Welcome to issue 2 of Snippet magazine for you all to enjoy. The

theme of this issue is ‘identity’ and we hope you find it of inter-

est.

Thanks as always to the talented team of people who have contrib-

uted.

Euan McKenzie Alexandra Cole Oliver Bowman

Riki Buckles Polly Dawson James Frost

Elena Ferretti Mati Ferretti Raffy Zoio

Olivia Goldsmith Thomas Irvine Emily Mitchell

India Parkinson Beth Scahill Will Stevens

Raffi Thomas Rachael Vickery Miss Mardle

Ms Baynes-Robinson Miss Foster Ms Hargadon

Sonny Da Silva-Peters Jack Gowland-Dale

Issue 3’s theme is fear so beware…

Editor’s Note

I think it was Shakespeare who once said: “woe am I!” and whoa am I having a epically horrendous day. I find myself sitting here on the verge of tears. I have had literally the worst day ever. Hell is a luxury hotel room compared to my stench of a life. I do not know why I bother to breathe (well, obviously I do), when the air stabs my lungs like a balloon filled with lead. I never knew it was this possible to be this apoplectic in this day and age. Like, OMG even when my pet guinea pig Persephone died I was not this tragic, and let me tell you, thems were tough times. The level of sadness that I feel is not even human. I am a sloth. Yes, only a sloth could feel this sad. The

never ending tunnel of despair that I am being catapulted through, due to my torturous situation and

grievous yet compelling tales of despair, just keeps going on and on and on and on and on and on like An-

drex (other products are also available).

Without being too dramatic about it, I am metaphorically lying in the metaphorical debris that is my meta-

phorical life. Metaphorically speaking of course.

I don’t really want to talk about it, it still hurts. Well, okay. Today, I argued with my best ever friend since

year 7. And now she hates me and she said that she never wanted to talk to me ever again and she didn’t

even like the card I gave her for her birthday and she hates the way I dress and she never even liked me

anyway and she just doesn’t understand me.

Ugh!

My life is so hard.

The universe is just too small to accommodate all of my problems, and neither is my brain. I have literally

just remembered a piece of homework that I have to do for my next lesson. Great, I have just stuffed my

already overflowing problem universe with another problem and now my problem universe is about to

burst at the seams and all of my problems will whiz and fly everywhere and everybody will be infected by

my problems and it will be all my fault and then that will also be my problem.

Okay, sorry, sorry, sorry. Ignore everything I just wrote. Everything is fine now. The

teacher was not angry about the homework.

I talked to my friend after school and she was so apologetic. She told me about how

horrible she felt about everything and how she doesn’t hate me and how everything is

fine. In response to my universe qualms, she simply laughed.

And she did like the card I gave her for her birthday.

William Pooley, a volunteer

nurse, was helping to prevent

the spread of Ebola at the

Kenema Government Hospital

when he caught the disease. He

was then flown back to Britain

so he could be transferred to the

Royal Free Hospital in London

for further treatment. There,

Pooley was treated in an isola-

tion room (with a frankly terrify-

ing appearance) equipped with

air filters.

William Pooley has now fully

recovered and is immune to the

pathogen. Remarkably, he is

planning on continuing his

volunteering work back in Si-

erra Leone. When inter-

viewed by The Guardian,

he said of his return, “While I'm

happy to be recovered and alive,

there's a lot of stuff on my mind

with what's going on back there.

It would be relatively safe for me

to go back and work there, and

it's really the least I could do

having received all this amazing

care and have people look after

me and potentially save my life.

It's the least I could do to go

back and return the favour to

some other people, even just for

a little while.”

But volunteering isn’t all Pooley

is doing to help, as he has re-

cently flown to the US to donate

blood for a transfusion to save

the life of a fellow Sierra Leone

volunteer who is infected with

Ebola. When Pooley was treated

for the disease, he was given an-

tibiotics and intravenous fluids

which boosted his immune sys-

tem, so now his blood has the

natural antibodies needed to

fight the disease, which, coupled

with the fact that he and the

other Ebola sufferer have the

same blood type means that he is

an ideal donor. Pooley is said to

be close friends with the infected

doctor through their work at the

hospital. The foreign office

quickly granted a new passport

for Pooley’s flight to Atlanta, as

his first one was incinerated

along with his other belongings

upon his diagnosis.

Pooley, 29, is a former Farlin-

gaye student, and following his

discharge from hospital, re-

turned to his parents’ home in

Eyke, near Woodbridge, to rest.

What do I need to know

about the Ebola Epidemic?

The epidemic has been causing

Who

Ebola

The Man

Survived

The deadly Ebola virus that has claimed

the lives of more than 2,000 people in

Western Africa is a lot closer to home

than you might think.

worldwide concern since the

death of a six year old boy and

his mother, sister and grand-

mother. Subsequently, there

have been a reported 5,762 cases

of the disease and 2,746 deaths

from the most severe outbreak of

the disease since its discovery in

1976.

Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) can

be caught through contact with

blood, saliva or other bodily flu-

ids, and is not air born. There

are cases of whole families

catching the disease from con-

tact with one another. It is also

thought that the washing and

embalming of the bodies of the

deceased has played a part in

the spread of the disease.

Symptoms, such as a fever, vom-

iting, a sore throat, muscle pain

and/or diarrhoea would begin to

show from two days to three

weeks after contracting the dis-

ease. Internal and external

bleeding may also occur.

Unfortunately, there is no defi-

nite cure for Ebola, but in Wil-

liam Pooley’s case, dedicated

medical care, constant rehydra-

tion and an enhanced immune

system managed to rid him of

the disease. The isolation unit

he stayed in helped to strictly

contain his illness, because if

another person caught the dis-

ease from him, the UK would be

on the verge of an epidemic. The

fact is, hospitals in Western Af-

rica do not have the technology,

equipment or money to control

the Ebola virus. This is perhaps

why the scale of the disease is so

severe. Some hospitals are un-

derstaffed which creates more

demand for volunteers, who are

simultaneously putting their

own lives at risk. A report by the

World Health Organisation

(WHO) revealed that hospitals

in Sierra Leone are only meeting

25% of the demand for hospital

beds.

The Ebola epidemic began in

Guinea and quickly spread to

Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria

and Senegal. A separate out-

break of Ebola in the Democratic

Republic of Congo is not as seri-

ous and is not thought to be re-

lated.

So what is being done? A three

day lockdown was placed on the

million residents living in Sierra

Leone to try to halt the spread of

the disease, as well as giving

health workers a chance to dis-

tribute information and hygiene

kits to the population. The latest

news on the situation so far is

that 92 bodies have been found

and at least 56 new infections

have been discovered since the

curfew began.

William Pooley received healthcare that many people in Sierra Leone will not

be receiving.

Ebola is caused by a virus, but there is

no vaccine available yet.

Ebola victims’ numbers are increasing at an exponential rate in east Africa.

Debate Nature vs. Nurture

One of the biggest questions concerning life, existence and creation (aside from why did the chicken cross the road, obvs) is where do

we come from? Not literally speaking, of course, (I think we should all know where babies come from by now), but morally. Where do

our traits, our preferences, our mind-sets originate? Where do we come from? Everyone is different, everyone is unique, but how and

when do we decide who we are? Do we learn over time what we think is right or wrong, or is it programmed into us at birth? And can

someone be born evil?

But all of the things that mankind knows (and that you say give us our personality) had to

be discovered before they were taught. Our identities are innate. Children all learn rela-

tively the same things at young ages, when their identities are beginning to show. Moral

values are drummed into primary school children. We are taught to share, not to steal, to

love each other and not to argue. However, in any class in any school, you will find some

children quite happy to oblige and others who go against these clearly set rules. Whether a

child would co-operate would depend on the personality, and at such a young age how

could their identity be defined by experience? Yes, not all of the children in the class would

have the same upbringing, but to say that children who have different upbringings have

different experiences and therefore different personalities would also be to say that chil-

dren with similar upbringings and similar experiences would have similar personalities,

which is not true. Siblings (not twins, I shall explain why later) who do not share the entire-

ty of their genetics (around 50%), but do share their environment aren’t always, if ever,

similar in identity. Studies show that siblings are similar only 20% of the time (this figure

comes from the investigation by researcher Robert Plomin). According to the nurture argu-

ment, siblings sharing the same environment should be very similar, so why is this not so?

Our minds obviously come from our genetics, instincts and biological links. The world

around us is created by human minds, not the other way round. Think of all of the human

ideas that have revolutionised (and in some ways partly destroyed) the earth. This basic

inquisitive attitude has to come from somewhere; it cannot be learnt from our surround-

ings because our surroundings have been made by us. Cave men were programmed to hunt

biologically, it was wired into their brains, and this has been developed over time, but it all

comes from the basic functions that they, and we, were born with.

It is silly to say that our personalities come from ourselves, and are not influenced by our

surroundings. Look how far we have moved on from the cave man, and how our personali-

ties have increased in complexity. This growth has to come from somewhere, and man’s

gradual understanding of the world has led to peoples’ characters becoming more com-

plex, therefore our personalities must come from, partly at least, the process of learning

about the world and our surroundings, and we are not born into an identity as you suggest.

There are a lot of traits that siblings share, or that are learnt from environment (I will explain

more about this further on). As for saying that children in a classroom would be too young to

have had past experiences that would affect their personalities, this is ridiculous! At young

ages, children pick up more things, are much more impressionable and more likely to be

influenced by others, such as their parents or friends, as well as perhaps picking up more

negative traits from stimuli such as television and the internet, which are becoming ever

more present in domestic childhoods. We really become who we are during childhood, a

time that is so heavily influenced by parents and education. Everything you know now, you

only know because at some point you learnt it (aside from very basic abilities, such as smil-

ing and blinking). We create our identities at the same time we are learning how to walk,

talk and socialise.

If you need conclusive evidence for the nature argument, then look no further than the re-

sults of some very interesting studies on twins. Twins are perfect for this kind of study, be-

cause they are genetically the same, so any differences would be environmental. The

‘Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart’ was a study of the similarities and differences of

twins who were separated at birth. The research particularly focused on one set of identical

male twins (coincidentally both called Jim by their adoptive families) who shared remarkably

similar traits. The amazing results showed that when both twins finally met aged 39, they

learnt that they were both bad at spelling but good at mathematics; each took carpentry,

each had been married twice, once to women named Linda and then to Betty, and one twin

had a son called James Allan, whist the other had a son called James Alan (notice the missing

L). The twins both named their pet dog Toy, both chain smoked, and both had law enforce-

ment training, at some point both being the part time deputy Sheriff in Ohio. They even

went on holiday on the same beach in Florida! What more proof do you need, that the ge-

netic link between these two men had caused these similarities?

That is a very rare, coincidental case! The “Jim Twins” had differences as well. Their hair-

styles were very different, one twin was married to a third wife (called Sandy) and one twin

preferred conveying himself through speech whilst the other was more suited to writing.

In terms of research defending the nurture side of the argument, an investigation at the

Twin Research and Genetic Epidemiology hospital in London has shown that the sense of

humour is learned from environment and influence, and thus does not originate from ge-

netics. The research looked at 127 pairs of both identical and non-identical twins. They were

shown 5 cartoons and then asked them to rate their wittiness (from one to 10; 1 being a

“waste of paper”, 10 being “the funniest cartoons they’d ever seen”). The results showed

that there was a similarity between a twins response to the cartoon, but because both iden-

tical and non-identical twins showed this, the researchers decided that this was probably

more inked to growing up in the same environment, as non-identical twins share around

50% of their genes, making a significant genetic impact on the results less likely. They also

suggested that a person’s ability to understand a joke may depend on their intelligence,

however this was not measured before the test was carried out. If this is just one aspect of

the personality, then what else might be the result of a particular environment?

So, perhaps a person’s personality is more of a family heirloom, passed down through gener-

ations, or is it learnt, taught or gradually picked up over time or maybe a person’s identity

comes from a mixture of the two, with the environment a person grows up in nurturing the

nature. There is no real answer to this debate, and, as is the same with so many philosophi-

cal questions such as this, we may need to accept that we may never know.

Nature Nurture

.

AHHHH! This cage is too big! Although it is so big, it feels

like a prison.

I’m nearly……. nearly there…… almost…… and I’m….. OUT!! I’m

free! What do I do now? Oh wait, I believe I have not properly in-

troduced myself, my name is Frederick Sebastian Emmanuel. I al-

so believe you must be very confused right now, so I will back-

track.

It was a windy Thursday…wait, was it a Sunday? Oh never mind, I

was sitting in my cage, which by the way I think is too big, but I

was thinking to myself, “Why am I, like, the smallest thing in the

universe?”

It just suddenly came to me. This thought. This, sort of, brain…

What do I call it? Erm… thing, that I believed wouldn’t go away.

But as usual, it did. So I carried on with my daily life, and BAM!

There it was again, that… thing got bigger and bigger and BIGGER!

Back to the beginning, wait was I even at the beginning? Yeah…

I… think… so.

Yeah I was. Ok, so, I got out of my cage, and I thought

to myself “What do I do now? Wait, what… have I

gotten myself into? Everything, everything is so… so

….so… big!!! The, the window, so high, the door, so

tall, the sleeping machine (?) so wide???

I never imagined everything to be THIS big!! It

looks so small from my perch, up high on the

book holder!! Well, there’s no going back now,

I just have to go forward, look ahead - wait, what

was that noise? Someone is coming!! Gotta hide… where??

Behind the bed? No, too obvious….. the... no that’s too…. Under

the mattress!!! That’ll work!! Right, under, nearly, yes!!! I’m un-

der!!! Wait, I think… yes! No!! Someone sat on the sleeping ma-

chine! Oh ah ow!! Ouch that hurts, can’t… breathe... suffo-

cating….. I see the…. light…. Grandma Bobby?? Is that you? Good-

bye world!!

A day in the Life of an identity-confused hamster

This time, it’s all about identity so in

Beats we’re going to be talking about

identity transformations in music. One

of the biggest transformations in music

was Miley Cyrus. Once a squeaky clean

Disney pop star, she transformed to a

twerking ‘adult’. This isn’t unusual

though, with Disney starlet after Disney

starlet going off the rails when they

‘grow up’. Miley Cyrus’ hit single

‘Wrecking Ball’ is a good song but ruined

by the video. Miley, you can make good

music without needing shocking videos.

4/10.

Another band transformation was the

slow change of boy band’s music. Ever

since 5SOS stormed the music scene,

new rock bands have been listened to by

a much wider variety of fans. One such

band is New Politics, a Danish rock group

that have released two albums ‘New Pol-

itics’ and ‘A Bad Girl in Harlem’. They are

currently supporting Paramore on their

tour and have toured with rock legends

Fall Out Boy! Their song ‘Dignity’ tackles

issues in society, with an epic beat be-

hind it. Rock back to its former glory, for

that it is 9 out of 10!

Over in films, I’m talking about the new

releases in cinemas this month. One new

film coming out this month is ‘The Book

of Life’, the latest family film from 20th

Century Fox Studios. The Book of Life fol-

lows Manolo Sánchez, who falls in love

with the beautiful Maria. Two spirits

watch and bet on who will win Maria’s

love out of two young men : Manolo or

Joaquin. One spirit, enraged when Mano-

lo wins Maria’s affections, sends a vicious

snake to kill Manolo! The rest of the film

follows Manolo as he journeys through

three lands, in order to try and get back

to the human world and Maria. Original

and a clever idea for a family-friendly

movie yet with an Halloween twist:

7/10!

Book to film adaptations have been hap-

pening for years, this month the ac-

claimed bestseller Gone Girl is the latest

to go from pages to cinemas. Gone Girl is

a bit too adult though, so instead here’s

another adaptation that has been both a

blockbuster and a bestseller. Divergent is

set in a dystopian future where there are

five factions who uphold a certain value:

truth, bravery, selflessness, intelligence

and kindness. Beatrice Prior is about to

choose her faction, when at the tests (to

see which faction you belong to) hers

comes up as inconclusive. What this real-

ly means is that she is Divergent. The rest

of the film watches her struggle with her

identity, her choice and what happens in

her chosen faction. A fast-paced film that

makes you think : 9/10!

Is there more to come from the Doctor’s past? Is Steven

Moffat Going to explore and show us some of the truths,

dangers, and battles of the Doctor?

Watch the rest of the series to find out about the future and past!!

Did you know…

Capaldi says: “The Tardis is not inside

an actual police box, you’re just in this

big cupboard. There are quite a few peo-

ple in there, so you get quite cosy and

there’s no fan or anything. But you have

to be the Doctor. All the other stuff you

put on the back burner, because it’ll just mess you up.”

The monster from Doctor Who Series

8 Ep. 4 had many at the edge of

their seats, with fear for themselves,

and the Doctor, Clara and the young

boy!

Fact:

Ian O'Brien's 1,573 pieces

of Doctor Who merchan-

dise have earned him a

place in 2015's Guinness

World Records.

The new outfit!

Lifelong Doctor Who fan Peter said:

'He's woven the future from the

cloth of the past. Simple, stark, and

back to basics. No frills, no scarf, no

messing; just 100% rebel Time Lord.’

We are mid-way through the

newest series of Doctor Who

and there is lots going on in

the TARDIS. Read on to find

out more!

Kieran Dyer, Darren Bent, Connor Wickham, Richard Wright, Darren Ambrose, and the

list goes on. For decades ITFC have produced numerous youth products that have gone on

to play at the very highest level. In 2005 Ipswich won the FA Youth Cup prompting excite-

ment amongst the Town supporters, many believed this would be the generation that could

take Town back into the Premier League and beyond. But under the management of Roy

Keane and Paul Jewell, the spine of the side consisted of big name signings and loanees

keen to progress their careers elsewhere. Now only one player from the 2005 FA Youth

Cup final is at Ipswich; David McGoldrick played for Southampton with Theo Walcott, Ad-

am Lallana and Gareth Bale.

In 2009, aged just 16 Connor Wickham made his debut for Ipswich Town. He was the

youngest player ever to play for the Town first team. Just weeks after his debut, manager

Jim Magilton was sacked and replaced with the infamous Roy Keane. In Roy Keane’s first

year in the job he appeared to continue with the clubs philosophy and handed a debut to

eighteen year old Luke Hyam and gave youth graduate Tommy Smith a long run in the first

team. East Anglian boy Tom Eastman was also given his debut. Both clearly had massive

potential and the Town faithful saw a bright future for the youngsters. However, over the

first few months of the 2010/11 season the side struggled and many young players were

dropped for older “been there, done it” players. This was not the winning formula for

Keane and he was sacked in January 2011.

Paul Jewell was shortly appointed as the new boss of Town; he had a track of record of

bringing through youth players and playing attractive football: two integral parts of

the club’s identity. Things did slightly pick up over the second half of the season

The Identity of ITFC

but many of the club’s youth graduates failed to make a big break into the first team. In

April Town suffered a humiliating defeat to arch rivals Norwich, and the club felt its identity

ripped apart. That summer, the only shining light from Town’s youth system Connor Wick-

ham, was sold to Sunderland for £8M. In Jewell’s second season he brought many of his

old players, not the chance for youth many expected. The club faltered to an average 15th

place. In October of 2012, as youth was given brief chances in the first team Paul Jewell

was sacked as manager of Ipswich Town. Mick McCarthy was brought into to save the club

from relegation. This time, the club was in real danger; nobody cared how he did it, as long

as he did keep them up. Early in his reign, Tommy Smith was the only youth graduate

who featured in the team. Later in the season, as the club pushed away from the relega-

tion zone, Luke Hyam also broke back into the team. The club did, at last, steer clear of the

drop. That summer, ITFC announced they would apply for category one youth status: it

would mean that far more first team ready youth players would come through the ranks at

the club. The club announced their aims to make 50% of the first team squad academy

graduates by 2017 and that supporters would be made to feel part of the club. It was Bryan

Klug; a man whose time at the club as a player and coach spanned five decades, summed it

up best though when he said: “It just feels more like the club I have loved all these years

once again.” ITFC had their identity back.

Despite the application, Town nar-

rowly missed out on Category One

youth status. Is that the point though?

Surely the fact that Ipswich Town are

carrying out their philosophy of a

successful youth system should be

music to any Town fan’s ear. That is

the identity of ITFC.

By Thomas Irvine

This 1977 project by NASA, turned

science fiction into science fact.

NASA scientists had to work out

how the two spacecrafts would

travel 3 billion miles without carry-

ing a huge amount of fuel. Gary

Flandro worked out that all the out-

er planets would align in 1977,

making the journey a lot shorter.

Michael Minovitch then discovered

they could use the gravitational pull

of each planet to propel the craft to

the next planet, like a slingshot, also

decreasing the amount of fuel needed.

NASA encountered a problem; they didn’t have enough money to complete the project, and they

were under a time limit. Their solution was Carl Sagan. Carl Sagan was a NASA scientist who loved to tell

stories and really believed in the project, so they employed him as ‘the voice’, getting the public to donate.

He came up with the idea to put a gold disk on each craft, with recordings of famous music and infor-

mation about us, so that if aliens found the craft they would know where they came from. Eventually,

NASA raised enough money and the project could continue.

For the spacecraft to complete their mission they would have to last at least 12 years. This was a

huge challenge, as nothing mankind made for space had lasted more than a few months.

It took two years to get to Jupiter from Earth, and once Voyager 1 and 2 arrived, the gravitational

pull was a lot stronger than they had expected. The Voyager team wanted to see the great red spot. At the

time they thought it could be an exotic island, but when the photos arrived they realised that the great red

spot was a huge storm that had been going on for hundreds of years. They also wanted to see one of Ju-

piter’s 63 known moons, Io. Something was peeking out from behind it that seemed to be another moon,

but when they looked closer they realised that Io was geologically active and that the ‘other moon’

was a volcanic eruption 270km high!

There was a long wait of five years before NASA could see Uranus and when Voyager 1 got

there, there wasn’t much light for the cameras. What they did see was that Uranus’ heat source

To Boldly Go Where No-

one Has Been Before

Voyager 1 and 2 are unmanned

spacecrafts with one mission - to

explore the outer planets of our

solar system for the first time ever.

One of their main aims was to

find alien life.

had shut down and that its moon, Miranda, looked like it had been pulled apart and stuck back together

again.

Another three years and Voyager arrived at Neptune. They only had one second to see it, so NASA

had to forecast the weather to see where it was best to point the cameras (the clearest patch of sky). Fore-

casting the weather is hard enough on Earth, but on Neptune, 3 billion miles away, with a very complex

atmosphere, it seemed impossible. Despite all these challenges they got the forecast right. Voyager got a

clear view of Neptune’s great dark spot which was, like Jupiter’s red spot, a huge storm, hundreds of years

old. Neptune’s moon Triton had geysers, which meant there was geological activity; this was surprising to

the team, because there isn’t much heat this far away from the sun.

Voyager 2 had completed its three-billion-mile journey; Voyager 1 was now above our solar system

and was told to do one last thing – to take a picture of the solar system from above, showing the sun and

all the planets. The cameras were then switched off to save energy so the craft could keep going for a bit

longer. Now 37 years on they are still sending back information. Voyager 1 has recently reached the outer

edge of our solar system; nothing man made has ever made it this far.

Voyager 1 Launch

5/9/77

Jupiter

5/3/79

Launch

20/8/77

Jupiter

9/7/79 Saturn

12/11/80

Saturn

Uranus

24/1/86

Neptune

25/8/69

Voyager 1

Why you should start using the interr bang

The interrobang is perhaps the greatest invention of the

20th century. Forget about the television, the internet or

the mobile phone, for the interrobang is triumphant over

them all.

And why have you, dear reader, never heard of this bi-

zarre unknown invention? Because it is gloriously unneces-

sary. It is the answer to a problem that nobody had,

and yet, it is so ingenious at the same time.

The interrobang is essentially a combination of an excla-

mation and a question mark. It was invented in 1962 by

Martin K. Speckter, who worked in advertising and want-

ed to replace the unsightly “?!” that followed rhetorical

slogans. Thus, the interrobang was born.

The term interrobang comes from the words interrogative

point (another word for a question mark) and bang (a

printers and programmers term for exclamation mark). It

could also be used to describe the ?! combination.

Some example of the Interrobang in use are:

What on earth is that gorilla doing in the classroom‽

Are you ever disappointed with the performance of

your dishwasher‽

Why you should start using the interr bang

Why you should start using the interr bang

Could the interrobang be any more fabulous‽

It is such a small, trivial thing to invent and yet, it is

actually quite clever. I’m sure you’ve all been in the

situation, while writing essays or creative writing piec-

es, when a disgruntled character has yelled out a can-

tankerous query, or a powerful question has needed the

little extra push of an exclamation mark, but it could-

n’t be used because it would make the layout look lazy

and untidy. To use an interrobang in a sentence is to

not only utilise a much overlooked and underestimated

tool, but also to show off an extensive knowledge of

various, obscure punctuation.

I know that now the interrobang is relatively unheard

of and underused, but in the late run 1960s it was

actually very popular among typographers and graphic

designers, and there was even a interrobang key on

certain typewriters. However, over time, the poor in-

terrobang faded into anonymity, and as this sad story

reaches present day, the interrobang is used very lit-

tle. And this is why we need to save them, now, be-

fore it’s too late. Do you want the interrobang to fade

into extinction? Do you want them to metaphorically die

out‽ Start using them, and think about how lucky you

are to have a punctuation mark so powerful. It really

finishes your sentences with a bang.

I’m sure you’ve all heard of the WWF or the RSPCA, two very famous animal charities

who fund and protect Pandas, Tigers and Leopards everywhere. But who looks after the

Jumping Slugs, the Kakapos and even the Blob fish. There must be a charity for those

creatures right?

Correct! Luckily in October 2012 Biologist, writer and TV presenter Simon Watt started

up the Ugly Animal Preservation Society. A society making people aware of those animals

who go unnoticed and unloved.

Recently an online vote was held to choose which of 11 ugly animals should be the socie-

ty's global mascot. 11 election style presentations were given and after thousands of peo-

ple had voted the winner was……….. The Blob fish! The society’s website is filled with

funny and educational videos and to check it out go to: uglyanimalsoc.com.

The Blob fish

The blob fish is well, you’ve guessed it, a fish, specifically, a deep sea fish. This little guy is

generally found in deep waters off the coasts of Australia and Tasmania. They are typical-

ly shorter than 30cm and are basically living jelly as their bodies are mainly a gelatinous

mass, slightly less dense than water meaning they can float. Unfortunately scientists fear

that they may become endangered because they die in deep sea fishing nets.

T he six degrees of separation is an idea claiming that everybody in the

world is linked by at most six friends. It doesn’t matter if two people live

in a different country, never have met or never will, because through six

or less acquaintances, they are connected. Apparently.

Does it seem a little complicated? Well, meet Paul and his best friend Paulo.

Paul has another friend called Pauline, who has never met Paulo (don’t ask me why,

perhaps Paul knows that Pauline likes Oasis and Paulo likes Blur, and thus obviously

need to be kept apart). You’d think that Paulo and Pauline, having never met, would

not be linked in any way. Because of their ties with Paul, this actually means they are

separated by one degree. But ah, the plot continues, because Paulo has a friend

called Paula, who has never met Pauline nor Paul! Ignoring the fact that everybody

involved in this web of deceit, lies and Britpop are terrible friends, Paula is linked to

Paul by one degree of separation (through Paulo) and to Pauline (through Paulo, then

Paul) by two degrees.

This fantastic theory was thought up by Frigyes Karinthy, a Hungarian author,

poet and journalist, in 1929 in a short story called Chains.

The six degrees concept was explored in the 1967 Small World experiments, lead

by Stanley Milgram. The investigation looked at how many degrees on average people

are linked. Letters about the experiments were posted to random members of the

American public along with the name of another random person. If the recipient

knew the person, they were instructed to post the letter to them. If not, then they

were told to send it to another person who perhaps had more of a chance of knowing

the person. The experiment was complicated by the fact that out of the 296 letters

sent, 232 didn’t reach their destination, and this is put down to people not passing

on their letters. The 64 letters that did reach their destinations showed that the aver-

age number of times the letter was passed on was in fact 5 or 6, proving Karinthy

correct. However, the test was deemed unfair by Judith Kleinfeld, who argued that

the ‘random’ people were actually chosen by the fact they considered themselves well

connected. Also because it is more likely for a longer chain to be broken by an unwill-

ing participant.

People disputing the six degrees theory, calling it an ‘urban myth’ also say how

isolated tribes who only interact within themselves quash the idea.

Social networking and mutual online friends have broadened this theory into

popular culture. It was calculated that everyone on Twitter is linked by 3.43 users on

average.

Although it may not be true worldwide, it’s still a pretty interesting idea, and

something that does carry a little weight, in terms of less people.

These are the answers to the

dingbats found on the previ-

ous issue on page 8.

Well done if you got any of

these right, some of them

were quite tricky!

1. The Full Monty

2. Generation gap

3. The plot thickens

4. All around the world

5. Mind over matter

6. Heat wave

7. Jack in the box

8. Little Britain

9. More often than not

10. Standing in line

11. Lean on me

12. Double identity

Look out for the answers in the next issue!

Look out for

the next Word

of the Week!