# Common Misconceptions Many Reasonably Intelligent People Have and Your Corrections **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 9, 2011, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226 "2011-05-09T02:24:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/241 "2011-05-13T06:10:05Z")
Some reasonably intelligent people apparently have little idea of how specialized fields they don’t practice are. My pet example is that, as someone specialized in programming, I’m not going to be much use in figuring out why a specific piece of software I’ve never used has ruined one of your files. I might have good guesses, and I can weed out the obvious nonsense others have thrown out as possible answers, but that’s it. It’s probably farther outside of my experience than the heart is outside of the average podiatrist’s experience: All physicians must, at least, pass detailed courses on general human anatomy and physiology, whereas the world of software is so huge, and individual software so varied, that once you get outside what you’ve used personally, ‘intelligent prodding’ (possibly with the help of documentation) is the best you can do. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/242 "2011-05-13T06:45:28Z")
> [@gurujulp](#): > > I have never heard of someone thinking that gravity is caused by rotation. Where did you hear that? I haven’t seen it since it first came out, but I seem to recall this notion from the movie _2001: A Space Odyssey_, as an explanation on the rotation of the space station. But I could be imagining, too. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 11:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/243 "2011-05-13T11:06:50Z")
re: the solstice: I read “days get longer in summer” as “when summer comes, the days are longer.” That is of course true, but if summer begins on June 20, it’s also of course true that the days start getting shorter. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/244 "2011-05-13T12:19:13Z")
Yeah, that’s what frustrated me about this so called popular belief - I think everyone really knows that there are more daylight hours in summer than in winter, which is perfectly true (for everywhere outside of the equatorial countries). ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/245 "2011-05-13T12:28:58Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > I haven’t seen it since it first came out, but I seem to recall this notion from the movie _2001: A Space Odyssey_, as an explanation on the rotation of the space station. But I could be imagining, too. Well yes, rotation can cause something similar in effect to gravity but you need to be on the _inside_ of the surface such as like a hampster in an exercise wheel, if you’re on the outside, like we are on Earth, the spin will reduce the effect of gravity. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 12:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/246 "2011-05-13T12:30:26Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > That’s not only silly, it can lead to other silly ideas. For instance, I regularly see people arguing that “Monogamy is outdated and unrealistic; perhaps it made sense when we only lived to be 35, but now that we live to be 75 or 80, well, it’s just not natural to live with one other person that long.” > > Silly argument, because even 2,000 years ago, a 20 year old couple who got married could expect to live together for 40 or 50 years. did female mortality due to pregnancy/labor complications have a signifant impact on average life expectancy in centuries past? ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/247 "2011-05-13T12:54:18Z")
One that bothers me, especially in educational circles is misuse of the terms “positive reinforcement” and “negative reinforcement”. It seems that most people will define positive reinforcement as something like “rewarding proper behavior”. So, little Johnny raises his hand instead of shouting out and he gets a gold star. This is (probably\*) an accurate description, but for the wrong reasons. The real problem comes when people try to identify negative reinforcement. Johnny shouts out the answer instead of raising his hand and the teacher yells at him: negative reinforcement, right? No. Reinforcement (whether positive or negative) occurs when the consequent reinforces the behavior (i.e. makes it more likely to occur again). Positive and negative in this context simply refers to whether you are adding something to the situation (like a gold star or praise) or subtracting (giving a break from homework or something). The opposite of reinforcement is punishment, which can also be positive or negative: yelling would be positive punishment, while taking a recess away would be negative punishment. So, while praising Johnny for acting appropriately is (probably\*) positive reinforcement, it’s not because either the behavior or the consequent are objectively “positive”. Yelling at Johnny is at best positive punishment, but could, in fact, be positive reinforcement, if Johnny is acting out because he is seeking attention. These things can actually get sort of complicated. Sending a kid to the principal’s office could be one of four things: positive punishment (if he hates the principal’s office), negative punishment (if he really likes class), positive reinforcement (if he likes the principal’s office) or negative reinforcement (if he hates class). It’s the sort of thing that I don’t necessarily expect the general populace to correctly identify, but it really bothers me when educators don’t seems to understand the distinction. I even took classroom management and Ed. Psych classes where we were shown videos where so called “experts” misidentified negative reinforcement. \*I say “probably” because what defines whether or not something is actually reinforcement is the actual result. If the behavior increases, then it’s been reinforced. If it doesn’t, then it hasn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/248 "2011-05-13T13:32:17Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > You could probably make a few dollars betting people how Galileo died. > > There are people who’ll swear he was burned at the stake or drawn & quartered. You can lighten their wallets a bit by betting them he died of old age. Another misconception about Galileo is that he went blind because he looked at the Sun through a telescope. He did go blind, but [from cataracts and glaucoma, or possibly another eye disease,](http://mintaka.sdsu.edu/GF/vision/Galileo.html) about 25 years after he looked at the Sun through the telescope. That doesn’t mean you should look at the Sun through a telescope, but it’s not why Galileo went blind. ---
**Author:** ![Nzinga\_Seated](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5ac83/32.png) [@Nzinga\_Seated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nzinga_Seated)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/249 "2011-05-13T14:03:52Z")
> [@Anne\_Neville](#): > > …That doesn’t mean you should look at the Sun through a telescope… Aw, shit. Too late. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/250 "2011-05-13T14:31:50Z")
> [@Machine\_Elf](#): > > did female mortality due to pregnancy/labor complications have a signifant impact on average life expectancy in centuries past? For what it is worth, I remember being told at a dig in Britain back in the 70s that one of the leading causes of death of women after smoke inhalation was death by fire [cooking, clothing catches on fire, screaming alpha] with childbirth complications and illness tied at a third unless it was one of the plague years. ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/251 "2011-05-13T16:46:26Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > Right. Except, of course, when Alabama gets down to -20°F it’s the end of Western Civilization, but when eastern Montana gets that cold it’s probably January. As a Northerner, this is something that’s always amused me about the South. If a half-inch of snow falls in, say, Texas, civilization grinds to a halt. If a half-inch of snow falls in, say, Michigan, most people won’t even bother to shovel their driveway. It takes several inches of snow (at least 6) before basic activities like driving become problematic. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/252 "2011-05-13T18:27:32Z")
> [@Diceman](#): > > As a Northerner, this is something that’s always amused me about the South. If a half-inch of snow falls in, say, Texas, civilization grinds to a halt. If a half-inch of snow falls in, say, Michigan, most people won’t even bother to shovel their driveway. It takes several inches of snow (at least 6) before basic activities like driving become problematic. [Old thread you might find interesting](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=525635) ---
**Author:** ![Alka\_Seltzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/253 "2011-05-13T18:55:11Z")
The seeds aren’t the hottest part of a chilli, it’s the paler flesh inside that they are attached to. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/254 "2011-05-13T19:02:41Z")
> [@Diceman](#): > > As a Northerner, this is something that’s always amused me about the South. If a half-inch of snow falls in, say, Texas, civilization grinds to a halt. If a half-inch of snow falls in, say, Michigan, most people won’t even bother to shovel their driveway. It takes several inches of snow (at least 6) before basic activities like driving become problematic. Well, two things: 1. In the South, snowfall very often occurs on ground that’s slightly warmer than freezing. It melts, and then refreezes as temperatures drop, forming a sheet of very slick ice. I’ve had more than one person from the North move to North Carolina and tell me they’ve never driven in such hazardous conditions. 2. If you’re going to have several big snowstorms every year, it makes a lot of sense to invest in a lot of snow removal equipment for your community. If you normally only have one significant snowfall every few years, it makes a lot more sense not to invest in a lot of snow removal equipment, instead just shutting some services down for a day or two every few years. Now, my favorite misconception. It’s only a misconception within certain fields, but I trot it out whenever some know-it-all smugly informs the room that a tomato is a fruit, not a vegetable. “Well, sure,” I say, “but only if a strawberry isn’t a fruit.” ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/255 "2011-05-13T19:42:53Z")
Three things. People in the South really don’t know how to drive on snow and ice, in addition to the other two things. And are you saying that a tomato does not have seeds in it? Or are you refering to the fact that tomatoes are usually USED as vegetables in cooking? ---
**Author:** ![Butterscotch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/dc4da7/32.png) [@Butterscotch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Butterscotch)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/256 "2011-05-13T19:43:08Z")
The one that annoys me is: “It’s natural, it’s good for you.” Snake venom is natural, doesn’t mean I should be chugging it down without a care… ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/257 "2011-05-13T19:45:25Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > Three things. People in the South really don’t know how to drive on snow and ice, in addition to the other two things. Yeah, but folks ragging on things closing down in the south on snow days all take that one for granted :). > [@](#): > > And are you saying that a tomato does not have seeds in it? Or are you refering to the fact that tomatoes are usually USED as vegetables in cooking? Sort of the latter. I’m saying that tomatoes are botanically a fruit, but that it’s perfectly proper to call them a vegetable, since when we talk about tomatoes we’re usually talking about them in cuisine, where they normally function as a vegetable. And I’m saying that if you’re talking botanically, then a strawberry isn’t a fruit. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2011, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/258 "2011-05-13T21:33:18Z")
They don’t KNOW (unless they’ve been here) just how badly most of us drive on snow and ice. Around these heah parts, most people don’t seem to realize that they need to allow for extra slowing and stopping distance. As for cuisine and botanic uses of the word fruit, I guess that you’re right. Even when I eat tomatoes raw, I’ll put some salt on them, and usually oil and vinegar too, which I generally don’t do with fruit. Tomatoes have more of a savory flavor to me, rather than sweet, and if I’m using fruit in a cuisine sense, it implies sweetness. Except for today’s strawberries. I move that we should classify today’s strawberries as “small red heart shaped styrofoam thingies”. ---
**Author:** ![california\_jobcase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@california\_jobcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/california_jobcase)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2011, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/259 "2011-05-14T02:43:38Z")
A strawberry is an aggregate accessory fruit. Botanically speaking. linky citey- [Strawberry - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garden_strawberry) ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2011, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226/260 "2011-05-14T03:03:02Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > And I’m saying that if you’re talking botanically, then a strawberry isn’t a fruit. Strawberries ARE fruit. What they’re NOT are berries, which have to be formed from a single ovary. The same holds true for Raspberries. And blackberries. Tomatoes, funnily enough, ARE berries. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226.md?page=12) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/common-misconceptions-many-reasonably-intelligent-people-have-and-your-corrections/581226.md?page=14)