I don’t think your math works there. Whatever the convicts’ proportion among the original settlers, the share of the overall population which claims descent from them should increase over time, unless all the convicts’ children were only breeding with other convicts’ children, and so on.
The point is that the convict contribution to the modern Australian gene pool is very small. “Around 1.5% of living Australians” is the accepted number here by people who did do the maths in recent times. Anecdotally that seems correct: I’ve known a couple of people who have proven convict ancestry, and hundreds whose ancestors got here in different ways, mostly gold-rush era immigrants (like mine) or from post-WW2 immigration.
I’ve no idea how many living Americans can genuinely claim descent from the Puritans of the Mayflower era, but I’d guess it’d be a similar figure, maybe less than 1%. The founding population was swamped by later migrants in both countries. So it’s a misconception to say that Australia was populated by British convicts in the same way it would be to say that America was populated by British Puritans.
Kennedy never called himself a jelly doughnut.
from
http://urbanlegends.about.com/cs/historical/a/jfk_berliner.htm
This old thread came to mind based on two misconceptions I’ve recently encountered (and not for the first time):
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An exchange rate does not in and of itself tell you anything about the relative strength of two economies, nor how expensive things will be in either country. If it takes two American dollars to buy one Ruritanian mark, that means neither that the American economy is twice as strong nor half as strong as Ruritania’s (you’ll see people go back and forth on that). Before the Euro when one dollar bought a thousand-odd Italian lira, no one thought the American economy was a thousand times stronger than Italy’s, but people don’t reach the same obvious conclusion when exchange rates with other currencies happen to be a lot closer.
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A lot of people don’t realize that diet sodas have no calories, and will chide you to quit drinking them if you’re on a diet. Yes, I know that diet sodas have other chemicals that may be harmful, but you’ll often hear people talking explicitly about the calories and sugar you’re taking in drinking a Diet Coke, and will be incredulous when you tell them that you’re not, in fact, taking in either one.
Diet Coke is liquid plutonium. I read it on a blog.
Well, since you brought it up, let’s have some fun.
Actually, yes they are. More specifically, they’re “canadensis”, which can be translated to “Canada geese” or, as more people say, “Canadian geese”. What’s the most accurate? I’m not sure, and it hardly matters. But they indeed “are called Canadian geese.”
No doubt Hawthorne had something to do with it:
Seems to me that a lot more think that since diet drinks have few or no calories, they can consume huge amounts with no adverse effects.
No, they’re not, unless you have seen their visas and know for a fact their country of origin is Canada. They are no more “Canadian” than a Virginia Rail is “Virginian”.
Thanks for linking to this; that’s a good explanation, if it’s accurate (and I assume it is).
We still wouldn’t have been able to keep from snickering about it if Kennedy had visited Hamburg, Frankfurt, or Vienna instead of Berlin, though.
That argument won’t work, or else you’d have England muffins and France fries.
And you don’t. QED.
Not sure if its a common misconception but I certainly found it an odd question, a couple of months ago a colleague at work approached me and asked if I could settle something she’d been discussing with a friend. Namely she was under the impression that the only aircraft that could fly at supersonic speed was the Concorde, a little further questioning determined that she believed that the Concorde was the only aircraft ever to fly faster than sound.
I’m not making fun of her, we all have gaps in our knowledge, and I imagine it went from “Concorde is the only supersonic civilian aircraft” to “Concorde is the only supersonic aircraft” but it was certainly a little eyebrow-raising!
That is a little odd. It indicates that she knows nothing about military aircraft. I am not sure why someone would think an airliner could fly supersonic but military planes like an SR-71 Blackbird could not. Even jet fighters can do it on afterburner routinely. Has she never heard of Chuck Yeager and the Bell X1 plus all the ones that flew several times the speed of sound after that?
The Concorde is out of service probably forever now as are all plans for supersonic airliners but there are a whole lot of military planes that can break the sound barrier at will.
Not to mention that we don’t have America bald eagles, Africa lions, Asia and India elephants etc. All the other animals take the same names as the people, so why should geese from Canada be a special case?
From which cite: The Canada Goose is often incorrectly referred to as the “Canadian Goose”. With a link to the Encyclopedia Britannica article saying “the term Canadian geese is incorrect.” Seems pretty authoritative to me.
Until now.
That a healthy person can get diabetes from consuming too much sugar.
This is flat out wrong, sugar consumption is unrelated to acquiring diabetes unless we’re talking about decades long lifestyle factors leading to type 2.
That asthma is psychosomatic/caused by high emotions, this one is REALLY annoying.
OK this is probably just Irish-American stuff transplanted back onto Ireland but wearing green for St. Patrick’s Day isn’t a thing in Ireland. That is, plenty of people wear green, but if you don’t nobody would notice, there’s no forfeit. Also, wearing orange wouldn’t make anyone bat an eye lid. The flag has both colours but even still, nobody gives a flying fuck.
There’s also the notion that St. Patrick’s Day isn’t a big thing in Ireland. It very much is. We even get a day off on Monday 'cos of it. 
I think this idea stems from the fact that Irish festivities weren’t exactly amazing by comparison with our cousins across the water and only in recent decades have we caught up with American St. Patrick’s Day parades in pomp, expense, etc.
Then the old corned beef and cabbage etc. etc.
I know, I found it really strange but then I personally know nothing at all about, for example, economics beyond the very basics (its one subject I just can’t grok).
That artificial sweeteners cause all manner of disease. Or, as my neighbour said to me yesterday, that we have “no idea at all what they do to the body”. Also that natural alternatives to sugar are somehow better. So for example using honey instead of sugar is better, when actually honey is pretty much the same thing as sugar.
You can borrow some green dye for your rivers if you like. We’ve got plenty. That should help!
Ooooh! I have a (silly) conundrum with this one. The Irish themed “pub” near my mom’s house has really excellent corned beef and cabbage. Some of the best I’ve ever had. So do I stick to my hipster disdain for the lack of authenticity, or do enjoy the noms? Decisions, decisions… 
Happy St. Patricks Day!