Earthworm meal?
The phrase “dining on earthworms” intrigues people in a variety of ways (whether or not they are intrigued in the first place). For historians, it can spark debates like this: Political rallies That happened in the German city of Worms in 1521. To nutritionists, the phrase can describe the work of scientists considering whether today's roughly 8 billion humans could all survive, if necessary, on a diet primarily of earthworms.
Henry Miller, James Mulhall, Lou Aino Pfau, Rachel Palm, and David Denkenberger, whom Feedback considers an all-star team in the earthworm nutrition community, recently devoured a mountain of data. After the meal, intellectually speaking, they said:Could harvesting earthworms significantly reduce global hunger in the event of a major disaster?” Published in the journal biomass.
The five researchers analyzed four techniques for efficiently capturing earthworms: digging and sorting, spraying with anthelmintics, making worm noises, and electric shocks.
They asked the “canned” (worm) question: Given the constraints of “scalability, climate-related collection barriers, and pre-consumption processing requirements,” could earthworms collected in these ways feed all of humanity? Their answer, in a word, is “no.”
Their 48-word response reads: “The authors are not aware of any studies on the human health effects of consuming diets high in harvested earthworms. However, in the authors' opinion, there is reasonable evidence that such diets may be harmful and therefore should not be recommended unless starvation is the alternative.”
Earthworm Meal
Miller, Mulhall, Pfau, Palm and Denkenberger are the latest pioneers in a long line of scientists who have come together to study earthworms' feeding habits.
Many others have focused on the feeding habits of the insects themselves.
Charles Darwin achieved some fame through his 1881 book, Formation of vegetable mold by the action of earthwormsNearly a century later, Christian Forchard and Peter Jummers wroteEarthworm diet: a study of the feeding guild of polychaetes” took up 92 pages. Annual Review of Oceanography and Marine Biology.
Forchard and Jumaz include a conversation-ending sentence that's worth memorizing and reciting if you want to impress at a party: “Alciopids are holoplanktonic animals with a muscular, eversable pharynx.”
Other scientists have studied what happens when insects are eaten, particularly by non-humans.
In 2002, Mary Silcox and Mark Teaford examined the teeth of several habitual earthworm eaters. They summarized their observations: Journal of Mammalogy,title”Insect diet: analysis of microwear on mole teeth” “.
“We measured microwear from the shear surfaces of mandibular molars. Parascallops Brewery (a hairy-tailed mole) Scapanus orarius “We compared the genes of (coast moles) with those of other small mammals, including tenrecs, hedgehogs, three species of primates and two species of bats.”
Some of the wear patterns on the mole's teeth “can plausibly be explained by interactions between the inner and outer teeth of the earthworm and the soil,” the researchers wrote.
Silcox and Teaford's mole teeth study may take on new importance if people on Earth choose to live a diet based primarily on earthworms, despite Miller and others' warnings.
Feedback has been received on the news regarding height requirements for certain courses at Vietnam National University’s School of Business Administration (HSB).
Deutsche Welle On July 2nd, the school announced that “this year's admission requirements are 1.58m or above for girls and 1.65m or above for boys,” because “the school aims to develop future leaders and excellent administrators” and “height is a determining factor, especially when it comes to leadership and self-confidence.”
The news report said that following public outcry, “HSB adjusted its admissions criteria” so that “the rule now applies to only one course – management and security.”
Are there schools or other institutions in the science, medical, or technology fields that have strict height requirements for students or employees? If so, please send us a document in Feedback with the subject line “Big/Small Careers.” Some job requirements reasonably specify that applicants must be physically able to use certain job-related equipment. Please do not send such requirements. We are seeking examples in Feedback where numbers, not needs, are prioritized.
Toilet Humor
Inspired by Feedback's collection of abandoned organisation slogans, Ken Taylor has been writing down slogans about abandoned things.
“I live in a very rural area. [the] UK – Cumbria. There are many isolated plots of land that are not connected to the sewer network and so rely on septic tanks, which need to be emptied regularly. I saw one such tanker truck carrying out its duties. The slogan on the side read “Move yesterday’s meal”. Nothing more to add…”
Marc Abrahams is the founder of the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony and co-founder of the journal Annals of Improbable Research. He previously worked on unusual uses of computers. His website is Impossible.
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