Random Fact Sheet #129 – The World in 40 Facts

If humans lived long enough, they would all eventually develop cancer. This is because of inherent limits in the DNA repair mechanisms.

2. Coffee does not dehydrate you. In fact, it hydrates the body nearly the same as water.

3. Jurassic Park's visual effects were so groundbreaking to filmmakers that it inspired Peter Jackson to begin work on Lord of the Rings, George Lucas to start on the Star Wars prequels, and Stanley Kubrick to invest in his pet project, A.I (Artificial Intelligence).

4. In 1931, a 15-year-old girl suffering from paralysis was mistakenly injected with the blood from a pet parrot after her family physician called a nearby hospital for advice and misheard “parent's blood” as “parrot's blood.”

5. Crocodiles play by carrying flowers in their mouths and giving their smaller companions rides on their backs.

During their 2002 World Cup qualifying match against Australia, American Samoa team had 19 of its players out because of passport issues and the under-20 team replacements were unavailable due to school exams. As a result, they only fielded one regular player. They lost 31-0.

7. Almost any parent-child combination of eye colors can occur. The genetics of eye color are complex and has moved on from the original thought that eye color was determined by a single gene, with brown being dominant and blue recessive.

8. Hospitals in the United States report a 24% spike in heart attack visits due to patients getting one hour of less sleep when switching to daylight saving time.

9. An estimated one in fifty people suffer from Aphantasia, a condition in which the person’s “mind eye” is blind and they can’t picture things just by thinking about them.

10. When Peru’s national football team qualified for the 2018 World Cup, their fan celebrations were so loud that it produced enough of a seismic wave to trigger earthquake alerts in Lima, the capital city of Peru.

The band Boston, the album and the hit single “More Than a Feeling” were all created by one person, Tom Scholz, mixing tracks in his basement. The actual band was formed later to play the songs live.

12. An 18-year-old from the United Kingdom was arrested after attending a youth group session about dealing with anti-social behavior, as he had an anti-social behavior order banning him from congregating with 4 or more youths and the group was larger than 3.

13. Male menstruation was considered a normal part of growing up in 20th century Egypt, but it turned out they were actually suffering from an endemic parasitic bladder infection called blood fluke (Schistosoma) which caused bloody urine.

14. In 1934, Swiss banking secrecy laws were strengthened to encourage Jews of Central and Eastern Europe who fearful of Nazis to hide their assets in Swiss banks. After a majority of those depositors died during the Holocaust, the laws were used to wrongfully deny their heirs access to those accounts.

15. The Romans used to send each other little postcards made of a thin layer of flexible wood, written in ink and then folded in two. About 400 tablets (in fragments) have been found near where Hadrian's Wall would be built. They tell us a great deal about the nature of life on the Roman frontier.

The US Post office delivers mail to the people of Supai, Arizona by the only way possible, by mule.

17. Because of a treaty signed in 1795, the state of New York still gives 150 bushels of salt to the Onondaga people every spring.

18. In 2016, Hawaiian Airlines won the right to weigh passengers to prevent crash landings.

19. A scientist named Doctor Claire Rind wanted to design a collision-avoidance system for cars, so she made locusts watch Star Wars while monitoring the reactions of their visual systems. A robot was programmed with the data obtained and was able to avoid collisions 91% of the time.

20. The “Aroma of Tacoma” is a putrid and terrible smelling odor akin to rotten eggs, associated with the city of Tacoma, Washington since the 1940’s.

More than 40,000 people apply to visit the extreme haunted house McKamey Manor every year. In two decades, nobody has ever completed the haunt.

22. The frontal lobes atrophy as we age. This doesn’t hurt intelligence, but it is responsible for inhibiting inappropriate thoughts. This is why adults have greater difficulty in thinking and start voicing ideas they would have previously suppressed.

23. The 17th century Ottoman Sultan, Murad VI, made the consumption of coffee a capital offense. In addition to closing Istanbul’s many coffeehouses, he would disguise himself as a commoner and stalk the streets of Istanbul with his executioner, beheading any coffee-drinkers that he caught.

24. The cornea doesn't have blood vessels but instead is nourished by tears. The cornea remarkably can heal minor abrasions in under 72 hours.

25. According to Fermi estimation, an average person in the United States of America meets 10.76 murderers in their lives.