Although science has already demystified many of these urban legends in laboratories, there are still people who don’t know about these updates
Everybody has heard that old story that we only use 10% of our brains (and that, in a future who knows how far away, will allow the birth of creatures like “Lucy”, played in the movies by Scarlet Marvelous Johansson).
Your mother and/or grandmother surely believe that “catching cold” results in the right cold. And everyone knows that the moon has a dark side.
What many people don’t know is that all this (and several other scientific “certainties”) is just history for the ox to sleep.
Although science has already demystified a shovel of these urban legends from the laboratories, there are still people who don’t know about these updates.
See, in today’s SUPERLIST, some myths of science that almost everyone still believes.
We use only a part of the brain capacity
That science still doesn’t know much about the brain (like the origin of migraines, for example), is true. But one thing is a brave lie: that our brain has 90% of idle area. The truth, however, is that there isn’t even a square centimeter of brain that isn’t applied in some day-to-day task.
As each area of the brain has a specific function and we need all of them to have a functional life, we cannot say that there are unused parts.
The organ consumes 20% (i.e. one fifth) of all the energy produced by our body, and it is very unlikely that it would have developed as much if it had idle parts. There are people who even leave the brain there, only occupying the space between the two ears. But that’s where everyone has their problems, right?
The moon has a dark side
From here, from the Earth, we can see only 59% of the lunar surface. The other 41% is what science used to call “the dark side of the Moon”. But – surprise! – this dark side receives sunlight just like the other!
The difference is that, because of the phenomenon called “captured rotation”, we only see the same side of the star, which gives us the sensation that a part of it becomes dark and dark forever.
The full moon affects mood
They say that the moon phases affect the liquid present in your brain, causing mood swings, and the police in some places even prepare for a greater wave of violence on those days of the month. But unless you are a werewolf, the full moon has nothing to do with your (bad) mood.
It’s been a while since scientists discovered that one has nothing to do with the other: in 1985, U.S. psychologists James Rotton and Ivan Kelly confronted 37 studies on the subject with statistics on admissions to psychiatric institutions, murders, car accidents, suicides and crimes in general.
And the result was that there was no connection between the full moon and an increase in these numbers. Now, if you are the eighth child and have seven older sisters, you can start to worry.
Sugar makes children hyperactive
Every good children’s party has a beautiful and seductive candy table. And also kids that look like a bunch of gremlins running, jumping, screaming and making a lot of mess. Don’t blame the candy table.
Scientific research has proven that it is the very presence of other children that makes the little ones superanimate. But it’s not to release the sweets to the gurizada: too much sugar is associated to obesity, insulin resistance (basic condition for diabetes), hypertension and even the increase of certain cancers.
Lightning never falls twice in the same place
This has already turned into a proverb. But, to start the conversation, the lightning does not fall. Technically, it rises from the earth to the atmosphere.
Then, lightning is an immense electrostatic discharge in search of a place to discharge – and he’s not exactly worried about choosing unpublished places.
The highest points of a perimeter are certainly more attractive, which means that the lightning rod of your building (or the neighboring building) has probably been hit several times – and in many of them you haven’t even noticed.
Throwing a coin from a building too high can kill someone
You will never do this, because you are a nice person. But you can rest assured: if you’re walking around New York and you get hit in the head by a little coin thrown by some pig spirit from above the Empire State Building, you won’t die. You can have a chicken, but that’s it.
Because they are a disc, coins have bad aerodynamics. So, the coin you play will fall spinning, which greatly slows down your speed.
Besides, it is light, and it doesn’t have enough weight to exert a lethal pressure on the cranial box.
But if someone decides to throw a heavier object or with better aerodynamics, then, yes, it can be fatal.
In certain contries dropping objects from windows is a criminal offense, which can be punished with a fine and imprisonment.
Antibiotics kill viruses
No, no, no and no! You can’t take antibiotics for any cold! Antibiotics, by definition, kill bacteria – and viruses have absolutely nothing to do with it! The result of a misuse of this kind of medicine can be catastrophic. In fact, it already is. If not taken properly, bacteria will develop resistance to antibiotics. Hence the emergence of superbacteria that we have seen recently. Viral disease is treated with antiviral, a type of drug that should also be prescribed by a doctor.
Fish have 5 second memory
“Fish memory” can no longer be used as a synonym for bad or weak memory. In fact, even goldfish – which have the greatest fame for being forgotten – have memories that last for months!
It is this ability to remember things, in fact, responsible for them not being extinguished. The fish store the acquired knowledge and avoid falling into the same predator traps.
Genetics decides whether or not you can make a straw with the language
There are people who can, there are people who can’t. But research from 1940 showed that genetics has bigger things to worry about than the straw of your tongue.
In the research, some children were able to learn how to do the straw. Eleven years later, a group of scientists demonstrated that the number of children who could roll their tongue had grown by 20% in school age children between 6 and 12 years old. If this number grew, then the ability could not be purely genetic.
Dolphins are the most intelligent animals after the human being
They are cute and very charismatic, but they are not among the most intelligent of Noah’s Ark. Scientists spent several years looking for a true dolphin language (one of the signs that demonstrates intelligence in living beings), but they never found it. In addition, intelligence tests with animals have placed dogs, orangutans, rats and even pigeons in front of these sea mammals.
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