What I Learnt For The Week 19: Audio Eyeglasses, Apiphobia, Moebius Syndrome, Savantism, Inverted Waterfall

Hello Buddies! Welcome once again to another educative and exciting episode of "What I Learnt For The Week".

Over the period of last week (21st - 25th May), I made some amazing discoveries, of which I would select some random 5 to represent the lessons learnt for each day of the week.

Monday: Zungle Audio Eyeglasses (Farewell to earphone)

Just like my usual custom is, and without an exception to this episode, I normally begin with lesson on emerging technology.

How do you play songs from your mobile device? Okay, I prefer to listen via an earphone plugged to my ear, while some others prefer to listen using the phone's speaker. But do you know that there's a way of transmitting songs directly to your brain without using either earphone or speaker? Yep! I welcome us to the possibilities embedded in technology.

A research was heralded by Zungle Inc that led to the designing of the zungle panther eyeglasses. This eyeglass looks like a regular sunglass, but it has the ability of transmitting music (in form of sound waves) directly to your brain. Now let's see how these glasses work.

Mechanism of Zungle eyeglass

You may have known that sound wave is a mechanical wave created by vibrations that travel through a material medium. These vibrations set off interruptions in the surrounding air, water or any other fluid; also setting them in motion as they are propagated.

Now these glasses are incorporated with bone-conducting electrodes that are placed directly on the skull. As the sound is being produced (in form of vibrations), the electrodes conduct these vibrations directly into the skull (remember, your ear is not blocked. That means, you are not completely cut off from other external sounds like earphone does).

Some may ask; "what is the sound quality like?" The glasses are incorporated with a signal boost to amplify the vibrations generated. So they can be transmitted through the skull with little or no attenuation (loss of signals). Also, it has a Bluetooth connectivity, so you can link your mobile device to it. And awesomely enough, it has a microphone attached to it (with noise filtering tech), so you can make calls at a fairly good audio quality. Most of all, it is rechargeable.

Pheww!! Too much talk. Here, I've gotten a video from YouTube for you to show you how this glass works.

Now we're really close to witnessing a sound telepathy system, where audio waves can be transmitted to the brain without any intervening medium.

To know more about the Zungle Panther eyeglass, click here.

Tuesday: Apiphobia (Fear of bee)

You love honey right? Well, almost everyone does, and we know they come from bees. Do you know how honey is extracted from bees even with the activities of the bees? Well, they use smokers to calm the bees (I've seen that, and that's a bonus tip for you). But do you know that there are some people that have irrational and unconditional fear for these sexy creatures? This is called Apiphobia.

[Image Source: Pixabay. CC0 Licensed]

This phobia is gotten from "Api" (the Greek term relating to bees), and of course "phobia" which means "fear of". This phobia is fairly common, and in some cases, the apiphobic people also fear wasps and other stinging or perceived stinging flying insects. Some also extend the fear to housefly. There's a popular adage in my local dialect:

Onye anwu gbara n'atu ijiji egwu. [Meaning: He that is stung by bee would be afraid of even the housefly] - Igbo proverb

To a fair extent, apiphobia is normal. I mean, no one likes to feel pain (and that includes the pain of some nasty bee stings), but some cases are so severe that, even the thought of bees can cause anxiety.

Causes of Apiphobia

If you have been stung by bees before or have witnessed someone stung by bee, it wouldn't be unnatural for you to pick up this phobia. Also, people may have been made to believe that bees are dangerous; maybe through the media or by words-of-advice; and this could cause them to pick up this phobia naturally.

And the effects of this on apiphobic people include: Uneasiness at the sight of bees, palpitation, unnatural sweating, and flight response. But it is worthy to note that bees would probably not sting you if you do not disturb or provoke them. Here's a bonus tip for you: Not all bees sting after all.

Wanna test if you're apiphobic? Watch this video to the end. Note; watch at your own risk.

Wanna know more about apiphobia, click here.

Wednesday: Moebius Syndrome

It has been believed by many that facial expressions; in some cases; speak louder than words. Okay that is true actually. Take this example: When someone asks you a question, a raise of the eyebrows would mean a "yes" (you've communicated by just facial expression without saying a word). But do you know that there are some people without facial expressions? Or putting it differently, there are people that don't have the ability to produce facial expressions. This is known as Moebius syndrome.

[Image Source: Pixabay. CC0 Licensed]

The sufferers of this weird condition find it almost difficult to move the face and/or create facial expression. Imagine the feeling of not being able to smile, grimace, frown even if you want to. Have you ever heard this phrase?

Smile for the camera

Now, this would not also apply to them, as they can't create a smile. Some of the sufferers also have impossibilities in blinking the eyes (damn! The face would be looking like it was sculpted from terracotta), now that's pretty weird. This condition is basically neurological which paralyzes or weakens the muscles of the face. More often than not, this is congenital, and it also affects other aspects of the person, including feeding and breathing.

What causes this? Some factors have been queried, which includes; defects of the abducens nerve (this is one of the cranial nerves that is responsible for eye movement), and also a defect or complete absence of the facial nerve.

The truth of this is, there is no recognized cure for this condition "yet", but some forms of therapeutic management can be offered to the sufferers to; at last; give them a fair life.

To know more, click here.

Thursday: Savantism

There is ability in every disability right? If you agree with me, then let's move along. There is a condition that is characterized by mental disability, but inside this disability lies amazing mental abilities; now that's what savantism is all about. And the people with this condition are called Savants. A greater percentage of savants have autism, and they are called autistic savants.

[Image Source: Pixabay. CC0 Licensed]

A very amazing case of this was the case of mental calculation exhibited by Daniel Tammet. At the age of 3, he started fiddling with numbers, and by his early twenties, he was recognized as a math genius. Some has said that he was faster than calculator in finding cube root of large numbers. Most awesomely, he calculated and recalled the "π" to over 20,000 decimal places. If this doesn't move you; here's another brilliant case:

Kim peek is another example of an exceptional savant. His own is rather different; he had an advanced memory ability, and could recall details of almost every page of books he had read. It was stated that he could recall; with amazing accuracy; 12,000 books during his lifetime. Kim was diagnosed with a damaged cerebellum, which could also explain the reason he had difficulty with some normal psychomotor functions.

It has been said that savantism could be linked to damages to some parts of the brain, which can either be congenital or acquired. Acquired? Yes, it can be acquired. A particular man; Jason Padgett got attacked by some individuals, and after he was hit on the head and physically assaulted, he experienced some concussion. And after recovery, he picked up an amazing mathematical ability. Wow!! Moving from assault to genius, lol. Who wouldn't like that kind of assault anyway?

Wanna know more about savantism, click here.

Friday: Inverted waterfall

Waterfalls are meant to flow downwards from top to bottom right? This could explain why the "fall" was affixed to it. But there has risen an exception to this. Some particular waterfalls actually flow in reverse (from bottom to the top). In my opinion, they should be called "water-rise" not fall, lol. I wouldn't know if @ruth-girl has talked about this weird phenomenon before, because she is an expert in that field.

Some people have considered these waterfalls to disobey the law of gravity, but scientists have proven that this phenomenon is caused by strong abrupt of wind blowing against the waterfall, thus making them appear like they are falling in reverse (or rather, rising from the bottom to the top).

Some of the waterfalls that have been seen to experience reverse fall include: Cliff of Moher in Ireland, Kinder falls in UK, Rjukandi falls in Eyjafjoll Iceland.

Wanna know more, click here.

This is the summary of the amazing discoveries I made over the week, and until I come your way again, don't stop learning. @samminator says so. Special thanks to @mobbs

Thanks for reading

Reference for further reading

• Kickstarter/Zungle-glasses
• Fearof.net/Apiphobia
• allaboutcounseling
• GeneticHomeReference/moebius-syndrome
• Rarediseases.org/moebius_syndrome
• Psychologytoday/savantism
• Wikipedia/Savant-syndrome
• Huffpost/Inverted-waterfall

All images are CC0 licensed and are linked to their sources

gif by @foundation