Weird science

Here’s the thing about us guys. If, today, you were to give us some amazing new technology with which we could render ourselves totally invisible – a very large percentage of us would try using it to spy on women undressing.

I guarantee this is true.

Just watch a movie like Paul Verhoeven’s Hollow Man. This 2000 flick featured Kevin Bacon as a brilliant yet obsessed scientist who tests an experimental serum on himself – resulting in his becoming transparent.

So what’s the first thing Mr. Invisible does with his newfound, God-like powers?

He checks out his female neighbor with the silicone job stepping into her shower.

My point is this: men, in most cases, are apt to look for the least beneficial application of any new science or technology. Forget about the "good of mankind" and "best results for the greatest number of people." We’re just in it for the thrills.

I bring this up because, even now, science is exploring the possibility of invisibility, and it’s all because of Harry Potter.

Researchers now say it’s possible to develop an "invisibility cloak" similar to the one used by J.K. Rowling’s fictional boy wizard.

In fact, Susumi Tachi, a researcher at Tokyo University, has already developed such a prototype – a garment fitted with a viewfinder that reconstructs the images behind and in front of the wearer, which are then projected across the surface of the coat. You basically "see through" the person wearing it to what’s behind.

British scientists are meanwhile working with materials that can cause light to bend around, rather than illuminate, an object’s surface, making it possible to create a garment that renders the user invisible.

Now, don’t you just bet that some male scientist somewhere is calculating the possible applications of this device in a women’s locker room?

Ever since firecrackers were invented, men have seized on science as their own special domain. Put another way: males like blowing stuff up. I’m not sure why we’re like this. It’s probably the kid in us. Science, for us boys, was never really fun unless you had something blow up. A volcano erupting baking soda. A chemical reaction. Stamping on lit firecrackers. That was pure science.

When we got older, us boys became men and saw lots of fun things that science could do. Like making bigger things blow up. Or mixing cocktails that triggered strange chemical reactions within us (see: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Hollow Man). Or stamping on lit watusis on New Year’s Eve.

Men have a tendency to make any scientific breakthrough frivolous or dangerous. Take gene science. Genetic research has led to the cloning of bigger and bigger animals, including horses recently by Italian scientists. So let’s put some male scientists on the case: How can this ground-breaking development be best put to use to benefit mankind? Why, by racing the cloned horses on a racetrack in Texas, of course.

Not only were thoroughbred horses quickly duplicated and saddled up to study their physical skills and performance against non-cloned horses at the races, a company is now planning to sell cloned thoroughbreds at $150,000 per.

Pure science at its best, in a man’s world.

Speaking of genes, it was recently announced that Genghis Khan, a prodigious spreader of DNA during his rape-and-pillage days, has hundreds of thousands of surviving offspring in the modern world. One documented relative of the Mongol barbarian is Tom Robinson, a Florida-based accounting professor. Research mapping on descendants of Genghis has conclusively proven that Robinson is related, on a genetic level, to the fearsome and barbaric warrior. So what possible use does this amazing scientific information have for a law-abiding accounting professor in Florida? Basically, at parties, he can impress people by telling them that he’s related to Genghis Khan. And who knows? Maybe he can exert a little more control over his students during finals week.

In addition to providing us with a few good bar tricks, science has often been our unwitting pal, our bud. Take studies on alcohol consumption. Research now shows that, while the benefits of drinking red wine may be achieved by women through drinking a single glass a week, for men, it takes two glasses a night to get the same amount of antioxidants and heart-attack reducing benefits.

If I read the research correctly, this means men get to drink more. It’s better for us. Hey, it’s actually essential to our health.

But science isn’t always man’s ally. There is some disturbing research, on occasion, for us men. Studies show we live shorter lives. We were more prone to heart attacks and stress-related deaths. Then genetic scientists started finding fault with our sperm, even our very chromosomes. Science was turning on us. Thank God we still enjoyed blowing up things.

Then there was the case of the Frankenstein penile implant. A man in Providence, Rhode Island recently won a $400,000 lawsuit against makers of his steel and plastic penile implant because (I’m not making this up) it failed to cease and desist for 10 years straight. Charles "Chick" Lennon, a 68-year-old handyman, had the thing installed in 1996 (a couple years before Viagra hit the market) and successfully sued makers of the Dura-II because it remained, um, at attention for close to a decade, preventing him from swimming, riding a bike or hugging people without pain, embarrassment and mental anguish.

This is the problem with rushing forward in science: us men always go too far. As Dr. Frankenstein well knew, there are some things that man must leave alone.