Fun Facts Thread

[agentjwall]

Post your odd, bizarre, or likewise interesting facts here. Keep it clean though (there are children watching!).


I'll start us off with some Golden Gate Bridge facts:

• The Golden Gate Bridge was originally going to be painted with yellow/black stripes to make it easy to spot out at sea for (military)naval maneuvering.
• The bridge is exposed to so much wear that whenever it is finished being repainted, the far side needs to be painted again! There is a crew out painting the bridge 7 days a week.

 

[Jayzy3]

Give me some credit for this if you will, the inspiration deserves it.

Also: The Japanese grow square watermelons for their ability to stack better.

Slugs have four noses

The best method of defense against an attacking alligator? Hold it's mouth open.

White is not actually a true color, just the absence of color

Already said this one in another post, but I will say it again: 70% of the mentally insane are in the lower class. What concerns me is the 30% that are our bosses

 

[Sweord]

The best method of defense against an attacking alligator? Hold it's mouth open.

Actually, the opposite is true. They have strong muscles that close the jaw, but weak ones that open it. Trying to keep the jaw open would probably result in missing fingers.

EDIT: Also, here's a link to show just how strong the jaws are. ^^ http://animal.discovery.com/news/briefs/20030915/alligator.html

 

[Thedarkgeneral]

Dolphins are one of the only other animals (other than humans) that kill for fun. They also will kill their own young

 

[Dielan9999]

Hot keys in Windows 7 are fun to use at work!

The windows key(win key) + E key will launch explorer (so you can unpin that stupid folder icon)


win + arrow keys do a variety of things, it snaps windows to the left and right sides of each monitor, maximize, and minimize the highlighted window. So if you have dual or triple monitors, you can snap to the side that's in the middle, when dragging doesn't work due to the extended desktop.

win + r opens a run prompt, which I use to contact servers that aren't mapped to drives, because it's faster than opening explorer and clicking on the address bar, then typing it, I also use the names of .exe files to open common apps, like mspaint for paint, winword for msword, and cmd for command prompt.

win + tab when using an Aero theme will give you a graphical switching interface. So when you have a million windows open like I do (support tasks, unfinished emails, command prompt, solitaire) it helps you out a little better than traditional alt+tab.

Pressing the scroll lock key twice, then a number, then enter will switch your KVM to a different port. Useful when you are using a KVM that doesn't have any buttons on it.



If i'm going to be forced to use Windows at work, I might as well get comfortable with it lol

 

[Mariohgcz]

White is not actually a true color, just the absence of color

Actually, this is quite the oposite, white is actually the COMBINATION of all colors. Want to prove it? Get a circle of paper, divide it in 7, and pain it the colors of the rainbow. After this, pass a string through the middle, and make it spin, you will see all of the colors turn into white.
Light is seen as white, when it decomposes, such as when it goes though a prism, or is reflected after rain to form a rainbow, it decomposes into several colors.

Another fun fact: If a roach touches a human, it will run to safety and clean itself.

 

[agentjwall]

@Jayzy3 @Mariohgcz

You are both partially correct. It depends on your perspective.

• If you look at color artistically, white is defined by the absence of color.
• Scientifically, white is defined as the combination of all colors.

The opposite is also true for black.

• Artistically, black is defined as the combination of all colors.
• Scientifically, black is defined as the absence of light (i.e. color).

 

[agentjwall]

Time for another daily fun fact!

Today's topic: Polar Bears

• The polar bear's scientific name is ursus maritimus which toughly translates to "water bear."
• The polar bear's fur is actually transparent, but the way it refracts light makes it appear white.
• Alge often grows on polar bear, making the fur appear light green instead of white.
• Some scientists believe polar bears show preference to which paw they use and are more commonly left-pawed (although the belief is somewhat controversial).

 

[Croot21]

Did you know, the first bred dog's name was Snuppy and it was and Afghan Hound ?

 

[agentjwall]

Sometimes I feel like I"m the only one who enjoys sharing obscure and strange facts...

Regardless, Today's topic is: Strange Words

• malihalapintapi: A word describing a situation where two or more people want to do something but neither are willing to suggest anything. (It is also known as the world's most succinct word)

• Dysania: the state of finding it hard to get out of bed in the morning. (Also a good excuse for being late )

• Awful vs. Awesome: You would assume that being full of awe is better than only having some awe, right? It turns out that back in the day, Awe used to mean "to dread or respectfully fear," usually referring to some sort of higher power. Over time that definition changed to "overwhelming reverence or admiration." As you can probably guess, aw(e)ful came from the initial definition while, awesome came later after the definition had changed. You can also switch the definitions of awe to make some interesting phrases...

"The god used his awful powers to save the people from suffering"​

"The awesome event emotionally scarred the child for the rest of her life"​

 

[MajorasMask]

AAAAAAAMAAAZZZINNNGGGG FACTS: Theme: Video Games​

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- Nintendo started off as a playing card company, not a games company.​

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- Millions of copies of E.T for the Atari have been burried in the Mexican desert from mass recall.​

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- All Sonic the Hedgehog 2 games were released on the same day, with no unique release dates.​

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- Starcraft is the first computer game ever to have been taken into space, then played.​

 

[Mariohgcz]

​

- Millions of copies of E.T for the Atari have been burried in the Mexican desert from mass recall.​

False, this was in New Mexico.

 

[MajorasMask]

Was it? I'm not too sure..

 

[Faunherer]

A decapitated turtle's heart can continue beating for up to 5000 hours

 

[Iarbobray]

Tardigrades are my favorite animal of all time, here's some facts:

• Tardigrades are also know as "water bears" or "moss piglets"
• When in a bad condition tardigrades can put themselves into "suspended animation" allowing them to live through it.
• Some examples include temperatures nearing absolute 0, temperatures are 150 degrees Celsius, and in a low-orbit around earth (for a few days, and yes, in space)
• Some can go a decade without water
• They are found in water

If you want to know more just find them on Wikipedia, they're amazing.

Here's a video.

 

[Thedarkgeneral]

A decapitated turtle's heart can continue beating for up to 5000 hours

Cracked.com? I saw this too.

 

[iTzDeXy]

If you say Banana backwards it sounds like gullible.

The eiffel tower in france isnt ment to be there, like that,
the very first owner went bank rupt or something and it stayed FOREVER (ish)

 

[Zaspar]

Tardigrades are my favorite animal of all time, here's some facts:

• Tardigrades are also know as "water bears" or "moss piglets"
• When in a bad condition tardigrades can put themselves into "suspended animation" allowing them to live through it.
• Some examples include temperatures nearing absolute 0, temperatures are 150 degrees Celsius, and in a low-orbit around earth (for a few days, and yes, in space)
• Some can go a decade without water
• They are found in water

If you want to know more just find them on Wikipedia, they're amazing.


Here's a video.

good

 

[ShizzDawgg]

Ok here are mine

• Thomas Edison, the inventor of the lightbulb (or innovator I should say), was afraid of the dark.
• George W. Bush and John F. Kennedy are 16th cousins, thrice removed.
• Abraham Lincoln's dog, Fido, was also assassinated.
• The average chocolate bar has 8 insect legs in it.

 

[agentjwall]

Ahh, good old extremophiles... And thanks for ruining chocolate for me Shizz -.-

Today's topic is... Bizarre scientific Concepts and Theories

• Godwin's law: As any discussion goes on the probability that a comparison involving Nazism, or Hitler approaches 100%. Put simply: given enough time, any conversation will end up referencing hitler.

• Schrödinger's Cat: A hypothetical situation where you place a cat in a box along with a device has exactly a 50-50 chance of killing the cat. Because of a quantum mechanical phenomena known as quantum entanglement, the cat is both alive and dead at the same time until the box is opened. Schrödinger originally intended this to show the absurdity of quantum mechanics, but scientists quickly adopted the idea as one of the classic examples of quantum mechanics in action.

• Freudian Slip: The belief that a 'slip of the tongue' can give insight into the subconscious. The phenomena is usually associated with lying, secret desires, et cetera.