tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1990338437877873686.post8656984991083359080..comments2024-03-29T03:36:27.656-04:00Comments on Murder is Everywhere: Tycho Brahe (1546-1601)Ovidia Yuhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05749549092493567689noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1990338437877873686.post-33081980526377983302010-08-06T15:11:03.772-04:002010-08-06T15:11:03.772-04:00A copper nose? Happens every day
A clairvoyant dw...A copper nose? Happens every day<br /><br />A clairvoyant dwarf? A dime a dozen. But a copper nose <b>and</b> a clairvoyant dwarf? Now, that's something.<br />==========================<br /> Detectives Beyond Borders<br />"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"<br /> <a href="http://www.detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/</a>Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1990338437877873686.post-68057816601917618222010-08-05T20:00:01.117-04:002010-08-05T20:00:01.117-04:00Oh, I loved this post. Tycho Brahe is one of my h...Oh, I loved this post. Tycho Brahe is one of my heroes -- he made those observations without a telescope. I've often wished I could have been there when his inebriated moose fell down the stairs (no cards or letters, PETA members, please). I'll bet he had a gold nose for formal occasions. I certainly would have.Timothy Hallinanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00551263887774445511noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1990338437877873686.post-36343810518842292652010-08-05T14:23:24.636-04:002010-08-05T14:23:24.636-04:00I really enjoyed this post! It reminded me of a bo...I really enjoyed this post! It reminded me of a book I recently found out about by Sam Kean, called The Disappearing Spoon. Here's a link to some info & excerpt. Below is the mercury related bit that jogged my memory. Hope you enjoy! http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128588187 <br />''For a long time, I kept an eye out for element eighty at school and in books, as you might watch for a childhood friend’s name in the newspaper. I’m from the Great Plains and had learned in history class that Lewis and Clark had trekked through South Dakota and the rest of the Louisiana Territory with a microscope, compasses, sextants, three mercury thermometers, and other instruments. What I didn’t know at first is that they also carried with them six hundred mercury laxatives, each four times the size of an aspirin. The laxatives were called Dr. Rush’s Bilious Pills, after Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and a medical hero for bravely staying in Philadelphia during a yellow fever epidemic in 1793. His pet treatment, for any disease, was a mercury-chloride sludge administered orally. Despite the progress medicine made overall between 1400 and 1800, doctors in that era remained closer to medicine men than medical men. With a sort of sympathetic magic, they figured that beautiful, alluring mercury could cure patients by bringing them to an ugly crisis — poison fighting poison. Dr. Rush made patients ingest the solution until they drooled, and often people’s teeth and hair fell out after weeks or months of continuous treatment. His “cure” no doubt poisoned or outright killed swaths of people whom yellow fever might have spared. Even so, having perfected his treatment in Philadelphia, ten years later he sent Meriwether and William off with some prepackaged samples. As a handy side effect, Dr. Rush’s pills have enabled modern archaeologists to track down campsites used by the explorers. With the weird food and questionable water they encountered in the wild, someone in their party was always queasy, and to this day, mercury deposits dot the soil many places where the gang dug a latrine, perhaps after one of Dr. Rush’s “Thunderclappers” had worked a little too well.''Vibrant Irelandhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07494376097026503961noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1990338437877873686.post-23842096286040820412010-08-04T20:50:15.230-04:002010-08-04T20:50:15.230-04:00My wife and I, Yrsa, loved your post - as we alway...My wife and I, Yrsa, loved your post - as we always do. And we've both mentioned it on Facebook, because we want others to have the same pleasure.<br /><br />Beth, thank you for the comment about FINNEGAN'S WAKE. Boy, did that resonate with me!<br />How many times (sigh) have I tried to get to the end of one of Joyce's books - and failed?<br />Ten?<br />Twenty?<br />I have no doubt that Sylvia Beach and Joseph Campbell truly enjoyed FINNEGAN'S WAKE.<br />But I have grave suspicions about the veracity of anyone else who claims they did.Leighton Gagehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09788807904434180290noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1990338437877873686.post-11440626348353287212010-08-04T20:01:03.307-04:002010-08-04T20:01:03.307-04:00Yrsa, would you consider being a high school scien...Yrsa, would you consider being a high school science teacher? How about writing some text books? Imagine the students who would pursue the sciences just to hear more stories about scientists with metal noses and parents who might have made an outrageous promise when they were drunk. They'd pay attention while you talked about planetary motion in case you have more to say about being drunk.<br /><br />As to Stephen Hawking, I fell for the story that A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME is a book that enables the average person to understand the cosmos and particle physics. I learned within a few pages that I am not average; I didn't understand a word. I put people who claim to have learned from, and enjoyed, Hawking's book into the same category as those who say they read and enjoyed FINNEGAN'S WAKE.<br /><br />BethAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1990338437877873686.post-35949545731424393532010-08-04T19:00:43.038-04:002010-08-04T19:00:43.038-04:00Hi Yrsa,
I am from the Nordic/british/irish/euro...Hi Yrsa, <br />I am from the Nordic/british/irish/euro mystery group at amazon.com. You have spoken to us before. A few of our wonderful readers have read your latest book. As soon as I get a hold of it, I will read it in a day. So I will wait a little and treat it as a christmas present. Anyways, we love your books and your wonderful articles here that show us your true colorful, comical nature.<br />I love this article. I always find science fascinating and I love when humor and life experiences are added to the actual facts.<br />How is your volcano? Still spewing? I will have to research the latest.<br />(I have adored and admired and laughed with Thora from day one and page one!!)anna kleinnoreply@blogger.com