Tumblr thread, one user says that archeologists identify human remains by taste. A second user points out that this is not true, bone is identified as not a normal rock by touching it to your tongue and seeing if it sticks. If it does then bone.
Third user shares a poem they wrote: mai nam is jane and wen i dig i fynde some roks both smol and big i put my tung upon the stone for science yes i lik the bone
4th user is an archeologist and is crying laughing with a bunch of other archeologists and they’re going to have shirts made with the poem.
You can also tell a claystone from a siltstone by rubbing it against your teeth! If it rubs smoothly without friction then it’s a claystone. If it feels abrasive then it’s a siltstone.
Better don’t tell your dentist
This was a lot of my degree. We licked everything. Still do.
Mouthfeel is an incredible sense. Babies learn what the world is by pushing handfuls of it into their mouths. Texture, taste, angularity, porosity, density, degree of lithificaton… instantly.
*edit: we did not all lick things. There are two distinct schools of thought, and not a lot of fence sitters.
Always great to see scientists with a sense of humor.
Pretty sure that’s most of them
No there’s a lot of boring phds you never hear about that don’t. More on the hard engineers side especially.
There’s no other way to test to see if it’s bone?
Conceivably you could do this with any similar skin type to a tongue so wet nipples and genitals would also stick to bone. Boners are the unlikely but accurate technical term for the application.
Did anyone else sing the poem? Good flow.
Bone licking is not required for doing the science. They do it for pleasure.
