Science desk
< November 29	<< Oct \| November \| Dec >>	December 1 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Science Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

November 30

Human/Animal Crossbreeds

So, you can cross a horse and a donkey to make an ass or a mule, and a lion and tiger to make a liger, or a dolphin and a false killer whale to make a wolphin. Could humans theoretically mate with orangutans or chimpanzees and produce offspring? Would the offspring be viable? Horatio Snickers (talk) 20:31, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

For starters, we do have some info in our article on humanzee. ---Sluzzelin talk 20:36, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Here are various facts and theories about how our very great-grandparents may or may not have bred with Neanderthals, Denisovans and their ilk. So there's a glimmer of hope for a chimpboy, but if it were already possible, we'd already have at least enough for a case study in a medical journal somewhere. Humans have been getting halfway there for a long time. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:17, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Reminds me of when AIDS was first gaining major publicity and it was alleged to have originated in apes. Frank Zappa said, "Why I want to know is, who's screwing those monkeys?" ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:27, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

If this subject disturbs you, do not swim with seals or dolphins. In any case, most reports of humanzees are just the unfortunate sufferers of Gandler-Kreukheim Syndrome. μηδείς (talk) 03:08, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

As we have an article on Next (novel) perhaps this malady is eligible to be added to List of fictional diseases.--Aspro (talk) 03:35, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There was also the hypothesis (I use the term loosely) proposed a number of years ago that humans are what came out after a chimp had sex with a pig. Evan ^{(talk|contribs)} 18:47, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It should almost certainly be possible to produce a chimera (honestly, I'd thought that by now some interpersonal squabble at an in vitro fertilization clinic would have gotten out of control and led to this...). I don't expect the hybridization to be easy or else we would know about it; what being hard means is that one guy trying it in 1919 is not proof it could never work. In theory, of course, with enough effort (a gene by gene germline replacement trial, conducted over countless generations) someone could surely make it work, but there's a vast chasm between the preposterous amount of resources that implies and the reality that so few people even attempt it. Wnt (talk) 09:43, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A chimera is not a hybrid. It is basically a random blend of cells that can look like a note sent by a serial killer with letters cut out of random publications. Look at this chimera between two different genera of mice, and note the assymmetry of the eyes, to say the least. In a civilized society you'd be looking at ostracism, defrocking, and all sorts of civil and criminal abuse charges if you did such a thing. μηδείς (talk) 17:55, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Well, obviously. Actually, I wouldn't bet on your odds if you have sex with a chimpanzee, even if she sign languages the judge that she thinks you're really pretty. But some lucky dog would get to study the resulting beings, and others would be paid to pontificate well nigh endlessly on their human rights and status and bioethics. Wnt (talk) 04:57, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I suspect that might be of interest, were it a grammatical English sentence, Wnt. μηδείς (talk) 03:12, 4 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This is English, which gives us the inalienable right to verb whatever we want, including "sign language". :) Wnt (talk) 06:22, 4 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

My objection was your combination of "you're" and "really pretty". μηδείς (talk) 01:29, 5 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

???? I know "your" is really common in this context nowadays, but I still like the old-fashioned "you are" contraction. Wnt (talk) 02:34, 5 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The objection was to the disfactualness of the claim that a chimpess would think I'm pretty, not to the incromulence of your construction. μηδείς (talk) 03:50, 5 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Orgasm Weapon (serious)

A few years ago I was looking at weapons or brain waves or electromagnetic radiation articles (something of that nature) and I found an article stating that a potential item exists that could cause females to orgasm from a distance. I am familiar with search operators and advanced search techniques but I can't seem to find the article. Please help. Thanks. Judasschwarz (talk) 22:45, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like the plot line of Flesh Gordon. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:47, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Is this the only response I'll get? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Judasschwarz (talk • contribs) 22:53, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

What have you found in Google so far? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:01, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A lot of stuff related to porn and a movie title "Orgasmo". I've also used Google to search Wikipedia articles containing terms weapons, electromagnetic, sonic, microwave, directed, energy, orgasm, non-lethal along with the - parameter to remove useless links. I wish I could use "intext" exclusively so that pages with a term in the title (orgasm in this instance) wouldn't come up. I don't know if that's possible or how to do that though.Judasschwarz (talk) 23:09, 30 November 2014 (UTC) edit- combined those search terms in various combinations.[reply]

You can do a "-intitle:orgasm" (no quotes). You'll need a separate one for the plural. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:20, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks I'm looking now with that parameter. I've also considered using The Wayback Machine. I have some experience using it but haven't used it to perform this sort of advanced searching. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Judasschwarz (talk • contribs) 23:54, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It was the key plot point in Orgazmo. That alone doesn't necessarily mean it's also not real, but it makes it feel that way. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:04, 30 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A quick Google search on "neurological orgasm weapon" brings up (a) lots of pages (mainly written in primary colours on a black background in ALL CAPS) by people who claim to be victims of them, and (b) references to this 2008 paper (see, for example, this article from the Guardian). The name Robert Galbraith Heath is also a common feature. Make of this what you will. Tevildo (talk) 00:05, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Judasschwarz (talk • contribs) 00:13, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Also is this: "(mainly written in primary colours on a black background in ALL CAPS)" a clue to something? I don't understand what that statement was added for. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Judasschwarz (talk • contribs) 00:17, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Well, that sort of website design is very common among people with unorthodox views of the world. I was just noting that people who believe they have been attacked by the CIA with "neurological weapons" - an unorthodox view by most standards - seem to follow this pattern. Tevildo (talk) 00:55, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing. At least that's what I grabbed from the hint. Using all-caps is GENERALLY CONSIDERED SHOUTING LIKE A MADMAN!!! And colourful text can uncomfortably distracting. If someone showed up on your doorstep, like a Mormon dressed in a silly pink and white costume with a purportedly true message about orgasms, it's natural to feel skeptical. Same applies to the web. Wikipedia is where it is because we dress the part. (That link was merely at the top for "black white blue suit". Any similarity to Jimmy Wales is a purely eerie coincidence.) InedibleHulk (talk) 01:00, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Lol, understood. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Judasschwarz (talk • contribs) 01:04, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The concept exists in science fiction, certainly—in Larry Niven's Known Space books, such a device is called a tasp. (Niven's books also present a wired, non-remote version called a droud.) Direct electrical stimulation of the pleasure centers of the brain is portrayed as potently habit-forming; addicts are sometimes called wireheads. The latter article, interestingly, provides some real-life examples of such stimulation (under controlled conditions); it seems to be just as attractive as science fiction suspected. As far as I know, there is no extant technology for carrying out such stimulation remotely and noninvasively. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 01:19, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

No fair, I was just going to say Tasp. Niven also invented flash crowds. μηδείς (talk) 01:40, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

And one of those stories contains the phrase "a stack of TVs, big ones almost an inch thick." —Tamfang (talk) 08:07, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

That reminds me, it was also in at least one softcore space porn. Can't remember if it was Femalien, Emmanuelle in Space, Andromina: The Pleasure Planet, Veronica 2030 or Femalien II. Pretty sure it wasn't Sex Files: Alien Erotica, but might have been Alien Sex Files 3: Aliens Gone Wild. I'd had enough of the genre by the time that one came out. InedibleHulk (talk) 03:04, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Are you think of that whore-er movie Barbarella in the Ogasmatron? Whilst on the subject. A beam of photons shone through crystalline carbon can have a funny effect on some people from quite a distance. Just a five carat stone in a jewellers window with a sign announcing Sale Now On is effective along a whole boulevard if the sun shines upon it.--Aspro (talk) 04:02, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

No, it wasn't that. Definitely later 90s, during the Baby Blue Movies res-erection (absolutely no pun intended) or Fridays Without Borders. Almost certain it was Emmanuelle in Space, but which one? Haven't seen Handful of Diamonds, but the pub scene sounds gripping. InedibleHulk (talk) 12:29, 2 December 2014 (UTC) [reply]

I'd be immensely surprised if any amount of searching turns up even a hint of serious research in terms of a device that could trigger an orgasm at a distance. For one thing, the mechanisms necessary for inducing the neurochemical changes implicit in such a feat would have to be so complex and so specifically targeted that, aside from being well beyond our current understanding, by the time you developed this technology you'd almost certainly already have the capability to incapacitate someone through means that would certainly be more practical for a weapon (by causing them to go unconscious, driving them into an agitated state, inducing intense pain or disrupting their senses or their ability to think clearly, all of which would be much easier to achieve -- and all of which, come to think of it, have been studied in recent times as possible avenues for a weapon that acts upon the brain at a distance). The only possible "advantage" a weapon that specifically induced and orgasm might offer over these approaches as a weapon would be a (reprehensibly) psychological one, in much the same way rape is sometimes employed in war to demoralize and humiliate.

Putting aside that piece of science-fiction, utilizing chemical aphrodisiacs is a tactic that has been considered by modern states a number of times, as several vague concepts or plans were hatched (but to the best of my knowledge never pursued very far) in which a laced water supply or aerosol would be employed, with an assault to coincide with the resulting love-in. It's just as well -- I mean, it might seem like the most horrific example, but would still almost certainly qualify as a chemical attack forbidden by modern international law and indeed one that could lead to significant health concerns for those involved, be it from physical reactions to the chemical itself, STD's, psychological impact and the possibility of resulting rape (again, the factor of a "love" weapon that goes under-considered).

To add yet another Sci-fi reference to those noted by others above, the last two books written by Frank Herbert for his Dune saga include a sexual weapon that comes in the form of women who are capable of enslaving huge populations of men with their wiles. For me it was one of the very few places in those otherwise absolutely genius books where I felt like the kind of social/psychological weapons that are common to the work jumped the shark just a bit. And of course a man ultimately defeats their capabilities by being even more of a sexual dynamo... Snow talk 23:16, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Niven came up with the chemical aphrodisiacs as well, in his Ringworld series, especially the vampire people. μηδείς (talk) 02:13, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I did add a tad of detail to "orgasmatron" non-fiction usage in 2008, but that certainly isn't ranged. Still, it invites a theoretical suggestion that some very strong electromagnetic stimulation might have related effect. Also, some artists I wouldn't want within a hundred miles of me claim to have done it with infrasound.^[1] Still, biology is variable ... I'm sure that if you survey enough women you'll find one who can achieve genuine orgasm purely by watching a Taylor Kitsch movie. :) Wnt (talk) 09:22, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

During the cold war, Wright Laboratory produced a series of short papers on highly unconventional weapons. One of those (to pick an example close to this one) was the infamous Gay bomb which was supposed to cause (male) enemy troops to suddenly turn gay and start hitting on each other after being sprayed with female pheremones from a chemical weapon of some kind - the idea being that they'd be effectively incapacitated and unable to fight! These (often horribly politically incorrect) ideas were almost never carried beyond those very short paper studies - and they seem to be wildly unlikely to work. However, some of them did get funded, experimentally (consider Project MKUltra that attempted to use LSD as a mind-control drug - or the Convair NB-36H nuclear-powered aircraft that actually flew over Fort Worth, Texas with an unshielded nuclear reactor aboard!). So if it ever existed (and I could find no evidence of that), it's highly likely that your idea was amongst those cold-war concept weapons. Lots of crazy things were dreamed up during the cold war - the research laboratories had more or less unlimited funding and minimal government oversight - so they tended to fund small think-tanks to put up ideas like this. In light of how recently that kind of "crazy" blue-sky thinking had revolutionized warfare by producing the atom bomb - you can see what it wasn't a bad idea to do that. So they'd have a bunch of smart people meet in a conference room once in a while and be instructed to list whatever comes to mind without constraints of any kind (practical, moral, financial, scientific or otherwise). The cost to do that is utterly negligible - and the potential reward could be something as ground-breaking at the Manhatten Project. However, when they turned those meetings into brief summary documents - and those are eventually declassified - you get a document that appears to be saying that the US government did research into making men turn gay...which couldn't be further from the truth. SteveBaker (talk) 14:31, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Did the article say why the orgasms were limited to females? Why would it be an effective weapon unless the enemy's army had a lot of women, which most armies don't? --Bowlhover (talk) 02:04, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A state's enemy isn't always an army. Sometimes protesters, rioters or opposition voters. They can release the hounds on animal activists, break a steel strike with rubber bullets or spend a billion in tax to secure anti-capitalists behind a fence. What better way to ruin a feminist demonstration than blasting demeaning rap through a loudspeaker, making everyone come, filming a viral video and insisting women's bodies did it to themselves? That's what really hurts. InedibleHulk (talk) 03:49, 3 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]