Common Misconceptions

There are many things that we hear and don’t take much notice of, still others we hear and take to heart as being true even without any proof as to the statements validity.  The following is a list of a number of concepts that at some point in my life were led to believe were “true” when in fact the truth was something completely different.  I should add that the reason I felt they were true was my parents told me when I was younger and I had no reason not to believe that they were telling me the truth.

1. Searing meat does not “seal in” moisture, and in fact may actually cause meat to lose moisture. Rather, meat is seared to create a brown crust and to add a rich flavour.
2. Entrapment law in the United States does not forbid police officers from going undercover, or from denying that they are police. It is a common misconception among persons engaged in low-level crime that if an undercover police officer is asked, “Are you a cop?” that they must reveal themselves to avoid entrapment.
3. There is no “dark side of the Moon”; every part of the Moon’s surface (save perhaps deep craters near the poles) is illuminated by the Sun roughly half of the time. Because of tidal locking there is a far side of the Moon, which is never visible from Earth.
4. Seasons are not caused by Earth being closer to the sun in summer than in winter. Rather, they are caused by Earth’s tilted axis. In July, during Northern Hemisphere summer, Earth actually reaches its furthest distance from the sun, but the northern part of the planet is tilted towards the sun, giving longer days and more direct sunlight; in winter, it is tilted away.
5. People do not use only ten percent of their brains.
6. Shaving does not cause hair to grow back thicker or coarser. This belief is due to the fact that hair that has never been cut has a tapered end, whereas, after cutting, there is no taper . Thus, it appears thicker, and feels coarser due to the sharper, unworn edges.
7. Although common colds are seasonal, with more occurring during winter, experiments so far have failed to produce evidence that short-term exposure to cold weather or direct chilling increases susceptibility to infection, implying that the seasonal variation is instead due to a change in behaviors such as increased time spent indoors at close proximity to others.
8. There is no “cure” for split ends or damaged hair. Shampoos and conditioners that advertise themselves as being able to reverse damage or reduce split ends are bogus. Scientifically, the only way to “cure” split ends is by a simple haircut. Once the cuticle of the hair shaft is split, it can often still grow split, but can never be mended. Haircare products can be used to soften the texture by using fillers that attach to the hair shaft, making the hair appear healthier.
9. In spite of reports of successful non-surgical techniques for penis enlargement, there is no known scientific study that has demonstrated the efficacy of such techniques, other than surgery.
10. Warts on human skin are caused by viruses that are unique to humans (Human papillomavirus). Humans cannot catch warts from toads or other animals; the bumps on a toad are not warts.
11. Some bats use echolocation to navigate while flying in darkness. Bats are not blind, however. Their eyes are small and poorly developed, but they are still capable of sight, particularly long-range, and in fact can be severely disoriented by excessive light.
12. An earthworm does not become two worms when cut in half. An earthworm can survive being bisected, but only the front half of the worm (where the mouth is located) can survive, while the other half dries out or starves to death. If one cuts the worm too close to the saddle (the fat pink section where all of the worm’s vital organs are located) then the worm may die.
13. Plants do not metabolize carbon dioxide (CO2) directly into oxygen (O2). Light-dependent reactions capture the energy of light and consume water, producing high-energy molecules and releasing oxygen as a by-product. Light-independent reactions use the high-energy molecules to capture and chemically reduce carbon dioxide, producing carbohydrate precursors and water.
14. The blue colour of lakes and oceans is not only a reflection of the blue sky. Water looks blue because water is blue; the water molecules do absorb some light, and they absorb red frequencies more than blue.
15. It is not true that a mirror reverses left and right. It actually inverts front and back. The left and right sides of a person’s mirror image seem to be reversed because we are actually accustomed to everyone else’s left and right being reversed when they turn around to face us. If, instead of rotating on the spot to face us, people instead flipped over into a handstand, we would see their left and right remain the same, but their top and bottom being reversed from our own. The mirror image faces us without its left and right or top and bottom being reversed in this sense, which is why it is the reverse of what everyone else sees when they look at us.
16. Nowhere in the Bible is the fruit eaten by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden referred to as an apple. The fruit is called the “fruit of the tree” (that is, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil), and neither the fruit nor the tree is identified as belonging to a known species. In Middle English, as late as the 17th century “apple” was a generic term for all fruit other than berries but including nuts. However, also in continental European art from that period representing the Fall of Man the fruit is often depicted as an apple.
17. Even though many Christians have adopted abortion as a cornerstone principal to abolish as part of their religious principals, nowhere in the Bible is abortion indicated as being against God’s will or prohibited. In fact, according to the Bible (specifically, the book of Leviticus, which contains many laws not accepted by most modern Christians), killing a fetus is considered a property crime.
18. Genesis does not state that there were only two of every animal aboard Noah’s Ark. In fact, it states that there were to be seven pairs of every clean animal, and two pairs of every unclean animal.
19. It’s a popular misconception that Muslims believe that Martyrs are awarded 72 virgins in heaven. Nowhere in the Qu’ran is that stated.
20. Thomas Crapper did not invent the flush toilet, Thomas Edison did not invent the light bulb, and Henry Ford did not invent the automobile or the internal combustion engine. In all three cases, their contributions were in the area of improving and popularizing the devices in question. For example, Ford introduced the assembly line, and used it to bring the cost of automobiles into reach of many more people, and Thomas Edison refined the internal gases and filaments, making a bulb last longer. Neither did Guglielmo Marconi invent the radio, a patent which was filed before him by Nikola Tesla, a claim that was ratified by the US Supreme Court in 1943 in Tesla’s favour.
21. Pong was not the first video game. In fact, Tennis for Two, created in 1958, was one of the first electronic games to use a graphical display. The first commercially sold coin-operated video game, Computer Space, was created in 1971 by the future founders of Atari. Fearing that Computer Space had not been popular because of its complexity, Nolan Bushnell and Allan Alcorn created Pong in 1972 after Bushnell had seen a similar game at a trade show.

Gentlemen only ladies forbidden

Did the word “golf” originate as an acronym for “gentlemen only, ladies forbidden”? That’s a common old wives’ tale. Or, in this case, more likely an old husband’s tale.

No, “golf” is not an acronym for “gentlemen only, ladies forbidden.
Like most modern words, the word “golf” derives from older languages and dialects. In this case, the languages in question are medieval Dutch and old Scots.

The medieval Dutch word “kolf” or “kolve” meant “club.” It is believed that word passed to the Scots, whose old Scots dialect transformed the word into “golve,” “gowl” or “gouf.”

By the 16th Century, the word “golf” had emerged.