What is Digg?95 Comments
- Caps, on 10/11/2007, -14/+89Is it Bush?
- kosmoX, on 10/11/2007, -2/+38Anybody else read the title as "The most hideous planet on earth?"
- PaulOwen, on 10/11/2007, -3/+38Later, we'll be featuring ...
The most irritating shape on earth
The most shocking mathematical formula on earth
The most unnerving geographical feature on earth
The most exaggerated hyperbole on earth - Jwoey, on 10/11/2007, -0/+28"damn, I wish i could move somewhere cooler."
- Jwoey, on 10/11/2007, -2/+28I'd rather judge ugly plants on the content of their character.
- PeppermintPig, on 10/11/2007, -1/+27"its the best joint rolling paper i've ever used though"
Funny, they say it's toxic. XD - SomaSynth, on 10/11/2007, -0/+25Really old things amaze me, even if it's just a plant. Knowing that something of this kind might have been around to catch the breeze from Caesar's ships sailing past the Pharos into Alexandria ~2000 years ago. Think what we could learn from it if it could speak.
- ichbinladen, on 10/11/2007, -1/+22What's so hideous about it? It's a damned plant.
- JonForTheWin, on 10/11/2007, -0/+19Reminds me of them sunken colonies. If it made the same sound that'd be awesome.
- abcdefghij, on 10/11/2007, -1/+18buried as lame.
Why is there a need to classify a plant as ugly or hideous? This plant adapted and evolved appropriately to its environment (a harsh one, I might say), and that is a beautiful thing.
I can understand if a rose or orchid be called beautiful, but this plant as hideous? Not everything should be categorized for the pleasure to the eye of the beholder. - gojcaj, on 10/11/2007, -2/+17it does speak. it tells me to burn things.
- GawtMilk, on 10/11/2007, -0/+15Most hideous plant?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stinkhorn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrion_flower
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echinopsis_lageniformis
There are much worse plants than this. Only, the aforementioned plants also smell bad, don't survive long, etc. This plant isn't bad at all. If I saw it in nature, I'd probably think "wow, that plant is really dehydrated", not "WHAT THE *****? That plant invokes one helluva gag reflex!". There's a very large difference between "unappeasing" and "hideous". For something to be truly hideous, it's got to evoke a NEGATIVE feeling in you...the plant in this article is more of a "meh" feeling.
It's not a plant I'd buy for a girlfriend, but it's not something I'd want to stamp on / completely destroy. - lemon67, on 10/11/2007, -0/+12I definitely did haha
- DPimp1262, on 10/11/2007, -1/+11I guess either by some sort of a genetic dating system to judge the age of the cells or the more likely they just measure the lengths of the leaves and compare that to the rate that they grow out of the plant. I'm not really that sure.
- NikoKun, on 10/11/2007, -0/+10I dono... I think I've seen uglier plants in my life...
- lukee, on 10/11/2007, -1/+9@Jwoey:
Yeah, sure, you /say/ you like the Namibian Welwitschia for her personality, but we all know you're lying. - deepdiggdude, on 10/11/2007, -4/+12Singularitarian,
You know, I'm still so irritated by your comment that I feel compelled to flame more.
Try to understand that the people who make public statements about the age of this and other living things are what you call EXPERTS. They have things like Ph.D.s 'n stuff. They spent years studying vast scientific resources and then, by eliminating the other possible answers came up with whats called a scientific theory.
You see, their way of discovery is extensive and sublime, exhaustive and comprehensive, while your stupid little statement reveals that your knowledge pool is painfull shallow.
If you have an opposing scientific theory then present it for review among the world's plant biologists. If not, STFU and let others who are qualified make statements about the natural world. - Takuro, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7Anybody else find this a little annoying to read? Does he really need to double-space after each sentence...
My English professor would have a field day with this. :P - xoon, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8When was society at its high point of judging anything?
- HarryHunt, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7Hmm, all plants in my appartment look like that. I'd even say that any plant can be made to look like that if you deprive it of water and sunlight long enough.
- inactive, on 10/11/2007, -2/+9wth.... are we really sinking that low in society that we have to now judge "ugly" plants on how they look?.
- pronouncable, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5Whacky-pedia!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welwitschia - venom8599, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5You'd think as someone writing an article, he would've heard about paragraphs.
- ever, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5.. Actually;
"Leaves typically grow at a rate of 8-15 cm/yr on mature plants, some of which have been found with leaves measuring 1.8 m wide and 6.2 m long, suggesting potential ages of 500-1000 years. Ages of 1500-2000 years have been claimed without supporting data".
Singularitarian's comment IS a bit weird and all but gaahh... Let's just stick to admiring the plant :). David Attenborough did a feature about welwitschia some years back, truly fascinating stuff. The writer of the article obviously has no interest in plants and / or biology. The article's been written like some terrible beauty pageant report. - shakin, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4It looks like a regular plant fell out of a pot and landed upside down.
- Buckiller, on 10/11/2007, -2/+6"But what happens when an ugly and hard-to-love plant is under similar threat? The silence is deafening."
Eww... I didn't like reading that... - gojcaj, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4its actually kinda hot.
- Iolite, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4Don't see what makes it so ugly. Just looks a bit lazy to me.
- imeddy, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4Ehm... eye of the beholder?
- daRoach, on 10/11/2007, -0/+4You're lame because you think going to the Omaha Zoo is lame. The Omaha Zoo rocks!
- bob_the_alien, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7@ deepdiggdude
Chill Out Man, first off, maybe he really didn't know how they dated the plant, and I saw nothing in his comment that made it degrading to anyone else. While nothing he said was insightful in anyway, I did find it a tad bit amusing.
Seems to me, your really just being more mean spirited with your comments than actually saying anything really useful yourself. SO just chill out, let it slide, otherwise, you keep with this intense hate, you may die of a heart attack. Stress free is the way to be. (reminds me of something Captain Planet would say :P ) - lemon67, on 10/11/2007, -2/+6Only has two leaves? hmm, I didn't COUNT, but that looks like more than 2.
- sublimethinker, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3@GawtMilk: Thanks for sharing those as I too knew that this was not the most hideous plant I've ever seen.
- venom8599, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3It looks about as ugly as a typical cactus. Now let's see the most hideous animal... as long as it doesn't turn out in some Twilight Zone way where it ends up being man.
- Bensign, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3I just saw this at the Omaha Zoo.
They had some huge exhibit about it and had signs pointing to it.
And yes, I know I'm lame because I went to the Omaha Zoo. - inactive, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3"In my day..."
- phenolholic, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3RTFA
- HydraulicToast, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3you can tell the author of this article is really into science.
its really cool but its so ugly and its not very popular because its ugly but it does only have two leaves which is kind of cool except its so ugly! - DeLtAIjK, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2@ abcdefghij,
The article says: "The funny thing is, the more I stare at the mess of sunscorched leaves in front of me, the more I like it.
Against all the odds, in one of the most inhospitable place on Earth, it has survived and adapted.
And perhaps above all, it is a triumphant counterblast against a world that prizes beauty above all things."
I don't think the author was classifying it as absolutely hideous, but rather, he exaggerated to draw attention to his article. I like how he makes a point about how conservationists don't give a damn about the plant because of its looks.
It seems like you and the author do agree that it's beautiful in its own right. - mabhatter, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I wonder if this is what inspired the sarlacc in star wars? multi tentacled, and lives practically forever... this is about the area SW was originally filmed in.
- ronaldinho, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2It's not hideous, it's just not pretty, that's all. I was intrigued when I read the article actually, the plant itself was interesting to know about. And to all those who thought the author was an idiot saying the plant was the most hideous: I don't think the author thought it was hideous, I think he admired the plant more than anything else. He's just saying that it's not pretty, and it gets overlooked because it's not pretty. The title is there to attract readers like us, which makes it seemed that we got duped (though it was a good enough article itself).
One last thing: how can it be pretty when it's been living in the desert for over 2000 years!? A tulip cannot even survive a day in that Skeleton Coast, let alone 2000 years - bubba9999, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2I don't know what the big deal is - my plants all look like this. I keep forgetting to water them.
- Wootery, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2Buried... idiot.
- inactive, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2The one same plant could have been seen my all my people in history that crossed that desert.
- venom8599, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2@daroach
I was commenting more on the fact that the author has line breaks after nearly every sentence. There are only a few cohesive paragraphs in the article. Most of it seems to just be a sentence, or perhaps two, and then a double-spaced line break followed by another one or two sentences.
As for the spacing after the end of a sentence, I find that to be a holdover from the era before Sans Serif fonts came into their own for on-screen text. Also, in those older typing classes they teach you to add a space in before periods and commas. It's all pretty unnecessary and actually doesn't look very natural.
For your information, I type in some funky home-taught way, combining the WASD gaming posture and traditional typing. I took typing classes, but I can type way faster in the way I've learned, however screwed up it may be. - artofwar420, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I actually think this one is pretty:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/Amorphophallus_Wilhelma.jpg - godfly, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1the rodney dangerfield of plant kingdom.
- AlpineStars777, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I recognize this plant from the Chicago Field Museum. It's huge if you see it in person and my first thought was it looked like something from Super Mario Bros.
- RTPMatt, on 10/11/2007, -1/+2I think those pictures look much worse than the one in the article.
Maybe someone should update wikipedia to catch its good side. - idonthack, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1I'd water it
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