Useless Facts

[Pauldohert]

Websites that expose untruths on other websites are of course 100% true.

 

[Kraj]

Websites that expose untruths on other websites are of course 100% true.

I find it interesting that humans tend to be more skeptical of someone who says, "That's a load of crap" than of the person who actually made the crap up in the first place.

 

[FoFa]

What does a parent with a big ego do when his kid's shelf pilels up with soccer trophies, Little League trophies, and swim trophies? According to a woman who runs a California trophy making business, the proud dad (proud of himself anyway) orders her to make up some old-looking trophies with his name on them so he can regain household bragging rights.

 

[FoFa]

Stupid Science
The U.S. Space program spent $18 million on the Mariner I to get a close look at the plant Venus. Never made it. A few minutes into it's flight, the unmanned Mariner I crashed into the Atlantic Ocean. What malfunctioned? Nothing. The computer controlling the ship's takeoff did exactly what it was programmed to do. But the programmer had left a minus sign (-) off one of the directions, and that made all the difference.

 

[jsanders]

Yes mistakes are indeed costly. But unfortunately many would use this as an excuse to end the space program.

One of the few remaining, American, pure sciences.

 

[FoFa]

I think more along the lines of appropriate to the Access forums is what a simple programmer error can mean,

 

[statsman]

Websites that expose untruths on other websites are of course 100% true.

Would this mean that 2 wrongs CAN make a right?

 

[statsman]

Stupid Science
The U.S. Space program spent $18 million on the Mariner I to get a close look at the plant Venus. Never made it. A few minutes into it's flight, the unmanned Mariner I crashed into the Atlantic Ocean. What malfunctioned? Nothing. The computer controlling the ship's takeoff did exactly what it was programmed to do. But the programmer had left a minus sign (-) off one of the directions, and that made all the difference.

Wasn't there another one where a ground controller sent incorrect directions to a probe. The probe was unable to understand the directions and self-destructed.

 

[Andromeda]

lol... I love this thread so far.. it's not that all useless facts

 

[jsanders]

Luckily for us the Europeans didn’t think the cost of crossing the Atlantic 500 years ago was too high.

 

[Ron_dK]

Luckily for us the Europeans didn’t think the cost of crossing the Atlantic 500 years ago was too high.

True.
The Dutch founded New Amsterdam in 1624 in the New Netherlands province.
After some fight, New Amsterdam was sold to the British for one guilder and was renamed New York in 1674.

 

[FoFa]

When baseball rookie Jim Wynn singled in a 1963 game, Mets first baseman Frank Thomas asked him if he'd mind stepping off the bag for a minute so he could "kick out the dust". Being new to the "bigs", Wynn did as he was asked by a veteran. He was promptly tagged out by Thomas, who had hidden the ball in his glove.

 

[FoFa]

When France conducted nuclear tests in the South Pacific in 1995, the French ambassador to New Zealand tried to calm everyone's concerns by explaining, "They aren't bombs. They are exploding artifacts."

 

[FoFa]

The QWERTY keyboard was designed to slow down typists by putting the most frequently typed letters under control of the weakest left-hand fingers. The nineteenth-century machines weren't mechanically trustworthy enough to keep up with ast typists. Now word processors can go much faster, but the old slow-down keyboard arrangement remains the same because no one wants to learn a new one.

 

[FoFa]

The National Institue on Alcohol Abuse spent a million dollars in the 70's to discover if drunk fish are more aggressive than sober fish. Turns out they are, which is why you never want to go fisiihng after the fish have been drinking heavily.

 

[FoFa]

Don't know if this is fact or fiction (a little to bizaar for fact me thinks), but I did run across it, and it is rather interesting.
Taking a different approach to space flight, the african nation of Zambia decided to send it's own astronauts to the moon by using a catapult. Zambian research scientists trained volunteers for the rigors of space flight by sealing them in an oil drum and rolling them down a hill.

 

[FoFa]

In 2003, a Virginia bank robber set a record for botching the job. He robbed a bank, then left a trail of dropped $100 bills al the way to his car, where he couldn't make a getaway because he locked his keys inside. He tried to break one of the windows, but wasn't strong enough to smash the glass. When he saw people from the bank coming after him, he turned his gun on them, and shot himself in the leg. Finally the cops gave him a break and took him off to jail.

 

[lmnop7854]

This could easily become the Darwin Awards thread.

Lisa

 

[FoFa]

English politicians are a bit different, which is how Screaming Lord Sutch came to run for Parliament from the Monster Raving Loony Party. His Platform? A campaign promise to improve Britian's climate by towing the entire island into the mediterranean.

 

[FoFa]

Dumb Product Warnings:
Label on a baby stroller. "Remove child before folding."
Makes you wonder why they needed that label huh?