Greatest experiment ever
In 1842 a guy named Elias Loomis performed one of the most ridiculous experiments I’ve ever heard of. In order to figure out the windspeed of a tornado (a hitherto unknown measurement) he needed a proxy- something that had gone through a tornado with a qualitative change. This change, he reasoned, should be repeatable under controlled conditions and thus quantifiable. It had previously been observed by many people that following a tornado chickens could be found completely stripped of their feathers, but otherwise unharmed. Loomis reasoned that if he could figure out at what wind speed a chicken loses its feathers he would know at least a minimum tornado wind speed- a first. So he loaded a six lb. cannon with five ounces of powder and a dead chicken. The feathers were completely blown off of the chicken, of course, but the chicken was also completely blown apart, making the experiment less than valuable. He estimated the velocity of the bird to be 341 mph. Read the full account here
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Interestingly, Kurt Vonnegut’s brother posited that the feather loss was actually due to a chemical response by the chicken to being frightened. This idea gained popularity for a while, but unfortunately makes no sense evolutionarily. In the question of “fight or flight” the chicken could do neither at that point.
