Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more
Archaeologists RIP
In July, Feedback reported that geologist characters in movies were surprisingly likely to die, often from “work related” causes like volcanic eruptions, but remarkably frequently by murder. We wondered how other scientists fared.
Andrew Hardwick flags The Avengers – not the Marvel superheroes, but the British spy series from the 1960s. “Any character introduced as a scientist was certain to be killed off,” Andrew says, due to the limited budget for hiring guest actors. “Exposition characters had to double up as victims or villains.” Feedback briefly considered performing an analysis to estimate the scientist death toll, but then we learned that the show ran for 161 hour-long episodes and decided we had better things to do.
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Meanwhile, David Hawke pulls us up on a detail. We claimed that one indicator a character will die is that he is played by Sean Bean. David argues that Bean’s breakout role was the heroic Richard Sharpe, in the TV adaptations of Bernard Cornwell’s historical novels. While some of Bean’s characters “meet their doom”, David says, “surely playing Sharpe more than compensates for this”. Feedback feels David underestimates just how often Bean dies on screen. A spanning 1986 to 2016 shows him meeting his maker no fewer than 24 times.
However, our main focus here is a missive from Andy Chapman. “As a now retired archaeologist I feel fortunate to have made it this far,” he writes, “given the film death rate for archaeologists.” They are particularly likely to die in films involving Egyptian mummies. “Here the death rate must approach 100 per cent, with only the heroic/romantic leads exempted, but often not their trusted assistants.”
Andy’s argument rests in part on the Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider films, alongside the various incarnations of The Mummy. Andy notes “an unhealthy death rate” in many of these franchises, albeit with a caveat. “Much of this would apply to people unlikely to be regarded as qualified archaeologists, as I don’t believe training in weapons and explosives feature on the syllabus of many archaeology departments.”
Andy’s more sedate approach to the field appears to have kept him safe. He spent his time “working largely in British commercial archaeology ahead of quarrying and construction projects”, which tended to yield less treasure or cursed swords, and more “boxes of broken pottery and animal bone”. Such finds, informative as they are, “don’t often lead to homicide”.
Reprogram yourself
Feedback is feeling a bit wiped out from the alleged “summer holidays”, which just mean we have to work while also ferrying Feedback Jr to their various social engagements. So we wanted a wellbeing hack, and reader Graham Lansdell was on hand to tell us about one. Through a convoluted sequence of events, Graham had become aware of GEOTRAN, “a coding language for the inner bio-computers”.
Promisingly, the official website that “GEOTRAN is a numeric-geometrical dialect which speaks directly to the body’s information fields (memory fields). It works similarly to entering new information into a computer system. By erasing subconscious, self-sabotage, and de-stressing blockages resulting from personal beliefs, early childhood programming, fears, and traumatic experiences, you can reformat for a better life!”
This sounded like just the ticket. Feedback could do with a bit of mind-body reprogramming to regain our usual mild levels of vim and vigour. So we .
We learned that, unlike conventional binary computers, “The GEOTRAN language uses twelve digits (1 through 12)”. Apparently, “these number codes create the actual instructions for the field to make a correction to the existing programming. The geometry locates the place where the dysfunction is stored, and the number makes the correction.”
It seems that GEOTRAN instructions must be “entered at specific points, called ‘spin points,’ on and around the body”. These instructions are then “fed to the heart/mind which has 7 layers or 7 different functions. The heart/mind distributes this information to 12 rings that operate somewhat like a CD, which also holds coded data that is read by light.”
Alas, due to our exhaustion, Feedback was unable to comprehend the instructions. In a bid to hack our system, we tapped our arm a few times to see if it helped, but so far it hasn’t.
It’s a gas
In our quest for ever-more-niche scientific tourist attractions, we keep finding museums dedicated to gas. Upon reading our item about Fakenham Gasworks Museum (1 August), Daphne Tighe experienced a stirring memory. “I was at grammar school 1940-1945 when there was not much scope for exciting outings,” she tells us. “One I remember was arranged by the science teacher to Horsham gas works.” Daphne has no plans to visit any of the modern equivalents, because “I can still remember the smell”.
Meanwhile, Chris Kendall tells us about Leicester, UK, home to the National Gas Museum. Its website claims it is “the world’s largest and most significant gas history collection”, and also that it is shut until 22 September 2026. “Is it any good, you ask?” says Chris. “I don’t know. Despite being a short walk from where I live, I’ve never been interested enough to go and see.”
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