Netherlands-based startup SpaceLife Origin wants to send a pregnant woman 250 miles above the Earth to give birth to the first extraterrestrial baby in history, in the name of science.

Should our planet ever become unable to sustain human life, our species’ only hope would be to leave and settle elsewhere, be it a haven floating through space or another planet. But in order for this exodus to be a success, we first have to learn how to reproduce in space, and the founders of SpaceLife Origin want to get the ball rolling by sending a pregnant woman into space and having her give birth in zero gravity conditions. It sounds like a crazy idea, especially since humanity is a long way from becoming a spacefaring species, but SpaceLife Origin believes that our long-term survival depends on it.

Read More »

How long do you reckon you could last in solitary confinement and total darkness? How about for a prize of $100,000? One daring poker player bet his friend that he could spend at least 30 days in such extreme conditions and underwent a high stakes 30-day experiment to prove it.

It all started last fall, as a friendly discussion between friends. Australian poker player Rory Young asked his buddy and fellow poker enthusiast Rich Alati how long he thought he could last in a small, dark room without any human interaction. Alati’s answer of 30 days seemed unrealistic to Young, and from there the stage for an unusual “prop bet” was set. Prop bets are designed to test the mental toughness of card players away from the poker table, and usually have very high stakes. This one was no different, with both players depositing $100,000 of their own money in an escrow account and agreeing to pay the other side if they lost the bet. Alati stood to win $100,000 if he managed to spend a full month isolated in a small, dark room, and Young would pocket the same amount if his friend quit before the deadline. The game was on!

Read More »

If you mess up in your marriage, trying to earn back your partner’s trust with an apologetic chest tattoos full of typos is probably not the best idea. A cheating husband learned that the hard way after a photo of his chest tattoo went viral on social media.

A man named Jose L. Torres, presumed to be from Houston, Texas, allegedly wanted to prove to his wife that he was seriously committed to changing his ways, and decided that the best way to do that was to get a statement permanently inked on his chest. In the apology/confession inked nipple to nipple and all the way down to his belly button, the husband starts off by emphasizing that he is the tattoo voluntarily, and then goes on to say that he is doing it as a way to earn back his wife’s trust after causing pain and suffering in their marriage. He then confesses to being a ‘liar’, ‘cheater’ and ‘manipulator’, among other things.

Read More »

A 19-year-old volunteer firefighter from western Pennsylvania was recently charged with arson, criminal mischief and risking catastrophe after allegedly setting two houses on fire out of boredom.

Last month, police in Munhall, a community located about 8 miles southeast of Pittsburgh, arrested Ryan Laubham, a local volunteer firefighter, for allegedly setting fire to a pair of occupied homes on December 3 and 10. After interviewing witnesses and checking CCTV footage, authorities identified Laubham as the prime suspect in both cases, and he himself admitted to the crimes, saying that he had set the houses on fire because he was bored.

Read More »

Horse races are usually all about speed, but in Ban’ei, a form of horse racing unique to the Japanese island of Hokkaidō, it’s strength and stamina that matter most.

Ban’ei race horses, also known as ‘banba’, are very different from the fast thoroughbreds we associate with horse racing. They can weigh up to 1,200 kilograms and are more than twice the size of the small dosanko horses native to Hokkaidō. These horses are crossbred descendants of workhorses imported from France and Belgium at the end of the 19th century to help farmers work their land, and are now considered a Japanese breed in their own right. Depending on their size, these strong animals can pull up to a ton of weight, and that’s exactly the kind of strength required to win the world’s slowest horse race.

Read More »

A restaurant in the Italian town of Castelfranco Veneto has come up with an ingenious way to get a leg up on the competition – treating guests to a unique dish called “fried air”.

Nicola Dinato, the head chef at Feva Restaurant wanted to capture the essence of being outdoors and breathing fresh air in an dish aptly called “aria fritta” or “fried air”. The name is a tad misleading, as the crispy treats are actually made of tapioca skin that’s first baked and then deep fried. However, there’s some air involved in the cooking process as well, or at least a component of it – ozone. After the tapioca skin is baked and fried, it is infused with ozone for 10 minutes, which gives the treats a special perfume. After the special infusion, the crispy fried air is placed on a bed of cotton candy, which Dinato hopes will remind patrons of clouds.

Read More »

Luca Luce is a talented makeup artist who uses his expert skills to turn his own head into mind-boggling 3D optical illusions.

40-year-old Luce has been working as a television makeup artist in Italy for over 18 years, but only started using his body as a canvas for optical illusions in 2014. He first made a name for himself online in 2015, when photos of his hand-painted optical illusions went viral on social networks like Instagram and Facebook. He’s come a long way since then, moving from his hands to his own head, which he now “carves”, “pierces” and “distorts” using only makeup supplies and mountains of talent.

Read More »

A Peruvian football fan recently showed his love for his favorite club by getting their jersey tattooed straight on his body. The tattoo took a total of 60 hours to complete, and has been getting mixed reactions on social media.

The unnamed man’s giant tattoo has been getting a lot of attention online since last month, when Jean Pierre Salinas, a tattoo artist at the Lima 13 tattoo studio started posting videos of the making-of process on Facebook. But while some appreciated the fan’s dedication to his beloved club, Alianza Lima, others said that he went too far and even mocked the man, claiming that while the team’s colors were white and blue, his darker skin tone created a brown and blue combination instead.

Read More »

Blood transfusions have been used to save lives for decades, but now one startup wants to use the medical procedure to combat the effects of aging by injecting older people with young blood. The treatment is called “Ambrosia”, after the mythological food of the Greek gods, which granted whoever consumed it longevity or immortality.

It only takes two hours to have two liters of plasma from donors aged 16 to 25 into your body, but according to Ambrosia founder Jesse Karmazin, the results are nothing-short of miraculous. He once called it “plastic surgery from the inside out“, told one reporter that while the transfusion doesn’t grant immortality, it “comes pretty close”, and told another journalist that just one infusion of young blood “dramatically improves people’s appearance, their memory and their strength”. The company even ran a medical study that officially ended in January of 2018, but despite boasting about its “really positive” results, Ambrosia Medical has yet to make those results public. And that’s what makes this treatment so controversial in the eyes of many health experts – no one has ever offered any solid proof of its efficacy.

Read More »

The Lion House is a unique rentable property in South Africa that allows tourists to spend their vacation in the middle of a nature reserve, surrounded by 77 adult lions.

Imagine going to sleep to the sound of lion roars, knowing that the only thing standing between you and dozens of predators is an electrified fence. If that sounds like the kind of thing you’ve always dreamed of, you’d better start saving for a stay at the Lion House, a special three-bedroom house located in the middle of a wildlife sanctuary in Harrismith, South Africa. It doesn’t feature many of the amenities you’d expect to find in a place that costs over $100 a night to rent, like TV or air-conditioning, but it does offer something very few, if any, other places around the world have – lions, 77 of them to be exact.

Read More »

Japanese design studio CWF has created the “Backpacker’s Closet”, a backpack so large it can literally be used a closet or even to carry a grown person around.

Measuring 100 cm in length by 68 cm in width, the Backpacker’s Closet features a maximum holding capacity of 180 liters (48 gallons), making it ideal for carrying a young adult. And if you’re worried about the shoulder straps snapping under the weight, don’t be, as this accessory is not only designed to withstand the advertised maximum weight, but also features padding and an extra middle strap to reduce stress on the wearer’s back and shoulders.

Read More »

A viral video of a South-African man barking like a dog after allegedly being bit by a canine infected with rabies has sparked a heated debate on African social media.

The video went viral after being shared by Instagram influencer and entertainer Tunde Ednut. In it, a young man wearing an oxygen mask and lying on a hospital stretcher can be heard barking incessantly. The man holding the camera states that he is filming a “beast like you’ve never seen before” with the permission of the patient’s father, adding that the barking is caused by the rabies virus. The young patients had allegedly been bit by a rabid dog around two weeks before and, despite getting the anti-rabies vaccine, he stopped talking and started barking instead. The narrator of the video claims that the patients exhibited other bizarre symptoms associated with rabies, like foaming at the mouth.

Read More »

Gourav Mukhi went from being celebrated as the youngest goal scorer in the history of the Indian Super League to being suspended for six months, after authorities found that he wasn’t actually 16-years-old, but 28.

Mukhi’s troubles started back in October, when the Jamshedpur FC striker scored a “historic goal” against Bengaluru FC. Not only was it a crucial equaliser for his team, but it made him the youngest scorer in the history of India’s soccer league. He was only 16 at the time, or at least that’s what his documents showed, but all the attention made people look at him more closely, and some started expressing doubts about his age online. It didn’t take long for evidence of his deceit to come out, as only three years prior, he had been suspended from the National U16 Football Championship, for being much older than he claimed. So if he was older than 16 three years ago, how could he be 16 now?

Read More »

Police in the Russian city of Sevastopol are scrambling to find the vandals responsible for destroying over a dozen speed cameras in the last month.

Reports of damaged stationary speed cameras and the solar panels that power them started coming in at the start of December, and police soon realized that these weren’t just isolated incidents. Someone was targeting them and even getting creative with the means of destruction. First, they started by shooting the cameras with metallic pellets fired from air guns, then they moved to sledgehammers, tearing down the concrete posts the speed cameras were mounted on, and recently they even began setting the expensive cameras on fire. Sevastopol authorities claim that the capture of these vandals is now inevitable, but with 16 destroyed speed cameras reported so far, police has yet to arrest any suspects.

Read More »

S Legend, a red and white Koi Carp bred in Japan became the most expensive live fish ever sold, after fetching a mind-blowing price of 203 million yen ($1.8 million), more than $1.3 million more than the previous record.

The 101cm-long Koi Carp from the highly-regarded Kohaku variety was bought by a collector from Japan after a fierce bidding war  at the Saki Fish farm in the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The female carp won first prize at the prestigious All Japan Koi Show last year, and is expected to bag her second title this year, which greatly increased collectors’ interest. Fans and collectors of Koi carp are now expected to travel from all over the world to catch a glimpse of the most expensive fish ever sold.

Read More »