2 min read

Results: Best Hot Take from YGBFKM

Ten hot takes. One vote. Science journalism has never been more democratically absurd.

Ten hot takes entered the poll. One walked away with bragging rights: a joke about a galaxy running in reverse.

The stories at YGBFKM have one job: be strange and true. The hot takes have a harder one: be funnier than the story itself. This ballot featured flatulent lakes, a jawbone hiding beneath a bathroom floor, a galaxy named Shadow Blaster that sounds like a 2000s nu-metal band, and seven other worthy contenders.

Voting is now closed. Thanks to everyone who showed up. Here's how the votes fell.

Results

  1. The Big Bang Made Two Universes. We Got the One Going Forward.

    5 votes

    Hot take: "Somewhere in the mirror universe, this hot take is being written backward. It's funnier there."


  2. The Lake Was Passing Gas. It Took 90 Years to Prove.

    4 votes

    Hot take: "More than 90 years to confirm 'it's farts' is the longest peer review process in scientific history, and somehow still faster than most insurance claims."


  3. Walking Sharks Gain a Cousin: Lazy Shark

    3 votes

    Hot take: "Altogether now: 'Lazy shark doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo. Walking shark doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo. Kadedekedewa doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo.' Welcome to the family."


  4. Dentist Spots Human Jawbone in New Tile Floor

    3 votes

    Hot take: "It's easy to miss in this story that somebody was doing dental healthcare up to a million years ago. Yet we still haven't solved the insurance problem."


  5. Shadow Blaster Galaxy Shot Neutrinos at South Pole

    2 votes

    Hot take: "'Shadow Blaster' is either the most metal name in the history of astronomy or a strong argument that scientists should be kept away from PR decisions."


  6. Turns Out Cats Are Not Curious. They Just Like Being Right.

    2 votes

    Hot take: "Every person who has ever spent real money on a 'stimulating' cat toy and watched the cat walk directly back to the same warm patch of floor already knew this. The study just confirmed that the cat had a plan and you weren't part of it."


  7. Organ Doctors Called 'Useless' May Be Deciding When You Die

    1 vote

    Hot take: "Medicine spent decades treating the thymus like a civil servant who'd taken early retirement. Meanwhile, Thymus Lumbergh is in the basement with his stapler, filing the paperwork for your demise."


  8. Fireball Over Boston Detonates With the Force of 300 Tons of TNT. Casual Saturday.

    1 vote

    Hot take: "Somewhere on the floor of Cape Cod Bay is an iron meteorite that traveled 93 million miles to be here and NASA's official tag for the landing spot is 'fishy squisher.' That's about as Monty Python as NASA gets."


  9. A Mouse Eye Learned to Photosynthesize

    0 votes

    Hot take: "Feed me, Seymour. My corneas are inflamed."


  10. Easter Island Lake Hid a Moai

    0 votes

    Hot take: "This moai was chilling in a lakebed for centuries without posting an update. That's the most stone-faced ghosting in history."


Two entries walked away with exactly zero votes: the corneas that wanted feeding and the moai that spent centuries ghosting everyone from the bottom of a lake. No shade to either. Sometimes the joke is right and the room just isn't ready yet.

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