Eskimos use refrigerators to stop their food from freezing.
Boots fitted with springs were forbidden by the original Queensberry Rules for boxing.
In 2014, a single parking space in London was sold for £400,000.
There is a Canadian skeleton racer called Dave Greszczyszyn.
Paris and Rome have only each other as sister city, following the motto “Only Paris is worthy of Rome; only Rome is worthy of Paris.”
See other: Quite Interesting Facts
“Vaccines cause autism.”
Ruling:
Pants on fire. Fraudulent research.
Analysis:
Based on a paper published in 1998, the publication was a small case series with no controls, linked three common conditions, and relied on parental recall and beliefs. Worse still, it has been shown that numerous facts about the patients’ medical histories were altered in order to manipulate certain results. Later evidence has shown that this fraudulent research was committed for both financial and political gain.
Over the following decade, actual epidemiological studies consistently found no evidence of a link between the MMR vaccine and autism.
See other: Mythconceptions?
A four-wheeled horse-drawn carriage, designed in 1839. It had an open seat for the driver in front of the closed cabin for two or four passengers. Named after its designer Henry Peter, 1st Baron Brougham and Vaux (1778–1868).
‘Topsham, brougham, renown, but known,
Knowledge, done, lone, gone, none, tone,’
– Gerard Nolst Trenité, The Chaos
A character is presented two alternatives, A and B. If the character chooses A, then something bad happens. If they choose B, a similar or identical bad thing happens—but for a different reason.
Consider the following excerpt from the Jacobean play Pericles, Prince of Tyre, which is at least partly attributed to Shakespeare:
I am no viper, yet I feed
On mother’s flesh which did me breed.
I sought a husband, in which labour
I found that kindness in a father:
He’s father, son, and husband mild;
I mother, wife, and yet his child.
How they may be, and yet in two,
As you will live, resolve it you.
– Pericles, Prince of Tyre (Act I, Scene I) Continue reading
Lysandra
We should note that people of all faiths regularly assure us that God is not responsible for human suffering.
Helena
This belief undermines the claim that God is both omniscient and omnipotent. Now, this is the age-old problem of theodicy, and we should consider it solved. If God exists, either He can do nothing to stop the most egregious calamities, or He does not care to. God, therefore, is either impotent or evil.
Lysandra
Even though your reasoning is correct, it might be rendered null and void by the belief that any omniscient being cannot be judged by human standards of morality.
Helena
Caution, that is a pirouette. Continue reading
‘There is no such thing as a fish.’
– The Encyclopaedia of Underwater Life
The Encyclopaedia of Underwater Life, edited by Andrew Campbell and John Dawes, published by Oxford University Press in 2005.
From fins to legs
375 million years ago
With plants well-established on land, the next step was for animals to move out of the water. Insects were among the first, around 400 million years ago. But they were followed soon after by big, backboned animals such as Tiktaalik, a fish that looked a bit like a salamander. Fish like Tiktaalik would eventually evolve four limbs, and give rise to amphibians, reptiles and mammals. It may be a good thing it left the water when it did, as soon afterwards the Late Devonian Extinction wiped out many marine animals, including some terrifying-looking armoured fish.
See other: History of Life
A best-selling 15th century work of fiction was The Tale of the Two Lovers, an erotic novel by the man who later became Pope Pius II.
In 1967, Picoaz, Ecuador, elected a brand of foot deodorant as the town’s mayor.
The word ‘fun’ does not appear in the King James Bible.
At least 109 journeys between adjacent London Underground stations are quicker to walk.
Apostasy, the abandonment of religion, is a capital offence in Afghanistan, Iran, Mauritania, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.
See other: Quite Interesting Facts
Knowledge Guild 