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Lockheed Scientist Gives Deathbed Interview About UFOs at Area 51

Boyd Bushman says he was a senior scientist at Lockheed Martin, and before he died he wanted the world to know about all the classified data he’d gathered about aliens from top-secret sources at Area 51. So he did this final interview, complete with pictures. Bushman has some weirdly detailed descriptions of where the aliens…

The latest measurements of the hole in the Ozone layer over the Antarctic put it at approximately the size of North America. Though that’s certainly still a considerably-sized hole at 9 million square miles, NASA reports that the overall measurement has been holding roughly steady since 2010. Image: NASA Goddard

The Guy Who Patented the Ouija Board Has a Oujia Board Gravestone

If you’re really serious about communicating with the dead, one would guess you’d get the best reception with a Ouija board that’s conveniently installed in a cemetery. This is the headstone of Elijah Bond, who patented the Ouija board, the beloved game that’s entertained and terrified people for over a century. Can you visit this…

How Universal Basic Income Will Save Us From the Robot Uprising

Robots are poised to eliminate millions of jobs over the coming decades. We have to address the coming epidemic of “technological unemployment” if we’re to avoid crippling levels of poverty and societal collapse. Here’s how a guaranteed basic income will help — and why it’s absolutely inevitable. Illustration by Tara Jacoby The idea of a…

The Best Halloween Costumes On The Internet

Happy Halloween, people! Tonight is the night — so paint on the makeup and get out your lattes and brooms, you Basic Witch. Here are the most jaw-dropping Halloween costumes we’ve found posted on the Internet this year. Weatherman from WDRB gets creative with the green screen. Watch the full video here.[via Brian Dies] Everything…

4-acre spider web may be the grossest thing you will see this Halloween*

This report on a 4-acre spider web covering a building has made shiver and curl in disgust. You are looking at the Baltimore Wastewater Treatment Plant, where 4 acres of their facility were covered by a spider web made by an estimated 107 million spiders. That’s 35,176 spiders per cubic meter! In fact, the scientists…

Which Classic Movies Have You Never Seen?

I have a confession to make: I’ve never seen The Shining. I’m a huge Kubrick fan, and I know from the famous stills and tributes that it’s a wonderful work of art. But I’ve never seen it, and I don’t know why. This sort of thing happens to everyone, though, right? This topic’s been on…

A new supernova has been discovered in the bright Virgo galaxy M61. It was discovered Wednesday by Koichi Itagaki of Japan, and at a magnitude of 13.6, it could soon become visible in smaller telescopes. Today it was confirmed as a Type Ia-pec supernova. More to come as we learn more! Image credit: Ernesto Guido,…

Meet the Amateur Sleuth Who’s About to Unmask the Zodiac Killer

Tom Voigt knows absolutely everything about the Zodiac Killer, the real-life murderer featured in the movie Zodiac. Neither cop nor crackpot, Voigt is certain that he’s amassed almost enough evidence to solve the decades-old case very soon. Voigt runs the popular website ZodiacKiller.com — an online destination for amateur sleuths who are fascinated by the…

New X-Shot Blasters Have You Targeting Bugs, Not Your Co-Workers

The folks over at Blaster Labs managed to get some surprisingly advanced info on a couple of new dart guns that Zuru will be adding to its X-Shot line in the fall of 2015—a full year ahead of their official release. Most homes with a decent arsenal of foam dart weaponry probably have a ‘don’t…

Every Horror Reference From The Cabin In The Woods In One Video

Thought you caught every single meta-reference in Drew Goddard’s fantastic horror feature Cabin in the Woods? Well now is the time to double check, because this video lays it ALL out. Brought to you by the folks at GoodBadFlicks, I agree with maybe 90% of everything they reference—minus the “sexy witches.” I think the cube…

Meet Afghanistan’s Elusive, Endangered “Vampire” Deer

This is a male musk deer, knowing for growing fangs during the breeding season. A recent survey by the Wildlife Conservation Society confirmed that Kashmir musk deer, one of seven related Asian species, still live in Afghanistan’s Nuristan Province, some 60 years after its last recorded sighting. Above: A Siberian musk deer, which is related…

The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow Was Inspired By A Yellow Fever Epidemic

A community paralyzed with fear, not knowing when an unseen presence will claim its next victim. Are we describing an epidemic or a supernatural predator? The similarity is not a coincidence in the horror story, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, whose author, Washington Irving, fled a yellow fever outbreak in New York. Writing in Smithsonian…

There’s No Wrong Way to Shoot Candy With a High-Speed Camera

Using a slight variation on the famous high-speed camera set-up by Doc Edgerton, the Edgerton Center at MIT shot a .22 caliber rifle through three peanut butter cups and captured this perfect image. Three peanut butter cups were harmed in the photographing of this photograph. [MIT] Photo via MIT’s Edgarton Center / Taken by Dr.…

Your Guide to the next wave of Marvel’s Cinematic Heroes

Marvel’s Cinematic Universe is getting a hell of a lot bigger in the next 5 years, with new heroes joining the likes of Captain America and Iron Man in Cinemas. Don’t know your Doctor Strange from your Doctor Who? Who the heck is Blackagar Boltagon? Here’s your handy guide to Marvel’s latest Silver Screen Superheroes.…

Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo Has Been Lost – One Pilot Confirmed Dead

Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo experienced an “in-flight anomaly” shortly after takeoff this morning. The suborbital space plane was conducting its first rocket- powered test-flight since January. California Highway Patrol now reports one fatality and one major injury following the accident. Above: A photo of SpaceShipTwo on April 19, 2013, the date of its first supersonic test…

Skateboarders turn an airport into their own personal skatepark

Skaters are great at appropriating architecture as obstacles for amazing maneuvers. But usually you think of the the rails and ledges of urban areas or constructed ramps as their playground. In this video, Finland’s Helsinki airport is the unlikely setting for some gnarly shredding. Legendary pro skater and photographer Arto Saari was behind the session…

How China Is Making Tiny Islands Inhabitable With Huge Floating Docks

The Spratly Islands are basically mounds of sand in the middle of the South China Sea, some of them barely tall enough to reach above the water. But China is hell-bent on making them inhabitable, even drawing up plans for floating energy and water plants. It has nothing to do with the islands themselves and…

Could We Use Ground-Based Lasers To Propel Rockets Into Space?

A pair of Russian scientists are proposing a radical new propulsion technique that would accelerate a rocket while in flight, by using a ground-based laser. Should it work, it could push aircraft to go beyond Mach 10. Conventional rockets are limited by the amount of solid or liquid fuel they can carry. To achieve higher…

The One Basic Fact About History That Time Travelers Always Forget

One of the staples of time travel stories is the idea that our heroes will visit earlier geological periods in Earth’s history. Of course — because they’ll want to see dinosaurs with ostrich feathers and giant millipedes. But they generally forget something very important about Earth’s past. If you’re going back more than 30 million…