1. Cracking joints enlarges/causes arthritis. You can crunch your fingers as much as you like — arthritis will not be from this. The story about the American doctor Donald Unger from California spread around the world. In 1998, he published a serious article about a study he had done on himself. For 60 years, Unger daily snapped the fingers of one hand, the left. The second, right — never clicked. When, after 60 years, he found no signs of arthritis on the “clicky” limb, he came to the conclusion that the crunching of the joints leading to arthritis was nothing more than a myth.
2. There are only three states of matter: solid, liquid and gas. Until the 20th century, scientists believed that all substances can be in one of three phases — gaseous, liquid or solid. It is these phases that are called the aggregate states of matter. However, modern science has stepped far forward and now it is known about the existence of a dozen states of aggregation of substances.
3. Lightning never strikes the same place twice. The probability that lightning will strike the same place twice is 45%, not 0%, as is commonly believed.
4. Fish only have a few seconds of memory. This opinion has been around for a long time. And there is even a saying: “You have a memory like a fish”, which means quite small. It’s not true about 3 seconds. It is a myth. Fish are vertebrates, and all vertebrates have a brain. Which is already responsible for such a function as memory. Scientists have proven that fish can remember at least 2 weeks.
5. Many people still believe that MSG (monosodium glutamate flavor enhancer) is a poison. It’s no more harmful than regular salt.
6. Bats are blind. In fact, they see relatively well. Like most mammals, they do not have color vision. In complete darkness, the mouse is able to do without it, using only echolocation.
7. You may develop warts from contact with frogs/toads. Warts are caused by the human papillomavirus through contact with the virus through broken skin. It is a human-specific virus that cannot spread between different species.
8. Bulls get angry when they see red. In fact, this is a myth — cows and bulls see the world in black and white and do not distinguish red from green or blue. In the case of bullfighting, it is not the color that irritates them, but the movement. In addition, during the battle, animals are made angry by sticking sharp peaks into them — it is natural that a bull furious with pain will rush at everything that moves. And the red color is rather a tribute to tradition, it symbolizes the blood and death of one of the participants in the battle.
9. Napoleon was short. The fact that the emperor of France was short seems incontrovertible and is not even questioned — after all, immediately after his death, a French doctor measured Napoleon’s height and wrote down: 5 feet and 2 inches. If translated into centimeters, then Napoleon’s height was 157 cm. If you calculate the emperor’s height in French feet, then it will be 168 cm. Considering that this height was recorded by the emperor at 51, it can be argued that in his youth his height could be 170 cm. Not the last role in shaping the image of Napoleon among people was played by enemy propaganda, which quickly seized on the rumors and began to present the Corsican as a kind of restless dwarf.
10. Chewing gum is digested only after 7 years, if it is swallowed. In fact, although chewing gum is a very sticky substance, it does not stick to the walls of the stomach and is perfectly excreted from the body.
11. Carrots can improve eyesight. We have all said many times that carrots help improve our vision, because they are rich in vitamin A. Carrots actually contain this vitamin, but consuming it in large quantities does not improve our vision. The myth originated during the Second World War. The British intelligentsia spread the rumor that their pilots ate a lot of carrots, so they successfully destroyed the German targets. In reality, they just used radar. In an attempt to hide the existence of their technology, the British spread this myth, which is believed to this day.
12. Fresh is always better than frozen. Frozen fruits and vegetables can be just as healthy as fresh ones. Before freezing, raw foods are cut when they have the most nutritional value and transported to factories where they are frozen. This way they retain all their nutrients. When vegetables and fruits lie on the shelf, they lose their useful properties, as they spend a long time in warm and humid air.
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