Hitachi has developed Radio Frequency Identification tags the size of dust particles.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags are tiny passive radio transponders with enough memory to store a 128-digit ID number. When hit with an incoming radio signal, a passive RFID tag uses power from the signal to transmit its ID in response.

RFID tags have been used in place of barcodes to track merchandise, as well as cattle. The tiny chips are used in US and UK passports to contain all the passport information, including a digital picture of the owner. They’re used in car keys (without the correct RFID chip, the car won’t start), libraries, quick-pass toll collection cards, and, yes…even humans: nightclubs in Barcelona and Rotterdam let VIP customers use chips implanted in their hands to pay for drinks.

The Smallest RFID Tag Yet

And now, Hitachi has made an RFID tag that’s only 0.05 x 0.05 mm — the size of a grain of powder. Hitachi plans to have these chips on the market in 2 to 3 years.

One of Hitachi’s current mu-chips is pictured on the left. New chips, 64 times smaller, are pictured on the right, along with a human hair.

Since existing RFID chips can already be embedded in paper (gift certificates, currency, etc.), one wonders what applications Hitachi has in mind for the new chips?

Think about this: RFID readers can be secretly located anywhere, including doorways and sidewalks. As Technovelgy points out, “…suppose you participated in some sort of protest or other organized activity. If police agencies sprinkled these tags around, every individual could be tracked and later identified at leisure, with powerful enough tag scanners.”

In fact, the FDA has already approved RFID implants in humans, and members of Congress have already discussed requiring seasonal immigrants to implant the tags before being admitted to the United States.

Read more Amazing, Orgasmic, and Fantastic Facts: Amasnic Fact Off Archive.

Read More: RFID, privacy, surveillance, tracking, 1984, mark of the beast

According to the 2001 Census, Jedi Knight is the fourth most popular religion in England.

The 2001 Census was the first census that asked people to identify their religion. In addition to a check-box list of major religions, the census form had a write-in space.

When the results were tallied, it was discovered that 7 out of every thousand people in England and Wales wrote “Jedi” in that space.

The reason for the sudden popularity of the Jedi cult can be traced to an internet campaign that—inaccurately—claimed the belief system made popular by the Star Wars films might receive official government recognition if enough people claimed it. To quote one of the emails, “Do it because you love Star Wars…or just to annoy people.”

Jedi Knights Around the World

The religion of Jedi Knight wasn’t limited to Great Britain. The census turned up more than 70,000 Jedis in Australia and 20,000 in Canada. But New Zealand had the highest percentage, at 1.5%. That’s more than 53,000 Jedis.

Religion by the Numbers

The 390,000 Jedis in England and Wales made The Force the fourth most popular religion (0.7% of the population of 52 million), but what were numbers 1 through 3?

Christianity was number one, with 72.0% of the population.

Muslims made up 3.1%.

Hindus made up another 1.1%.

And 14.8%, heathens who will soon be burning in hell for eternity (Hey! I’m joking, alright…), simply said they weren’t religious.

The Creator

George Lucas, the creator of Star Wars and Jedi Knights, was baptised and raised as a Methodist. Lucas expanded his religious views through studying Eastern religious traditions. In an interview with Bill Moyers, he expounds on The Force:

I would hesitate to call the Force God. It’s designed primarily to make young people think about the mystery. Not to say, “Here’s the answer.” It’s to say, Think about this for a second. Is there a God? What does God look like? What does God sound like? What does God feel like? How do we relate to God? Just getting young people to think at that level is what I’ve been trying to do in the films. What eventual manifestation that takes place in terms of how they describe their God, what form their faith takes, is not the point of the movie.

Read more Amazing, Orgasmic, and Fantastic Facts: Amasnic Fact Off Archive.

Read More: Jedi, Star Wars, census, George Lucas

Since 1996, the world’s treasuries have been printing a secret constellation on almost every paper currency in the world.

In addition to shipping over 15 million spiders per day, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing is also in the business of printing millions of constellations.

The EURion Constellation

Coined the “EURion constellation” by computer security expert Markus G. Kuhn because he first noticed it on EURO notes, the EURion constellation consists of a pattern of five 1 mm circles.

The constellation is arranged roughly the same as the astronomical constellation of Orion. The pattern of small circles is often repeated in a much larger group of circles. In addition to Euro notes, the EURion constellation appears on redesigned U.S. bills, German marks, British pounds, and the national currency of over thirty other countries.

On some bills, the circles are very obvious. On others, they are carefully integrated with the currency’s design, such as forming musical notes in an unlikely short music score on the 20 pound British note.

Why Money Needs Its Own Constellation

The EURion constellation was added to currency to help computer software detect the presence of a banknote in a digital image. Once detected, the program can block the user. This prevents users from using color photocopiers to counterfeit money, for example.

The design details of the EURion constellation remain secret, although there must be at least a handful of people who know all about it due to the fact that so many copier machines (Xerox, etc.) and computer programs (Photoshop, Paintshop Pro, etc.) across the world detect the pattern.

As for the inventor, a patent application suggests that the design of the pattern and the detection algorithm were worked on at OMRON Corporation.

Read More: EURion, EURion constellation, money, currency, printing, counterfeit

Given any date in the last 25 years, a woman known as AJ can recall the day of the week, the weather, personal details, and major news events that occurred on that date.

The scientists at the University of California, Irvine, call her the human calendar. She contacted them six years ago. Since then, they’ve put her through exhaustive interviews and psychological tests, but still don’t understand how she does it. There have been savants who have narrow perfect memories, pertaining to music or a particular hobby, for example. But AJ’s memories are broad in scope, and she seems to be normal otherwise: early 40s, college graduate with average IQ, has held a job and gotten married.

So how does AJ’s brain store so much information, even when she’s not trying.

What if Brains Aren’t Memory Storage Devices?

In the UK in the 1970s, the University of Sheffield’s campus doctor was treating a math student for a minor ailment when he noticed the student had a larger than normal head. The doctor asked neurology professor Dr. John Lorber to take a look.

Dr. Lorber ran a CAT-scan and discovered that the student (a male math major, 126 IQ, went on to graduate with honors…) had virtually no brain. He had less than a millimeter of tissue at the top of his spinal column. The condition is called hydrocephalus, and it’s usually fatal in the first months after birth when the cranium fills with fluid. The fluid doesn’t leave room for the brain to develop.

Professor Lorber went on to locate several hundred people with similar conditions, some with “no detectable brain.” No brain, but they had memories and functioned normally…

If Not the Brain, Where Are Memories Stored?

The Akashic records, the Book of Life, the Cosmic Mind, and Carl Jung’s Collective Unconscious all refer to some sort of universal memory storage that records all events and responses concerning Consciousness in all realities. Some say that we experience memories when our conscious minds access the Akashic records.

Many NDE experiencers say that before we come to earth, in order to learn, we promise to forget that the world is really an illusion. Part of the brain’s function is to block our consciousness from freely accessing the Akashic records while we’re here.

If this is true, then sometimes the brain fails. And when that happens, people like AJ can remember practically anything.

“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” ~Albert Einstein

Read More: memory, brain, autism, hydrocephalus, John Lorber, Akashic records, Jung, collective unconscious

The state of Iowa annually produces 400 pounds of shelled corn for each person in the U.S.

In 2005, corn farmers in Iowa produced 2.2 billion bushels of the United State’s 11 billion bushels of corn. With a bushel of corn weighing in at 56 pounds, that brings the national total above 2,000 pounds for every person in the country. Globally, that’s 94 pounds for every human on Earth (including the 16,000 children that will die from hunger today.)

The U.S. harvests twice as much corn as any other grain crop. So, where does all that corn go?

People Are Made of Corn

Most American meat comes from corn. As explained so well by Michael Pollan, livestock is one super duper corn-transmogrifying machine. Put in a 56-pound bushel of corn and you get:

28 pounds of catfish. 19.6 pounds of chicken. 13 pounds of pork. 5.6 pounds of beef. It’s not just meat that’s full of corn, either…

There’s corn in sandwich buns, in dipping sauces, in chicken nugget binders and breadings.

French fries soak up half their calories from the corn oil they’re cooked in, then get dipped in a tomato-flavored corn syrup called ketchup. Then all that corn food is washed down with more corn—soft drinks made with high-fructose corn syrup.

But you can’t get something from nothing. What creates all of that corn?

Sunlight, Water, and Petroleum

Like most plants, America’s corn grows by absorbing a lot of sunlight and water.

Corn also requires loads of fertilizer (made from oil), and pesticides (made from oil), and a lot of farm machinery (which is both made from AND operated with oil). Unless you’re picking wild berries, every single calorie you eat is backed by at least a calorie of oil—more than likely ten or more calories of oil. Yummy.

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Read More: corn, oil, energy, environment, fertilizer, pesticides, Michael Pollan