Mildly interesting facts

**AlphaOmega** · 14th June 2018, 13:50

Took the children to the science museum the other day.

I found it stimulating as well. I'm trying to keep them questioning the world around them.

Thought it would be handy to have a thread where we can post interesting or unusual facts.

First up. The air lock scene in 2001. I always thought that a human would explode if exposed to space without a suit. But apparently, Kubrick consulted the experts and there is about 12 seconds during which Dave would have time to fire himself through. Presumably quite an interesting 12 seconds.

Link with details

Scene

**mindforge** · 14th June 2018, 14:00

That was mildly interesting, thank you! The range of effects Hollywood generally depicts is quite wide.

**Mikee** · 14th June 2018, 14:15

Everyone on the planet would easily fit in loch Ness (if drained).

**hogthrob** · 14th June 2018, 21:25

Originally Posted by Mikee

Everyone on the planet would easily fit in loch Ness (if drained).

How much less space do humans take up when they're drained?

**hogthrob** · 14th June 2018, 21:27

I have a larger than average number of arms.

**E_2_Right-Force** · 14th June 2018, 21:37

95% of men have one testicle that hangs lower than the other two.

**Jambo** · 14th June 2018, 14:19

Humans share 55% of their DNA with bananas.

Explains a lot of my daily encounters...

**Tokyo Tokei** · 14th June 2018, 14:34

Your head is older than your feet

**notnowkato** · 14th June 2018, 14:37

A Labrador's sense of smell is so acute, it could smell a kipper placed on the moon......(not really, I don't think )

**Brighty** · 14th June 2018, 14:41

Dogs can't look up

**Jardine32** · 14th June 2018, 17:08

Before the term "bloopers" was coined, outtakes were called "boners"
J

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**robcat** · 14th June 2018, 20:22

If you spread the surface area of your lungs over a tennis court, you’d be dead.

**steptoe** · 14th June 2018, 20:26

"little" Napoleon was actually taller than the Duke of Wellington and Admiral Nelson.

**David_D** · 14th June 2018, 22:55

If you laid all the economists in the world end to end, they still wouldn’t reach a conclusion.

**Groundrush** · 14th June 2018, 23:19

The observable universe is spherical and you are slap bang at the centre of it.

As the universe expands, there will become a point in time where all the galaxies and stars we can see now will be so far away from us and red-shifted so much that they will all become completely unobservable and the universe will appear to be completely empty.

**Dave+63** · 15th June 2018, 07:02

Originally Posted by Groundrush

The observable universe is spherical and you are slap bang at the centre of it.

As the universe expands, there will become a point in time where all the galaxies and stars we can see now will be so far away from us and red-shifted so much that they will all become completely unobservable and the universe will appear to be completely empty.

Now that is quite interesting!

As we know that we’re not the centre of the universe (well most of us anyway), one can only conclude that there are already parts of the universe that have become unobservable to us.

You also appear to be saying that the galaxies are not just moving away from us, they’re also expanding too?

**ViperStripes** · 15th June 2018, 09:40

For those that like the facts in this thread I can highly recommend "No Such Thing as a Fish" podcast. It's the researchers behind QI who do their own podcast, funny and full of facts like the above.

https://twitter.com/nosuchthing

**Groundrush** · 15th June 2018, 12:02

Originally Posted by Dave+63

As we know that we’re not the centre of the universe (well most of us anyway), one can only conclude that there are already parts of the universe that have become unobservable to us.

The universe is roughly 13.8 billion years old and light can only go so fast, so you might think that a distance of 13.8 billion light years from the observer is as far as anyone can ever hope to see. In fact, because the universe is expanding we can actually see about 45.7 billion light-years. The difference being made up by red-shift (relativity is weird man) and the fact that the rate of expansion is increasing. Interestingly, because every point in space has it's own observable universe, what is inside for one may well be outside for another. How big the total "outside" universe is, is any ones guess.

Originally Posted by Dave+63

You also appear to be saying that the galaxies are not just moving away from us, they’re also expanding too?

Affirmative.

**Dave+63** · 15th June 2018, 16:27

Originally Posted by Groundrush

The universe is roughly 13.8 billion years old and light can only go so fast, so you might think that a distance of 13.8 billion light years from the observer is as far as anyone can ever hope to see. In fact, because the universe is expanding we can actually see about 45.7 billion light-years. The difference being made up by red-shift (relativity is weird man) and the fact that the rate of expansion is increasing. Interestingly, because every point in space has it's own observable universe, what is inside for one may well be outside for another. How big the total "outside" universe is, is any ones guess.

Affirmative.

Cheers!

My daughter is studying Astro physics and the little that I pick up (and sometimes understand) is quite mind blowing.

**Mr Curta** · 15th June 2018, 03:58

Kishi Station in Kinokawa has a cat as stationmaster.

**Jon Kenney** · 15th June 2018, 05:05

Like most people my age, I'm 48

**VDG** · 15th June 2018, 07:02

Al Capone business card said that he is used furniture salesman

**DMC102** · 15th June 2018, 09:50

Peanuts are not nuts.

**mondie** · 15th June 2018, 11:25

All the soil removed in the building of the Manchester Ship Canal could build a 3 x 6ft wall around the entire equator.

**David_D** · 15th June 2018, 13:23

Originally Posted by mondie

All the soil removed in the building of the Manchester Ship Canal could build a 3 x 6ft wall around the entire equator.

Don’t keep us guessing! What did they do with it?! 😳

**JasonM** · 15th June 2018, 13:27

Originally Posted by David_D

Don’t keep us guessing! What did they do with it?! 

Made Manchester?

**mondie** · 15th June 2018, 13:33

Originally Posted by David_D

Don’t keep us guessing! What did they do with it?! 

Dunno as I wasn't around then but staggering to think it was all done by hand.

**jwg663** · 15th June 2018, 14:47

Originally Posted by mondie

All the soil removed in the building of the Manchester Ship Canal could build a 3 x 6ft wall around the entire equator.

Originally Posted by David_D

Don’t keep us guessing! What did they do with it?! 

The navvies dropped all the soil out of their trouser-legs (it's where 'The Great Escape' writers got the idea from) & created the land where Wythenshawe now stands.

**Ummar01** · 19th June 2018, 23:48

My mildly interesting fact.

Lots of quality footwear has red linings. Apparently this was originally to make it easier to identify officers that died in battle during ww1

**Saint-Just** · 15th June 2018, 18:37

Reminds me of an [fill-in with whatever nationality you want to mock] proverb:
“Snow in November, Christmas in December “

**Parabola** · 15th June 2018, 22:18

Rotavator is the rotavator backwards

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**Jardine32** · 16th June 2018, 09:49

https://youtu.be/JkS1ymQ73oc

An example of point three above.
J

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**Andyg** · 16th June 2018, 20:49

The more money spent on a wedding is inversely proportional to the time the marriage lasts .

**Mr Curta** · 16th June 2018, 21:02

Originally Posted by Andyg

The more money spent on a wedding is inversely proportional to the time the marriage lasts .

Bodes well for mine

**Andyg** · 17th June 2018, 19:31

Originally Posted by Mr Curta

Bodes well for mine

If your wife to be is happy with a cheap and cheerful wedding, she really wants to be married. If she is looking at the wedding as an event and is in competition with her friends to put on the best do then good luck

Best of luck with your forthcoming nuptials.

**Mr Curta** · 17th June 2018, 19:45

Originally Posted by Andyg

If your wife to be is happy with a cheap and cheerful wedding, she really wants to be married. If she is looking at the wedding as an event and is in competition with her friends to put on the best do then good luck

Best of luck with your forthcoming nuptials.

I meant the prognosis - our cheap and cheerful wedding was 12 years ago. Small group of friends and family.

**Raffe** · 16th June 2018, 21:15

Originally Posted by Andyg

The more money spent on a wedding is inversely proportional to the time the marriage lasts .

Unfortunately I can confirm that.

**Brian** · 19th June 2018, 09:31

Originally Posted by Andyg

The more money spent on a wedding is inversely proportional to the time the marriage lasts .

This, in my experience, also applies to the startup business office setup and cars.

B

**Saint-Just** · 16th June 2018, 21:17

Works for me. We had very little money but wanted to pay for it ourselves. That was 30 years ago this coming September

**Andyg** · 17th June 2018, 19:27

Originally Posted by Saint-Just

Works for me. We had very little money but wanted to pay for it ourselves. That was 30 years ago this coming September

Worked for me as well - 32 years in July. Less so for my brother - about £50k, "no children allowed", proper sit down with free bar, morning suits, etc - lasted 12 years.

**Jardine32** · 18th June 2018, 17:09

President James Garfield could write with both hands, at the same time, in different languages (Greek and Latin).
J

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**Mikee** · 19th June 2018, 04:02

Photons do not experience time.

**Groundrush** · 19th June 2018, 08:52

Originally Posted by Mikee

Photons do not experience time.

Indeed, in a vacuum. Which means a photon can be everywhere in the vacuum of the universe all at the same time. But when a photon enters an optically dense material it slows down and it does experience time. If you were a photon, you'd think you were jumping from one material to the next, in different regions of the universe, with no sense of how you got from one to t'other. What is more, time and space would distort and change pace depending on what you find yourself passing through. Until one day you venture into the wrong part of space and get eaten by an over excited atom. Weird huh?

**alfat33** · 19th June 2018, 08:57

Originally Posted by Groundrush

Which means a photon can be everywhere in the vacuum of the universe all at the same time.

However if we tried to show that for a particular photon, the measurement would instantly disrupt that state of the photon, meaning we can never actually see a particular photon everywhere all at the same time.

Have I remembered that right?

**Groundrush** · 19th June 2018, 09:42

Originally Posted by alfat33

However if we tried to show that for a particular photon, the measurement would instantly disrupt that state of the photon, meaning we can never actually see a particular photon everywhere all at the same time.

Have I remembered that right?

Pretty much yes. Theoretically, a photon can exist everywhere in a vacuum all at once, but in order to detect a photon you need to do something to it, the easiest way would be to cause it to be eaten by an atom in an optically dense medium. So in order to measure your everywhere photon you have to force it to be somewhere, thereby nullifying the entire point of your measurement. Theoretically speaking of course.

**alfat33** · 19th June 2018, 09:00

Gibbons sleep sitting upright.

**unclealec** · 19th June 2018, 09:12

I'll have a pint of whatever the photon is drinking.

**MintG** · 19th June 2018, 15:25

Figs are pollinated by wasps that actually get trapped inside the fig in the process of pollination. The fig dissolves the wasp’s body through clever chemistry when it dies inside the fig. True story.

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**Tokyo Tokei** · 19th June 2018, 15:40

Eddie's Speedbird is an anagram of Ed's Bedside Pride

**alfat33** · 19th June 2018, 17:37

The minimum depth of an Olympic swimming pool is 2m.

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