Apparently,

[rbkwp]

How Many Teeth Does a Great White Shark Have?

apparently

A great white shark will go through as many as 20,000 teeth in a lifetime,
as it is constantly replacing lost teeth.

A great white shark has about 300 large, triangular-shaped teeth with
jagged, serrated edges, arranged in many rows in its mouth. When a shark
clamps down on something, or someone, it will shake its head violently from
side to side, in order to rip off hunks of flesh. The first two rows of
teeth are used for grabbing and cutting the prey, while the teeth in the
last rows are replacements for teeth that get broken, get worn down, or
become substitutes for teeth that fall out. A great white can lose and
replace as many as 20,000 teeth over a lifetime...

 

[rbkwp]

appaently,im bored

i found 'i hate it when,bc i am using a browser i seldomm use these days duh

Antarctica's Pine Island Glacier lost another large chunk of ice at the end of ... READ MORE

 

[BillM]

of ... READ MORE

Where???

 

[rbkwp]

haha dont know was it this??? ha


apparently i confused the fuck out of myself, again Bill haha
↑
of ... READ MORE
Where???

http://www.ecowatch.com/iceberg-breaks-off-antarctica-2268242877.html

 

[rbkwp]

apparently
a LOT of reading/digesting/analyzing but worth it haha

Have a great weekend! -- Dan
The Failed Attempt to Create a Ten Hour Day
There are 24 hours in a day, seven days in a week, and (roughly) 365 days in a year. There are 60 minutes in an hour and 60 seconds in a minute. You probably knew all that. But you know it because you've committed it to memory -- it's not something you can reason out. A lot of measurements -- at least in areas that haven't switched to the Metric system -- suffer from that design flaw. Instead of there being a base unit (say, a meter) with other units simply being some power of ten larger or smaller (kilometers, centimeters, to further our example), we end up with 7s and 24s and 60s and all sorts of other numbers which do not match the number of fingers we have.

It's not entirely clear why our days have two 12-hour halves or why our hours have 60 minutes of 60 seconds each. Per Scientific America, the ancient Egyptians are possibly the culprit -- "the importance of the number 12 is typically attributed either to the fact that it equals the number of lunar cycles in a year or the number of finger joints on each hand (three in each of the four fingers, excluding the thumb), making it possible to count to 12 with the thumb." Or maybe it's the ancient Babylonians, who, for some reason, used a base 60 system. (And note, 60 is just 12 times five.) But neither of those two measures are as important as they used to be. So, why haven't we switched to decimal time?

Well, if the French Revolution is any indication, it's because regular people don't really care about the math behind the clock.

Starting in the 1750s and continuing onward, a handful of philosophers and mathematicians began to write about their struggles with the base 12 system -- it seemed counterintuitive or, at least, antiquated. The same was true for other aspects of the non-base 10 world, particularly weights and measures. Why are there 12 inches to a foot? Or 14 pounds to a stone?

When the French revolted against the monarchy forty-something years later, the political upheaval spread beyond politics and into this realm. After the storming of the Bastille, the French nobility made many concessions to the revolutionary forces, among which was relinquishing control over what were official weights and measures. (If you control how things are measured, you can control the results.) This became the first major foray into the metric system, even though it didn't stick immediately. (France dropped this precursor to the modern metric system in 1812 and re-adopted a new one in 1837. If you want to learn more, the "history of the metric system" entry on Wikipedia is an interesting, but long, read.)

But the revolutionaries weren't only concerned with pounds and inches; they also tried to reform the minutes and hours, too, using something now called "French Revolutionary Time" or "French Republican Time," depending on which source you go by. The idea was simple -- ten hour days, with each hour consisting of 100 minutes, and each new minute made up of 100 seconds. On November 24, 1793,per Mental Floss, this base 10 system became the law of the land, and clockmakers began to produce things like the item depicted above to further those efforts. As you can see, the two center rings are base 100 and 10, respectively from the center out, while the traditional time is measured on the outside rings. The arm of the clock pointing at 8 o'clock in the new system is also pointing to a few minutes before 7:15 PM in the old system.

And the change didn't stop there. Gone were seven day weeks -- they were replaced by a ten-day week. Each month was now 30 days, no more, no less, each made up three weeks. There were still 12 months, in order to make the math work out correctly (roughly), but each month was renamed to reflect the seasons as experienced by someone in Paris. Five or six (on leap years) celebratory days came at the end of the year, bringing us to the same 365 days in the current calendar.

Or, at least, that was what the law said. In practice, people didn't really care to change how they kept time -- as Mental Floss further notes, unlike weights and measures, which impacted trade and commerce, "there were few practical reasons for non-mathematicians to change how they told time." The base 12 system was good enough -- plus, their clocks didn't need to be replaced, which sounds like a silly reason, but the cost of changing over every single clock was significant.

Failing to get the people on board, the new government ultimately gave up the effort. The decimal time experiment lasted less than 18 (regular) months; by spring of 1795, the French leadership dropped the edict.

 

[rbkwp]

Are There Places Where the Sun Doesn't Shine?

apparentyly??
we know the cxonnotations huh ha'

Two villages in Norway and Italy have mountainside mirrors to reflect the
sunlight during the winter months.

For as long as anyone could remember, residents of two villages in Norway
and Italy, both situated in deep valleys surrounded by mountains, lived
without direct sunlight for about six months every year. But in the last
decade, both villages decided to do something about it. The towns -- Rjukan
in Norway and Viganella in Italy -- erected giant computer-directed mirrors
in the mountains to track the Sun and direct daylight into the villages
during the winter months.

 

[rbkwp]

Apparently,

Why People Originally Didn't "Like" Cigarettes

Pictured above are Wilma and Fred Flintstone, the starring characters of The Flintstones cartoon series. The Flintstones debuted in the fall of 1960 and lasted for six seasons in their original run, but their cultural importance has persevered even longer. Flintstone characters have appeared in more than a dozen spinoffs and other TV shows, were perhaps the most recognizable children's vitamins of a subsequent generation, were the focus of multiple live-action films, and even had a direct-to-DVD crossover movie with professional wrestlers.

The early days of that cartoon empire, though, were fueled by something less-than-innocent: cigarettes. As seen above, Fred and Wilma are smoking Winston cigarettes, a brand dating back to the mid-1950s. That's because, at the time, Winston was the main sponsor of The Flinstones. Episodes of the show ended with Fred and his pal Barney looking for a way to unwind after a long day and settling on sharing a smoke. Fred and Wilma then do the same. (You can watch the ad here.) The ad closed with Fred speaking Winston's then-famous catchphrase: "Winston tastes good like a cigarette should."

And that's where the controversy came in. No, not cartoon characters hawking cigs -- while there were some who objected, the cartoon at the time was seen mostly as geared for grown-ups. And regardless, those complaints were dwarfed by the larger outcries: people complaining about Winston's grammar.

To modern ears, maybe the slogan "Winston tastes good like a cigarette should" sounds OK. But to the more sophisticated grammarians of the age, the word "like" was not quite right. In the slogan, the word "like" is being used as a subordinating conjunction, connecting an independent clause ("Winston tastes good") with a dependent one ("a cigarette should"). But, these linguists protested, the word "like" isn't a conjunction and shouldn't be used that way. The proper word, they argued, should be "as." And this was a big deal at the time.

Per Wikipedia, the media tastemakers of the time were none too pleased with this abuse of language; poet Ogden Nash wrote a snarky poem about the advertisement's poor grammar (republished as part of a grammar explainer, here) while television news giant Walter Cronkite refused to read the ad copy on air. When Merriam-Webster, the publishers of the often authoritative dictionaries, published an edition which declared that "like" could be used acceptably as a conjunction -- citing Winston's ad as an example of such an accepted use -- the literary elites doubled-down on their ire. According to the book "Language in the USA: Themes for the Twenty-first Century," "the dictionary's derelictions were front-page news for months -- the New York Times condemned it as a 'bolshevik' document, and the Chicago Daily News took it as the symptom of 'a general decay in values.'" Yikes.

Ultimately, Winston prevailed in the grammar battle. Today, "like" is often used as a conjunction, as I'm sure we've all experienced (probably without noticing). Merriam-Webster stood its ground; it currently includes an entry for "like" as a conjunction and noted that "'like' has been used as a conjunction in ways similar to 'as' since the 14th century." Critics of cigarettes moved onto more important battles, such as stopping the marketing of the cancer-causing product altogether and particularly the marketing targeting children. There, they were much more successful; in 1963, when the Flintstones introduced Pebbles (Fred and Wilma's daughter) to the show, the cartoon found a more kid-friendly sponsor: Welch's grape juice.

 

[rbkwp]

How Do You Find out If You Have Been Nominated for a Nobel Prize?

not that theres any likelihood any of us etc
or
become the first black president of the racist side of the USA


Individuals are not told if they have been nominated for a Nobel Prize;
nominations are kept secret for 50 years.
Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel’s will stipulated that his fortune, mostly
amassed from his 355 inventions (including dynamite), be used to help
individuals and organizations doing work that provides the “greatest
benefit on mankind.” Nobel Prizes are handed out every year on 10
December, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death in 1896. They are
considered to be among the most prestigious and coveted prizes in the
world. But unless you win one, you probably won’t know that you were ever
nominated, since the names of the nominees are kept secret for 50 years

 

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apparently
a nice bit of history i bet you never knew of
well i never but am delighted to read/know of it ha

Chicago Freight Tunnels
A century-old network of freight tunnels underneath the city's historic business district.

cute little trains

http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/...3_2_2017)&mc_cid=687709ec7c&mc_eid=d67b59bc0e

 

[rbkwp]

I originally published this in May of 2013. Hope you enjoy it! Have a great weekend. -- Dan
apparently
Mr Rogers was a big big hit with many of you youngsters .. cool
Fred's Fish

The first episode of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood aired in 1968; the last new episode aired in 2001. If you or your children grew up in America and you’re reading this, there’s an almost 100 percent chance that you’ve seen at least bits and pieces of the show. You probably know about Fred Rogers’ habits — changing his sweater and shoes when he entered and exited his home, “traveling” by trolley to the Land of Make Believe, feeding his pet fish, and speaking directly to the children at home as if they were visiting his house. For one of his millions of five-year-old year old named Katie — the fish feeding part was of particular importance. It was so important to her that she and her father wrote him a note with a simple request:

“Please say when you are feeding your fish, because I worry about them. I can’t see if you are feeding them, so please say you are feeding them out loud.”

Katie’s father explained. Katie was blind, and, in her father’s words, “she does cry if you don’t say that you have fed the fish.”

The story is recounted by Rogers in his book, “Dear Mr. Rogers, Does It Ever Rain in Your Neighborhood?: Letters to Mr. Rogers.” The host of the Neighborhood also explains (in response to a question from “Meaghan, age 10”) why he has fish in the first place:

First of all, when we feed the fish, we’re showing that we “take care of” other living things, and being taken care of is something very important to children. They know they need grown-ups to provide them with food, like the fish in our tank need us to feed them. It does have a lot to do with responsibility, as you mentioned! Also, I like to watch anything that swims!

As for Katie’s request? In the book, Mr. Rogers tells readers that, since receiving the note, he’s “tried to remember to mention out loud that times that I’m feeding the fish. Over the years, I’ve learned so much from children and their families. I like to think that we’ve all grown together.” What else would we expect from a man for whom every day was a beautiful day in the neighborhood?

 

[rbkwp]

How Harmful Are Tanning Beds?


apparently
never knew the name for this infernal probably USA contraption
bet it was only the overly nutty wealthy that owned/participated etc

In 2015, U.S. tanning beds were linked to 1,200 skin cancer deaths and
medical costs of about $343 million USD.

The link between indoor tanning and skin cancer is indisputable. Tanning
beds emit UV light, which damages skin cells, triggers DNA mutations, and
reduces immunity -- all of which have contributed to a dramatic rise in
various skin cancers in the United States. In 2015 alone, researchers at
the University of North Carolina attributed 9,000 cases of melanoma, 86,000
cases of squamous cell carcinoma, and 168,000 cases of basal cell carcinoma
to the use of tanning devices. The report, published in the Journal of
Cancer Policy, also linked the quest for a bronze glow to the premature
deaths of around 1,200 people in the United States in 2015.

 

[rbkwp]

How Popular Is Happy Hour in Ireland?


apparently
no happy hourr in IRELAND

In an effort to discourage heavy drinking, happy hours have been illegal in
Irish bars and pubs since 2003.

Most people are familiar with "happy hour" specials at bars and
restaurants, in which alcoholic drinks are temporarily discounted,
typically after the end of the working day. And on St. Patrick's Day,
plenty of American bars try to cash in on the celebrations by offering
themed happy hour drinks. So it may surprise you to learn that in Ireland
-- even on St. Patrick's Day -- happy hours have been illegal since 2003.
As part of an initiative to curtail binge drinking and create a more
family-friendly environment in pubs, the Irish government enacted a ban on
any promotional activity in bars and pubs -- such as two-for-one "happy
hour" pricing -- that was likely to encourage people to drink excessively.

 

[rbkwp]

APPARENTLY

its a most BEAUTIFUL GORGEOUS NZ AUTUMN day out there today
beautiful gorgeous ,5 days running now
no wonder its my favourite season, bugger Spring and its usual accompanying rain

WHOOOOPEEEEEE!!!

 

[rbkwp]

Who Is the New Muppet on “Sesame Street”?

apparently i immeadiately thought itd be a Trumplike muppett teaching the US Adult/children etc etc


A new Muppet is joining the cast of “Sesame Street” -- a character
named Julia, who has autism.
For the first time in a decade, a new Muppet will move into the
neighborhood on Sesame Street. Julia, a character with autism, will debut
on 10 April 2017, and it is hoped that her inclusion in the show will help
children learn about autism and embrace its differences. The character will
be brought to life by puppeteer Stacey Gordon, whose son is on the autism
spectrum. The frequency of autism diagnoses has shot up in recent years,
and the CDC now estimates that one in 68 children are on the autism
spectrum.

 

[rbkwp]

apparently

took the 'greatest military in the world/according to OBAMA,to realise this scam/we Aussies call it a rort

For two days, Clark was in charge, mismanaging things as any amateur would.

When the First Responder is Also a Disaster

On May 26, 2002, the captain of a towboat on the Arkansas River fell prey to a fainting spell, losing control of his rig. The boat slammed into a bridge, causing the mayhem seen above. More than 500 feet of Interstate 40 in Oklahoma toppled into the water below, resulting in the death of fourteen people.

As happens in many disaster situations, the Army comes in to help. In this case, the commander in charge was Captain William James Clark. Captain Clark immediate went into action, taking control of the situation and setting up camp. He directed federal investigators in the recovery of personal effects lost to the water below, coordinated with the Oklahoma governor at the time, and personally contacted the next of kin of some of the deceased. Clark secured a few motel rooms for the first responders, obtained supplies from a local Army surplus store, and convinced a local car dealership to loan his men a pickup truck. These purchases weren't donations, though. They were backed by the U.S. military -- that is, Clark informed these local businesses that the Army would be picking up the bill.

But there was a problem: Clark wasn't in charge -- the Army didn't send him there. They couldn't have, because Clark wasn't even in the Army, and never had been.

He was just a garden-variety fraudster, albeit a temporarily successful one.

There were clues, of course; as the Anchorage Daily News would later note, "the spare tire around his waist is the feature most people remember of his 300-something pound body, and that he has a tendency to lose sentences in his mind before they make it all the way out of his mouth." But that -- and the fact that he wasn't doing a good job managing the recovery efforts -- didn't seem to be enough to call his authority into question. For two days, Clark was in charge, mismanaging things as any amateur would.

And yet, no one seemed to care. While Clark wasn't an experienced first responder, he was an experienced fraudster -- the bridge imbroglio wasn't his first time illegally claiming he was someone he wasn't. (In fact, he had already gone to prison for fraud twice beforehand.) And it wasn't the last, either; he'd later defraud an Alaskan computer salesperson out of a laptop, claiming he was about to be deployed to Iraq. (He wasn't.)

While Clark probably could have pulled off the ruse for a while longer, on day three, he decided to instead abscond (with the truck). Once he fled, people began to notice all the clues which, in total, showed that he had no business leading the recovery efforts, to say the least. The manhunt began and, two weeks later, Clark was discovered in Canada. He was deported, arrested, and sentenced to a five-year prison sentence -- and forced to pay more than $10,000 in restitution, most of which went to pay for the truck.

 

[rbkwp]

Apparently,
read of this several times,intriuged!

The Exodus

By many estimates, the world’s Jewish population hovers around 14 million. Most of those people — around 12 million — live in either the United States or Israel. No other country, as seen in this chart, has even a million. And if you click that link and scroll and scroll and scroll some more, you’ll see that an estimated 100 Jews live in Ethiopia. That number was once much, much higher.

In the mid-1700s, a European explorer named James Bruce journeyed from Scotland to the Horn of Africa. While in present-day Ethiopia, Bruce discovered a population of people, then-estimated to be around 100,000, following Jewish traditions and observing many of the holidays and laws typically observed by Jews. That group, now known as Beta Israel, dates back until the 4th century if not earlier, and some believe that they are descendants of the lost biblical tribe of Dan. While at times the people of Beta Israel were persecuted for their beliefs, the population held at about 15,000 to 25,000 until around 1974. That year, a Soviet-backed military junta known as the Derg took control of Ethiopia. The Derg’s leader, Mengistu Haile Mariam, was no friend of Ethiopia’s Jews, killing many shortly after taking control of the nation, barring the study of Hebrew, and at times, outlawing the practice of Judaism altogether.

Over the next decade, Israel, the United States, and an unlikely cast of allies (particularly, the Sudanese) tried to bring Beta Israel out of Ethiopia and into Israel. The first attempt, Operation Moses, ran from November of 1984 until January of the following year, and managed to evacuate about 7,000 Jews from Ethiopia. While somewhat successful, about two-thirds of the Beta Israel population were left behind, and in many cases, children were separated from their parents. Israel kept an eye out for other opportunities to surreptitiously relocate the remaining Beta Israel population, and in May of 1991, one finally presented itself. Rebel forces overthrew Mariam’s regime and on May 21, 1991, the dictator fled, ultimately to Zimbabwe.

While the new Ethiopian leadership may have been kind to Beta Israel, there were hardly any guarantees (and certainly concerns, given other political tensions in the region). Israel, with the help of the U.S. under the George H.W. Bush administration, acted quickly, engaging in something called Operation Solomon. A total of 34 jumbo jets were enlisted for a series of non-stop flights between Ethiopia and Israel over a 36-hour period centering on May 24, 1991. Many of the jets had their seats ripped out in order to provide more space for refugees, as seen above (via this gallery of photos from the Operation), and one flight, officially, held a record 1,087 people — and that didn’t include a few dozen children who weren’t on the official manifest. Five children were born on board the flights, and at one point, as many as two dozen planes were in the air at the same time.

Over the 36 hour period, almost the entire Beta Israel population — roughly 14,500 people — was evacuated from Ethiopia. Despite the fact that many of those transported via Operation Solomon left almost all their belongings behind, the majority of the Beta Israel group were elated to have emigrated to a new home. As one immigrant told the New York Times, “It was a very nice flight. We didn’t bring any of our clothes, we didn’t bring any of our things, but we are very glad to be here.”

 

[rbkwp]

andba HAPPY EASTER to you too


To Boldly Go Where No Advertisement Has Gone Before
The International Space Station -- if reduced to two dimensions -- is roughly the size of a soccer pitch, at about 73 meters (239 feet) in length and 109 meters (356 feet) in width. It orbits the Earth at an altitude of 330 to 435 km (205 to 270 miles) -- the distance from New York City to either Washington D.C. or almost to Pittsburgh -- which is to say that it's pretty far away, and certainly too far of a distance to watch a soccer match. Yet, from where you are right now, you may be able to see it at times. Here is NASA's tool to help you "spot the station," in their words. Using that tool, you'll be able to spy the IS from Earth for a few moments each month. If you know where to look, and when, the ISS will appear as a small, bright dot in moving across the sky.

But yes, it's just a dot. At about 7,9000 m^2 -- 0.0079 km^2 -- the International Space Station isn't large enough to appear as anything else. For example, it's way too small to successfully deliver an advertisement to the people of Earth. That's not for lack of trying, however.

In April of 1993, six years before ISS began circling the globe, a budding space entrepreneur wanted to bring the first ad into low Earth orbit. Dubbed Space Marketing, Inc., the Georgia-based company dreamed of launching a 1 km^2 illuminated sign into the sky and slightly beyond. As the Los Angeles Timesreported a few months later, the idea was to take a huge piece of mylar, roll it up tightly, launch it about 240 km (150 miles) upward, and rig it so that it unfurled while in orbit. The "space billboard," as Space Marketing called it, would be "appear about half the size of the full moon" to those of us back home, per the Times.

While a company exec claimed that the seemingly floating ad would be unobtrusive ("Unless you're trying to see it, you won't"), most weren't convinced. The idea was met with almost universal (planetary?) condemnation -- from the publisher of AdAge and Carl Sagan, to Ralph Nader and members of the U.S. Congress. Congress acted, passing a law banning "obtrusive" space advertising, but the measure was more symbolic than anything else -- there are other nations that go to space and some of them accept sponsor dollars. Space Marketing basically ignored that legal setback and still sought advertisers, telling the Los Angeles Times that they had as many as 11 potential leads.

Ultimately, society was spared having to be exposed to a pseudo-lunar billboard -- but not because of the reasons above. Per a UN report (pdf), space junk was to blame. Low Earth orbit is home to a lot of former satellites and other space debris; the UN report noted that the proposed space billboard "was estimated to receive some 10,000 impacts of space debris per day" -- way more than the mylar could handle -- making it impossible for Space Marketing to secure further funding.

 

[rbkwp]

like,and its the eog 2ND

Scientists know when you're dreaming, thanks to a newly discovered brain wave signal

apparently


Why Do Dogs Tilt Their Heads?


trained my RED SETTER to perfectly respond to silent body language
and all the smart arse animal behavioourists said 'you cant train red setters' F'wits'

Researchers believe that dogs tilt their heads for several reasons, such as
detecting vocal cues and body language.

You may think your pup is just so doggone cute when he tilts his head to
one side, hanging on your every word. But is he listening intently, or is
it something else? Animal behavior experts say that dogs are good at
responding to body language and vocal cues, and that it’s possible that
they are listening for specific words or inflections -- especially those
that could lead to fun outdoor activities or food. But the head tilt may
also be connected to how a dog’s ear is constructed, and by angling his
head, a dog may be trying to pick up on useful sensory information. Stanley
Cohen, a noted psychologist known for his best-selling books on the mental
abilities of dogs, says that the head tilt may also be related to sight.
Depending on its size, a dog's muzzle may block his view of his owner's
facial expressions, and by tilting his head, he's trying to get a better
view.

 

[rbkwp]

Is Being an Airline Pilot a Stressful Job?

apparently


In a 2015 mental health survey, nearly 13% of airline pilots met the
criteria for likely depression.
After a Germanwings co-pilot deliberately flew an Airbus A320-211 into the
French Alps in March 2015, investigators found out that 27-year-old Andreas
Lubitz had been struggling with depression. In fact, Lubitz had been
treated for suicidal tendencies and had been declared "unfit to work" by a
doctor. The catastrophe was a wake-up call for the industry, and in its
wake came a mental health survey of commercial airline pilots around the
world. Of the 1,848 pilots who responded to the anonymous survey in 2015,
12.6 percent met the threshold for depression, and 4.1 percent reported
having suicidal thoughts during the two weeks before taking the survey. If
the results are accurate, the incidence of depression among pilots would be
nearly double the national U.S. rate of about 7 percent.

 

[rbkwp]

Close Encounters of the Jedi Kind

In 1999, George Lucas disappointed Star Wars fans around the world with The Phantom Menace, a forgettable first prequel to the initial Star Wars trilogy. From Jar Jar Binks to midichlorians, there are not a lot of positives to take away from the movie. (Okay, the Darth Maul lightsaber duel is pretty cool.) But there's at least one pretty fun easter egg, highlighted above. During a meeting of the Republic of the Senate, you see a variety of different races and species voicing their displeasure at the current galactic leadership. (Watch the scene here.) One of those species are the Asogians, but you probably know them better E.T.'s siblings and cousins.

E.T., though, isn't a creation of George Lucas -- he's from a Steven Speilberg movie of the same name. And yet, this isn't the only Lucas'Spielberg crossover reference. In the Indiana Jones franchise -- Speilberg movies -- you'll see two more. The more prominent one, seen below, comes from the Temple of Doom -- that's Club Obi Wan, a reference to the Jedi, of course. The much, much more subtle one appears in Raiders of the Lost Ark; as Mental Floss details (with pictures), R2-D2 and C3P0 appear as hieroglyphics in the room with the Ark.

And then there's R2-D2 again, this time hanging, upside-down, from the hull of the mothership in Speilberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind, seen here. (He's not very clear there, but the model used for that shot is in the Smithsonian's collection, and R2 is plainly present.) It's fair to say that Lucas and Speilberg, then, share a friendship. But as it turns out, they share a lot more than that -- they also share a ton of money.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Wars both came out in 1977. Having just come off the success of Jaws, Speilberg had a lot of leverage and flexibility to make another film, and Close Encounters was therefore given Columbia Pictures' full support. But, as recounted in a previous Now I Know, Star Wars wasn't expected to do very well -- Lucas' studio, 20th Century Fox, only secured 40 theaters for its opening weekend.

The relative success of the two films became a point of contention between the two filmmakers -- but not in the way you think. As io9 reported, one day, "Lucas was visiting Spielberg on the set of Close Encounters of the Third Kind in 1977, before Star Wars: A New Hope came out. Suddenly, the two of them were arguing which movie would do better — but they were arguing for each other's films. Lucas said Close Encounters would make more money, while Spielberg insisted onStar Wars."

So, they made a bet. Speilberg recounted the terms in an interview with Turner Classic Movies, which UPI later recapped:

“He said, ‘Oh my God, your movie is going to be so much more successful than Star Wars! This is gonna be the biggest hit of all time. I can’t believe this set. I can’t believe what you’re getting, and oh my goodness,'" Spielberg said of Lucas. "He said, ‘All right, I’ll tell you what. I’ll trade some points with you. You want to trade some points? I’ll give you 2.5 percent of Star Wars if you give me 2.5 percent of Close Encounters. So I said, ‘Sure, I’ll gamble with that. Great.’”Close Encounters made more than $300 million at the box office -- a success by any measure -- but of course, Star Wars grew to become a cultural touchstone for multiple generations. In total, Speilberg made more than $40 million on the point trade. (Lucas probably doesn't mind -- Star Wars made him a billionaire.)