Cool Sciency Stuff You Did As A Kid -

TheRaisin · #31 03-08-2005, 08:04 PM

Heh. For sure. One where the odds are very much stacked against challengers.

Gawd that sounds cool.

Dino · #32 03-09-2005, 03:03 AM

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For a technicality, "polymer" simply means "many units" - plastics are polymers, but starch is a polymer molecule as well. It's one of them ambiguous can-mean-what-it-likes sort of word. :b

Sorry, but that's both a misleading and incorrect statement, I'm going to have to correct it.

Polymer is certainly NOT an "ambiguous can-meat-what-it-likes" sort of word. There is a whole seperate field of chemistry reserved for polymers, and the meaning of the word Polymer is quite clearly defined because of this. A quick googlesearch would've saved you from the indignity of publicly demonstrating your lack of knowledge.

A polymer is actually a (usually organic) chemical compound made up of many molecules bonded to each other - the most common and pure example of this, is a hydrocarbon polymer.

Starch is a polymer too, but is no more of an organic chemical than plastic. It is however considered a biochemical, which plastic of course is not.

Unfortunately for me, the first post that I made here about polymers was made the day before I actually began learning about polymers in chemistry class. So I had no idea what I was talking about in that post, and only had one experience with polymers to draw any information from. That one experience was learning about hydrocarbon plastics and basic polymers in my Secondary School Science class.

But I'm still cooler than you.

Software Bug · #33 03-09-2005, 10:58 AM

i have stil some sea monkeys and growing cristals somewhere imported out of england

webmaster_dragon · #34 03-09-2005, 11:19 AM

oh, yes along with collecting animal skulls, I have this wunderfull plan to... *RULE THE WORLD!*, umm, I meen pet cute bunnies, or adopt a puppie... or, um... other nice things normal people doo...

Leto · #35 03-10-2005, 01:13 AM

When I was six, I filled a Sea Monkey containter completely with food... It was left in a storage compartment. Then, when I was eleven, there was one SUPER FRICKIN' HUGE Sea Monkey. Like, you could see its ribs, it otherwise it was rpetty see-through in the greenish water. And it was alive. Now, I think it is dead though. Sort of sciency, but not really.

Dino · #36 03-10-2005, 01:57 AM

Sea monkey's don't count as Science, they come under Biology, which has some links with Science.

I hate Biology.

TheRaisin · #37 03-10-2005, 07:23 AM

Biology friggin' rocks.

Dino · #38 03-10-2005, 07:51 AM

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Biology friggin' rocks.

It's mega boring man, have you ever done biology homework? I tell ya it'll be war if I ever have to write the word "vacuole" or "cytoplasm" in my best handwriting ever again.

You never get to do any of the cool stuff like dissecting a frog... it's always just dissecting an onion and inspecting it's epidermal cells under a microscope. Then you end up cutting your finger on the cover slip that you broke, and get hit round the head with last week's edition of New Scientist for being a clumbsy absent minded clutz.

Teal · #39 03-10-2005, 10:39 AM

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A quick googlesearch would've saved you from the indignity of publicly demonstrating your lack of knowledge.

Love ya, Dino.

But I prefer to trust what I learned in my degree to what good old Google can tell me.

"Polymer" = "poly" many + "mer" unit. True, it does refer primarily to hydrocarbons, but anything with a repetitive molecular unit is a polymer - ditto with dimers ("two units" - a lot of proteins are dimers) or tetramers (ditto).

And starch is very organic - it's a giant polymer of covalently bonded glucose units, and since glucose is a molecule consisting exclusively of carbon, oxygen and hydrogen, then so is starch. Plastics, being crafted from crude oil, and thus primarily long-chain hydrocarbon molecules, are similarly known as "organic" molecules (organic referring to the fact they're heavy in nonmetals and primarily CHON, as opposed to "mineral" like metal oxides and the like).

My degree almost killed me. And now I've forgotten most of it. *wah*

:

But I'm still cooler than you.

Jury's out on that one.

sligster · #40 03-10-2005, 05:19 PM

Biology, in a sense, can be pretty boring. But doing wacked out experiments on animals like Super Munch (giant sea monkeys lol), it can be fun

TheRaisin · #41 03-10-2005, 06:06 PM

You know, sea monkeys seem to be a classic kid "experiment", but I've never even seen them. Would anyone like to post an image?

sligster · #42 03-10-2005, 06:54 PM

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You know, sea monkeys seem to be a classic kid "experiment", but I've never even seen them. Would anyone like to post an image?

they're like tiny shrimp... sort of

TheRaisin · #43 03-10-2005, 07:58 PM

Hmm. Neat. Nowhere near as cool as the amazingness that is TRIOPS, though.

What exactly are sea monkeys? What species of animal are they, and what are they related to?

a flock of seagulls · #44 03-10-2005, 08:50 PM

WHA! thats a seemonkey?!?!?! i thought they were the size of a monkey! and were brown and had tails!
and ate seabananananas!

Dino · #45 03-11-2005, 12:25 AM

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Love ya, Dino.

But I prefer to trust what I learned in my degree to what good old Google can tell me.

"Polymer" = "poly" many + "mer" unit. True, it does refer primarily to hydrocarbons, but anything with a repetitive molecular unit is a polymer - ditto with dimers ("two units" - a lot of proteins are dimers) or tetramers (ditto).

You're basically repeating what I said. Polymer = multi-molecular chemical. And by the way, you left out monomers - a very important word in polymer chemistry, even though it's no more than one single molecule. But I ask you, what is 2, 3, 4, and 5 without 1?

:

And starch is very organic - it's a giant polymer of covalently bonded glucose units, and since glucose is a molecule consisting exclusively of carbon, oxygen and hydrogen, then so is starch.

Actually technically starch is two polymeric carbohydrates called amylose and amylopectin, which are complex glucose polymers. But for the sake of argument you did correctly describe the basics of it.

I still don't truely understand your implied "more organic than plastic" argument, though.

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Plastics, being crafted from crude oil, and thus primarily long-chain hydrocarbon molecules, are similarly known as "organic" molecules (organic referring to the fact they're heavy in nonmetals and primarily CHON, as opposed to "mineral" like metal oxides and the like).

Actually, in chemistry, organic compounds are considered to be anything with carbon-hydrogen bonds. That has been established after hundreds of years of argument on the subject, and I'm not about to accept anything else from some post-graduate crammer who's forgotten the majority of what he learned.

AquaticAmbi · #46 03-11-2005, 08:00 AM

All you want to know about sea-monkeys:
http://www.sea-monkeys.com/html/abou...atarethey.html

Then go to look around the rest of the official sea-monkey site. You wouldn't believe how many products they have.

oddguy · #47 03-11-2005, 08:08 AM

Cool science stuff I did as a kid...

Well, my brother and I made a solor oven. It was really sweet. Sure, it took an extra long time to cook in it, but you could cook anything you wanted to. Though, us being impatient children, we mostly cooked the fast stuff...like hotdogs.

I did have an ant farm as a child, but it didn't really last long. I prefered playing with ants that were expendable...I had an infinite supply outside. I'd grab ants and drop them out a window to see if they lived...and they did. I'd also take an ant far away from his home to see if he could find his way back. Stuff like that.

I did other cool stuff, but I'll post it later.

-oddguy

Teal · #48 03-11-2005, 03:16 PM

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You're basically repeating what I said.

...ditto on that.

I only left out "monomer" since that's (essentially) the same as "molecule".

:

Actually, in chemistry, organic compounds are considered to be anything with carbon-hydrogen bonds. That has been established after hundreds of years of argument on the subject, and I'm not about to accept anything else from some post-graduate crammer who's forgotten the majority of what he learned.

Agreed - I was just half asleep and couldn't word it the way I wanted.

But you're right, of course, carbon-hydrogen and carbon-carbon bonds are the very backbone of organic chemistry. (Well, right apart from my gender

Odd that with such a feminine name people still think I'm a bloke. *headscratch* "Forgotten everything" was a bit of an exaggeration, too - I just don't think I'll ever use it in my career, which is a shame - a good proportion of four years of learning I'll never need, unless I go into industry.)

I never had seamonkies. I never heard of them until I was in my late teens and never really felt inspired to try grow them - I couldn't keep my "pet" PLANT alive, so I don't think I'd do so well at sea-monkies.

Joshy · #49 03-12-2005, 06:53 PM

Definately fermenting Alcohol in Chemistry(aka making alcohol, which we all drank in the end and got sick)
And charging persplex rod with static electricity (thats because everyone is referring to jacking off, as we were rubbing the rod up and down)

Leto · #50 03-12-2005, 08:38 PM

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they're like tiny shrimp... sort of

Holee carp! The size of the image is just a little larger than the actual size of my huge-ass seamonkey. Just checked- nothing is in the seamonkey container, except mouldy crap. Mabye the corpses, exploded?!

Dino · #51 03-13-2005, 11:41 AM

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(Well, right apart from my gender

Odd that with such a feminine name people still think I'm a bloke. *headscratch*

It puzzles me how people can assume that it's possible to tell that someone is female literally without getting any clues from their forum profile and or the way they carry themselves off in their posts.

I'm not saying you're making that assumption, I'm just stating for the record, and clearing my conscience while I'm at it.

I have no way of telling that you're female, since you just act normally. Most females seem to make a point of acting female, but since you don't it's all to easy to just assume that you're male.

I hate society.

Teal · #52 03-13-2005, 11:48 AM

D'oh, sorry Dino. I so rarely actually have to log in here I keep forgetting my forum user name on here (Teal) is different to everywhere else (Keaalu). But then, people still seem to assume "Keaalu" is a male name as well, which just confuses me.

TheRaisin · #53 03-13-2005, 11:51 AM

Yes, Super Munch. Exploded.

One time we had like a gallon jug of orange juice in the fridge, and it was maybe one-third full, and it sat in there for weeks, and it started fermenting! It was cool. There was this tiny crack in the side and there was this gas rushing out. It was sweet. I didn't drink any. I don't really like orange juice.

Dino · #54 03-14-2005, 04:57 AM

Your ninja foetus looks like a ninja seamonkey.

Software Bug · #55 03-14-2005, 05:34 AM

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Hmm. Neat. Nowhere near as cool as the amazingness that is TRIOPS, though.

What exactly are sea monkeys? What species of animal are they, and what are they related to?

i had TRIOPS

they never came out.....

i think i even have a bag of them somewhere

(eggs)

Mojo · #56 03-14-2005, 11:10 AM

I have had the Creepy Crawlers as werll, along with the oven thingy, and glow in the dark latex stuff. Gawd, my room was filled with those bugs (They'd stick a bit when they was finished...).

Nowadays, I'm into nitro RC's. Anyone els had this hobby?

***Nate*** · #57 03-14-2005, 06:17 PM

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Yes, Super Munch. Exploded.

One time we had like a gallon jug of orange juice in the fridge, and it was maybe one-third full, and it sat in there for weeks, and it started fermenting! It was cool. There was this tiny crack in the side and there was this gas rushing out. It was sweet. I didn't drink any. I don't really like orange juice.

Sounds like something a friend of mine once. On the first day of year 11, he brought a bottle of orange juice to drink but never did. It sat in his locker all the way through the year and on the last day he took it home, only to bring it back first day year 12 and put it in his locker for another year. On graduation day he opened it (by this time the liquid was brown) and poured it out in his backyard, where it killed the grass.