burn exposed skin within seconds, cook it to carbon in three minutes. The sunward side of an unprotected body would heat like a microwave to 250 degrees F while the shady side rapidly froze to minus 240, "cracking" the skin into solid ice.
Take a space entourage near Jupiter, and the cyclotron-level radiation would sterilize all living tissue. Near a
star, bodies would immediately blister, char and then vaporize. Near a white dwarf or neutron star, "tidal effects would rip one's skeleton to pieces."
But most of space is simply dark and cold, where a person, of mostly water, would turn into a block of ice that, if struck by drifting debris, would "shatter into pieces, perhaps dividing itself along internal 'fault structures' defined by organs and tissues."
Question: Is there any scientific explanation for love -- like why it happens between strangers?
Answer: There are laws of love just as there are laws of any natural phenomenon, answers psychologist Phillip Shaver:
1. Romantic love, once thought to be largely Western, is now known to be universal, although it is not always -- maybe not even usually -- the basis for matrimony. "In cultures where parents or other authorities arrange marriages, love is often viewed as dangerous and foolish. Hence the popularity of Romeo and Juliet stories."
2. Early attachment is key, with the same bonds that grow between infant and caregivers being carried forward into adulthood and shaping romantic love, says psychologist Chris Fraley. Thus adult lovers indulge in touching, kissing, "baby-talk," playful flirting.
3. Married couples tend to be similar in age, attitudes, social status, political views, religion, body build, looks, even height and eye color. Scores of studies show that the opposite of "opposites attract" is true!
4. People raised together, as in a kibbutz, generally don't intermarry, perhaps a natural way of avoiding genetic ill-effects of incest, says Shaver. Part of the "rush" of falling for a stranger is self-expansion as the other's best traits are incorporated into oneself.
5. Are marriages made in heaven? They're made in the neighborhood as people whose paths cross again and again grow familiar, then fond, then familial. Sometimes the process can backfire, relates psychologist David Myers. Just ask the Taiwanese man who wrote 700 please-marry-me letters to his girlfriend. "She did marry -- the mail carrier."
Question: How deep go the roots of that fast-food icon, the Big Mac?
Answer: At the heart of it are two ground-beef patties whose cooked meat flavors would have been familiar to Homo erectus in Africa 1.6 million years ago, says anthropologist David B. Givens. The browning releases chemicals that provide the complex chocolaty, nutty, fruity and caramel-like tastes we humans prefer to bland raw flesh.
The bread, meat and veggie combo is ancient, with the first oven-cooked bread invented by the Greeks and served open-faced with toppings -- a pizza precursor.
Moisturizing meat sauces, too, are millennia old.
Altogether, a Big Mac lacks the subtlety of cabernet, truffles and haute cuisine, concludes Givens. Fast food is "low brain" stuff -- basic salty, sour and sweet -- feeding the ancient hungry reptile in us.
Send STRANGE questions to brothers Bill and Rich at strangetrue@compuserve.com