I came across this question online a few days ago and it made me pause and scroll back up. Wait, wait, wait. Is this person confusing Thor with Zeus? It’s an easy mistake to make, given how often ancient gods appear in popular media. Or are they asking a genuinely more fascinating question: Is Thor the Nordic equivalent of the Greek Zeus?
There is something magical about rainbows that brings out childlike wonder and joy in people. Where else in your life do colorful shapes just appear out of thin air in front of you (and then disappear just as fast)? No wonder people in the past had all kinds of mythical lore associated with rainbows. These days we know that rainbows form when sunlight meets rain, but have you ever wondered why rainbows appear where they do and what determines their shape and position?
Have you ever wondered where the word ‘helicopter’ comes from? I always thought it originated from the pairing of the words ‘heli’ and ‘copter’. After all, there are words like ‘heli-pad’ and ‘copter’ (or a ‘chopper’) that seem to support that interpretation. Turns out, that’s not true at all! Language has a funny way of taking a word and morphing it into something else.
This is the third and final part of the post series where I explore the reasons behind the sharp change in birth rates currently happening everywhere around the world. I will also be looking to find answers to the question of whether it is really that bad if global populations decrease.
In the previous post (Part 1), I started looking into the question of why are birth rates (and fertility rates, which, while not technically synonymous, reflect the same trends) suddenly on the decline all around the globe. In this second part, I will focus more on the reasons behind this decline, both historical and more recent ones.
It’s early morning. After I have willed myself out of bed and got my kids ready for the day, I sit down to eat my breakfast (either soggy cereal or cold porridge, the staple of parents of young children everywhere) and read the news. The algorithm already knows what I am interested in, so most of the headlines I come across are at least vaguely intriguing. After a quick scroll, I notice it. Another one. I click and skim through the article, but there really isn’t anything new there. The title reads, ‘2023 saw the lowest recorded birth rate ever in insert random country’. I mentally archive the article with a dozen other similar ones I have come upon in the last several months, each about a different country around the world. They are all experiencing the same trend.
With the new ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ movie becoming a cultural moment akin to last year’s ‘Barbie’, I set out to explore the impact of Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine on pop culture. What better way to investigate this than to compare the popularity of the name ‘Logan’ with the appearances of Wolverine in visual media.
Since I mentioned taxis in my last post, it feels only fitting to write about the origin of this word today. I have always been fascinated by etymology – the scientific study of the origin and evolution of words. I love to find out about the weird and wonderful connections that exist in languages. Especially as a history nerd, it is so cool to learn about how a word reflects the time and place of its origin. So, for whatever reason, I once started thinking about whether there was a connection between the words ‘taxi’ and ‘tax’.
This is a place where you can read about all kinds of interesting things and find answers to questions you didn’t even know you had. I started this blog to satisfy both my curiosity and my need for a creative outlet. I write a lot for work, and even though I take pleasure in crafting the perfectly structured and logically argued piece of scientific writing, academic texts need to follow certain rules and consequently are not very conducive to releasing one’s creativity. Thus, Serendipity Loop was born!
