Awesome Learning

On his trip to the Amazon Rainforest, Destin of Smarter Every Day found a group of caterpillars that seem to have figured a way for all of them to move faster. How? By acting as each other’s conveyor belt. Unedited video here.

Jason Lewis films the Performance Picture Vehicles crew as they setup and perform a car roll over stunt for an unnamed film. Skip to 8:50 for the stunt. The amount of work and risk they put in for a few seconds of video is amazing.

Footage of one of the last known uncontacted tribes on the planet in the Brazilian forest. A zoom lens provides a glimpse without disturbing them, while we learn about the threat the “civilized” world poses to them.

Placebos and the placebo effect are some of the most intriguing puzzles of humanity. Evolutionary psychologist Nicholas Humphrey talks about a possible reason for why placebos even work at all.

The latest educational clip from Mental Floss debunks dozens of things we always thought were true. We were most disappointed to find out that the brontosaurus didn’t actually exist. Why? No brontosaurus burgers.

PBS Off Book talked to a variety of experts about one of mankind’s most exciting and frightening endeavors: developing artificial intelligence. Watch the video to find out some of its challenges, rewards and risks.

Do you know which animal makes a “Wang wang” sound? Find out in this video by Vimeo user properniceinnit. He asked people of different nationalities to demonstrate how animals sound in their language.

Cockpit Chronicles is an ongoing blog and video series by American Airlines co-pilot Kent Wien. The series lets us in on the activities and routines of flight crew. The linked video is about preparing meals for the crew.

Tommy Edison, who has been blind since birth, has shown us how he cooks and what he sees; here, he responds to the popular request to draw various objects based on how he thinks they look. (Thanks Ben!)

We’ve seen a list of people who cheated death. Now here’s a list of people who died in unexpected ways. Some of them are dumb ways to go, but mostly these are just freak accidents. And also infections.

Michael from Vsauce explores humankind’s fearful reaction to things that aren’t actually dangerous. Vagueness, ambiguity and things that are just slightly off are key contributors. We’re going to go wash out our eyeballs now.

200 Calorie portions of foods. ASAPScience made a crucial mistake though. The definition they gave in the video is for the calorie, which is 1/1,000th of a Calorie – note the capital ‘C’. 200 Calories is equal to 200,000 calories.

The most badass animal to grace ZeFrank’s True Facts series, the mantis shrimp has sexnocular – hexnocular? – vision, a flamboyant attire and a punch so hard and fast it can break an aquarium’s glass.

A popular Japanese cooking show on YouTube, Cooking with Dog stars an anonymous chef and a dog named Francis. Each episode Francis sits beside the chef and narrates in English. Naturally. It’s confusing and educational.

(NSFW: Language) “Classic Literature. Original Gangster.” The online study guide Thug Notes is just like CliffsNotes, except its host Sparky Sweets drops knowledge about literary works using African-American street slang.

CameraRocket collects information about cameras from all over the Web and presents them in a clean and easy to understand format. You can look at the specs, reviews and more about a camera or even compare two cameras.

If you believe Joseph Campbell’s Monomyth theory, most narratives follow a similar “Hero’s Journey” structure. Here, Mario, Fafa and Johnny T explain how the theory can be applied to everything from Star Wars to Happy Gilmore.

Vsauce imagines what it would be like if the Man of Steel introduced his fist to your face. The hilarious conclusion? If he used all his strength, Supes couldn’t actually punch you: you’d be obliterated even before his fist touched you.

17-year-old Tim Doner is a hyper-polyglot: he can speak nearly 20 languages, and is said to be the youngest person to achieve such a feat. How did he do it? Through good old hard work. And by watching TV.

A hardworking chipmunk is busy gathering nuts around the forest and stashing them in his burrow. His opportunistic kin takes the easier route. A wonderfully shot excerpt from Discovery’s North America series.

MinutePhysics answers a question we never knew was worth asking – do you really feel the temperature of other objects when you touch them? Unless you’re a physicist, the answer might surprise you.

BuzzFeed lists a handful of incidents that should have proven fatal to the people involved, but they somehow beat the extremely small odds and came out alive and kicking. Stay strong, Alexis!

Minute Earth talks about the possible reasons behind bidirectional traffic conventions, reminding us that we live by many conventions dictated by ideas that are long obsolete. If we can even remember them.