Any sufficiently developed one is indistinguishable from magic. Layer of Magic
Fern - herbaceous plant, representative of the Osmundaceae family. Scientists consider Northern China, Korea, and the Far East to be its homeland. The fern is found in the forests of Russia, Ukraine, Finland, Central Asia, and Mexico. The plant is a green stem with pinnately dissected leaves (see photo). Fern is considered one of the most ancient plants on the planet, originating in the Devonian period. According to scientists, compressed fern wood became a material for coal.
In order to understand what this plant is, it is necessary to trace the stages of its development: the stem of the fern grows underground, in the spring young leaves called fronds begin to form, then the leaves grow and most resemble a huge snail, the leaves unfold and become like a hook . The fern does not bloom, but reproduces using spores.
Its scientific name Pteridium aguillinum(bracken fern) the plant received due to its resemblance to the wing of a huge bird (with Greek language preton translates as “wing”, aqulia means “eagle”).
There is a lot to do with ferns interesting legends. People were very wary of this plant because it looked very mysterious. Our ancestors did not understand how this plant reproduces if it never blooms. People looked forward to the flowering of the fern as a special holiday. According to a well-known belief, a person who finds a flower of this plant on the holiday of Ivan Kupala will be able to get incredibly rich, since on this night the earth itself opens up and shows hidden riches. In Rus' they believed that this plant could open any lock and that you couldn’t hide a single secret before a fern. According to ancient legend, the fern appeared thanks to the goddess of love Venus, supposedly she shed her beautiful hair, and this amazing plant grew from it. Another legend says that a girl fell from a cliff, and a spring appeared in that place, and her hair became a plant similar to a bird’s wing.
Useful properties
The beneficial properties of fern are due to its valuable chemical composition. The plant is rich in alkaloids, starch, essential oils, flavonoids, tannins. Fern shoots contain carotene, tocopherol (vitamin E), riboflavin, or vitamin B2. The presence of alkaloids makes the plant wonderful painkiller.
Fern contains large number proteins similar to grain protein, which is easily digestible and has a positive effect on the body. With regular use, the plant has a positive effect on growth processes.
Fern has a beneficial effect on the functioning of the nervous system, tones the body. There is evidence that the plant helps remove radionuclides from the human body.
The rhizome of the plant, which is harvested in September, is used for medicinal purposes. Fern is effective for varicose veins, inflammation of the sciatic nerve, and for cramps of the calf muscle. For these diseases, the course of treatment is 3 weeks.
Use in cooking
Fern has been used in cooking since ancient times. Only two types of ferns are used for food purposes: bracken and ostrich. The so-called rachis, or shoots of the plant, are edible. And its young leaves are added to salads, fried, pickled, and used as a seasoning. Fern shoots taste like mushrooms. Due to the high presence of proteins, the plant is loved by residents of Japan, Korea, and the Far East. The calorie content of this product is 34 kcal per 100 grams.
There are two types of fern preparation: boiling and canning. Anyway, Before preparing the plant, its shoots must first be boiled. You should not neglect this stage and fry fresh rakhis: this will ruin the dish, because the fern will taste bitter. The leaves are washed in salted water. When the water boils, after a few minutes it is drained, the plant is washed and again filled with salted water. Next, the fern is cooked until tender. The shoots should not break; it is enough to bring them to a state where they bend easily. The cooked plant is placed in a colander and used according to culinary recipes.
A popular option for preparing fern is its pickling. Thanks to salting, the product can be stored for a long time, and you also get an excellent “semi-finished product” that can very quickly be turned into an amazingly tasty dish. The plant is thoroughly washed, then placed in a glass jar and covered with salt, the fern is folded in layers, sprinkled with table salt. Next, the container with the plant is pressed down on top with something heavy and placed in a cool place for 14 days. After two weeks, it will be necessary to drain the brine and transfer the shoots to another container. Moreover, the plant is again folded in layers with the difference that the layer that was on top should be at the very bottom. The fern is again filled with brine with a minimum salt content of 22%. In this form, the fern can be stored for several years.
There is specially prepared fern for sale for food purposes. The purchased product must be soaked in clean water for several hours to remove excess bitterness and salt. During this time, it is better to periodically drain the water and fill the plant with new water. After two hours, the fern is transferred to a pan and cooked for about 15 minutes without adding spices. At the same time, you need to chop the onion and meat. Next, the meat and onions should be fried on vegetable oil. After heat treatment, the fern is cut into small pieces and fried along with the rest of the ingredients. At the end of cooking, add 1 tbsp to the dish. l. soy sauce. The dish is served hot.
A well-known recipe for preparing this plant is “ fern in Korean" Onions and carrots, cut into strips, are stewed in olive oil until golden brown. Add fern sprouts to the vegetables in the pan and mix thoroughly. The resulting mass is thoroughly mixed again and seasoned with seasoning for cooking carrots in Korean. Next, the vegetables are simmered until tender for 15 minutes.
Fern benefits and treatment
The benefits of the plant have long been known in folk medicine. Fern is used as painkiller for joint pain, headaches. For rheumatism, it is recommended to take warm baths with fern decoction. Also, decoctions of the plant are effective for jaundice, diseases of the intestines and spleen. Externally, the plant is used for eczema, abscesses, and scrofula. Fern root powder relieves congestion in the intestines and spleen.
A decoction of fern rhizomes can be prepared at home. To do this, boil 10 grams of crushed rhizome for 10 minutes in 200 ml of water. Take the decoction 1 tsp. along with bee honey. Sometimes the broth is mixed with flour and taken by dividing the “dough” into 10 parts. Fern is a potent remedy, preparations based on which cannot be taken without medical indications. After taking the plant, be sure to give an enema and take a saline laxative. Taking other types of laxatives is strictly prohibited.
Externally, fern decoction is used as a bath or rubdown. In order to prepare a bath with a decoction, you will need 50 grams of rhizome per 3 liters of water. The broth is infused for several hours and then poured into a cool bath.
Fern harm and contraindications
The plant can cause harm to the body if used uncontrolled. It is better to use fern under the supervision of a herbalist or attending physician, since the plant is poisonous.
Fern is contraindicated for pregnant women.
Contraindications to its use are also fever, anemia, tuberculosis, liver and kidney diseases, ulcers, chronic diseases.
In case of overdose, the patient should rinse the stomach and immediately seek medical help.
Fern is one of the oldest higher plants, appearing about 400 million years ago in the Devonian period of the Paleozoic era.
Here is information about plants called Fern from Wikipedia:
Giant plants from the group of tree ferns largely determined the appearance of the planet at the end of the Paleozoic - beginning of the Mesozoic era.
Modern ferns are among the few ancient plants that have retained significant diversity comparable to that of the past.
Ferns vary greatly in size, life forms, life cycles, structural features and other features.
Their appearance is so characteristic that people usually call them all the same - “ferns”, not suspecting that this is the largest group of spore-bearing plants: there are about 300 genera and more than 10,000 species of ferns.
The variety of leaf shapes, amazing ecological plasticity, resistance to waterlogging, and the enormous number of spores produced have determined the wide distribution of ferns around the globe.
Ferns are found in forests - in the lower and upper tiers, on branches and trunks large trees- as epiphytes, in rock crevices, in swamps, in rivers and lakes, on the walls of city houses, on agricultural lands as weeds, on roadsides.
Ferns are ubiquitous, although they do not always attract attention. But their greatest variety is where it is warm and damp: the tropics and subtropics.
Ferns do not yet have true leaves. But they took the first steps in their direction. What a fern resembles a leaf is not a leaf at all, but by its nature is a whole system of branches, and even located in the same plane.
So this is called a flat branch, or a frond, or, another name, a pre-shoot. Despite the absence of a leaf, ferns have a leaf blade.
This paradox is explained simply: their flat branches and pre-shoots underwent flattening, as a result of which a lamina of the future leaf appeared - almost indistinguishable from the same lamina of a real leaf.
But ferns, evolutionarily, have not yet had time to divide their fronds into stems and leaves. Looking at a frond, it is difficult to understand where the “stem” ends, at what level of branching, and where the “leaf” begins. But the leaf blade is already there.
Only those contours within which the leaf blades united so that they could be called a leaf did not appear. The first plants to take this step are gymnosperms.
Ferns reproduce by spores and vegetatively(growths, rhizomes, buds, aphlebia, etc.). In addition, ferns are characterized by sexual reproduction as part of their life cycle.
Ferns include both herbaceous and woody life forms.
fern leaf
The body of the fern consists of leaf blades, a petiole, a modified shoot and roots (vegetative and adventitious). Fern leaves are called fronds.
In temperate forests, ferns usually have a short stem, which is a rhizome found in the soil. The stem has well-developed conducting tissue, between the bundles of which the cells of the main parenchyma tissue are located.
Fronds (fern leaves) unfold above the soil surface, growing from the buds of the rhizome.
These leaf-like organs have apical growth and can reach large sizes, usually serving two functions - photosynthesis and sporulation.
Sporangia are located on the lower surface of the leaf, and haploid spores develop in them.
Life cycle
IN life cycle ferns alternate asexual and sexual generations - sporophyte and gametophyte. The sporophyte phase predominates.
The sporangium opens at the bottom of the leaf, the spores settle on the ground, the spore germinates, a shoot with gametes appears, fertilization occurs, and a young plant appears.
In the most primitive ferns (creeper ferns), sporangia have a multilayer wall and do not bear special devices for opening.
In more advanced ones, the sporangium has a single-layer wall and adaptations for active opening. This device looks like a ring. Already among primitive ferns, heterosporousness can be traced.
Modern ones have a small number of homosporous species. The gametophyte of homosporous plants is usually bisexual. In primitive people it is underground and always in symbiosis with mushrooms.
In advanced gametophytes, the gametophytes are aboveground, green and quickly maturing. They usually look like a green, heart-shaped plate.
Gametophytes of heterosporous ferns differ from homosporous ferns (in addition to their dioeciousness) by a strong reduction, especially of the male gametophyte.
The female gametophyte, which consumes reserve nutrients from megaspores, is more developed and has nutritional tissue for the future sporophyte embryo. Moreover, the development of such gametophytes occurs inside the membranes of mega- and microspores.
According to some sources, ferns originated from mosses. However, some scientists believe that horsetails, mosses, mosses and this section originated from psilophytes.
In the Devonian period, seed ferns evolved from spore ferns. They belonged to the first gymnosperms. From them descended all other gymnosperms and, probably, flowering plants.
Economic importance
The economic importance of ferns is not so great compared to seed plants.
Species used for food include common bracken (Pteridium aquilinum), common ostrich (Matteuccia struthiopteris), cinnamon osmunda (Osmunda cinnamomea) and others.
Some species are poisonous. The most toxic of the ferns growing in Russia are representatives of the genus Dryopteris, the rhizomes of which contain phloroglucinol derivatives.
Extracts from shieldweed have an anthelmintic effect and are used in medicine. Some representatives of the genera Kochedyzhnik (Athyrium) and Ostrich (Matteuccia) are also poisonous.
Some ferns (nephrolepis, kostenets, pteris and others) have been used as indoor plants since the 19th century.
The fronds of some shield plants (for example, Dryopteris intermedia) are widely used as a green component of floral compositions. Orchids are often grown in a special “peat” made from densely intertwined thin roots of the plant.
The trunks of tree ferns serve as building material in the tropics, and in Hawaii their starchy pith is used as food.
Fern in geology
Presumably, ferns could take a large part in the formation of fossil coals - when they are buried by sediment and there is no access to oxygen. Imprints of ancient ferns are not uncommon in coal seams.
Thus, ferns are included in the global organic cycle and, in particular, in the carbon cycle of planet Earth.
Rocks composed of ferns are called bioliths (“stones of biological origin”), they are also fossil fuels.
Here additional information about plants called Fern:
If you have a large shady corner with moist soil in your garden, there is a direct reason to plant a garden of ferns in it.
The diversity of these ancient plants allows them to be used as a component of almost any element of landscape design - from rockeries to interesting solo compositions.
Fern gardens look very environmentally friendly, like a piece of ancient nature not destroyed by civilization.
Knowing the peculiarities of the biology of these plants and taking advantage of the diversity of ferns, throughout the summer you can admire either the unusual reddish young shoots, or the openwork patterns of the fronds, or the change in their color, getting unusual, fantastically beautiful pictures.
Due to the widest species diversity, ferns can be used in gardens of various styles - both regular and landscape - including both solitary plantings and landscape compositions.
Regular style gardens are characterized by planting ferns in shady areas such as a pond, fountain or grotto. This style is characterized by straightness and graphic rigor of lines.
Choosing species with a clearly defined leaf texture, such as the combed shield with lance-shaped fronds, varieties of the female kochedednik - “ Crictatum", the shape of which resembles an open fan, and " Frizelliae", with fronds jagged along the edge, you can ensure that the entire composition in a regular style will sparkle with new facets.
In landscape gardens, interesting compositions are formed from them, selecting varieties and forms that harmonize or contrast with each other in the shape of the fronds and their color.
The latter trend in gardening is especially fashionable; besides, anyone can create a small garden of ferns, the main thing is that the site has a shady corner and loose, fertile soil with constant moisture.
And for those owners whose plot is located in a natural forest, creating a garden of ferns is generally the best solution to the problem of how to transform the plot without disturbing its naturalness.
Fern thickets in a landscape garden.
We will definitely grow Ferns in the eco-park, and under suitable conditions in fairly large quantities.
I strongly recommend visiting the page and be sure to familiarize yourself with 25 more Aquatic plants: the inhabitants of a reservoir need many Aquatic plants, because some of them supply the inhabitants of the reservoir with oxygen, and some with food. In addition, thickets of aquatic plants contribute to the reproduction of many fish and allow fry to hide from predators, which increases the natural productivity of reservoirs.
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One of the oldest plants on our planet is the fern. It grows both in and in swampy areas. Today, more than 20 thousand species of this unique plant are known.
We will look at the name of ferns and their structure in detail in this article.
Description
Representatives of the fern order belong to the department They have, which delivers substances and water to all organs. Plants consist of roots, stems and well-developed leaves. It has no flowers or seeds. We will look at the names of fern organs in more detail below. These plants can be found in almost every corner of the globe. However, their high species diversity is concentrated in the humid tropics. In size, these plants range from very small (a few centimeters) to quite tall and powerful (up to 20 meters).
Names of fern organs and structures
Roots. In this plant they are accessory. This means that the root practically does not develop; instead, shoots and leaves are formed. The stems are quite diverse, both in internal structure and in appearance. In some ferns they can be creeping or climbing, but the most common are ordinary straight ones. Quite large leaves extend upward from the stem. They perform the functions of sporulation and photosynthesis. Sporophylls mature on the underside of the leaves. Once on the ground, the “female” spores germinate into shoots, which are small plates. Typically, their diameter is no more than one centimeter. On the surface of the plates are the so-called “female” genital organs. From male spores, microthicknesses are formed in which sperm mature. They are carried by the wind, falling on trees, grass, etc. After the shell ripens and ruptures, the “male” seeds find themselves in the external environment. With water, the sperm enters the female thallus. This is how a new plant appears. At the same time, the heart-shaped outgrowth withers and dies. Some ferns can reproduce vegetatively. In this case, new plants are formed on old leaves lying on the ground. Over time, they will take root in the soil and sprout.
Ferns do not have a cambium. That is why their strength and growth are limited, and annual rings do not form on the stem. These are such unique plants - ferns.
Types and names
Some representatives of this order are purely decorative. Other ferns, photos and names of which are described in this article, differ healing properties. Still others are widespread in the culinary arts (bracken, ostrich, brown osmundra). There are also poisonous plants, for example, depending on their habitat, they are divided into terrestrial and aquatic. There is also another large group - tree-like.
Nephrolepis
The homeland of this amazingly beautiful indoor plant is tropical America. It has long, arched fronds with luxurious wavy leaves.
Common ostrich
This plant got its name due to the similarity of the leaves to the shape of ostrich feathers.
It grows on the outskirts of swamps, in damp forests and floodplains. Reproducing quickly, the plant forms dense thickets. It is the ostrich that florists use to make bouquets and flower arrangements.
Female Kochedyzhnik
Grows in gray, dark places. It can be seen in ravines and forest peat bogs. Kochedyzhnik forms hummocks in swampy areas. Its heavily dissected leaves are light green in color. In winter they die off. The root is short but quite thick. In spring, new young leaves begin to grow. The plant reproduces by spores.
Phlebodium aureus
This plant grows on trees, attached to the trunk with “legs”. It has a creeping rhizome with soft brown-golden scales, from which feathery leaves about 1.5 meters long extend.
Orlyak
The height of this plant can reach more than 60 centimeters. It is found almost everywhere, even on dry and poor soils. The fern has a horizontally branched long rhizome, from which yellow single leaves extend. The roots of this plant have healing properties and are used in medical science.
Maidenhair
People call this plant "Venus hair".
It has very thin and long (up to 35 centimeters) light green leaves located on black stems. Adiantum loves partial shade. It can be grown in garden plots or at home.
Shieldweed
In nature, this plant grows in the mountains among stones or in a shady forest. In height it can reach from 30 to 150 centimeters. The shield plant has a powerful rhizome, from which leaves arise on long petioles, forming a goblet-shaped rosette. The plant develops very slowly. The name of ferns in some cases is due to their biological characteristics. This can be said about the shield plant. On the underside of the leaves of the plant there are spore-bearing organs, covered with kidney-shaped plates, like shields. This feature gave the name to the fern. The plant is poisonous. Nevertheless, many healers use its rhizome to make medicinal potions.
Family Cyathaeaceae
Includes more than 600 plant species. These tree ferns are found primarily in humid tropical zones. The height of plants can reach more than twenty meters. The stability of the fern is possible due to the dense plexus of hard adventitious roots that make up the cover of the trunk.
The leaves are usually pinnate and very large. Their length can be up to six meters. Some types of ferns (names and photos are presented on this page) have oval areas of air-bearing tissue at the point where the segments are attached to the stem of the leaf blade. They serve for gas exchange. In some plants, air-bearing areas protrude above the leaf.
Family Cybothiaceae
They grow mainly in the forests of Asia, Central America, Mexico, Southern China and Representatives of this family have a straight stem. Leaves are double or triple pinnate. The top of the trunk is covered with a protective cover consisting of soft long hairs. The young leaves of this plant can be eaten.
Tyrsopteris
A representative of this family, the fern Thyrsopteris elegans, grows only on the island of Juan Fernandez, located in the Pacific Ocean near South America. Its height is about 1.5 meters.
Culcitic
They are represented by large ferns with a creeping trunk. The length of the plant, as a rule, is no more than 50 centimeters. Leaves - 4, 5 pinnate, small (up to 3 cm). Petioles are light or dark brown. The leaves are not fully expanded, covered with light brown or reddish hairs. The names of fern plants of this species are as follows: Culcita coniifolia (grows in northern and central South America) and C. macrocarpa (in the Macaronesian floristic region). The number of this species is steadily declining.
That is why this species of fern is included in the list of protected plants in Portugal and Spain.
Water
The names of ferns - Marsilea and Salvinia - belong to the third group of plants of the species we are describing. They live exclusively in bodies of water.
Marsilea quatrefoil
This small perennial plant has wide, blade-shaped, rounded leaves. Sporocarps of 2-3 pieces are located at the base of the petiole. Each of them is about 5 millimeters long. Usually the height of marsilea does not exceed twenty centimeters. However, the petioles of the floating leaves can reach 80 cm, and the rhizome - about 1 meter. Typically this type of fern is used to decorate ponds.
Salvinia
This plant is rare and needs protection. Very often, salvinia is grown specifically for landscaping aquariums. The plant can be seen in ponds of botanical gardens. Outwardly, it does not look like the usual ferns. The stem of salvinia is thin and long (about 15 cm). The leaves are collected in threes. Two of them are solid, elliptical in shape with a heart-shaped base. The third leaf is underwater. It is covered with hairs and dissected into thread-like strips similar to roots.
This leaf absorbs nutrients and water.
Indian
The name of ferns of this species is known firsthand to lovers of aquarium flora. The plant grows in tropical regions of the world. Its light green leaves are beautifully dissected. Under favorable conditions, they can reach a height of 40-50 centimeters.
Thai
The plant's homeland is Southeast Asia. The fern has corrugated, lanceolate, rigid leaves that can reach thirty centimeters in height. They are attached to a dark green, strong rhizome.
Clarke's Third Law states: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." The same can be said about numerous scientific phenomena. Although the inner scientist constantly repeats to us that everything in the world has a rational and logical explanation, we continue to see real magic in some phenomena. Some of them are simply optical illusions, others are explained by sophisticated chemical or biological processes, and others help to better understand the physical laws that underlie the Universe.
The phenomenon of color illusion
Find the lighthouse in the video and look at it carefully without moving your gaze. In a few seconds, the sea and sky will turn blue, the lighthouse will turn white, and the island will turn brown. But just one movement of the eyes, and everything suddenly becomes black and white. Is there really some kind of spell cast on the picture?!
Most likely, you have encountered similar illusions before. The way they confuse us can reveal a lot about human perception.
In reality, no flowers exist. All the variety of colors that we see is the result of the brain processing light waves of different lengths. In other words, nothing red is actually red, we perceive it that way.
Cone receptors allow us to distinguish colors three different species on the retina. They are responsible for shades of red, blue and green. When any of these receptors become “satiated” with their color, they become “tired” and stop working. This means that the eyes lose the ability to see certain shades for some time. Instead of the “tired” cones, the remaining ones begin to work. As a result, we see colors opposite to those for which non-functioning receptors are responsible: green instead of red, blue instead of yellow, and so on. There is no magic: the mechanism of vision remains unchanged, and “apparent” colors are no less real than “real” ones, because both exist only in our heads. How can one not recall Bill Cipher, who claims that reality is just an illusion?
Video: Visual illusion
Instant glaciation
Few people know that anyone can master the abilities of Queen Elsa herself, if desired. Place a bottle of distilled water in the freezer; it should freeze to at least -8°C. Carefully remove the vessel, and then, throwing all caution to the wind, hit it on a hard surface. The water in it will turn into ice right before your eyes.
How does this work? We know that water freezes at 0°C, but in fact this rule only applies to ordinary water with particles of various impurities. Ice crystals cannot form on their own; they always grow around something. There are no foreign particles in distilled water, so it can reach low temperatures without freezing. Shaking the bottle when it hits the table causes the appearance of tiny air bubbles, around which ice crystals immediately begin to grow, which causes rapid icing.
Video: How to make water in a bottle freeze instantly
Weightless flywheel
In this video, Veritasium creator Derek Mueller defies gravity by lifting himself above his head with ease. flywheel weighing 19 kilograms, attached to the end of a steel rod. IN normal conditions This is almost impossible, unless you are Thor, of course, but when the weight at the end of the rod rotates rapidly, the distribution of forces acting on it changes.
In fact, the flywheel, of course, does not violate the laws of gravity. In physics, the observed phenomenon is called “gyroscope precession.” An example of a gyroscope would be a spinning top or a structure similar to the one shown to us in the video. Now about precession. When a load rotates on a rod, it has angular momentum (another name is angular momentum). When a structure is exposed to any force (for example, when we push it in a certain direction), a moment of force is created, under the influence of which the angular momentum of the rotating object changes, and the direction of its rotation becomes perpendicular to the direction of the force (push). Therefore, the flywheel in the video seems weightless to the experimenter, although in fact its mass remains unchanged.
Video: Guy lifting a heavy flywheel
Ghost words
Turn on the video. It doesn't matter whether you're wearing headphones, as long as the audio is played in stereo. There is no need to wait until midnight to light candles.
At first you will hear two sound tracks superimposed on one another, but after a while you will begin to distinguish certain words and phrases in this noise. Here's a list of what you might hear:
- No way;
- Nowhere;
- Randall;
- Rainbow;
- Over and over and over;
- hangover;
- Bueno;
- No no no no no (with buzzing between words);
- In one earphone: love me love me love me love me;
- In the other earphone: no way no way no way no way.
Please note that when you focus on any word or phrase from the list, it magically begins to appear in the audio. This illusion is based on the brain’s desire to find sequences known to it in any chaotic flow of information. For the same reason, we think that clouds look like objects and animals, and also that the face of Jesus is depicted on burnt toast. Such audio recordings can be considered the audio analogue of the Rorschach test.
Video: Audio recording with changing words
Transformation from caterpillar to butterfly
The process of metamorphosis resembles magic even when observed from the outside, and what happens inside the mysterious cocoon can only be called a miracle.
Many people think that the caterpillar hides in its cocoon only to grow wings and several pairs of thin legs. In fact, metamorphosis has more in common not with the spontaneous growth of limbs, but with the casting of metals. The caterpillar's body inside the cocoon turns into a kind of organic glue made of proteins. The cells of the imaginal disc float in it, which (like stem cells) can form any tissue. From these, a new body of the insect is built, which differs in structure from the body of the caterpillar.
The most amazing thing is that the butterfly, formed from glue, has a memory of its past life in the shape of a caterpillar. Experiments have shown that caterpillars, trained to avoid certain odors, continue to avoid them even after they become butterflies. A natural question arises: where the hell is their memory located?
What happens inside the cocoon is even more amazing than it seems from the outside
Demon pendulums
This fascinating demonstration of wave dynamics looks like magic or some clever program at work. In fact, the pendulums here are the most ordinary, and the answer lies in the good old laws of physics.
The length of the threads on which the weights are suspended is of primary importance. The pendulum on the longest thread makes 51 oscillations per minute, the next - 52 oscillations, and so on in increasing order until the last one, hanging on the shortest thread and swinging 65 times per minute.
Because of these differences, the pendulums do not move synchronously. Although the movement algorithm is absolutely the same, each of them is at its own “step” (swings in one direction or another or freezes). After 60 seconds, they line up again and the cycle repeats.
Video: Mesmerizing swings of pendulums
"Spooky" quantum entanglement
Quantum entanglement is clearly not the kind of trick you can use to entertain your friends at a party, but its similarities to magic are undeniable. Just look at the strange name of this phenomenon.
In short, quantum entanglement is a cross between telepathy and teleportation. When two particles are formed by the same process, such as atomic decay, they develop a mystical connection through which they exchange information about each other. This means that, knowing the state of one of them, it is possible to accurately describe the state of the second without making measurements, even if they are located at different ends of the galaxy.
Einstein called this phenomenon “spooky action at a distance” because, apparently, such particles are capable of exchanging information at speeds exceeding the speed of light, which is completely impossible. After all, then it turns out that they somehow learn about each other’s state without exchanging data.
Quantum entanglement (like all quantum mechanics in general) still puzzles scientists. Today it best fits the definition of magic.
Quantum entanglement is a scientific phenomenon that can rightfully be considered synonymous with magic.
Most of the mysterious phenomena considered are explained within the framework of biology, psychology and physics. Some of them, however, still confuse scientists, but there is every reason to hope that these mysteries will soon be solved.
The brilliant futurist writer Arthur C. Clarke is famous for the three laws he formulated, most notably the third law, which states that “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” However, in modern society this law is losing its relevance.
Clark was a versatile person - writer, inventor, philosopher. But above all, he is a futurist, being whom he looked forward with hope, and this filled his ideas with meaning.
This can be understood from his three laws:
- When a respected but elderly scientist claims something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he claims something is impossible, he is very likely wrong.
- The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to dare to step into the impossible.
- Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
So, the third law. Let's remember how things were with technology several centuries ago. Every inventor who was “friends” with science risked being branded a sorcerer and being burned at the stake. But time passes, and the knowledge accumulated by humanity is growing exponentially. If you show a TV to someone who has never seen one, they may be stunned by what they see, but they will likely realize that with some knowledge and materials, it is quite possible to put together.
In truth, even a technically savvy person is unlikely to understand down to every detail what this or that technological innovation consists of. We perceive an artificial heart or a complex particle accelerator in exactly the same way. Or, for example, a street magician shows the wonders of levitation. It may be impressive, but hardly anyone would consider a magician to be a magician. It is not known how he does this, you might think, but I am sure that with modern technology it is possible.
The thought “I can’t do that” or “I don’t know how this happens” has always made people believe in magic. Modern man thinks more broadly: “I don’t know how to do this, but I can learn” or “I don’t know how this happens, but if you want, you can find the answer.” This is why Clarke's Third Law is not relevant in our world.
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