In biology we had a parisitologist lecture. Apparently people do use tapeworms to lose weight. They go eat some beef with marble-shaped cysts that contain tapeworm larvae.

Another story (possibly apocriphal) was about a tennis player in Japan who noticed small white things on the court. After going to another court he noticed them again. They were segments falling off a tapeworm in his gut.

This species of tapeworm sounds like I wouldn't want it.(Well not that I would want a tapeworm.) It's called Diphyllobothrium latum, the broad fish tapeworm. This is the largest tapeworm found in humans growing up to 18 m, or 60 feet in length. Usualy traveling through three hosts throughout it's life cycle: - a microscopic freshwater crustacean, Cyclops - a fish that eats the Cyclops. - then a HUMAN! (usualy through Sushi, or sashimi) Every day a single worm may discharge up to 1 million fertilized eggs into it's host's feces.

Tapeworm is the name of a Nine Inch Nails side project, consisting mostly of some of NIN's usual suspects, but featuring a variety of "guest" artists. Relatively few juicy tidbits have surfaced as yet, but Trent Reznor, the brain cell behind NIN, has said that the project is more "collaborative" than his main band, with most of the music being written by longtime associates Danny Lohner and Charlie Clouser.

Other artists whose participation has been supposedly confirmed include:

There is also a laundry list of other possible, but unverified, conspirators, including Rob Zombie, Marilyn Manson, Perry Farrell (Jane's Addiction), Richard Patrick (Filter), and David Gahan (Depeche Mode), among others.

During the 2000-2001 tour of A Perfect Circle, featuring Tool vocalist Maynard James Keenan, the band debuted a version of a Tapeworm song entitled "Vacant," said to be the first song completed in demo form. Trent Reznor said in interviews around this time that he was "disappointed" to hear the song make its first appearance this way, because he hadn't considered it a finished work.

The release date of the Tapeworm material has been pushed back over and over, with rumors still continually flying around as to who's participating, who's not, and when we might finally see some product from such an ambitious collaboration.



Update 2003-02-24: As CzarKhan reminded me recently, Tapeworm has been largely dormant since this writeup first hit the streets. Among the few relevant whisperings to surface in the interim is the assertion by Trent that Charlie Clouser is no longer working on Tapeworm — which, if true, would be a shame, because Clouser's talent as a remix artist would seemingly lend itself to a project like this. Remembering the legendary Nine Inch Nails studio perfectionism, of course, makes one wonder if the material will ever see the light of day, but Tapeworm looks so good on paper that the fans still have to hope.



"It's like the sasquatch or something; it's rumored to exist. Every now and then a farmer in Nebraska will spot a riff or a melody..."
          -- Maynard on Tapeworm; from Kerrang! by way of 9inchnails.net

Tape"worm` (?), n. Zool.

Any one of numerous species of cestode worms belonging to Taenia and many allied genera. The body is long, flat, and composed of numerous segments or proglottids varying in shape, those toward the end of the body being much larger and longer than the anterior ones, and containing the fully developed sexual organs. The head is small, destitute of a mouth, but furnished with two or more suckers (which vary greatly in shape in different genera), and sometimes, also, with hooks for adhesion to the walls of the intestines of the animals in which they are parasitic. The larvae (see Cysticercus) live in the flesh of various creatures, and when swallowed by another animal of the right species develop into the mature tapeworm in its intestine. See Illustration in Appendix.

Three species are common parasites of man: the pork tapeworm (Taenia solium), the larva of which is found in pork; the beef tapeworm (T. mediocanellata), the larva of which lives in the flesh of young cattle; and the broad tapeworm (Bothriocephalus latus) which is found chiefly in the inhabitants of the mountainous regions of Europe and Asia. See also Echinococcus, Cysticercus, Proglottis, and 2d Measles, 4.

 

© Webster 1913.

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