It's not so much the phenomenon itself (although if true, intuition would suggest that someone might have noticed this before). Nor is it really that someone actually postulated such a hypothesis ("We were wondering if large animals have such a magnetic sense" said Dr Sabine Begall from the University of Duisberg-Essen (uh-huh..)). Scientists are supposed to think laterally and ponder such things...
It's more that someone managed to find the resources to deploy an unspecified number of researchers on the task of searching thousands upon thousands of Google Earth images of grazing cattle from hundreds of sites around the globe to gather the necessary body of evidence required to advance such a claim. "Sometimes it took hours and hours to find some pictures with good resolution, and it was difficult to tell the head and rear of the cattle." said Dr Begall.
Amazing. It's equivalent to paying our trading staff to spend hours and hours of their valuable time on the internet playing Ebay, instead of trying to figure out their USD/ARS from their elbows.
What's that UDH?... Oh, well, I suppose it depends what sort of contract they are on.
Scientists uncover direct evidence of cows displaying animal magnetism
(Incidentally, I wonder how access to a website such as animalmatingzone.com comes to be blocked at a medium-sized international investment bank. The mind boggles...)
9 comments:
If it was blocked specifically then indeed one's mind does boggle .....
I'm not sure exactly how the controls work but everything points to it being an ad hoc system. That is, traffic is noticed on an non-business site such as bogger.com andf.daslfj. arghghgh
I went onto the Goggly earth thing earlier to see if I could see any alignments of people here at our MSIB. Through the xray pic version I got a clear view of 80 percent of our staff all aligned in one direction - pointing at the nearest eBay screen.
Oh and there was a similar scene to the one depicted in your photo, just it was me on the receiving end and my 'colleague' in our Moscow branch that was intent on inserting some Euros where the sun definitely doesn't shine. Bloody good this goggley earth
Bad luck with the Russki cowboys, er, bovine boy. Don't worry, those euros will come down in a couple of days of their own accord.
Spoken like one of experience.
Come to think of it,talking about having experience how did you even KNOW of a site called animalmating.com?
Anyway, when these euros re-emerge I'll leave them in your desk drawer, where they can fester whilst you spend ANOTHER two day jolly up out of office, leaving me alone to suffer SB's, well SBness, FVJ's f++kwittedness, Pam's gimpyleerysmileyness and lest we forget I will still be blithely ignored by PNB (possibly new boss).
I hope FVJ can magnetically align himself with a suitable window....
All future leave for you is CANCELLED.
animalmatingZONE.com get it right!
Err, I mean, that's what I think it was. Ask Mr K. I know he left the office early in Singapore to go home and check it out while Mrs K. was at her "look-a-bit-more-like-Beyonce-every-day class."
Don't worry, I know you'll have fun while I am away. Now that FVJ knows the definition of arbitrage he'll spend the next 48 hours explaining to you how it's done in a market of your choice.
Oh, and I have asked IT to disable Ebay.de so SB should be in a particularly vibrant mood...
As for Pam, well, Freitag is Freitag so you know what's coming there. No, not the secretary.
so if I go out cow-tipping will they all fall east or west?
btw, thanks for putting me on your blogroll! :)
LOL! Well, these things are important to someone, I guess. I mean, perhaps if we magnetise those milking parlours properly, the cows will just walk in, all by themselves!
Oh, wait! They already do!
@chat blanc - this depends entirely on whether you are in the Northern or Southern hemisphere.
And remember, if you go out cow-tipping on your own, don't forget your iron filings - just scatter them and it throws the silly moos off balance if you get in a spot of bother.
@Jay - They do indeed... I still find it a bit suspicious that this weird phenomenon has only just been noticed. But then of course how did we ever conduct valid scientific field research without Google Earth?
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