A Ton of Crap (90 page)

Invasion of Russia
Hitler wished to end the war swiftly, and knew an invasion of England was not the best way to go about it. Instead, he broke his pact with Stalin and invaded the Soviet Union. The German army invaded Russia on June 22, 1941, with a devastating blitzkrieg known as Operation Barbarossa. Within one week, 150,000 Soviet soldiers had been killed or wounded. On July 3, Stalin implemented the scorched-earth policy, which required that all facilities and supplies be destroyed before retreating so the Germans could not use them. Roads, bridges, factories, and fields of crops were destroyed, slowing the German advance. The campaign lasted much longer than Hitler had anticipated, and the German armies could not withstand the Russian winter, giving the Soviets the advantage.

SCIENCE FICTION

H. G. Wells
H. G. Wells was dramatically influential in the world of science fiction literature. Among his most famous works are
The Invisible Man
,
The Island of Dr. Moreau
,
The Time Machine
, and
The War of the Worlds
.
The Time Machine
, written in 1895, is considered one of the first modern science fiction novels. Wells’s
The War of the Worlds
was so influential that in 1938 Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre on the Air adapted it into a radio program. The program, about an alien invasion, inspired panic in listeners who feared an actual alien invasion was occurring.

KNOT THEORY

The Reidemeister Moves
In 1932, German mathematician Kurt Werner Friedrich Reidemeister worked with knot diagrams (that is, pictures of knots), and discovered a set of three moves that could make any knot diagram into any other type of knot diagram with the same knot. He came up with three rules: a strand could twist and untwist; one strand could be placed over the other strand (also known as the poke move); and a strand could be moved over or under a crossing (also known as a slide move).

THE EARTH’S SPHERES

Hydrosphere
The hydrosphere is 10 to 20 kilometers thick, and consists of all of the water found on Earth. This can be in solid, liquid, or gaseous form. The hydrosphere includes parts of the lithosphere and extends upward into the atmosphere for about 12 kilometers. A small amount of the hydrosphere is fresh water, meaning it is not salt water. This includes rivers, streams, and bodies of water that are precipitated into the atmosphere. The majority of fresh water, however, is frozen. Salt water makes up 97 percent of the Earth’s water. As the salt water collected in the deep valleys of the surface of the Earth, oceans were created.

SIGN LANGUAGE

About Deafness
When there is a complete loss of the ability to hear out of either one or both ears, it is known as deafness. Deafness can be caused by a number of factors. It can be inherited, or caused by diseases (such as meningitis), complications at birth, the presence of ototoxic drugs, and exposure to extreme noise. Deafness can appear at birth (known as congenital deafness), or come on either gradually or suddenly. There are two main types of deafness: conductive (when transmission of sound waves is interfered with) and sensorineural (when nerve impulses cannot reach the brain). In the fourth century b.c. it was believed that deaf people were also unable to speak, and thus unteachable, and this stigma lasted with the deaf community for centuries.

WORLD WAR II

Pearl Harbor
The attack on the U.S. Naval base at Pearl Harbor is what brought America into World War II. The Imperial Japanese Navy led a surprise attack at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. The Japanese launched two attacks, sinking four U.S. battleships, killing 2,400 Americans, and wounding another 1,200. The next day, on December 8, the United States declared war on Japan. President Roosevelt famously announced to the American people, “Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date which will live in infamy—the United States was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.”

SCIENCE FICTION

Robert Heinlein
Robert Heinlein lived from 1907 to 1988 and is considered one of the most controversial authors of science fiction. Heinlein began his career writing for pulp magazines. He is credited for turning science fiction into a serious field within literature. His work contained political messages and dealt with the hypocrisy of religion. He wrote thirty-two novels and many short stories, with some of his best-known work being
Stranger in a Strange Land
,
Starship Troopers
, and
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
. His novel
Space Cadet
, from 1948, featured nuclear weapons and even cell phones.

KNOT THEORY

Why Knot Theory Is Important
Knot theory might not sound very useful at first, but it is very important in understanding some of the most complex parts of our world. Understanding knots is extremely useful in learning about enzymes that act on strands of DNA, because DNA is tangled in knots. In order for DNA to interact with enzymes, the strands must unpack. The enzymes help unpack DNA by slicing through the DNA, allowing the strands to reconnect in a less tangled manner. By thinking of DNA as a knot, one can use knot theory to understand how DNA unknots and how hard the process is, as well as understand more about enzymes.

THE EARTH’S SPHERES

Cryosphere
The cryosphere is sometimes included as part of the hydrosphere. The cryosphere refers to the parts of the planet that are so cold that water freezes into a solid form. The polar regions of the planet (North Pole, or Arctic; and South Pole, or Antarctic) are considered the main parts of the cryosphere. These areas are covered in huge ice sheets, and at the South Pole, Antarctica has an ice sheet covering the entire continent. The cryosphere is not limited to the poles. Places with extremely high elevations, like Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa, are also considered part of the cryosphere, and even seasonal areas where lakes and rivers freeze over are considered a part of it.

SIGN LANGUAGE