Random Facts that you find interesting

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paddedgrimlin

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I like finding bits of random facts and things, I'm wondering what kinds of things everyone else out there find.

Post something that you have looked up or researched and thought was interesting or funny, include meme's gifs, pics, whatever.

ran into this bit of info today never really thought about what the word OK really stands for....


What is O.K. short for?
The most popular theory is that OK comes from ‘oll korrect’, a deliberately misspelled writing of ‘all correct’. It was popularised in Boston newspapers around the 1840s when it was fashionable to go around spelling things incorrectly for humorous effect. Legend also has it that New York Democrats later adopted the abbreviation to promote their candidate Martin Van Buren – the initials ‘OK’ were derived from his nickname, Old Kinderhook.
 
The cereal Corn Flakes was initially intended as a dietary aid to stop masturbation. (link for the incredulous
http://mentalfloss.com/article/32042/corn-flakes-were-invented-part-anti-masturbation-crusade )

Tarot (yes, that tarot) was originally a game called Tarocchi. Tutors for rich families sometimes used the illustrated cards (which is to say, not the number pips) to tell morality stories to their less literate charges. It wasn't until the 18th century that they were used for divination, though they had a fairly standard form for 200 years before.

Not only tomatoes a fruit, they're a nightshade. The fruit, skin, and seeds are perfectly fine to eat. Literally everything else on the plant will $@+/ you up!

White, green, oolong and black tea — same plant with different process of preserving/drying applied. Camellia sinensis is amazing!

Blueberries are sweeter than strawberries! The strawberry uses a trickery mechanism on us, using its fragrance to SMELL sweeter than it actually is to attract things to eat it that will propagate its seeds.
 
Pecock feathers are actually all brown. However, the surface of each feather has micro structuring to it that actually bends and reflects light in a way that makes them appear to have vivid coloring.

Clothing manufacturers are currently in the process of adapting this same micro structuring into fabrics too. Just think, no more running or fading dyes.
 
All mammals have seven cervical vertebrae, even giraffes. Except for manatees (they have 6) and sloths (two-toed sloths have 5 to 7 and three-toed sloths have 8 or 9 cervical vertebrae).
 
Humans misperceive violet light (higher frequency than blue) as purple light (blended blue and red), due to being trichromatic and to having a secondary activation peak of the "red" cone cells. By contrast, many species of bird are tetrachromatic, having a fourth color receptor with a peak response in the UV range, so to them violet would appear as obviously distinct from purple as purple is from yellow; a different pair of cone receptors is being activated (blue & UV (for violet) versus red & blue (for purple)) to produce a completely different color (just like red & blue (for purple) versus red & green (for yellow) in humans).
 
Sapphyre said:
Humans misperceive violet light (higher frequency than blue) as purple light (blended blue and red), due to being trichromatic and to having a secondary activation peak of the "red" cone cells. By contrast, many species of bird are tetrachromatic, having a fourth color receptor with a peak response in the UV range, so to them violet would appear as obviously distinct from purple as purple is from yellow; a different pair of cone receptors is being activated (blue & UV (for violet) versus red & blue (for purple)) to produce a completely different color (just like red & blue (for purple) versus red & green (for yellow) in humans).


So, can birds be color blind for ultraviolet?
 
Makubird said:
So, can birds be color blind for ultraviolet?

I suppose so…? ^^; I have no idea what forms of color blindness have actually been observed to occur in tetrachromatic species, but it makes sense!
 
Sapphyre said:
Humans misperceive violet light (higher frequency than blue) as purple light (blended blue and red), due to being trichromatic and to having a secondary activation peak of the "red" cone cells. By contrast, many species of bird are tetrachromatic, having a fourth color receptor with a peak response in the UV range, so to them violet would appear as obviously distinct from purple as purple is from yellow; a different pair of cone receptors is being activated (blue & UV (for violet) versus red & blue (for purple)) to produce a completely different color (just like red & blue (for purple) versus red & green (for yellow) in humans).

Huh... That's really fascinating... I'll have to read up on that! :smile:

Talking of colour, here's my interesting fact for the day...

Different societies distinguish colours differently... and the words your society has for different colours determines how you perceive colour. Whilst Westerners have (broadly speaking) eleven words to describe colour, the Himba tribe have far fewer:

Zoozu - most dark colours, some reds, greens, blues and purples
Vapa - mainly white, some yellows
Borou - some greens and blues
Dumbu - some greens, reds and browns

Himba people shown one "blue" object amongst lots of "green" objects find it almost impossible to spot the odd-one-out. To Western eyes, it looks like they can't tell blue from green.

Then Westerners are shown two different types of (what we would call) indistinguishable "greens", and the Himba find the odd-one-out instantly.

There's a great documentary you can watch if you want to learn more! Have a look here:

https://www.adisc.org/forum/group.php?discussionid=3030&do=discuss
 
tiny said:
Huh... That's really fascinating... I'll have to read up on that! :smile:

Talking of colour, here's my interesting fact for the day...

Different societies distinguish colours differently... and the words your society has for different colours determines how you perceive colour. Whilst Westerners have (broadly speaking) eleven words to describe colour, the Himba tribe have far fewer:

Zoozu - most dark colours, some reds, greens, blues and purples
Vapa - mainly white, some yellows
Borou - some greens and blues
Dumbu - some greens, reds and browns

Himba people shown one "blue" object amongst lots of "green" objects find it almost impossible to spot the odd-one-out. To Western eyes, it looks like they can't tell blue from green.

Then Westerners are shown two different types of (what we would call) indistinguishable "greens", and the Himba find the odd-one-out instantly.

There's a great documentary you can watch if you want to learn more! Have a look here:

https://www.adisc.org/forum/group.php?discussionid=3030&do=discuss


That is like diapers and the ABDL community. We can instantly recognize many different brands and characteristics, whilst vanillas just think "diaper".
 
Makubird said:
That is like diapers and the ABDL community. We can instantly recognize many different brands and characteristics, whilst vanillas just think "diaper".

Sort of, but it works both ways. The Himba can easily distinguish two types of green that we would consider identical, while Westerners can distinguish greens and blues that the Himba see as (almost) the same colour.

Look at these two circles made up of coloured squares. Can you spot the odd colour out on the left one? The Himba can do this instantly and laugh when Westerners struggle to do so. Show them the circle in the right, and they find it almost impossible to spot the odd one out?

both-colour-tests-rights-to-media-tumblr.jpg

It shows that the words we have to distinguish colours actually changes the way that we see the world.
 
Think I spotted it. Though the all green ones look all the same, one square looks a deeper version of itself. Does that make sense?
 
SpAzpieSweeTot said:
Think I spotted it. Though the all green ones look all the same, one square looks a deeper version of itself. Does that make sense?

I think they are all exactly the same. Aren't they, Tiny? :smile1: Sometimes one of the squares looks a bit different from the others when you look at it for too long. But then, I'm not a Himba so I could be wrong...

Maybe it would help if I were tetrachromatic...
 
I like when I find things on Facebook or the internet that explain expressions.

The door jam on the floor is called a threshold because it was intended to hold the thrashings (seed coats from grains) in the house. They where put down as an absorbent substance and also keep the dirt floor from raising dust as you walked.

Raining cats and dogs comes from medieval times when the houses where thatched roof down to almost ground level. The animals would climb up on the roof to sun them selves. Because of the wax coating on the thatch that was used (to repel rain and not soak thought to the underside) when sudden rain swells came through the rain would run off and all of the animals would fall off as well.

Shit is an acronym for Store High In Transit. Manure was dried and shipped to other places for fertilizer. If it was stored low in the holds the if any water got to it then it would soften and ferment releasing methane. When a sailor would go below to check on the water level that lantern they would carry would ignite the gas and blow the ship up.

Sailors/Captains wore eye patches to keep one eye accustomed to the dark. When they would go below decks they would lift the eye patch so they could see almost immediately and not have to wait for there eyes to adjust to the dark.

I know many more and am thus told that I am a walking book of trivial "Shit" by some friends.
 
egor said:
I like when I find things on Facebook or the internet that explain expressions.

The door jam on the floor is called a threshold because it was intended to hold the thrashings (seed coats from grains) in the house. They where put down as an absorbent substance and also keep the dirt floor from raising dust as you walked.

Raining cats and dogs comes from medieval times when the houses where thatched roof down to almost ground level. The animals would climb up on the roof to sun them selves. Because of the wax coating on the thatch that was used (to repel rain and not soak thought to the underside) when sudden rain swells came through the rain would run off and all of the animals would fall off as well.

Shit is an acronym for Store High In Transit. Manure was dried and shipped to other places for fertilizer. If it was stored low in the holds the if any water got to it then it would soften and ferment releasing methane. When a sailor would go below to check on the water level that lantern they would carry would ignite the gas and blow the ship up.

Sailors/Captains wore eye patches to keep one eye accustomed to the dark. When they would go below decks they would lift the eye patch so they could see almost immediately and not have to wait for there eyes to adjust to the dark.

I know many more and am thus told that I am a walking book of trivial "Shit" by some friends.

I'm skeptical of acronym explanations for old words and it seems rightly so in this case: https://www.snopes.com/language/acronyms/shit.asp

I didn't dig into the others but I guess I'm also skeptical of anything story that seems a little too obvious or pat. I wonder if there will be appealing but bogus explanations for present day things in the future? "Didja know Facebook was made from real faces?
 
SpAzpieSweeTot said:
Think I spotted it. Though the all green ones look all the same, one square looks a deeper version of itself. Does that make sense?

Which square do you think it is? :)

(And are you seriously telling me you can see it?! I've seen this test many times before and I find it close to impossible!)

Makubird said:
I think they are all exactly the same. Aren't they, Tiny? :smile1: Sometimes one of the squares looks a bit different from the others when you look at it for too long. But then, I'm not a Himba so I could be wrong...

It looks that way to me, but no -- apparently one of the greens is different to the others. And it's as clear to the Himba as the blue one (that they can't distinguish) is to us... even on a computer screen. You've got to check out part 4 of the documentary in my link above if you're interested. :)

The theory is that, as a tribe who survive on foraging, being able to distinguish between "plant colours" is beneficial, so the language of their society has evolved to make more distinctions between the colour green (a very common colour in plants) than ours. So... The words that your society has for colour determine the way in which you perceive reality... and whether you can spot the odd green/blue square from the two circles above. Crazy!

Is it just me, or... have you ever wondered about the names we give to the colours of the rainbow...? Red, orange, yellow, green, blue... indigo... violet... Aren't indigo and violet just different shades of blue... (or of each other, at least)? :-/

When you think about it, for humans there are only three different colours -- red, green and blue. Yet we invent lots of other words for colour like brown, or grey, or pink... Where are they in the rainbow...?

In fact, pink (or magenta) is a colour invented by our brains...

[video=youtube;iPPYGJjKVco]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPPYGJjKVco[/video]

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Trevor said:
I'm skeptical of acronym explanations for old words and it seems rightly so in this case: https://www.snopes.com/language/acronyms/shit.asp

I didn't dig into the others but I guess I'm also skeptical of anything story that seems a little too obvious or pat. I wonder if there will be appealing but bogus explanations for present day things in the future? "Didja know Facebook was made from real faces?

Yeah... "shit" is just too onomatopoeic to have any other etymology. :biggrin:

I've been caught out many times believing in urban legends that have turned out to be wrong... Things like "posh" standing for "Port Out, Starboard Home"... and the rude V-sign being due to archers having their first two fingers cut off so they couldn't fire a bow... I guess the idea of something that "makes sense" is sometimes so appealing that we don't really question it... :-/
 
Marka said:
I believe that it's a slightly lighter green one on the left circle (the same position of the blue one, on the right-hand circle)... I'm quite sleep-deprived now however; I've had a pretty remarkable ability to see slight color variations. What's particularly odd is... On a bright sunlit day; alternating which eye that I have open, I see more blue-hues and richer greens in one - the other seems more receptive to shades of yellows and reds (browns will be richer in depth)... Go figure... -Marka

I notice a different color balance in one eye than in the other as well — I think it's common. The peak receptivity of each type of cone cell (graph) is an average across the population, but individuals vary, and I'd not be surprised that individual eyes vary as well. ^.^ Actually, a few lucky women are tetrachromatic! They can't see ultraviolet, but have a second "red" cone cell with a sufficiently different peak absorption frequency, and can therefore easily distinguish hues that look identical to almost everyone else. Check it out!

tiny said:
Different societies distinguish colours differently... and the words your society has for different colours determines how you perceive colour. Whilst Westerners have (broadly speaking) eleven words to describe colour, the Himba tribe have far fewer:

Zoozu - most dark colours, some reds, greens, blues and purples
Vapa - mainly white, some yellows
Borou - some greens and blues
Dumbu - some greens, reds and browns

Himba people shown one "blue" object amongst lots of "green" objects find it almost impossible to spot the odd-one-out. To Western eyes, it looks like they can't tell blue from green.

Then Westerners are shown two different types of (what we would call) indistinguishable "greens", and the Himba find the odd-one-out instantly.

There's a great documentary you can watch if you want to learn more! Have a look here:

https://www.adisc.org/forum/group.php?discussionid=3030&do=discuss

That is certainly curious. According to this test I have very good color perception, but the green squares in the video you linked appeared identical to me. I have to wonder whether it is truly their language that alters their ability to distinguish colors, or perhaps natural selection has shifted the peak absorption frequencies of their cone cells?

Also, for those fascinated by color, don't miss the Impossible Colors! ^.^Impossible for trichromatic humans, anyway…
 
"The star above you, crystal blue..." — Syd Barrett

Only the colour blue can save a mind in distress.

Unfortunatley for Syd the blue he saw was The star above...

"As above so below" so poor Syd Barret lost his mind to The (crystal blue) star above.

True story

'Twinkles'
 
Yeah, it's clearly a light blue, where the other ones are all a dark green. It sticks out like a sore thumb, can't miss it. Circle on the right, about the 10 o'clock position.

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Ps. One good way to find the color difference is to use your thumb and fingers to block all but one of the dots. Slowly move your hand around to compare the other dots- one at a time. Once you finally spot it, you'll wonder how you missed it before.
 
Does anyone see the three dotted squares in the circles? They clearly stand out from the background :p
 
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