(Image: Paul McDevitt)
Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more
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A cutting riposte
IT IS a situation that many readers will relate to. Howard Bobry writes to say, “I find myself in need of a phrase that concisely says ‘this is so incredibly stupid that it’s difficult to respond’.”
The backstory: the composite boards in his outdoor decking are curling up at the ends due to moisture absorption. Having brought this up with the manufacturer, they offered a solution: replacement boards, the ends of which he could trim off to forestall any future curling.
“This is a bit like saying that as one could fall from a height of 100 metres and suffer no injury for the first 98 metres, it is safe to jump from 98 metres,” says Howard. “Tempting as it is to tell my correspondent to go take that leap, I wonder if anyone can suggest a pithy response.”
Mark Caldwell is perplexed by Virgin Trains’ new delivery service, which has a of “120×300cm”. Maybe they route via Flatland?
Genetic algorithm breaches code
GENOTYPING service 23andMe sequences customers’ DNA for the purposes of medical insight, ancestry and presumably entertainment. To allow users to access their genome in ever-more novel ways, the company also created an interface that allows anyone to write software that explores an individual’s 23andMe data set.
Step in a mischievous coder going by the moniker “offensive-computing”, who created ““, a tool that will allow websites to filter users based on their genetic traits. 23andMe immediately blocked it from accessing their interface their rules on promoting hate.
Perhaps offensive-computing will have better luck selling the code to more traditional strongholds of, uh, exclusivity, such as the Garrick Club in London – whose patrons voted last month to continue the club’s 184-year ban on double-X-chromosome members.
Bamboozled by carbon claims
WEIGHING heavily on Ian McLean’s mind is the surprising discovery that his environmentally friendly laundry detergent scrubs more than just stains. The packaging announces that “every kilogram of this plastic captures and stores ~2 kilograms of CO2 from the atmosphere”.
Feedback thinks this must present a real headache for delivery: how much does a carrier charge for packs of detergent that grow heavier en route to the store? And will supermarkets need to be cautioned that shelves may topple as the packs gradually triple in weight?
The answer, of sorts, is that EcoStore “Carbon Capture Paks” are made from bamboo-derived plastic. By absorbing CO2 as bamboo and turning the fibre into a plastic bottle of detergent, the company claims to be carbon-positive.
Yet we struggle to see how this is any more carbon-positive than oil-derived plastic, which does the same thing, albeit on a million-year timescale. And we’re still none the wiser as to how one kilogram of packaging can contain two kilograms of carbon dioxide.
Crime stats shooting up
IT’S NOT new to point out that the US has a gun problem, although the country’s politicians are still hotly debating whether that problem is an excess of guns or an insufficient number of them.
Even so, Matt Ashmore is alarmed by a statistic published in The Daily Telegraph, which reports that the US gun murder rate of “3.55 deaths per capita is a staggeringly high figure”. , says Matt, who thinks three-and-a-half murders per year for every man, woman and child in the country “is really quite unsustainable”.
Memorial stone
THANKS to Lewis Perdue, who draws our attention to the brief obituary in Nature for David Raup, a highly influential palaeontologist who specialised in extinctions. At the age of 82, he probably didn’t quite deserve the headline “Fossil scientist dies”.
Russell’s rogan josh
DOES the set of all sets that contain spices contain itself? So wonders a colleague, who spotted this recursive ingredient list on a jar of curry paste: “Ground Spices (20%) [Turmeric (5%), Paprika (4%), Cumin, Coriander (3.5%), Spices]”.
Perhaps the spices inside the square brackets are distinct from the spices outside, which are ground, she reasons. But if they aren’t ground, how could they be contained within the ingredients list for ground spices?
Further to that, what makes cumin so special that it can be acknowledged, despite – presumably – only being present in amounts as insignificant as the unnamed spices? “The longer I looked, the more confused I got,” our colleague laments.
Feedback estimates that if the spice list truly is self-referential, there should be an endless amount of spice in the curry, making the paste extremely tasty and very good value. Sadly our colleague reports that the resulting dish “didn’t taste infinitely spicy at all”.
A handy feature
JUST in time for summer, our attention is drawn by Hugh James to an for the Gtech 18V Cordless Hedge Trimmer and Branch Cutter. Users are assured that “a built-in safety switch prevents accidental starting, and the blades will stop when you take one hand off.”
“Oh well,” says Mark, “I suppose you can always complete the hedge with the other.”
