In some cases, eating feces may be an attention-seeking behavior. It's hard to argue with that statement actually.

Hey, that reminds me of a New York Times article I read a few years back.

Apparently the majority of NYC's pedestrian signals were installed in the 1960s and you could press a button to request a traffic light change to help you cross the road.

Then those buttons were decommissioned at a later date and have not worked since the 1980s or so. They're still there, and you can press them, but they do nothing.

Occasionally people will still press them, especially newcomers to the city, but it has no effect on the traffic, which will still change as the normal patterns indicate.

I believe it.

- A cockroach can live several weeks with its head cut off - it dies from starvation!

- In the year 2000, Pope John Paul II was named an "Honorary Harlem Globetrotter."!

- Most dust particles in your house are made from dead skin!

Originally posted by Omni Rex Draconis
"Combined, children in the US spend 6.3 billion hours colouring annually, almost 10,000 human lifetimes!"

- www.colourlovers.com Really? Wow! I think the maths also holds up too.

Divide 6.3 billion by 365.25 and you get the combined man-hours (or should that be kid-hours?) per day nationwide. That's about 17.2 million man-hours a day, combined.

Given that there's about 300 million US residents, then 17 million is (coincidentally) about 17% of them. That's eminently reasonable. May even be a little on the low side. Maybe kids make up about 20 or even 25% of the population, I'd hazard.

So all you'd need would be for each kid to spend about an hour a day coloring, and you'd get 17.2 man-hours a day. For 6.3 billion man-hours a year.

Far out! http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...lies/smile.gif

Seriously?

I colored so much...

Originally posted by Asher
Seriously?

I colored so much... Rainbows?

Sorry http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...es/biggrin.gif

Snopes is another site that does debunking, in particular of urban myths.

Both sites seem to have good factual sourcing to back them up. But they both seem to get pretty judgmental and high-horse moralistic on people for believing stuff that seems borderline plausible.

I liked the single line "Am I being petty?" in that blog you posted to, JulianD. I think it applied pretty well to the entire article, which was rather shrill in its "I'm-mad-as-hell" tone.

Personally, I reckon if you're going to correct somebody's mistake, it pays to do so diplomatically in all but the most extreme circumstances. :/

Saddam Hussein donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to a Detroit church and received a key to the city more than two decades ago, soon after he became president of Iraq. Where's that key now? http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ilies/cute.gif

Spinoza was gay.

Frankly, I'm surprised we didn't get a "dogs http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...lies/heart.gif http://www.discussworldissues.com/im...ons/icon14.gif" from the LordShiva yet.

Originally posted by SlowwHand


"Nutmeg is extremely poisonous if injected intravenously."

I wonder who the dimbass was that made this startling discovery? I know someone that went through every spice on my spice rack and rolled a sample joint from each. He was soooo ill afterward. http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...ilies/wink.gif

Selected entries from http://www.weird-websites.com/justweird/weird-facts.htm

Most lipstick contains fish scales! How about a kiss fishface?

Over 2500 left handed people a year are killed from using products made for right handed people! DOH

101 Dalmatians and Peter Pan are the only two Disney cartoon features with both parents that are present and don't die throughout the movie. But don't worry, they're all family films.

A barnacle has the largest penis of any other animal in the world in relation to its size. I just don't know what to say about this.

A female ferret will die if it goes into heat and cannot find a mate. Awwwwww.

A pregnant goldfish is called a twit and A whale's penis is called a dork. I think I'd rather be called a twit.

Evian (the bottled water) spelled backwards is "naive."
The Jokes on you.

If you feed a seagull Alka-Seltzer, its stomach will explode. I sure it took a million dollars of taxpayer money to figure this one out. My neighbor's kid would have done it for free.

Termites eat wood twice as fast when listening to heavy metal music. Another million dollars wasted.

The Declaration of Independence was written on hemp paper. I guess we know what they were smokin.

The original copy of the Declaration of Independence is lost. Yeah, they smoked it.

There are more nutrients in the cornflake package itself than there are in the actual cornflakes. Why an I not surprised.

Many more fun facts are there.

Originally posted by SlowwHand


"Nutmeg is extremely poisonous if injected intravenously."

I wonder who the dimbass was that made this startling discovery? Probably the same guy who first tried it anally.. http://www.discussworldissues.com/im...ons/icon14.gif

Apparently, the largest living organism by mass is an Aspen stand and the largest living organism by area is likely a fungus or a sea plant.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Largest_living_organism

The Aspen tree (Populus tremuloides) forms large stands of genetically identical trees (technically, stems) connected by a single underground root system. These trees form through root sprouts coming off an original parent tree, though the root system may not remain a single unit in all specimens. The largest known fully-connected Aspen is a grove in Utah nicknamed Pando, and some experts call it the largest[1] organism in the world, by mass or volume.[2] It covers 43 hectares (.43 km²) and is estimated to weigh 6,600 short tons (6,000 t). [3]

A giant fungus of the species Armillaria ostoyae in the Malheur National Forest in Oregon was found to span 8.9 km² (2,200 acres)[4], which would make it the largest organism by area. Whether or not this is an actual individual organism, however, is disputed: some tests have indicated that they have the same genetic makeup [5], but unless its mycelium is fully connected, it is a clonal colony of numerous smaller individuals. Another clonal colony that rivals the Armillaria and the Populus colonies in size is a strand of the giant marine plant, Posidonia oceanica, discovered in the Mediterranean Sea near the Balearic Islands. It covers a band roughly 8 km (4.3 miles) in length.[6] I guess we know where Frank Herbert got his idea from for the dominant form of life in "The Jesus Incident". (And likewise for Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri's dominant form of life on Planet.)

-mysoginist
-no known relationship with a woman
-hosted a young man under his roof
-received a letter from another young man saying he was jealous he couldn't live with him I miss the real Boris too http://www.discussworldissues.com/fo...lies/frown.gif

You aren't aware of the antics of real Boris?

You are at least four times more likely to choke to death on a Brazil nut than accidentally impregnate an otter.

The official fun/weird facts thread
 

Several different species of chestnut trees, especially the Chinese Chestnut, have flowers that give off a strong, unpleasant odor - said to be similar to the smell of human sperm.

Personally, I've never had a problem with it.