# Interesting Facts



## LeeC (May 23, 2016)

This thread is not intended for conspiracy theories, hearsay, or innuendo! 
This thread is for factual information only, not personal conclusions. 
Please stay on thread.

Here's one not everybody is aware of.

As of the end of 2013
One in 31 U.S. Adults are Behind Bars, on Parole or Probation.
One in 52 are on parole or probation.
Google if you wish to verify. 

Breakdowns by ethnicity and type of offense at:
http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=5135

As an aside, you might relate these statistics to foreign terrorism affecting U.S. citizens. ;-)


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## TJ1985 (May 23, 2016)

You're more likely to be: 

Killed by a vending machine,
Killed by a wasp or bee sting,
Killed by flesh-eating bacteria, 

than you are to win the lottery. 

BUT, you're more likely to win the lottery than you are  to shuffle a deck of 52 playing cards into sequential order. You're also more likely to win the lottery than you are to be hit by a meteor. I'm not sure if that's a fatal strike but since the only person I've heard of being hit by one didn't live, I'm thinkin' it's probably not good for you. A tiny speck of space sand moving at a few thousand meters per second, it'd have to be like getting shot from above but much more... gooey. 

Neat thing? I know of a dozen friends who buy a ticket every single chance they get. I tell them how incredibly unlikely it is, they counter with "somebody's gotta win it, it could be me!" 

Remind me what the definition of insanity is again?  

BTW, how does one become killed by a vending machine? I'm envisioning two morons, one who tipped the machine over onto himself, and another who tried to put a foreign coin into a machine and felt it's dire wrath in a "shooting sodas at the speed of sound" sort of way.


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## Bard_Daniel (May 23, 2016)

Well then, I pulled up a fact claiming that squirrels plant thousands of new trees per year by simply forgetting where they put their acorns.

Didn't see that one coming. :razz:


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## Jigawatt (May 24, 2016)

Scientific studies have shown that blushing helps ease hostile responses by communicating that a person is ashamed or apologetic. Studies show that blushing elicits sympathy, which helps keep the subject alive. Humans are the only animals capable of blushing. 

No wonder a butthole like me can live so long.


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## Boofy (May 24, 2016)

Lemming mass suicide is a myth! Disney perpetuated the myth when they shot a nature documentary called "White Wilderness" in which crew were discovered to have actually chased the poor blighter's off of cliffs. They couldn't get actual footage of it happening so they uh... took the initiative.


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## SomethingWitty (May 24, 2016)

Ortolan is a traditional French gourmet dish in which a bird is force fed, drowned in brandy, roasted and consumed whole (bones and all) underneath a towel to hide the act from God.

And now I know what _we're_ having for dinner! Any takers?


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## Sonata (May 25, 2016)

“Count” Victor Lustig was famous for being one of the smoothest con  men in history, but his most impressive stunt was when he convinced six  scrap metal dealers to bid on the Eiffel Tower. 

 The story goes that Lustig got the idea when he read an article about  how the Eiffel Tower was rusting, and the high cost of its maintenance  and repairs. Since the tower was only supposed to stand for 20 years, some Parisians were saying it should be taken down entirely.

 Not one to miss an opportunity, Lustig devised a plan to convince the  city’s biggest scrap-metal dealers that he was a government director  charged with the discreet task of selling off the Eiffel Tower’s scrap  metal. He rented limousines and gave tours of the landmark, and  insinuated not only that this was very hush-hush government business,  but that he could be bribed into accepting the winning bid. 

 One dealer was convinced, and paid Lustig $20,000 in cash plus an  additional $50,000 to make sure his was the winning bid. Once he had the  money, Lustig raced off to Austria to lay low while the story broke —  but it never did since the dealer was too embarrassed to report Lustig’s  scam. 
 Lustig later returned to Paris and gave it another try, but was  worried one of the scrap dealers had notified the police. He fled to the  U.S. where he was ultimately caught.


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## bucklethree (May 26, 2016)

Yeah, interesting thread!


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## escorial (May 28, 2016)

In chess knight is spelt without the k because the king is k


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## Sonata (May 29, 2016)

*Weird facts that will sound totally false
*
Choosing exciting places for first date increases the chances of the other person falling for you.  

Farting helps reduce high blood pressure and is good for your health.

 Breastfeeding allows a baby to give germs to mothers so that her  immune system can respond and can synthesize antibodies for her baby.    

Handshakes were originally meant to make sure that the person you  were meeting wasn’t carrying a concealed weapon. The hand clasp proved  that your hand was empty and shaking was meant to dislodge any weapons  hiding up the sleeve.

The boomslang snake’s venom causes you to bleed from all holes of your body.

Women have twice as many pain receptors on their body than men. But a much higher pain tolerance.

When getting a new car, choose one that is silver. The color is most  visible on the road and is least likely to get into an accident.

By law, a pregnant woman can pee anywhere she wants to in Britain, even if she chooses, in a police officer’s helmets.

The butterflies you get in your stomach when you see someone you like is actually a stress response caused by adrenaline.

 A small amount of stress helps you to remember things better but a large amount may hinder your memory.


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## LeeC (May 29, 2016)

Do you know what Square Sailing is?

Before our modern navigation instruments it was easier to determine latitude than longitude, so sailors would first take a North-South course until they reached a desired latitude, the would turn East or West to search for their destination. 

For example, in the mid-Pacific sailors were guided by the Southern Cross. If their destination was Hawai’i, they would sail North or South until they reached a latitude of twenty degrees north. They knew they were at that latitude when the Southern Cross stands on end and the distance between the top and bottom stars is the same as the distance from the bottom star to the horizon.


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## LeeC (May 29, 2016)

Testing your knowledge. Do you know what the Eastern Pacific Gyre is commonly called, why it's called that, and it's significance on our food chain?


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## Kevin (May 29, 2016)

Eastern Gyre? No...
 What is a gyre, bird of prey?  (wiki, yes, but no cheating)


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## LeeC (May 29, 2016)

Kevin said:


> Eastern Gyre? No...
> What is a gyre, bird of prey?  (wiki, yes, but no cheating)


Sorry Kevin, I wasn't specific enough. I'm talking about an ocean gyre (a circular pattern of currents in an ocean basin), and specifically about one of the five major ocean gyres.

The name I used is also confusing, as it's more scientifically called the North Pacific Gyre.


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## Kevin (May 29, 2016)

I looked it up. Had no idea... an eddy.... happens in the same spot. Makes sense.  The El Nino effect is of specific importance to me. I am directly effected.  'Gyre', new word for me...


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## Firemajic (May 29, 2016)

This is a fact, Lee... There are cave drawings from thousands of years ago, all over the world [ before people even traveled and visited other cultures] that depict the same images of aliens and mermaids...  how is that possible... The famous Nazca lines, in Peru show space men, like the ones we have today, dressed in big helmets and gear... these drawings are thousands of years old...


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## Sonata (May 29, 2016)

LeeC said:


> Testing your knowledge. Do you know what the Eastern Pacific Gyre is commonly called, why it's called that, and it's significance on our food chain?



Is that the one also called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch?


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## LeeC (May 29, 2016)

Sonata said:


> Is that the one also called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch?


The gold ring is within your grasp Sonata? Do you know the significance of it on our food chain?


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## Sonata (May 29, 2016)

LeeC said:


> The gold ring is within your grasp Sonata? Do you know the significance of it on our food chain?



Something to do with the toxins in the discarded plastics which have been broken into minuscule pieces which are ingested by - not sure what - but whatever ingests them is then eaten by fish, thus entering the food chain.  And fish ends up being eaten by humans.

I was reading about this recently but I do not remember where.  It was about where and how various toxins in food came about.  Sorry to be so vague but I did not save the article.


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## LeeC (May 29, 2016)

Firemajic said:


> This is a fact, Lee... There are cave drawings from thousands of years ago, all over the world [ before people even traveled and visited other cultures] that depict the same images of aliens and mermaids...  how is that possible... The famous Nazca lines, in Peru show space men, like the ones we have today, dressed in big helmets and gear... these drawings are thousands of years old...



There are depictions yes, but interpretation is still in the postulation stage. I can't remember the scientific paper, but there is a new theory that the Nazca lines have nothing to do with space flight. Can't recall the specifics of the purpose put forth, nor the supporting evidence though.


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## LeeC (May 29, 2016)

Sonata said:


> Something to do with the toxins in the discarded plastics which have been broken into minuscule pieces which are ingested by - not sure what - but whatever ingests them is then eaten by fish, thus entering the food chain.  And fish ends up being eaten by humans.
> 
> I was reading about this recently but I do not remember where.  It was about where and how various toxins in food came about.  Sorry to be so vague but I did not save the article.


Bravo Sonata, you are a lady of knowledge and the gold ring is yours. The only point missing is that this specific garbage patch is the size of France (twice the size of Texas), and thus has a serious impact on our food chain, increasing to the point of life threatening for our progeny.


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## Firemajic (May 29, 2016)

interpretation is a grey area though... The cave drawings were a way to communicate, and record their world/ history.... things they wanted passed down and remembered...


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## LeeC (May 29, 2016)

Firemajic said:


> interpretation is a grey area though... The cave drawings were a way to communicate, and record their world/ history.... things they wanted passed down and remembered...


Well put  Makes my mind wander to how future generations may interpret our writings today ;-)


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## Sonata (May 29, 2016)

LeeC said:


> Bravo Sonata, you are a lady of knowledge and the gold ring is yours. The only point missing is that this specific garbage patch is the size of France (twice the size of Texas), and thus has a serious impact on our food chain, increasing to the point of life threatening for our progeny.



The reason I had been looking for details about toxins that can be  unknowingly ingested was because someone had queried me giving first my  epi girl and then the not-quite-so-'orrid-now puppy raw fish.  I used to  buy large fresh sardines for my epi girl, and one of my drivers would  sometimes pick up a load of fish heads [and guts] for her - freebies.   Unfortunately he died a few months back [he was only about 45] and I do  not know where he got them from.

I can still buy fresh sardines [from my poulterer] although last time I  telephoned for some he brought me a different type of fish.  

Raw fish, so I had been told, especially whole fish that had not been  gutted, was very bad for dogs and the toxins were probably the cause of  my girl's epilepsy, and did I want the puppy to also develop it?  Hah - I  did not start raw feeding until about three months after my girl's  epilepsy started, and the puppy had been having raw sardines since she  was able to cope with them.

So when I was looking for toxins in fish that might cause epilepsy, not  that I found any, I found an article about the Great Pacific garbage  patch.


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## escorial (May 29, 2016)

Grace Kelly first actress to get her face on a stamp.....


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## LeeC (Jun 8, 2016)

“It was dark when they came back, the walkers. A couple of them were in shock, eyes full of tears. The beach was littered with bodies. Some were babies barely a foot long, others up to a metre and a half. Dismembered and disfigured, disembowelled and strewn along the beach. Perhaps a hundred small sharks with fins hacked off, one day’s catch. Shark-finning is the second biggest illegal industry after drugs on the planet and has strong mafia involvement with high levels of corruption. Studies have shown that the more sharks there are in an area, the more fish. They’re considered a “keystone” species. It’s appalling, but globally we have already killed ninety percent of large marine predators. That’s staggering and will hugely undermine ocean ecosystems.”


Snippet from Duncan Morrison's “Hope or High Water” [non-fiction]


"_Probably the most visible example of unintended consequences, is what happens every time humans try to change the natural ecology of a place._"  ~  Margaret J. Wheatley


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## Miseo (Jun 9, 2016)

Flamingos cannot eat unless their heads are upside down.


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## Sonata (Jun 9, 2016)

[FONT=verdana,arial][SIZE=-1]Until the nineteenth century, solid blocks of tea were used as money in Siberia.

 The Nobel Peace Prize medal depicts three naked men with their hands on each other's shoulders.

 When glass breaks, the  cracks move faster than 3,000 miles per hour. To photograph the event, a  camera must shoot at a millionth of a second.

 A Boeing 747 airliner holds 57,285 gallons of fuel.

 A car uses 1.6 ounces of gas idling for one minute. Half an ounce is used to start the average automobile.
[/SIZE][/FONT]


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## JustRob (Jun 9, 2016)

"The hairy ball theorem of algebraic topology states that there is no nonvanishing continuous tangent vector field on even-dimensional n-spheres." (Wikipedia)

Or, to put it more simply (because I have little idea what that means), there's no way to comb all the hair on a hairy ball flat. Somewhere some hair will always stick up. I consider myself to be a bit of a mathematician and, yes, I've always found that with my hair. That's my excuse anyway.


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## LeeC (Jun 10, 2016)

How wolves change rivers
Understanding ecological cascading effects. 
Why it matters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysa5OBhXz-Q&feature=youtu.be


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## LeeC (Jun 10, 2016)

How Whales Change Climate
Understanding ecological cascading effects. 
Why it matters.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M18HxXve3CM


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## LeeC (Jun 10, 2016)

“Galapagos translates as “galloping saddle” after the saddle shape the tortoise shells developed while reaching for higher leaves. With stories of them growing up to nearly two metres long and 450kg, giant tortoises once numbered in the hundreds of thousands. Due to captive breeding programmes, their numbers have now recovered to a small fraction of that, perhaps 15-20,000. The reason they survived at all was not because they adapted quickly, but because they were so big it was difficult to get them back to the early sailing and whaling boats. So the sailors and whalers took the smaller ones from the around the coast. Three hundred a visit at times. Why? Because tortoises can live for a year or more without food and water, which meant they could be stored on their backs in the holds, and kept as fresh meat for long voyages. Nasty by our standards. If we ask the question of ourselves, though, “What do we do that will be considered ignorant in the future?” some of the answers are simple. With respect to animals, industrial farming and depletive fisheries are stark nightmares.”


Snippet from Duncan Morrison's Hope or High Water. [non-fiction]


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## Terry D (Jun 10, 2016)

Comparatively speaking, the common male flea has the largest sex organ in the animal kingdom.


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## Phil Istine (Jun 10, 2016)

deleted


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## Tired (Jun 10, 2016)

According to some sources, humans are the only mammal that willingly puts off sleeping. No wonder we're all insomniacs.

Also, if you're trying to stay sober, avoid the most commonly consumed drug: caffeine.  :razz:


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## LeeC (Jun 10, 2016)

Considering I began this thread to collect interesting facts, and noted such in the first post, it's surprising that it got to the fourth page before frivolous comments crept in. "Interesting" is a relative term, but "facts" as opposed to random comments is not. I'd think it would be respectful to stay on thread, and post one's random thoughts elsewhere, but given the range of the community I suppose that's too much to be expected.


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## Crowley K. Jarvis (Jun 10, 2016)

LeeC said:


> Considering I began this thread to collect interesting facts, and noted such in the first post, it's surprising that it got to the fourth page before frivolous comments crept in. "Interesting" is a relative term, but "facts" as opposed to random comments is not. I'd think it would be respectful to stay on thread, and post one's random thoughts elsewhere, but given the range of the community I suppose that's too much to be expected.



I thought this was:
 						[h=2]The Lounge[/h]  						*General discussions and off-topic posts welcome here.

*But oh well*. 


*
46% of women suffer from PCT/PCB, AKA, anxiety, depression or aggression after sexual activity. The more you know!


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## PrinzeCharming (Jun 11, 2016)

I found it fascinating that Boxing legend Muhammad Ali chose to have his Hollywood Walk of Fame star mounted on the wall simply because he didn't want people to walk over his name.


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## LeeC (Jun 11, 2016)

Crowley K. Jarvis said:


> I thought this was:
> *The Lounge*
> 
> *General discussions and off-topic posts welcome here.
> ...


It is Crow. My thought is I wouldn't jump into someone else's discussion on a lark, out of respect for those participating in the discussion or accumulation of information. And if I had something different to say I'd find a more appropriate thread or start a thread of my own. If what I think you're saying is that it doesn't matter in the Lounge, why have different threads? Have only one long thread for the board with everything mixed together. Seems to me it would be quite distracting, not to mention cumbersome in scanning for what one is interested in. Then too, there's the generational aspect (no disrespect intended) where with so many people today, everyone is talking at the same time. An example of that single thread board approach would be Twitter where one may follow any number of others. I limit myself to no more than an hour a day on Twitter, maintaining a presence and interacting with others in good part for the sake of branding and networking (necessary in today's fast paced world). I do enjoy coming across others I know, like those from here, but likely miss some of their tweets in all the hubbub. Because of that impersonal aspect, I find the same amount of time I spend on FB more enjoyable. The circles one interacts in are smaller and more manageable. 

Then too, where you're a man of today's world, I'm an old fart that's more comfortable in the wilderness listening to wildlife. There are also differences in what we care about, which is a general extension of the foregoing. So, different strokes and all that Crow, you have as much right to your opinion as I do, and I respect that.

Take care


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## Deleted member 56686 (Jun 11, 2016)

I think what Lee is saying is that the spirit of the thread has been derailed to an extent. To a point that's okay; a joke or two can lighten things up a bit, but when it gets out of control and doesn't get back to the intended purpose, that isn't a good thing.


So, come on, do some research, and let's see some interesting facts


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## escorial (Jun 11, 2016)

George Orwell is his pen name..Eric Blair is his real name


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## Boofy (Jun 11, 2016)

escorial said:


> George Orwell is his pen name..Eric Blair is his real name


It's a good thing he wrote under a pen name. Orwellian sounds much better than Blairian, somehow.

William Shakespeare's wife shares her name with famous Hollywood actress Anne Hathaway.


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## escorial (Jun 11, 2016)

the reason his book is called 1984 is because it was written in 1948 and he just turned the numbers around


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## PrinzeCharming (Jun 11, 2016)

Today is National Making Life Beautiful Day. We encourage everyone to celebrate men and women who are making life beautiful.


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## Tired (Jun 12, 2016)

According to Wikipedia, scissors were most likely invented around 1500 B.C. in Ancient Egypt. Pivoted scissors were only manufactured in large numbers after Robert Hinchliffe created the model in 1761. This model is the one we see and use nowadays.


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## Sonata (Jun 12, 2016)

[FONT=verdana, Arial][SIZE=-1]Your body is creating and killing 15 million red blood cells per second.  If it created less than it killed, you would die.  Life is a wondrous thing in that your body knows how to balance things in order to keep you alive.
[/SIZE][/FONT]


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## JustRob (Jun 14, 2016)

All the land that makes up our planet effectively floats within another sphere of water, the seas. As the moon pulls the seas out of shape the land always floats to the centre of the mass of water, so there are high tides on both sides of the planet, not just the one nearest to the moon, so we get two a day instead of one. 

Many years ago I wrote a computer programme that randomly creates rotating images of planets. Looking at the planet that it normally displays I noticed that the majority of the land is on one side while the majority of the sea is on the other. From what is stated above this shouldn't be possible in reality. However, there have been single supercontinents on Earth, such as Pangaea, in the distant past. How then was this possible? I assume that it is due to the fact that, unlike my computer generated fictional planet, the ratio of sea to dry land on the Earth is high, so the only projection above the sea could be a bulge in the land mass on just one side. Presumably the centres of gravity of the land and the sea must always coincide though, whatever their shapes, hence the two tides.


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