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Groovy! Dive into the world’s largest online slang dictionary
Language can’t stay still for long. It’s constantly evolving alongside the cultures that use them—and slang frequently showcases this complex relationship at its most creative, playful, and strange. While some terms or phrases may linger for centuries, most of today’s slang terminology is more current. That often makes it difficult to keep up with the times, let alone understand casual communications of the past.
That’s where Jonathon Green came to the rescue. In 1993, Green started compiling 500 years of English slang by sifting through mountains of primary sources. The culmination was Green’s Dictionary of Slang, a three-volume reference set containing 10.3 million words over 53,000 separate entries. It was first published in 2010, but the printed reference tomes are out-of-date and out-of-print only 16 years later. Today, an original copy of Green’s Dictionary can easily set you back over $1,300.
Like slang itself, Green is for the people. Following a few more years of work, the lexicographer—a studier or compiler of dictionaries—transferred his entire project online for anyone to peruse. As Open Culture recently highlighted, Green’s Dictionary of Slang is now available for free as its own, regularly updated website. Not only that, but it includes more than 60,000 additional quotations along with 2,500 new entries and sub-entries. The site also contains search tools as well as a predictably gigantic source bibliography. For an additional subscription fee, users can also gain access to additional citations and advanced search options.
“Language does not reach an end, nor does research,” Green wrote in his original introduction to the website in 2016. “GDoS Online is therefore a project in continual development. As well as the natural expansion of the material on offer, it is our intention to add to the way the information is displayed, both as to quality and quantity.”
With a little persistence, regular perusal of Green’s Dictionary may help revive some long forgotten gems: it’s well worth your next stoppo, if nothing else.
The post Groovy! Dive into the world’s largest online slang dictionary appeared first on Popular Science.
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A Tyrannosaurus tooth embedded in dinosaur skull tells a violent story
A rare dinosaur fossil on display at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Montana, tells a gory story. The skull from a large plant-eating Edmontosaurus has a tooth lodged into it, indicating that it may have met its final moments as a meal. The tooth in question belongs to one of the most famous dinosaurs on earth—Tyrannosaurus.
Montana was once home to Tyrannosaurus rex, the most famous of several known members of the fearsome Tyrannosauridae family. This apex predator stomped around until the end of the Age of Dinosaurs, roughly 66 million years ago. It lived alongside large plant-eaters like Triceratops and the duck-billed Edmontosaurus.
In 2005, paleontologists found a nearly complete Edmontosaurus skull in the fossil-rich Hell Creek Formation in eastern Montana. Now on display at the museum, a reexamination of the skull revealed one striking detail: a Tyrannosaurus tooth stuck inside its face. The findings are detailed in a study published today in the journal PeerJ.
The full Edmontosaurus skull. The triangle indicates where the tooth is embedded. Image: Montana State University/Museum of the Rockies.“Although bite marks on bones are relatively common, finding an embedded tooth is extremely rare,” Taia Wyenberg-Henzler, a study co-author and University of Alberta doctoral student, said in a statement. “The great thing about an embedded tooth, particularly in a skull, is it gives you the identity of not only who was bitten but also who did the biting. This allowed us to paint a picture of what happened to this Edmontosaurus, kind of like Cretaceous crime scene investigators.”
When comparing the embedded tooth to all of the known prehistoric inhabitants in the Hell Creek Formation, they found that it closely matched teeth of Tyrannosaurus. CT scans of the skull helped the team discover more details about the wound.
“A fossil like this is extra exciting because it captures a behavior: a tyrannosaur biting into this duckbill’s face,” added co-author and Museum of the Rockies’ Curator of Paleontology John Scannella. “The skull shows no signs of healing around the tyrannosaur tooth, so it may have already been dead when it was bitten, or it may be dead because it was bitten.”
The Tyrannosaurus tooth. Image: Montana State University/Museum of the Rockies.Tyrannosaurus was one of the largest carnivores to ever walk the Earth and paleontologists have been studying their feeding habits for decades. The tooth found inside this Edmontosaurus skull gives another look into Tyrannosaurus behavior. According to the team, the way that the tooth is embedded in Edmontosaurus’ nose suggests that the duck-billed dino met its toothy attacker face-to-face. Typically, this happens to an animal that is ultimately killed by a predator.
“The amount of force necessary for a tooth to have become broken off in bone also points to the use of deadly force,” said Wyenberg-Henzler. “For me, this paints a terrifying picture of the last moments of this Edmontosaurus.”
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Chihuahua, boxer, and 10 other dog breeds at risk of breathing troubles
Despite their popularity, for their seemingly helpless-looking eyes and flat faces, short-skulled (or brachycephalic) dogs like the French bulldog often have serious difficulty breathing. A study published today in the journal PLOS One found that in 12 breeds, a flat face, collapsing nostrils, and rounded physique puts them at a higher risk for developing common breathing conditions. Pekingese and Japanese chins were noted to be the highest risk.
The study examined the risk of Brachycephalic Obstructive Airway Syndrome (BOAS) in 14 short-skulled dog breeds. Image: Anthony Lewis (www.anthony-lewis.com), PLOS, CC-BY 4.0For breeds like bulldogs and pugs, their shortened skull shape can lead to a condition called Brachycephalic Obstructive Airway Syndrome (BOAS). It causes exercise intolerance, difficulty breathing, and wheezing and can lead to surgery. Pugs, French bulldogs, and bulldogs are the most well-known and studied brachycephalic breeds, but there are several other dog breeds that could face these same issues.
“BOAS exists on a spectrum. Some dogs are only mildly affected, but for those at the more severe end, it can significantly reduce quality of life and become a serious welfare issue,” Dr. Fran Tomlinson, a study co-author for the University of Cambridge Veterinary School, said in a statement. “While surgery, weight management and other interventions can help affected dogs to some degree, BOAS is hereditary, and there is still much to learn about how we can reduce the risk in future generations.”
To better understand what characteristics predict BOAS, the team collected data from 898 dogs representing 14 different breeds, including boxers, King Charles spaniels, Chihuahuas, and Pekingese. They measured the animals’ skulls and noses, bodies and necks, and checked them for symptoms of BOAS.
They graded the dogs for BOAS on a scale from zero to three—zero indicating few symptoms and three meaning the dog had difficulty exercising and getting enough air. The team then compared the 14 breeds to pugs, French bulldogs, and bulldogs.
Pekingese had a rate of BOAS similar to bulldogs, with only 11 percent of pekingese dogs breathing freely. The Japanese chin also fared poorly, with only 17.4 percent free of symptoms. The King Charles spaniel, shih tzu and Boston terrier had between 25 and 50 percent of dogs at grade zero. The Cavalier King Charles spaniel, Pomeranian, boxer, and Chihuahua fared best, with between 50 and 75 percent of dogs at grade zero.
Four Boston terrier study participants with (from left to right) study authors Dr. David Sargan, Dr. Fran Tomlinson, and Dr. Jane Ladlow, all from the Cambridge Veterinary School. Image: Fran Tomlinson.The two breeds at a high risk for BOAS—the Pekingese and Japanese chin—had high rates of nostril narrowing, with about 6 percent and 18 percent of dogs respectively having open nostrils.
According to the team, this shows that BOAS varies widely amongst brachycephalic breeds. Understanding the differences and pinpointing key risk factors could help scientists develop more targeted and effective strategies to help dogs at risk.
“This research would not have been possible without the support of dedicated owners and breeders who volunteered their dogs to take part,” the authors add. “Their enthusiasm and willingness to engage with health testing highlights how much people care about improving breed health.”
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Biologists discover gene that may determine ‘good’ and ‘bad’ dads
Most mammals grow up in single parent homes. It’s estimated that over 95 percent of the planet’s nearly 6,000 known mammalian species rely almost exclusively on mothers to nurture and raise their offspring. But even when dads stick around, it’s not always smooth sailing. Fatherhood can range from attentive and caring to downright violent behaviors—but why this spectrum exists remains largely a mystery to evolutionary biologists.
Take the African striped mouse (Rhabdomys pumilio), for instance. Males can exhibit diverse responses to their young after becoming fathers. Particularly caring mice dads will groom their pups and even insulate them with their bellies against inclement weather. Meanwhile, other fathers may ignore or hurt a litter’s weaker siblings.
Although a simplified example, the striped mouse can serve as a proxy for other mammals including humans. Knowing this, researchers at Princeton University recently investigated the neurological underpinnings of rodent fatherhood. Their new study published today in the journal Nature indicates that a specific molecular group inside the brain may largely determine how dads react to their progeny.
To learn more, the team recorded the neural activity of male striped mice when placed in various situations both with and without pups. They soon noticed that neural activity in the brain’s medial preoptic area (MPOA) increased whenever the males encountered a young mouse. These MPOA spikes weren’t uniform, however. Higher activity in the region corresponded with helpfulness, while lower recordings aligned with hostility. Although this isn’t the first time that biologists noted MPOA’s relation to parenting, past research largely linked it to rodent females after becoming mothers.
“But in the case of these males, it’s not pregnancy or even parenthood that transforms their brains,” Forrest Rogers, a neuroscientist and study co-author, said in a statement. “Bachelors can be just as capable of caring as experienced dads.”
Rogers and his colleagues noticed MPOA was not the only area that tied to parenting. Surprisingly, the more caring mice dads also displayed lower levels of a gene called Agouti. This gene is typically known for its influence on metabolism and skin pigmentation, not fatherhood.
“Discovering this previously unknown role in the brain for parenting behavior was exciting,” said Rogers.
After finding this new link, researchers wanted to know what conditions influenced Agouti gene expression in the MPOA. Contrary to what one may initially assume, they found that solitary males possessed low levels of Agouti compared to males who lived in groups. Especially high levels also sometimes muted neural activity in the MPOA.
Artificially boosting Agouti through gene therapy reinforced these observations, too. Male mice who were previously nurturing became less interested or even volatile towards pups if they produced more Agouti. As a remedy, the team later relocated some of these males from communal to solitary living conditions. This naturally lowered their Agouti levels, making them more interested in the mice pups again.
“Our findings point to Agouti as a potential evolutionary mechanism that allows animals to integrate environmental information, such as social competition or population density, and adjust the balance between self-preservation and investment in offspring,” added study co-author and neuroscientist Catherine Peña.
Forrest, Peña, and their collaborators are still interested in examining which specific environmental factors may influence Agouti levels in mammals like striped mice and humans. At the same time, they warned against viewing their findings as a one-size-fits-all solution for parenting behaviors. Instead, they hope to help other researchers identify factors that may contribute to higher risks of issues like father figure neglect or abuse.
“Parenting is a complex trait. We’re not suggesting that you can take a pill to become a better parent, or that struggles with parenting reflect some molecular deficiency,” said Peña.
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Prehistoric Japan was home to cave lions—not tigers
Present-day Japan may see its fair share of bears, but the islands’ big cat populations are long gone. Between 129,000 and 11,700 years ago, temporary land bridges allowed the ancient predators to migrate between mainland Asia and the islands. Paleobiologists have long believed tigers were the primary cats to make this trek, but recently analyzed evidence published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests a different timeline.
“Our findings challenge the prevailing view that tigers once took refuge in Japan and that cave lion distribution was limited to the Russian Far East and northeast China,” explained the study’s authors. “These findings provide evidence that lions, rather than tigers, colonized the Japanese archipelago during the Late Pleistocene.”
The earliest big cats got their start in Africa around 6.4 million years ago, but it would take another 5.4 million years for the first lions to travel into northern Eurasia. While their tiger cousins largely migrated toward Eurasia’s southern regions, the predators still occasionally crossed paths in the “lion–tiger transition belt,” an area spanning portions of the Middle East through Central Asia into eastern Russia where the two intermingled.
Amid these Late Pleistocene migrations, Earth also experienced glacial periods that lowered sea levels and revealed land bridges linking Asia’s lion–tiger transition belt to the Japanese archipelago. Fossil records suggest that many tigers took advantage of these pathways, but they are not without some instances of mistaken identity. According to the study’s authors, researchers previously catalogued these big cat fossil discoveries based on morphological evidence instead of more reliable DNA data.
To double-check these past conclusions, the team reexamined a set of fossil specimens using genetic sequencing and radiocarbon dating. Although many examples are now in poor condition, five yielded enough information to facilitate lineage profiling. In each case, the “tiger” in question instead possessed molecular information aligning with a now extinct species of cave lion (Panthera spelaea). Even more striking, the team didn’t find any tiger evidence in Japan from the Late Pleistocene.
Radiocarbon analysis of one specimen indicates that it lived around 31,060 years ago, but researchers believe the first cave lions possibly arrived as far back as 72,700 years ago. It now appears the big cats also thrived on the islands for at least 20,000 years after their species went extinct in Eurasia. Researchers believe the reason for their prolonged survival is what brought them to the archipelago in the first place—the land bridges.
“This extended survival of cave lions may reflect Japan’s unique paleogeographic history,” they wrote, adding that “This finding extends the known range of cave lions in East Asia and refines our understanding of how far south the lion–tiger transition belt shifted during this period.”
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Mature Cultural Desire
A common immature attitude to desire is to assume that you are entitled to what you passionately desire, and to then cry if you don’t get it, to pressure others to give it to you. If you still don’t get it, a common response is to then declare that you’ve given up on the entire category, and just don’t care anymore.
For example, you fall in love with someone who rejects you, and then declare you are done with love, and will just live alone. Or you want a career as an actor, but then fail there, and so declare that jobs don’t matter, they are just a paycheck. Or you try to elect socialist utopian, who then betrays your hopes, so you decide it’s all corrupt, and you might as well elect partisans on your side.
A more mature stance, adopted by the wiser and more experienced, is to admit that you care a lot, but even so you can’t always get your favorite outcomes. Thus you must search carefully for the best feasible options. (LLMs confirm this overall story: 1,2,3.)
Regarding culture, the most common attitude I see is naive entitlement. Such folks fully embraced the aesthetic and moral views of their childhood, schools, associates, and entertainment sources. They see the views of folks from other times and places as just wrong, and expect history to prove their judgements right. They are typically disappointed when later generations reject many of their cultural truths.
The second most common attitude I see is among folks who have come to realize that cultures change greatly over time, and that the reasons they were given to embrace their local cultures don’t really stand up to scrutiny. In response to evidence that their culture is likely to decay and be replaced by very different ones, such folks often express indifference. They don’t care much which cultures win in the long run.
These both seem, to me, immature stances on cultures. A more mature stance is to admit that the future won’t preserve your culture by default, and that in fact it might not preserve very much of it. But then to ask what you most value in your culture, and to search for ways to preserve those best features. Even if you maybe can’t save much.
Folks with a mature stance on cultural desire are ready to help me think about how to fix cultural drift.
Capitalist ≠ Voluntary
Time for a status update on cultural drift. I’ve been pondering solutions, and now see at best only three weakly promising options. The other possible approaches seem to me at best only modest supplements to these three best solutions.
The first solution is for some rather large polity to adopt a very competent form of governance (e.g. futarchy) tied to an ex post measurable sacred goal correlated greatly with the capacity of our main world civ over the next few centuries. Citizens should see this goal as sacred so that they are proud to sacrifice for it, and ashamed to abandon it. Polls suggest some possible goals: the date when a million people live in space, or when we achieve physical immortality. This approach requires that that we find, prove, and adopt a competent form of governance, tie it to such a sacred goal, and do so for polity so large that its actions have a substantial influence on the overall chance of our main world civ achieving this goal. Yes, this seems a long shot. Futarchy to help firm cultures seems a good training ground.
The second solution requires groups where members somehow become strongly attached to the goal of group adaption itself, even though few today feel much attachment to it, or see it as remotely sacred. Yes, that seems harder, especially given the modern taboo on “social Darwinism”, but an advantage of this approach is it that can work for much smaller groups. We’d create a way to measure ex post group adaptive success in a few centuries, make market estimates today of those future measures, and then reward/punish group leaders as those estimates rise/fall. This requires substantially competent governance, and could fail if the world too strongly shares many maladaptive global norms and status markers. Yes this also seems a long shot.
While I have separate posts on the above two approaches, this is my first post on the third solution: more capitalism. Which, yes, also seems a long shot. The parts of our world that are driven by capitalism today, such as tech and commerce, seem to have healthy cultural evolution, even though they are subject to many maladaptive global norms. So the idea here is to get more parts of our world to be more driven by capitalism.
Yes, many other parts of our world, such as marriage, parenting, sex, friendship, and art, are mostly “voluntary”, but that’s not “capitalism” for my purposes here. Just as kings of old who “owned” nations were also not very “capitalist”. The issue here isn’t what choices are voluntary, or who owns what, but which behaviors are strongly directed by for-profit ventures who use the powerful tricks we’ve learned over recent centuries to manage such orgs. Tricks like as stock price signals, hostile takeovers, boards of directors, CEOs with stock options, clear performance metrics for employees, standardized job roles, and so on. These tricks, added to basic capitalist freedoms and incentives, are what let capitalism be so powerful today at enforcing and evolving adaptive behaviors.
Some examples of how capitalism might drive more behaviors:
We might pay lots to parents. For example, we could give them a transferable right to a percentage of the future tax revenue that those kids pay as adults. While parents might try to manage this by themselves, investors and for profit ventures such as boarding schools seem likely to get involved to advice, shape, and manage parenting in big ways.
We could have capitalist governance of towns, cities, or larger sized government units. This could induce much stronger adaptive incentives re policies that governments set or influence. For example, they might make citizenship transferable.
We could change bequest and charity laws to let organizations that pay low tax rates primarily hold assets and reinvest their returns. If allowed to persist for generations, such orgs would accumulate most of the world’s capital. As a result, the world would have far more capital, investment rates of return would fall to econ growth rates, and capitalism would care lot more about the long term future.
Making hostile takeovers of firms much easier would greatly increase competitive pressures to make firms efficient.
Heath and life insurers, merged together, could let people buy only cost-effective medicine.
Crime vouchers could help clients be cost-effective at avoiding committing crimes, and at punishing them if they do commit crime.
Tax career agents could help guide key life choices, such as re education, careers, or even marriages.
Note that, like the second approach above, this approach could also fail if the world too strongly shares maladaptive global norms and status markers.
While this third “capitalist” approach seems more “libertarian” than the other two, I fear it doesn’t seem libertarian enough to excite most self-identified libertarians, who likely prefer the current artisanal non-capitalist ways that we manage marriage, parenting, sex, friendship, art, etc.
What about the other approaches I’ve discussed before? AI/ems would strengthen selection pressures, but not directly address other drift issues. Spreading across stars would induce variety at the largest scales but not address within system drift. Nationalism, recently risen and now falling, seems too weak to drive sufficient competition. Deep multiculturalism seems very hard, unpopular, and only addresses the variation issue. These can at best supplement the main three approaches.
Added 15Feb: A poll finds this approach to be most favored:
Let me emphasize that all these approaches require a group or polity using them be sufficiently insular re a wider world culture’s norms and status markers.
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