In 1995, the number of TV programmes in Britain watched by over 15 million people was 225. By 2004, this had fallen to six.
Biologists cannot agree on definitions for the words ‘species’, ‘organism’ or ‘life’.
Beijing, Seoul and Tokyo all mean ‘capital’, in their respective languages.
Dildos are illegal in Texas.
The amount of water on Earth is constant, and continually recycled over time: some of the water you drink, will have passed through a dinosaur.
See other: Quite Interesting Facts
“Sushi means raw fish.”
Ruling:
False. Erroneous translation.
Analysis:
Though sometimes also translated as ‘vinegared rice’, sushi means ‘sour rice’ and does not always feature fish. Nowadays, sushi is first and foremost a rice dish, which can include vegetables, cooked fish, raw fish, poultry, or other proteins.
See other: Mythconceptions?
It could be argued that North Korea qualifies as a failed state. The regime is so unstable and insecure it requires a totalitarian grip on every citizen in order to survive. The government aspires to control every aspect of life to ensure the perpetuation of its power. It mainly achieves this by indoctrinating its citizens from birth and maintaining an atmosphere of fear and constant battle against invisible foreign enemies.
In reality, the allegedly perfect regime is ludicrously incompetent and inconsistent. Supposedly, there is housing for everyone, but no citizen can choose where to live. Supposedly, there is schooling for everyone, but no one can choose what they want to learn. Supposedly, there is universal healthcare, but there are no medicines to cure patients. On the one hand, individual initiative of any kind is stamped out, on the other hand, the government cannot provide basic necessities for its citizens, most importantly, food. On top of that, dissenters, nonconformists, critics and others who are considered traitors to the regime are regularly imprisoned, tortured or executed, often together with their entire family. (The list of known human rights violations is too long to go into any further.)
This begs the question, with such a tenuous grip on power, how does the North Korean regime manage to survive?
Continue reading
Helena
Consider the Holocaust: centuries before the mid 20th century, Christian Europeans had viewed the Jews as the worst species of heretics and attributed every societal ill to their continued presence among the faithful. In the 1930’s and 1940’s, while the hatred of Jews in Germany expressed itself in a predominately secular way, its roots were religious, and the explicitly religious demonization of the Jews of Europe continued. The anti-Semitism that built the Nazi death camps was a direct inheritance from medieval Christianity.
Sappho
Examples aplenty, the Vatican itself perpetuated the blood libel in its newspapers as late as 1914. And both Catholic and Protestant churches have a shameful record of complicity with the Nazi genocide.
Galene
Hang on, what is this so-called blood libel? Continue reading
In Japan, there is a common myth of the spirit of language called kotodama; a belief that some divine power resides in the Japanese language.
The term kotodama literally means ‘the spirit of language’. It is a belief based on the idea of Shintoism, the indigenous religion of Japan which worships divinity in all natural creation and phenomena.
In ancient Japan, language was believed to have a spirit, which gives positive power to positive words, negative power to negative words, and impacts a person’s life when his or her name is pronounced out loud. Wishes or curses were thus spelled out in a particular manner in order to communicate with the divine powers. According to this ancient belief, the spirit of language only resides in ‘pure’ Japanese that is unique and free from foreign influence.
“What a strange thing!
to be alive
beneath cherry blossoms.”
― Kobayashi Issa, Poems
Today we can observe that the diversity of Japanese society goes hand in hand with the diversity of its vocabulary, which we can see from the rapid increase of loanwords in Japanese. However, at the same time, this increases a sense of insecurity in relation to the linguistic and cultural identity of Japan.
As a result, the ancient myth of kotodama has been reinvented as a way to manifest Japanese linguistic identity through the idea of a ‘pure’ language. Kotodama has no fixed definition, and continues to transform as Japanese society undergoes changes. It is questionable if the Japanese still really believe in the spiritual power of language – however, the myth of linguistic purity persists in the mind of the Japanese through the word kotodama.
Over a decade ago, National Geographic organised a global survey to measure the developed world’s geographic literacy.[1]
On average, fewer than 25 percent of young people worldwide could locate Israel on the map. Only about 20 percent could identify international news hotspots like Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq.
‘Geographically Illiterate: Someone who sucks at geography.’ – Urban Dictionary
More recent research shows no improvement. When the Russian Federation invaded the Ukraine in 2014, the Washington Post conducted a survey which showed that only 16% of Americans was able to locate the Black Sea nation on a map.[2]
More importantly, it was found that this lack of geographic knowledge is related to preferences and decision-making: namely, the farther their guesses were from Ukraine’s actual location, the more they wanted the U.S. to intervene with military force.
Whatever your views on this political squabble, the following conclusion is inevitable: whether people are in possession of a certain geographic fact determines their opinion in a certain way.
As for geography, knowledge of the location of places and the physical and cultural characteristics of those places are a requirement to function more effectively in an increasingly interdependent world.
On top of that, knowledge of the geography of past times and how geography has played an important role in the evolution of a society, their ideas, and its environment are not only prerequisites for historical knowledge, but also necessary for making sound decisions in the present.[3]
“If geography is prose, maps are iconography.” – Lennart Meri
These findings only underline the importance of teaching Geography. However, as always with formal education, it does not tell the whole story: besides teaching Geography as a core subject on the national curriculum, National Geographic researchers found that geographic knowledge also increases through travel and language proficiency.
In the highest-scoring countries of the National Geographic Survey (Sweden, Germany and Italy) at least 70 percent of the young adults had travelled internationally in the last three years, and the majority spoke more than one language (at the time, no less than 92 percent of young people in Sweden).
In the U.S. and Mexico only about 20 percent of young people had travelled abroad during the same period and the majority spoke only one language.
“All I ever wanted was a world without maps.” – Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient
‘Our daily lives are interwoven with geography. Each of us lives in a unique place and in constant interaction with our surroundings. Geographic knowledge and skills are essential for us to understand the activities and patterns of our lives and the lives of others. We move from place to place, aided by transportation and navigation systems. We communicate using global networks of computers and satellites. We strive to live in healthy physical and social environments. We work to avoid the negative consequences of exposure to natural and technological hazards. We search for interesting destinations and vacations. We observe and learn about our own culture and other cultures around the world. We want to lead satisfying lives and contribute to the welfare of our communities. Geographic knowledge and understanding is fundamental to reaching our goals, and in attaining a higher quality of life.’
– Why Geography Is Important (2005), Grosvenor Centre of Education
[1] The National Geographic–Roper 2002 Global Geographic Literacy Survey polled more than 3,000 18- to 24-year-olds in Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Sweden and the United States.
According to Robert Pastor, professor of International Relations at American University, in Washington, D.C., “The survey demonstrates the geographic illiteracy of the United States.”
About 11 percent of young citizens of the U.S. couldn’t even locate the U.S. on a map. The Pacific Ocean’s location was a mystery to 29 percent; Japan, to 58 percent; France, to 65 percent; and the United Kingdom, to 69 percent. Less than 15 percent could locate neither Israel nor Iraq.
“War is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.” – Ambrose Bierce
[2] From March 28 to 31, 2014, The Washington Post asked a national sample of 2,066 Americans what action they wanted the U.S. to take in Ukraine, but with a twist: in addition to measuring standard demographic characteristics and general foreign policy attitudes, they also asked the survey respondents to locate Ukraine on a map as part of a larger, ongoing project to study foreign policy knowledge. The newspaper wanted to see where Americans think Ukraine is and to learn if this knowledge (or lack thereof) is related to their foreign policy views. The survey also found that 5 out of 2,066 Americans thought the Ukraine was located in the U.S. corn belt.
[3] The importance of geographic knowledge is of paramount importance, not only for a better understanding of historical and present geopolitical issues, but also as a scientific measuring device to help humans to make better decisions about the environment. Consider the intellectual poverty of young people who are ignorant of:
Samurai held viewing parties to watch cherry blossom fall.
According to CNN, in 2007, around the globe, at any moment there were 28,258 Internet users who were viewing pornography.
Koalas almost never need to drink water, getting sufficient water from the leaves they eat.
Abraham Lincoln was arrested for defecating in public at the age of 17. The charge was later dismissed and his record sealed.
Matt Groening, the creator of The Simpsons, named many of the characters after his own family such as: Homer (his dad), Margaret (his mom), Maggie and Lisa (his sisters), and Abe (his grandfather). His brother Mark was the inspiration for Bart. He chose to name the character “Bart”, though, because it was an anagram for “Brat”.
See other: Quite Interesting Facts
In Argentina, it was forbidden to say “Juan Domingo Perón” after the coup that deposed him in 1955; the media referred to him as the “Deposed Tyrant”.
Orang-utan means ‘person of the forest’ in Malay.
Liquorice is used in Chinese medicine.
94% of happy, healthy participants, when placed in a totally silent room developed tinnitus.
At the age of 100, Teiichi Igarashi became the oldest person to climb Mount Fuji – in his socks.
See other: Quite Interesting Facts
Knowledge Guild 