X Character Flaws That Made Human Beings What They Are Today

Most of us are taught from a young age what it takes to be a good person. Be confident and independent, eat right and wash behind your ears our parents tell us. It’s all fine advice for those living in the modern world, but if our ancient ancestors had followed it we’d probably still be hanging out in the forest munching chiggers off each other’s backs. Turns out in order to become nature’s biggest winners, we first had to act like pretty big losers.


Gluttony

Today’s world is one in which it’s possible to legitimately purchase fried chicken filled donuts, given you accept the fact you’ll likely be stealthily filmed from the neck down when buying one for the local news’ latest “obesity epidemic” cover story. Should we feel guilty about our eating habits, or has humanity actually benefited from our hardwired urge to cover with gravy and devour anything dropped in front of us?

The thing is, there are plenty of animals that eat simple, healthy, plant-based diets, and for the most part, they don’t tend to be particularly bright.

Dumb, yet delicious.

Most of the planet’s sharper animals are, like humans, essentially scavengers, as a certain amount of intelligence and long-term memory is required to remember, for instance, which berries are a tasty treat and which will make you shit your intestines inside-out. Once a species develops this basic intelligence it becomes infinitely more resilient and able to adapt to new ecosystems. Just compare rats, which will be around long after we’ve killed each other off, because they’re willing to eat filth, to those snooty bamboo-munching pandas who probably won’t survive another decade. If you want to make it big as a species, your dignity has to be the first thing to go. Now, let’s piss off some vegetarians…

Best to just skip to the next entry vegetarians.

It wasn’t just ancient man’s willingness to shove just about anything in his mouth that contributed to his intelligence--much of it can be attributed to our ancestors starting to consume large quantities of meat and fat. Our large juicy brains consume a huge amount of energy, the kind of energy that could only be provided by big greasy slabs of animal flesh in those primitive pre-high fructose corn syrup times. The hunting of ancient critters also contributed to the creation of the first tools, and strengthened tribal bonds. So chew that gristle with pride friends, turns out it’s brain food.


Bad Hygiene

Scientists have long questioned why human beings evolved to become one of the few mostly hairless mammals on the planet. One leading theory is that our ancestors were dirty little monkeys who lost their hair as a way of escaping rampant parasites, particularly body lice we picked up from gorillas (don’t judge, the Pleistocene period was a crazy, experimental time man).

But how did losing our body hair help us become what we are today? Well now that we no longer had insulating fur covering us, we had to create clothing, and groups living in different areas produced varying levels of pigmentation to protect their exposed skin from the sun, leading to the development of race. Oh, and the need to keep warm may have also contributed to our ancestors learning one other mildly important skill…

The marshmallow was discovered shortly thereafter.

Give those crazy cavemen credit, they knew how to make the best of a bad situation. Most people who catch gorilla crabs these days just end up with a prescription for special shampoo and a lifetime ban from the zoo.

Gossip

It was long thought that human beings developed language to aid in cooperation during hunting, but a new theory suggests that language may not have developed out in the forest with the men, but back around the campfire amongst the gossiping women. The fact that women may have been responsible for language is easy enough to believe considering even today when guys get together their vocabularies don’t seem to extend far beyond the words needed to describe a pair of tits or their buddies’ total gayness.

Clearly female cavepersons were a lot more advanced.

So, ironically what many consider the lowest use of language may have been what led to its creation in the first place, but did gossip have any other positive ramifications? Yes, gossip was absolutely essential in holding together larger more complex human social groups. Most ape societies max out at around 50 members since the primary method of socializing for them is grooming, and picking all the tasty critters off your neighbour’s backside can be a time consuming process. Gossip on the other hand can help you find out who’s been dragging who by the hair to which cave, or who covets whose pile of shiny rocks, much more efficiently, which allowed early man to hold together larger social groups up to around 150 members (gee, that number seems familiar). But why are these larger groups important? Well…


Social Anxiety and Depression

Our brains are about six times too big for an animal our size. Did mankind develop this massive amount of grey matter to help us in our long-standing mission to make mother nature our bitch? It seems unlikely since even animals that aren’t particularly brainy still make out okay in the wild. It’s more probable that humans managed to get a hang of the nature stuff pretty early on, and the real purpose of our huge leap in intelligence was to help us figure out our increasingly large, complex social groups. In other words, trying to navigate the perils of the lunchroom at school probably stimulates your mind more than any of your classes ever will.

Studying the skulls of our ancestors, scientists have found disproportionate growth in the parts of our brains used to construct mental simulations. Being able to play out different situations in your mind and predict possible outcomes is not just essential to surviving the social jungle, it’s also the basis of all problem solving. Basically every scientific or creative breakthrough in human history can trace its roots to some sweaty palmed caveman sitting alone in his hut fretting about whether the other cavemen think he’s cool, and conjuring up fantasies about what it would be like to finally talk to that cavegirl with the shapely brow ridge.

Depression played it’s part too, as some speculate depression evolved as a way to make people separate themselves from the group in times of stress, so they could try to simulate a solution to their problems in peace. So yeah, if your teenager’s being an angsty little punk, don’t worry, they’re actually contributing the betterment of the human race. Well unless they’re goth—everyone knows Goths are an evolutionary dead end.

Scientists suspect the Homo Gothius subspecies were quickly wedgied out of existence.

Refusing to Grow Up

There are few quicker ways to get under a person’s skin than to call them childish. From a young age we’re pressured to be mature, but as it turns out refusing to grow up is a cornerstone of human evolution, so take that mom and dad.

Human childhoods are unique in that we’re born with a massive brain (just ask any woman who’s had to birth one of ‘em) and wriggling vestigial bodies, that grow slowly and don’t really change significantly until puberty. While most animals put all their energy towards quickly growing adult-like bodies, humans instead spend our early years strengthening the pathways in our brains and absorbing information. Our species’ unique ability to pass information and knowledge from one generation to the next, is due to the fact that humans essentially spend 20-years barfing in their offspring’s mouths before they finally kick them from the nest (and even then the barf keeps coming in the form of college tuition, weddings, and their old room again after the divorce).

Cracked.com--validating man-children using science since 2006.

We're there for ya' man...

Drunkenness

As diverse and sometimes conflicting as the world’s countless cultures can be, there’s at least one thing we share—we all love of getting shitfaced. Scientists suspect humans have been boozehounds since our very earliest days when we looked like something you’d hire an exterminator to chase out of your attic. Hell, our bodies are specially designed for alcohol consumption, with portions of our livers specifically designated for metabolizing alcohol. So human beings have been getting tanked for ages, but aside from helping ugly cavemen hook up, has it had any major effect on human progress?

Surprisingly it has. Human beings only truly started to thrive once we developed agriculture, as it allowed us to settle down, found cities and start multiplying like catholic bunnies. Generally it’s been assumed we began farming to provide ourselves with a food source and that brewing alcohol from these plants came later, but some scientists have begun to question whether we might have the timeline backwards. They think we liked getting snookered so much we established agriculture in order to give us plants to brew, and that the whole growing food to feed our children thing was just a happy side effect.

So our entire modern society was founded on getting plastered. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Nathan Birch contributes to the development of the human culture with his webcomic Zoology.

7 Amazing Houses (Built by Equally Amazing People)

The world is home to pretty much every shape, size and bizarre form of house you can possibly imagine, but as amazing as these houses are, the stories of the people who built them are often even more fantastic. A house says a lot about a person, and these houses tell the world that its owner isn’t about to conform to it’s rules (or maybe that they just forgot to take their medication).


The Toilet House

No need for a lengthy description here—it’s a house designed to look like a giant toilet. We realize housing markets are in the can and all, but we’re not sure we needed a house that illustrated it quite so literally.

So Who the Hell Built This Thing?

Sim Jae-Duck was born in a washroom. Usually this is the kind of personal trivia you try to keep to yourself, but Sim Jae-Duck isn’t merely unashamed of the fact that the first thing he saw in this world was that the tub could really use a de-grouting, he’s downright proud of it. It was no mere coincidence that his mother gave birth there either, as Sim’s grandmother told his mom tthat babies born in bathrooms were destined to live long successful lives. Normally that kind of advice would be cause to ship grandma off to the nursing home, but it turns out that she may have been on to something as Sim Jae-Duck went on to become the Mayor of the South Korean city of Suweon.

During his term Sim was given the nickname “Mayor Toilet”, and while this is hardly the first time people have referred to politicians and toilets in the same sentence, Sim truly earned his moniker by being completely obsessed by the things. Sim believes bathrooms should be “clean and beautiful resting places imbued with culture” and hopes to transform them into something closer to a garden or art gallery (if those things were filled with the smell of poop).

Yeah yeah, toilets are great. Enough already.

In 1999 Sim Jae-Duck launched his World Toilet Association, and to celebrate unveiled his glass walled toilet house, which features two bedrooms, guestrooms and of course three luxurious state-of-the-art washrooms. Feeling disappointed that you can’t literally live your life in the crapper? Well if you have 50 thousand dollars laying about you too can spend a night in Sim’s toilet house. Just remember to bring some good reading material.


The Scrap Wood Skyscraper

Believe it or not, this thing that looks like some sort of haunted scrap heap is in fact an inhabitable house.

Located in the Siberian town of Arkhangelsk, it’s believed to be the tallest wooden dwelling in the world, towering 13-stories and seemingly defying several laws of physics by not toppling over every time a slight breeze hits it.

So Who the Hell Built This Thing?

Nikolai Sutyagin built the entire house himself by hand mostly from scrap lumber. According to its creator the house was originally intended to only be 2-stories, but looked “ungainly”, so he just kept building, which we’re pretty sure isn’t a technique recommended by most architectural schools.

Despite the quirkiness of his final product, Nikolai sounds like quite the inspiring figure doesn’t he? The kind of guy you tell your kids about when you want them to get their asses up from in front of the TV. Well until you find out that Nikolai Sutyagin was actually a Russian gangster who built his house to be the Russian equivalent of the Playboy mansion.

You're more likely to get tetanus than in the real Playboy mansion. On the plus side, you're also less likely to have to sleep with Hugh Hefner.

The house contains a garden, ballroom, 5-story bathhouse and numerous rooms where Sutyagins business colleagues could “entertain” various women. Come to think of it, he may inspire us even more now.

Of course he's not wearing a shirt.

The Narrow House

Well, clearly this is just a picture of a house in construction. That white structure is just one of the walls of a full house to be built later, right?

Nope, turns out that’s an entire house, the thinnest one in the world in fact. The house measures only about 3-feet wide at the front, expanding to a roomy 6-feet across at it’s widest point. Despite being narrower than a lot of human beings here in America, this Brazilian house manages to pack in two living rooms, three bedrooms and a kitchen.

So Who the Hell Built This Thing?

A few years ago, Helenita Queiroz Grave Minho found herself out of a job. While some people might use this as excuse to catch up on their daytime TV while hiding inside to keep the disability checks coming, Helenita decided to be proactive. She wanted to build a house that she could rent out for extra cash, but unfortunately the only land she had to build on was a narrow alleyway. That didn’t stop her.

Helenita's a lady who gets her way.

Helenita went through a lengthy battle with the Mayor’s office before she was allowed to build (during which we imagine the phrase “are you completely insane?” must have been common) but eventually the authorities gave in. Despite having no architectural training, Helenita designed and built the house with her husband, and it’s now become a local tourist attraction, with Helenita planning to build another story on it as well. Hopefully she stops there though, since we’re not sure “world’s narrowest collapsed pile of rubble” will have quite the same draw.


The Coral Castle

On the southernmost tip of Florida, an area not exactly known for it’s high culture, lays the Coral Castle, a structure that has been compared to world wonders like Stonehenge and the great pyramids of Egypt, and it was all built by a single man who, if his neighbours are to be believed, may have had magical powers.

So Who the Hell Built This Thing?

Latvian immigrant Edward Leedskalnin was dumped by his fiancé on the day before their wedding. After a steel toe to the nuts like that a lot of men might fantasize about building a fortress to shut themselves away from humanity in, but Edward Leedskalnin, being a can-do kind of guy, actually did it. Edward moved to south Florida and began building himself a castle using giant blocks of limestone from the nearby Gulf of Mexico. Everything in the castle, from Edward’s two-story tower living quarters, to the furniture, to the strange sculptures in the courtyard, to his throne (he way have been overcompensating just a tad with that one) were made of these stone slabs, with no mortar or cement to hold them together.

While that’s odd in and of itself, even stranger is the fact that nobody knows how the hell the guy did it all. Leedskalnin went to great lengths to make sure nobody saw him working, and it remains a mystery how he managed to move, cut and precisely assemble these chunks of rock (some of which were up to twice as large as the stones used at Stonehenge) all on his own. Oh, and if that wasn’t enough, eventually he decided the location he’d chosen for his project wasn’t quite right, so he moved the whole thing 10-miles down the road. Think changing apartments is tough? Try moving when you have to take over a thousand tons of limestone with you.

See this giant hunk of stone? I totally lifted it, and I'm not going to tell you how.

Over the years people have come up with plenty of interesting theories to explain the creation of the Coral Castle, and by “interesting”, we mostly mean batshit insane. Neighbours say they witnessed Edward placing his hands on the rocks, chanting and causing them to levitate, local teenagers claim to have seen him flying the blocks like hydrogen balloons, and some even believe Edward may have discovered the very key to the universe. Edward himself said his amazing building abilities were due to him discovering the secrets of the pyramids. Gee, thanks for the clarification. Even Spock himself demands an explanation…



The Beer Can House

Somewhere in Houston, Texas lays the Beer Can House, which in a stirring tribute to both recycling and alcoholism, is adorned with over 50-thousand crushed beer cans.

So Who the Hell Built This Thing?

We know what you’re thinking, and no, the Beer Can House was never a frat house believe it or not. The house was actually created by upholsterer John Milkovisch. The whole project started when Milkovisch decided to replace his lawn with cement slabs which he covered with marbles, metal and all sorts of other random junk, because in his words, he just “got sick of mowing the damn grass.”

With his property now officially an eyesore, he decided to really go for broke. According to friends, Milkovisch lived on the route the beer truck drove to get to the grocery store, and like a middle aged beer bellied kid, he’d run out like he’d seen the ice cream truck and clean it out, stocking eight to ten cases in his garage at all times. Perhaps it was the influence of all those beers that made him think sticking the empties on the walls was a good idea, but it turned out fine for Milkovisch as the house is now considered a beloved local landmark. Basically what we’re saying is that if there’s ever a vote on who the awesomest guy ever was, John Milkovisch ought to at least be on the ballot.

John Milkovisch appreciated the finer things in life.

The House on the Rock

Near the unassuming small town of Spring Green, Wisconsin lays one of the oddest houses in America. For starters it’s perched on top of a 60-foot tall column of sheer rock, and inside you’ll find a seemingly randomly assembled collection of bizarre themed rooms. There’s a room full of strange automated instruments, a recreation of an early 20th century town, a large carousel and more. Basically it’s what Disneyland would have been like if Walt had banged his head a few too many times as a kid and spent most of his life doing shrooms.

Apparently Godzilla lives somewhere in this house.

So Who the Hell Built This Thing?

The house’s creator, Alex Jordan Jr., was famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s biggest fan. Jordan travelled to meet Wright so he could show him the plans for a building he had designed, hoping to get his idol’s approval, and well, Wright basically straight-up told Jordan he was the shittiest architect in history, dropping the following awesome line on him…

"I wouldn't hire you to design a cheese crate or a chicken coop. You're not capable." There’s only one thing to say to that. Ouch.

Frank Lloyd Wright: The Don Rickles of the the architecture world.

Well after that Jordan turned in his Frank Lloyd Wright fan club badge, and decided he was going to make Wright eat his words by building a house on top of a rock spire he spotted while driving home in a huff from the fateful meeting. 80-years later Wright is America’s most respected architect and Alex Jordan is one of seven crazy people mentioned in a Cracked article. You sure showed him Alex.

Not even Alex Jordan's hat could compare to FLW.

Le Palais Ideal

Somewhere amongst the French countryside, near the town Châteauneuf-de-Galaure, lays Le Palais Ideal (“The Ideal Palace”), a large incredibly ornate palace built out of small stones, and decorated with imagery from the Bible, India and many other cultures from around the world. It may seem like a monument from some sort of long-lost civilization, but in reality the Palais Ideal is only celebrating it’s 100th birthday this year, and it’s creation was all the result of a man tripping over a stone.

So Who the Hell Built This Thing?

Le Palais Idea was entirely the work of Ferdinand Cheval, a mailman who tripped over a stone one day while on his route. Cheval could have simply tossed the rock aside, or perhaps gone with his mailman instincts and hurled it at somebody’s head, but instead he found himself fascinated by it’s shape and was inspired to create the Palais. From that day on, and for the next 33-years, Ferdinand Cheval would collect stones along his route, at first stuffing them into his pockets, before upgrading to a basket and eventually a wheelbarrow. Fortunately the backhoe wasn’t invented yet because we’re sure Cheval would have taken one on his route if he could.

Clearly not the kind of man you say "no" to when he asks to pick stones off your sidewalk.

After collecting the stones, Cheval would then painstakingly piece together his ideal palace, usually working at night by the light of an oil lamp. Cheval wanted to be buried there, but unfortunately that was against French law. Since Cheval was a mailman, and thus possessed that unique postal worker combination of insanity and love for pointless rules, he decided not to fight it and instead spent the next eight years building a mausoleum using the same techniques he had used for his palace. He made sure the mausoleum didn’t get all musty before he moved in either, promptly dying less than a year after he finished it.

Nathan Birch also writes the solidly constructed webcomic Zoology.

6 Creepy Urban Legends (That Happen to be True) Part 3!

As we’ve already proven twice that friend of a friend people keep hearing things from may not be as full of shit as you always thought, so get ready as Cracked once again makes you wet yourself with cold hard facts.


The Deadly Elevator

The Legend:
The metal doors clamp down on a hapless victim, who can do nothing but scream in terror as the elevator dings and begins to rise, shearing off their head or limbs as it does. We’ve watched scenes like this in enough movies that we all have that twinge of panic as the doors start to close on us as we try to catch an elevator. But surely this kind of thing doesn’t happen in real life. There are safety measures, right? Right?

The Truth:
Well yes, there are, but for whatever reason they were of no help to Dr. Hitoshi Nikaidoh on August 16th, 2003. Why didn’t the elevator open again, or shut down when the doctor became pinned between the doors at the shoulders as he was getting on? To this day nobody’s exactly sure, but inspectors have suggested the tragedy may have been caused by a single out of place wire. Think about that little morsel next time you’re debating whether to take the elevator or the stairs.

As the doors held Dr. Nikaidoh in place like a vice, the elevator began it’s ascent, slicing his head in two at mouth-level, leaving only his left ear and lower jaw attached to his body. Found that a little nauseating to read? Well suck it up, and try to imagine how the nurse who was already in the elevator and had to spend up to an hour in a blood-soaked box with the good doctor’s head felt. We’re surprised they didn’t find her scaling the elevator cables like John McClane in scrubs to get the hell out of there after 5-minutes.

While Dr. Nikaidoh’s story was certainly gruesome, he’s far from the only one to have been done in by an elevator mishap, as around 30-people are killed by elevators each year. Yes, 30 people a year have to die while listening to elevator muzak. If there’s a God out there he’s one cruel bastard.


The Case of the Killer Collar

The Legend:
A man shows up at a bank, and informs the tellers that he’s very sorry, but he’s going to have to clean the place out. You see, around his neck is an explosive collar that will deposit his brains all over the walls unless he robs the bank. A film favourite, explosive collars have made appearances in movies like Battle Royale and Transporter 3, but could this kind of Jigsaw killer-esque plot exist in real life?

The Truth:
On a day like any other in late August 2003, pizza deliveryman Brian Wells was about to end his shift when a fateful order came in. The directions given to Bryan led him to a winding deserted dirt road that ended at a lonely TV tower. Now most people upon arriving at the spooky deserted road would have just tossed the pizzas in the ditch, but not Brian Wells. He was dedicated to his minimum wage delivery job.

What exactly happened on that dirt road is still subject to debate, but what we do know is that around an hour later he reappeared at a nearby bank, with a strange collar around his neck, a homemade shotgun shaped like a walking cane in his hand, and a note demanding a quarter million dollars in cash. While supposedly all those responsible for putting the collar on Brian Wells have since been caught and charged, the wacky walking cane shotgun leads us to believe that there may have been another perpetrator that hasn’t yet been brought to justice.

Never count out the Penguin.

Unfortunately for Brain he was about as good at robbing banks as he was at avoiding obvious horror movie set-ups, and was apprehended by the police in the parking lot. The cops quickly discovered the collar, but just took it for a stylish ticking fashion accessory, and didn’t bother to call the bomb squad for nearly half an hour. By the time the bomb squad did arrive, the collar had gone off, blowing a “postcard-sized” hole in Wells’ chest.

The police found a list of tasks on Well’s body, each of which were to be completed in a set period of time or the the bomb would go off. Poor Brian was doomed from the start though, as it was later determined it would have been impossible for him to execute all the tasks even if everything had gone according to plan. He simply hadn’t been given enough time. These are the kind of tragedies that happened before the world had Google Maps.


The Body Farm

The Legend:
Near where you live there very well may be an isolated patch of land covered with unburied corpses, some of them posed, or even stuffed in car trunks, rotting in the midday sun. Is there a serial killer on the loose? Has the gravediggers’ union gone on strike again? No, in fact what’s going on here is, surprisingly, completely legal.

The Truth:
You won’t see much mention of this on CSI since it would take away from the usual 30-minutes devoted to David Caruso putting on and/or removing his sunglasses, but body farms are becoming an increasingly important tool for forensic scientists. These patches of land have bodies scattered over them by scientists so they can study how bodies decay under a variety of conditions.

Think checking out the local body farm sounds like a fun weekend excursion? Well if you live around Knoxville Tennessee, San Marcos Texas or Cullowhee North Carolina, you’re in luck, because that’s where the country’s three body farms are located. The one found in Knoxville is the oldest and most elaborate, covering 2.5 acres and containing 40 to 50 bodies at any one time. If there’s not one near you yet, just wait, as scientists are looking to start new body farms faster than Wal-Mart opens new stores, with some hoping for a future with a body farm in every state. Because apparently the way bodies rot in Nebraska is completely different than in Iowa.

Now, check out this video of a kindly grandfatherly type showing off his collection of molding cadavers and discussing wearing human skin gloves.

The Chainsaw Suicide

The Legend:
A man decides to use a chainsaw to end it all in an incredibly gruesome (and honestly kind of awesome) way.

The Truth:
So David Phyall, a 50-year old British man, really really didn’t want to leave his apartment block, which was set to be demolished. Alternative accommodation was offered to him 11-times, but David just wasn’t taking. One by one all his neighbours moved out, leaving David the one holdout rattling around in a condemned apartment building all on his own.

David Phyall's aparment block. We're thinking maybe he overreacted a little.

Something had to give and it turned out that something was going to be David’s vertebrae. See David had a plan that was definitely going to cost him his safety deposit, and make a hell of a chore for the cleaning staff. David tied a chainsaw to the leg of a table, laid down with his neck against it, set the saw on a 15-minute timer, then took a stiff drink. David’s plan, and head, went off without a hitch.

A superior asked the police Sergeant that found Phyall if discovering the body was a shock to him.

"In some ways it was sir" replied the Sergeant reportedly.

He was promptly fined by the British police for being too bloody excitable and not showing proper stiff upper-lippishness in the line of duty.


The Call from Beyond the Grave

The Legend:
People receive numerous calls from a loved one, only finding out later that the person calling them has been pushing up daisies for hours. Believe it or not, it’s actually happened (texting from beyond the grave on the other hand has yet to be verified).

The Truth:
On September 12th, 2008, a California commuter train ran through a red warning light, crashing into a freight train, killing 25 people. The family of Charles Peck, knowing he was on the train, watched the news with dread waiting for news of his fate—and then they got a call. Then another, and another, all from Charles’ cellphone. One family member after another was called, with Charles’ cellphone sending out 35 calls in total, at which point, ghost calls or not, we’re sure they just started letting the things go to voicemail.

The police managed to find Charles’ body among the wreckage by tracking his cellphone signal, but it was not a happy reunion. Brian was dead, and to this day how those calls were sent remains a mystery. Now, how about some irony with your creepy? Guess what the train’s engineer was distracted by when he ran past that red light? Yup, in a twist that would be cut from a Twilight Zone episode for being too cheesy, it was his cellphone. God’s not only a cruel bastard, but a hack horror writer as well apparently.

Qualified to be a train engineer apparently.

Shrunken Heads

The Legend:
Head shrinking has been the subject of legend, jokes and old Looney Tunes sight gags for ages, but the practice couldn’t actually be real, could it? It’s just one more bit of bullshit white people made up about folks a shade darker than them, right? Well…

The Truth:
Head shrinking was in fact a real thing, practiced mainly by tribes located around the Amazon River basin. For those looking to throw the perfect head shrinking party, here’s the recipe:

Make a cut on the back of the head, then painstaking peel all the skin and flesh from the skull. Sew the eyes and mouth shut, then boil the flesh up good, dry it with hot rocks, then mold it back into a head-like shape. Viola! A handy miniature version of the guy you nailed with that arrow last week!

While head shrinking was real, it was quite rare even amongst the tribes that practiced it, that is until collecting shrunken heads became the Pogs of the late 19th century. The shrunken head trade actually became big business, with numerous South American and Polynesian tribes (most of whom never shrunk heads in the first place) going to war with one another just to collect heads. In a tactic that was amazingly dickish even by white people’s extraordinarily low standards when it came to dealing with natives, traders would give the tribes guns in exchange for the shrunken heads, ensuring a steady supply of new product.

Pictured: A large collection of shrunken heads and one horrible human being.

The sale of shrunken heads continued in the United States for years until it was finally officially outlawed sometime in the 1940s. Yes, as late as the 40s people still thought it was cool to trade human face jerky. By the way, wondering what price was put on a human life back then? How about 25 bucks a pop? Yeah, people paid as much for an actual human head then as a modern day head shrinker charges every half hour to listen to you babble about your childhood while he writes out his shopping list.

Nathan Birch also writes the always disgustingly cute webcomic Zoology.

6 Mysteries About Your Own Body Science Still Can’t Explain

The human race has scaled the tallest mountains, charted the deepest oceans and played a quick front nine on the freaking moon, but there’s one frontier that still largely mystifies us--our own bodies. Why do we yawn? Why do we blush? We assume such everyday phenomenon must have been explained ages ago, but in reality asking these simple questions of a scientist will net you at best a shrug, and at worst some bullshit he just made up off the top of his head.


Adolescence

Hey teenagers, need something else to add to your angst pile? Turns out these awkward times you’re going through are far from universal in the animal kingdom. It’s only humans Mother Nature decided to kick in the nuts, cursing guys in particular to years encased in an opposite sex repelling bubble of greasy awkwardness. What evolutionary sense does it make that so many guys are confined to their parents’ basements smearing Clearasil on their face during their sexual prime years?

Possible Theories

Some scientists argue that guys’ half-decade of dorkdom is designed to force them develop traits chicks dig, like a sense of humour, artistic talent, and conversation skills. Honestly though this theory sounds like the wishful thinking of scientists who don’t want to face the ugly truth that their memorization of the periodic table and every Monty Python skit won’t be getting them in any girl’s pants ever.

Guys’ torment isn’t helped by the fact that most girls develop in the exact opposite way, growing adult-like bodies several years before they’re fully sexually mature. The result is a high school hellscape of sulking unsightly dudes who think of nothing but sex, and girls who look 20, but aren’t yet ready for it. Some scientists theorize that girls develop an outward appearance of maturity early in order to be accepted into adult female society where they can learn to cook, raise kids and do other girly stuff. We’re sure feminists love that one.

Scientists can’t even agree when exactly the adolescent phase evolved. Some believe teenagers existed as early as the Homo erectus era over a million years ago, while others think it’s a much more recent development. Until they find a Homo erectus skeleton holding a fossilized iPod filled with My Chemical Romance songs, we may never know for sure.


Cracked Solves the Mystery

God just has a real hang-up about teenagers humping.

Yawning

Yawning is associated with many things, tiredness, stress, listening to your dad’s high school football stories for the millionth time, but as of yet science can’t explain the underlying purpose of the yawn. Even more odd is the fact that yawning spreads from person to person faster than stomach flu in a kindergarten class.

Possible Theories

The prevailing theory since the days of ancient Greece was that low oxygen levels in the blood triggered yawning, with the yawn providing a quick influx of the gas. As is usually the case though, it turns out people from back in the day didn’t know what the hell they were talking about. In fact it’s been found yawning may actually decrease oxygen intake.

So with that antiquated theory out of the way, it was time to turn to more sophisticated ideas. Ideas like yawning being the body’s way of controlling brain temperature. Yeah, apparently scientists think our brains function with all the complexity of an old car engine. The “proof” of this was experiments in which it was found people with cool packs attached to their heads yawned less. The greater scientific community’s response to the finding that people sitting in an unfamiliar lab with ice packs on their heads weren’t much in a yawning mood was basically “no duh”.

Also, all the people studied were Wilford Brimley impersonators for some reason.

As for why yawning is contagious, some scientists have pointed to human being’s primitive herd instincts. Group yawning could have helped regulate sleeping patterns, so that a “whoops, we all feel asleep at once and got eaten by giant sloths” situation didn’t develop. This remains merely a theory though, and of course still doesn’t explain while people yawn while on their own.

Cracked Solves the Mystery

Yawning is nature’s evolutionary defence against shitty parties.

Placebo Effect

Unlike other entries on this list, it’s not so much that we don’t understand why the placebo effect exists (it’s of obvious benefit), we just don’t get how it works. Why do placebos work as well as actual medical techniques in up to 50 to 60 percent of cases, and why is the phenomenon becoming more and more powerful? Also, how is ExtenZe able to make that special part of the male anatomy up to 25% bigger? Mysteries abound.

Possible Theories

There’s debate over whether the placebo effect is even real at all, with some believing and that most recoveries attributed to the effect can be explained by the body’s natural healing abilities. Yes, it’s possible 50 to 60 percent of what the trillion dollar medical industry does could be achieved by staying home, resting and watching daytime TV. Try not to think about that one too much or you may end up on YouTube screaming something at a town hall meeting.

Others say that placebo effect is all in the brain, and while it’s true that our brains can release mixtures of chemicals with painkilling abilities, it can’t all be in our heads. The placebo effect has been found to help everything from warts, to heart disease, to asthma. Doctors have even gone so far as to conduct sham knee surgeries that were almost as effective as the real thing. This is stuff all the rest, nice thoughts and happy brain chemistry in the world isn’t going to make go away.

Some have even hypothesized the placebo effect may just be us unconsciously ignoring or repressing symptoms so we please our doctors. Trust us though, there’s better ways to land that hunky doctor.

Cracked Solves the Mystery

Baby Boomers fabricated the concept to give them an excuse to legalize medical marijuana.

Hey maan, lemme lay some medical advice on ya.

Dreaming

Even though human beings are obsessed with dissecting and interpreting them, we really know very little about dreams. What causes them, why we have them, what they mean—you name it, we don’t know it. Sorry, you’re just going to have wait on a explanation of that time you dreamt about giving Gary Busey a backrub while riding a flying armadillo.

Possible Theories

The old Freudian theory was that dreams were expressions of our unconscious desires, but none of the cool psychologists still follow Freud these days. Besides, if Freud was right far too many people have a sick fetish for being forced to take pop quizzes in their underwear.

ALL MY DREAMS ARE COMING TRUE!

Others have suggested dreaming is a way for our brain to formulate new ideas through the use of “random thought mutations”, which sounds more like the title for some New Age album than anything scientific. Still the notion that we could somehow create a super powered idea, capable of kicking the asses of mere regular ideas, through the power of mutation has its appeal.

Another theory states that dreaming is our brain tidying itself up and disposing of useless “junk thoughts”. In order to buy this idea though you have to accept that the average guy’s dreams about tits and being Batman are junk, and we’re sure you agree that’s simply unacceptable.

There’s also mounting evidence that much of what influences our dreams comes from outside, not inside, our heads. Noises and scents may have an effect on the content of our dreams, and we bet your wacky tealeaf reading, dream-interpreting aunt didn’t take into account the Earth’s geomagnetic activity during her analysis.

Cracked Solves the Mystery

Dreams do have one evolutionary advantage—scoring flattery points.

Blushing

Darwin considered blushing the “most peculiar” of human expressions, and had a hell of a time trying to explain why people would evolve such an obvious tell for when we’re lying or feel vulnerable, considering our lives and relationships are all built on a precarious foundation or half-lies, unspoken truths and outright bullshit. Despite the passing of over 100 years we still don’t understand blushing any better than Darwin did.

Possible Theories

One idea is that blushing developed as a way of appeasing and submitting to dominant members of society. This doesn’t make a whole lot of sense though as everyone blushes, dominant personality or not, and the whole process is involuntary anyways. Relying on something that you can’t control to please the tribe leader back in primitive times seems like a good way to get yourself tossed in the volcano.

Some scientists, noting that women blush more than guys, have suggested that blushing developed specifically so they could prove they were honest and submissive towards men. Once again, we’re sure feminists love that one.

I just questioned a man! Curse my wicked mouth!

Others have gone the complete opposite direction, positing that blushing is not a sign of submission, but one of anger. We’re all narcissists at heart and when somebody publicly shows us up or embarrasses us, blushing is basically us sending them an involuntary screw-you. We can see why some would like this theory, since it makes someone who blushes and mumbles their way through all their social interactions sound like a badass.

Cracked Solves the Mystery

It’s nature’s way of outing who in the group just farted.

Goddammit Grandma.

Pubic Hair

Anyone who’s caught themselves an eyeful of flapping chimpanzee dong at the zoo can attest to the difference between humans and our ape cousins when it comes to body hair distribution. Most apes have furry bodies and their monkey junk flies free, while humans take the exact opposite approach, sporting mostly naked bodies with the exception of impressive bushes. Why are our naughty bits surrounded with hair that attracts lice, bacteria and makes most pornos filmed before 1980 nearly unwatchable today?

Possible Theories

Traditionally the idea has been that pubic hair was for warmth and protection from dirt and debris, which makes a fair amount of sense for women, but zero for men who have the actual important bits dangling mostly hairless in the breeze.

A more modern theory is that pubes are meant to capture pheromone-laden sweat, although some question the appeal of musty crotch smell. Some argue it developed as a sexual ornament for attracting mates, like a sad, kind of gross equivalent of a peacock displaying its tail. Others believe the exact opposite; that having less pubic hair is an evolutionary advantage. Certainly most cultures throughout history (with a few exceptions, like those weirdos in Japan) haven’t really prized the stuff.

Hell, there was even an old hypothesis that our short and curlies exist to give babies something to grab and hold onto. We really don’t want to know about the family life of folks who came up with that one.

The dull way of carrying a baby.

Cracked Solves the Mystery

Pubes exist to make you the awesomest dude in the showers after middle school gym class.

Nathan Birch also writes the fur filled comic Zoology

Despite being popular for much of history, moustaches are now the style equivalent of wearing parachute pants on your upper lip. Thankfully, a few segments of the population continue to brandish their push brooms with pride.

Original Gangstas: The 7 Most Hardcore Blues Songs Written Before 1950

Your grandparents are full of shit. What they don’t mention as they grumble about the rap music destroying civilization, was that the blues they were listening to in the 30s and 40s could be every bit as violent, sexually explicit and sometimes just downright insane as the worst gansta rap has to offer. Compared to some of these vintage lyrics the members of N.W.A are levelheaded concerned citizens, and Eminem’s a regular feminist.


“22-20 Blues” by Skip James

“22-20 Blues” tells the tale of a woman who just won’t get her act straight. See, Skip James sent for her, on several occasions, and yet she didn’t show up! The brazen audacity! Of course in the world of blues there’s only one way to deal with minor punctuality issues – murder.

Big on punctuality.

A Few Choice Quotes

You know, sometimes she gets unruly
An she act like she just don't wanna do
Sometimes she gets unruly
An she act like she just don't wanna do
But I get my 22-20
I cut that woman half in two

Oh, your.38 Special
Buddy, it's most too light
Your .38 Special
Buddy, it's most too light
But my 22-20
Will make ev'rything, alright

Shooting your woman with a mere .38 pistol? That’s for pussies. Ironically James soon found himself humbled when Robert Johnson recorded a far more popular version of his song. The only real change Johnson made? He upped the calibre and named it the “32-20 Blues”. It was all about the gun size with those boys.


“If You’se a Viper” by Stuff Smith

More than a few rappers have based their careers on professing their affection for certain smokeable substances, a proud tradition that dates back to jazz and blues from as early as the 1920s. Apparently one of the worst side effects of pot is smokers’ inability to stop writing songs about it.

This guy liked to do drugs? No way.

A Few Choice Quotes

Talk about a reefer of five feet long
Not too fat and not too strong

Come on now, 5-feet? That’s just impractical.

Now when your throat get dry
And you know you're high
Everything is dandy
Truck on down to your candy store
Get you kicks off peppermint candy

Peppermint candy? The munchies sucked in the pre-Doritos era.


“Whoopee Blues” by King Solomon Hill

Another song about a poor blues man having to deal with a mean mistreating woman. King Solomon Hill isn’t one to settle for mere murder though, he wants his woman sent to hell to do it with the Devil, which strikes us as just a tad judgemental. We’re no theologians, but we’re pretty sure slashing your girlfriend to death with a razor is pretty much a one-way ticket to becoming Satan’s bitch.

Don't worry, he's in hell now.

A Few Choice Quotes

Wherever you been gone all day, that you may make whoopee all night
Tell me you been gone all day, that you may make whoopee all night
I'm gonna take my razor and cut your late hours,
You wouldn't think I'd be servin' you right

Undertaker been here and gone, I gave him your height and seize
I said, Undertaker been here and gone, I gave him your height and seize
You be makin' whoopee with the devil in hell tomorrow night

Apparently undertakers didn’t ask a whole lot of questions back then.

You made me love you, now you got me for your slave
Baby, you done made me love you, now I got me for your slave
From now you'll be makin' whoopee, deep in your lonesome grave

Ahhh, now we see. He did it because he cared too much!


“Mad Mama Blues” by Josie Miles


Obviously violence against women was a bit of an unfortunate theme of early blues, but as Josie Miles shows, female blues singers didn’t shrink from a bit of insane violence either. Josie doesn’t even need a reason, in “Mad Mama Blues” she’s out to wreck the city like Godzilla in a cocktail dress and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

A Few Choice Quotes

Now I could see blood runnin’
Through the streets
Now I could see blood runnin’
Through the streets
Could be everyone
Layin’ dead right right at my feet.

“Hello?! 9-11? Quick! You have to…oh God, she’s coming!”

Give me gunpowder
Give me dynamite
Give me gunpowder
Give me dynamite
Yes I’d wreck the city
Wanna blow it up tonight

“It’s Josie Miles!”

I took my big Winchester
Down off the shelf
I took my big Winchester
Down off the shelf
When I get through shootin’
There won’t be nobody left

“Send the police! The national guard! Before it’s too…arrrraaghaghh!”

“Shave ‘Em Dry” by Lucille Bogan

Odds are Lucille Bogan had just has sex when this picture was taken.

Looking at a picture of Lucille Bogan it’s easy to imagine her as the motherly type, making breakfast and scolding you for your dirty mouth, but in reality beneath the modest exterior was the queen of the “dirty blues”, and the writer of such classics as “Sloppy Drunk Blues”, “Tricks Ain’t Walkin’ No More” and the “Bull Dyke Women’s Blues”.

Her most infamous song was “Shave ‘Em Dry”, a 3-minute ode to her own humping prowess so filthy it would Lil’ Kim blush.

A Few Choice Quotes

I got nipples on my titties, big as the end of my thumb,
I got somethin’ between my legs’ll make a dead man come

You know it’s a good song when the first two lines reference necrophilia and thumb-sized nipples.

Say I fucked all night, and all the night before baby,
And I feel just like I wanna, fuck some more

You know how people ask which dead celebrity you’d like to meet if you could? We submit Lucille Bogan for your consideration.

Now your nuts hang down like a damn bell sapper,
And your dick stands up like a steeple,
Your goddamn asshole stands open like a church door,
And the crabs walks in like people.

Er, actually we take that back.


“Butcher Pete” by Roy Brown

So, there were plenty of old blues songs that were either horrifically violent, or sexually explicit, but Roy Brown wasn’t a man to be satisfied with just one or the other. His song “Butcher Pete” is about a guy who goes around the countryside “chopping up all the women’s meat” with his “long sharp knife”. Get it? This is a rare example where hiding the sexual content behind double entendres and innuendo somehow made the song a thousand times more offensive.

Jeez, this song is getting a bit offensive. Better add some graphic stabbings.

A Few Choice Quotes

Ever since Peter flew into town
He's been havin' a ball
Just cuttin' and choppin' for miles around
Single women, married women, old maids and all
It’s nice to know Butcher Pete doesn’t discriminate. Old maids need chopping too.

The police put Pete in jail
Yes, he finally met his faith
But when they came to pay his bail
They found him choppin' up his cellmate

Whoa whoa, wait. Chopping up his cellmate? Come on blues guys, you already beat rap to the punch when it comes to horrifying violence and misogyny, do you have to claim suspiciously gay lyrics too?


“A to Z Blues” by Blind Willie McTell

From Ray Charles to Stevie Wonder, the list of beloved blind performers is a long one, but as Blind Willie McTell proves, not all blind musicians are quite so cuddly.

The blindness was the only thing that limited his carnage.
At first the “A to Z Blues” seems to be a standard “my woman done me wrong” blues song, but then Blind Willie goes and gets creative. The result is a song that sounds like something that might have been created had Sesame Street ever been visited by Charlie Manson.

A Few Choice Quotes

I’m gonna cut your head four different ways.
That’s long, short, deep and wide.

Cutting heads is a lost art. Most kids today would probably know 2 different ways max.

When I get a rhythm of this rusty black handle razor
you’re gonna be booked out for an ambulance ride.
Cause I’m gonna cut A, B, C, D on top of your head
That’s gonna be treating you nice like mama you ain’t gonna be dead.

Keeping someone alive as you slowly carve the alphabet into them is one of the more liberal definitions of “nice” we’ve heard. Wait, why are you backing away? We still have 22 more letters to go!

I’m gonna cut E, F, G right across your face.
H, I, J, K, that’s where runnin’ bound to take place.
Cut L, M, N cross both your arms.
You’ll sell an’ peddle gal your whole life long.
Cut N, O, P, Q that’s gonna be trouble too
Cause I’m gonna grab you mama and turn you every way but loose.
Cut R, S, T to hear you cry
That’ll be the last time tears a run from over your eyes.
Cut U, V, W on the bottom of your feet.
That’ll be the last time you walk up an’ down 25th street.
Marking cross your bosom with X, Y, Z
When I get through with this alphabet
You’ll quit your messing with me.

Blind Willie’s dedication to educating as he horrifies is nothing short of inspirational really.

Nathan Birch also writes the not at all gangsta webcomic Zoology.