Science has come far, and new discoveries are being made every day.
In fact, scientific discoveries and advances are so common that it's easy to lose track of the latest in science news. Not every major breakthrough makes it to major news networks, and you can find many published studies online that you'd never hear of otherwise. Some scientific revelations are so scary and panic inducing, that the information is kept mostly under wraps for the general public.
Redditor u/andretwic asked the scientists of Reddit, "What are some scary scientific discoveries that most of the public is unaware of?" and scientists shared some frightening information that you may rather not know.
10. This doesn't sound deadly and would be cool to witness
"The star Betelgeuse in Orion may be about to go supernova. We've known it's going to go supernova soon (that's astronomy soon as in could be tomorrow or in 200 years). Betelgeuse is a variable star, so it gets brighter or dimmer all the time, but it just got dimmer than we've ever seen it before.
No one's 100% what's going on. If Betelgeuse does go supernova, all of our satellites and stuff will be fine, the solar wind will protect us. The main problem is we'll have no night for a while (maybe weeks?) so it'll really throw animals off."
9. Practice safe sex
"'Super gonorrhoea' is resistant to the vast majority of strong antibiotics, including fluoroquinolones and macrolides. N. gonorrhoeae is mutating all the time to resist antibiotic effects. There have been multiple reports of super gonorrhoea in Australia, England, etc."
8. I honestly had to Google "replication crisis"
"The 'replication crisis' in psychology (though the problem occurs in many other fields, too).
Many studies aren't publishing sufficient information by which to conduct a replication study. Many studies play fast and loose with statistical analysis. Many times you're getting obvious cases of p-hacking or HARKing (hypothesis after results known) which are both big no-nos for reputable science."
7. I hate bugs but they're so important
"The world has 70% less insects on average than it did 40 years ago. We really are coming up on our silent spring.
For the people saying there are less pests, those arent the ones we're worried about. Insect pollinators are vital to so many crops, we could be facing serious problems with certain food supplies soon. In recent years China has had issues with apple and pear crops to the point where some regions have had to pollinate crops by hand. Also, insects form lower blocks of many food webs, and their disappearance will spell trouble for higher trophic levels."
6. Great, something else to worry about
"Abdominal aortic aneurysm. It's basically an aneurysm that happens in the big artery in the middle of the abdomen. It's fine and is usually asymptomatic but when it ruptures, a patient loses all their blood within a short period of time. The scary part is that it usually is diagnosed by accident due to annual checkups for something else. Anyone can have the disease, but especially people with Marfan syndrome, smoking, hypertensive, and hyperlipidemic."
5. Take care of your ears
"Known link between untreated hearing loss and cognitive decline i.e. dementia.
ETA: key word is untreated. If you previously had normal hearing and it started slipping, please see an ENT and audiologist... If you have had hearing loss since childhood, you're not one of the ones I'm worried about. You have either learned sign language to keep you from being isolated due to your hearing loss and/or you have learned how to use hearing aids/cochlear implants to keep you from being isolated due to your hearing loss.
The link is really between communication and cognition, not the physical ability to hear. It's just that in people who previously had normal hearing, if they don't do anything it will impair their communication and in turn affect their cognition."
4. The island of nuclear horrors
"Not a scientist but I will still take the time to mention something that scares me I only found about a month ago, and I don't think a lot of people are aware of but probably should be. Back in 1946 to 58, the US tested 60 nuclear weapons on the Marshall Islands and buried the nuclear leftover waste and soil in a 30 ft deep cavern 'sealing' it with a concrete dome...the dome is cracking and now it's leaking into the ocean and surprise surprise it's not fixing itself, and the people responsible are essentially ignoring it or saying it is not their problem. Imagine Chernobyl but bigger and in the Ocean."
3. Another reason to fear climate change
"There are ancient microbes lying dormant in glaciers. As climate change progresses and these glaciers melt, it is possible that we will be exposed to ancient diseases for which we will have no immunity."
2. That researcher is a hero
"A genetically modified bacteria that could have possibly wiped out a lot of crops and plant life was almost commercially released into the environment. Fortunately, a researcher decided to do one more test in the lab before it was used in production. Found out it killed all the wheat seedlings, and she destroyed the remaining stock of it."
1. Man eating fruits
"Pineapples have an enzyme that digests protein. So whenever you eat a pineapple, it is eating you back"
