One of my favourite facts is

[vernon]

[quote name='swee'pea99']There is a 98.2% chance that at least one of the molecules you have just inhaled came from Caesar’s last breath.[/quote]

Which is heavily dependent upon the assumption that none of the exhaled molecules have been incorporated into plants and animals or dissolved into water to form carbonated drinks or into oxides of other elements...or....etc....

 

[vernon]

These are great facts!

Here's mine. Elephants can't jump.

Really??....

http://www.videosift.com/video/Elephants-CAN-jump

 

[Arch]

Their legs all bend forward though - isn't that unusual?

No. Their joints work in the same way as any other quadruped. But in a horse, say, the 'knee' in the middle of the back leg is actually the ankle, which is why it seems to bend the 'wrong' way - the knee (the joint between femur and tibia) is higher up the leg. (my annotations below)

View attachment 2592

http://www.newrider.com/Library/Misc_Tips/skeleton.jpg


Elephants have the joint between femur and tibia lower down, as their weight is more directly over the leg than a horse. Therefore the knee is where you expect it, in human terms, and the ankle is lower and much less flexible.

View attachment 2593

http://www.talkorigins.org/pictures/holden/struct-fig2a.gif

All mammals have two humeri, two radii, two femora and two tibiae, except some cetaceans (dolphins and whales) who have only vestigial or missing hindlimbs. Two femora and two tibiae means two knees, maximum.

Montage, no, not a biology teacher, an archaeologist specialising in animal bones.

 

[Arch]

uhoh...a Biology teacher?

How many knees does a Bee have?

As bees don't have an internal vertebrate skeleton, I'm not qualified to say.

 

[Dayvo]

As bees don't have an internal vertebrate skeleton, I'm not qualified to say.

Well take an unqualified guess, Arch!

It'll be more informed than most of ours!

 

[Arch]

Well take an unqualified guess, Arch!

It'll be more informed than most of ours!

Well, using knees in a rather informal manner, I'd say 6. But I suspect they are really something like 'medial articulations' in proper terms.

Good god! they have femora and tibiae! So they are knees!

See, I hate not knowing a thing like that, I have to look it up...

 

[TVC]

The human body produces more energy than 1 cubic meter of the sun.

FACT!

 

[accountantpete]

The Andes Mountain Range is so massive that it acts like a giant sail and can speed up or slow down the Earth's rotation depending on the particular weather conditions- or so Dr Karl reckons and he's nearly always right.

 

[Speicher]

Ah, but you're forgetting this is a cubic square mile. A lot of water can get lost inthose extra dimensions.

Yes, I pointed that out on Page one of these thread, and no one took any notice.

 

[vernon]

Yes, I pointed that out on Page one of these thread, and no one took any notice.

What exactly is a cubic square mile of fog? It's not a unit that I recognise.

You can have a square mile which is two dimensional or a cubic mile which is three dimensional. I can't get my head around a cubic square mile unless I'm missing something that's glaringly obvious.

 

[colly]

There are as many teaspoons of water in the Atlantic as there are molecules in a teaspoon of water.

Give or take a bit naturally.

 

[ComedyPilot]

The human body in free fall accelerates to a terminal velocity of about 125mph at a rate of 9 metre per second squared.


And it's bloody good fun.

 

[colly]

Carbon dioxide has a triple point of -56.603° C.

It can exist as a solid, vapour or liquid at this temperature.

 

[FBOAB]

The bit that ticket collectors punch out of train tickets are called didcots.

 

[D-Rider]

99% of gargoyles look like Bob Todd