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Amazing Fractal Cabbage
fourmilab.ch — This is so visually stunning an object that on first encounter it's hard to imagine you're looking at a garden vegetable rather than an alien artefact created with molecular nanotechnology. Then you realise that vegetables are created with molecular nanotechnology, albeit the product of earthly evolution, not extraterrestrial engineering.
- 688 diggs
- digg it
- outerspaceapple, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1I think you have a pretty bad description there, but wow do those plants look strange.
- YourAnalogBuddy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0ditto outerspace, def digg, but convoluted description
- NGNR, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Similar patterns can be seen with relation to the Fibonacci sequence and thus the golden ratio phi = 1.618033989.... in pineapples, sunflower seeds and also other plants and objects including more shells.
http://www.mcs.surrey.ac.uk/Personal/R.Knott/Fibonacci/fibnat.html - whoatemydigg, on 10/12/2007, -4/+0Lame, what people digging this story dont eat vegetables or something
"Come Onnnnn.." - TacitusBen, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0You can get these at my grocery store for a Euro. They're more like Broccoli than cabbage.
- rm999, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0Thats really cool, but goddamnit lakah you confused the hell out of me.
- phidong, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I wish I could see this in real life. It looks really neat.
- Gawd_it_HURTS, on 10/12/2007, -4/+0Goddamn vegetables.
- AeonTorpor, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1Godblessed vegetables
- AeonTorpor, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0Mmmm... forbidden cabbage *drools*
- Pureeviljester, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0Interesting... no, nevermind, it's not.
- mikeazorin, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0been there, eaten that. It doesn't taste all that great, and you can only really see the fractals to the 3rd degree. Probably shipping's fault.
- sfacets, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0How is this amazing? It's like a dude from a backwards tribe seeing a car for the first time.
- Hypersapien, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Is this what they were talking about on that one episode of Numb3rs?
- FunHeadlines, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0I ain't eatin' that!
- SatansMagicHat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1don't yell at lakah, he was just copying the description fromt he website.
Lol, Numb3rs owns. - 3Den, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0sfacets: can you show any other examples of something natural you might see every day exhibiting this degree of obvious self-similarity?
- burke, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0"Is this what they were talking about on that one episode of Numb3rs?
I had the same thought :) - lofidan, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Heh, my mum cooked these just a month ago for me and I was taken aback at its appearance. Spooky seeing it on digg.
Tastes like baby corn raw (yummy) but more like broccoli when cooked. - ipunchstrangers, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0saw this last week sometime, still love it. fractals always capture my interest.
- dj_sea2005, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0would you like fries with your cabbage?
- halophoenix, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Seen these guys on the store shelves pretty often. They're even creepier in the erm...flesh.
- VesperDEM, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0Once again, a story that is "YEARS" old. Really guys, is this the best you folks can come up with?
- lakah, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Sorry guys.. got lazy and copied from the site. Made more sense at the time. I swear!
Thanks for the diggz! - yibble, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0These things are tasty when put into a veg' steamer. Had one the other day in my weekly veg' box... Yum!
- rebz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Vesper, I dont see you submitting any stories
- Mudcrutch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0im starting to get annoyed with the digg effect on web sites.
- coldcoffee, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Man, wouldn't that cabbage taste good on the 'Broodwich'?
- Pureeviljester, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0The broodwich can not be dis-assembled!
WTF is the digg effect? Maybe if you explained it people wouldn't do it. Or maybe you should just not be a jerk and let us digg effect. - mrbass, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Here's my fractals. Generated a a few thousand in about 12 hours with chbg (linux program) and picked out the best ones.
http://membo.org/index.php?folder=/0-fractals/ - scottjl, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0hey. i think i can see mary in that cabbage! let's sell it on ebay!
- VesperDEM, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0rebz, your point?
- ubiquityxx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Amazing specimen of nature. Great Digg.
- Ashepp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Anyone know where you can order seeds of these in the US ?
- smithco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Interesting, but his choice of examples in the technical section are rather poorly chosen. If anyone is interested in this phenomenon, search the web for 'phyllotaxis', you'll get about a bajillion examples in nature and in simulation. Or, follow the link to my own introduction to the topic: http://pages.cpsc.ucalgary.ca/~smithco/phyllotaxis/index.html
- SirDreamAlot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Ugly. can't believe i dugg it.
- pyromouse, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Not a cabbage
When I was growing it, we reffered to it as Broccoli Romanesco (I assume it's right). Certainly more closely related to broccoli or cauliflour than a cabbage. Pretty good.
Order seeds? I don't really know. Do you live in california? I might be able to set you up. - pyromouse, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1actually, first place I googled had seed packets:
http://seeds.thompson-morgan.com/us/en/product/752/1 - Tonyisbad, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0i remember this being brought up on that show Numb3rs, its kinda cool, actually its a lot cooler to look at than to eat.
- nariposa, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0FEED ME, SEYMORE
- Ch1x0rofDeath, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Ignoring AeonTorpor's earlier post,
Mmmmmmm, fractal cabbage...::drools::
Sorry, couldn't resist. - quas, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Best romanesco photo ever:
http://www.chromasia.com/iblog/archives/0411202114_clean.php
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