# Ever been shocked at what some people don't know? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 10, 2012, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416 "2012-03-10T22:36:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 31
**Author:** ![Floater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/dc4da7/32.png) [@Floater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Floater)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2012, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/601 "2012-03-26T09:46:41Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > If Finnish is like Hungarian (and it is, in some respects, being Finno-Ugric and all) the difference between a long and short s is, well, the length of the sound. Both are unvoiced. That is correct and the rule applies for both vowels and consonants. Finns called Esa generally get their names pronounced Eesa by Swedes (and as far as I know there is no such name). ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2012, 9:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/602 "2012-03-26T09:51:38Z")
> [@tdn](#): > > I need to put myself in this thread. Though this is more ignorance than stupidity. > > I spent the last couple of weeks, among other things, visiting my cute little niece at her cute little college. It was so quaint! Community college, I believe. > > I asked my brother-in-law if they were, like, into sports or anything. Do they have some sort of team? My BIL’s jaw dropped to the floor, then he laughed. “Um, the Gators? You’ve heard of Tim Tebow, right?” Consider me schooled. Ehr… if it’s the University of Florida it’s not a CC. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2012, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/603 "2012-03-26T14:02:28Z")
> [@mnemosyne](#): > > The fact is, I’d simply never thought about it before and while a few moment’s thought made it abundantly clear, and even very logical and clever, there was - and is - still a part of me that doesn’t want to believe it. I don’t know why, but the mental image of large cables connecting parts of the world across the oceans just blows my mind. Do they stretch across undersea mountains and trenches? Do sharks occasionally run into them? I’ve since read wikis and seen photos and even watched a Discovery Channel show about a cable-laying boat and I know it’s all true… but, _really? WOW!_ > > One day, I want to go to a spot on the beach where the cables come up out of the water and just look at them. It occurred to me just now that I probably was close when I was in PEI or even in Brighton, UK. > > Underwater cables as long as the ocean. Wow. I’m not sure this qualifies as something you were curiously ignorant about, as I would guess many people today don’t realize the engineering marvels of underwater cables that were achieved back then. Also, it’s frankly a difficult thing to grasp. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2012, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/604 "2012-03-26T14:50:25Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Ehr… if it’s the University of Florida it’s not a CC. Well, yeah, NOW I know that. ---
**Author:** ![sjc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e5b9ba/32.png) [@sjc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sjc)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2012, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/605 "2012-03-26T21:04:25Z")
I knew a guy who was into wilderness survival stuff and was raising rabbits for the skin and meat. One day I was talking to him (while he was feeding the rabbits) and I mentioned that rigor mortis didn’t last forever. He was like: “Rigor mortis, what’s that?” I replied that it was the Latin name for when a body goes stiff after death, assuming that he just didn’t know the term. As near as I can tell, he was unaware of the existence of this phenomenon. I didn’t quite confirm this because I was too flabbergasted to clear it up without sounding like I thought he was an idiot–which I preferred not to do. It seems natural to me that your average person would have heard of rigor mortis by the time they reach adulthood, maybe from cop show or a detective novel, maybe from the news, or just from the aether so to speak. Still, it doesn’t seem outlandish that someone who lived the comfortable modern urban/suburban life sheltered from death would perhaps not have heard of it. What really surprised me was this guy who was killing rabbits (and sometimes skinning roadkill for their pelts) would have never heard of or noticed that dead creatures stiffen up for a period of time after death. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2012, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/606 "2012-03-26T21:17:52Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > I’m not sure this qualifies as something you were curiously ignorant about, as I would guess many people today don’t realize the engineering marvels of underwater cables that were achieved back then. > > Also, it’s frankly a difficult thing to grasp. Well, my attempts to explain/determine how the first overseas phone call must have happened without a cable connecting both ends were… sadly hilarious… but I take your point. It might not be such common knowledge, but it was still a moment of :smack: (As a result of this conversation, once in a while, I’ll pick up a tin can and pretend to call my husband through it…without a string connecting them, like a wirreless tincan [telephone](http://icecreamjournal.turkeyhill.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/tin-can.jpg)!) ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Rik](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mister_rik/32/491_2.png) [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/607 "2012-03-27T02:30:04Z")
I just remembered one. Back when I was 23 or so (1989-90) I had a retail job, where I worked in a store’s **electronics** department. I was frequently befuddled by customers, usually “older” folks, who would pick up a functioning display model of, say, a digital clock, carry it to the counter, and ask me, “Is this electric?” I honestly wasn’t entirely sure what they were asking. They’re holding a clock that is displaying the time in big, red, glowing numbers and asking if it’s “electric”. I had composed a number of sarcastic replies in my head that involved “magic”, “hyperspace transmissions”, and “bottled lightning bugs”, but I kept those to myself and mentioned “batteries” instead. But that’s what I wasn’t understanding. Were they drawing some distinction between “electric” and “batteries”? I’m pretty sure my Depression-era-raised grandparents were familiar with batteries and the fact that batteries store electricity, and these customers were younger than them. This isn’t the backwoods of Mississippi, and judging by the way they were dressed these weren’t uneducated rural yokels. ---
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/608 "2012-03-27T02:58:42Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > But I was a bit shocked when a 30-something commuter friend had never heard of Sharon Tate or the Ziegfeld _Follies_. (Yes, only I would bring up Sharon Tate or the Ziegfeld _Follies_ during morning-commute chat). Hell, I made a Wikipedia article on [a Ziegfeld Follies songwriter](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Stamper). How obscure can it be if the spell-checker in Firefox knows it? ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/609 "2012-03-27T04:28:40Z")
> [@Mister\_Rik](#): > > I honestly wasn’t entirely sure what they were asking. They’re holding a clock that is displaying the time in big, red, glowing numbers and asking if it’s “electric”. I had composed a number of sarcastic replies in my head that involved “magic”, “hyperspace transmissions”, and “bottled lightning bugs”, but I kept those to myself and mentioned “batteries” instead. Maybe they meant to ask whether the _display_ was electric. After all, they had non-LED digital clocks in the 70s or earlier\*, and glowing watch faces decades before that. \*Example shown [here](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLzjr26y_1Y). ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/610 "2012-03-27T06:33:58Z")
> [@Mister\_Rik](#): > > . . . Were they drawing some distinction between “electric” and “batteries”? . . . That’s my interpretation. Does it plug into a wall outlet, or do you have to put in new batteries (or recharge them) every few months. Naive way of putting it, but that’s what I _think_ they were asking. (I usually buy adapters to change battery-powered gadgets to “plug into the wall” gadgets.) ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/611 "2012-03-27T13:35:38Z")
My father who is in his 70s told me that a guy couldn’t be gay because he looked like a bodybuilder…HUH? Turns out he thought no gay man would want muscles because that is masculine, gay men want to look feminine. I had a good chuckle when he said no gay guy would sit in a gym to look like Awwwnald. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/612 "2012-03-27T13:49:44Z")
**Mister Rik** : That reminds me of when I was ten years old. We’d gone to Sears and I was hanging out by the home electronics. A salesman was explaining something to a woman. (I don’t remember what the thing was – it was too early for VCRs, but that was about the size of the gadget.) The salesman was talking about an accessory called a ‘battery eliminator’ (a/c adapter). The woman said, ‘Wait… It runs on _batteries?_ I thought it ran on _electricity!_’ I laughed at that, but only after I was out of earshot. I did grasp that she meant, ‘It uses batteries as a default, and I have to purchase an a/c adapter if I want to plug it in the wall?’ but I found the initial ejaculation amusing. ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Rik](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mister_rik/32/491_2.png) [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/613 "2012-03-27T14:30:15Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > Maybe they meant to ask whether the _display_ was electric. After all, they had non-LED digital clocks in the 70s or earlier\*, and glowing watch faces decades before that. > > \*Example shown [here](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLzjr26y_1Y). Heh. I had one of those for _years_. It was noisy. Chug-chug-chug-chug-chug-chug… But I was used to it. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/614 "2012-03-27T15:09:21Z")
Actually, I came up (ha) with one. Someone made a joke about Viagra the other day. It occurred to me that this is arguably the most famous recently invented drug in the world, and I happen to possess a penis, and yet I actually don’t know how Viagra works. Not in the pharmaceutical sense, but in the application. Does it give you a boner X minutes after you take the pill, or does it just make it possible to get a boner if you’re aroused? Does it have an effect only if you have a specific medical condition or does it give boners to anyone ever if they don’t have an erectile dysfunction? Do guys use it recreationally? If it just gives you a hard-on does that mean you have to time when you take it? (“Well, looks like her clothes will be off in 40 minutes, so I have to take it… wait for it… NOW!”) Or is it something you take every day to treat the condition in general, and erectile dysfunction goes away? I quite honestly have no idea, and you’d think I would have picked that up now. This isn’t some obscure drug. It’s about as famous a pill as there is. I even know what they look like, they’re in so many commercials; it’s a little blue diamond shaped thing (at least Viagra are, are there knockoffs yet?) ---
**Author:** ![Peanuthead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peanuthead/32/360_2.png) [@Peanuthead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peanuthead)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/615 "2012-03-27T16:51:17Z")
> [@Mister\_Rik](#): > > I just remembered one. > > Back when I was 23 or so (1989-90) I had a retail job, where I worked in a store’s **electronics** department. I was frequently befuddled by customers, usually “older” folks, who would pick up a functioning display model of, say, a digital clock, carry it to the counter, and ask me, “Is this electric?” > > I honestly wasn’t entirely sure what they were asking. They’re holding a clock that is displaying the time in big, red, glowing numbers and asking if it’s “electric”. I had composed a number of sarcastic replies in my head that involved “magic”, “hyperspace transmissions”, and “bottled lightning bugs”, but I kept those to myself and mentioned “batteries” instead. > > But that’s what I wasn’t understanding. Were they drawing some distinction between “electric” and “batteries”? I’m pretty sure my Depression-era-raised grandparents were familiar with batteries and the fact that batteries store electricity, and these customers were younger than them. This isn’t the backwoods of Mississippi, and judging by the way they were dressed these weren’t uneducated rural yokels. More than likely he wanted to know if you _plug it in_ or _wind it up_. Clocks didn’t always run on electricity you know. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/616 "2012-03-27T17:30:40Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Actually, I came up (ha) with one. Take as needed about an hour before sexual activity. AFAIK, stimulation is needed. And I think it lasts a few hours. And yes, anyone (with a penis) can use it. And of course it’s taken recreationally. Do you think that guys are taking it on the way into the office? 😃 Here’s one that I just remembered. “Yes he was. Dude, he totally was. Uh huh! Dude, you don’t know what you’re talking about. Of course he was. Hold on, I’ll ask a coworker. Hey tdn, Barry Manilow was a member of Jethro Tull, right?” ---
**Author:** ![Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hypnagogic_jerk/32/4252_2.png) [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypnagogic_Jerk)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/617 "2012-03-27T19:15:06Z")
> [@tdn](#): > > Take as needed about an hour before sexual activity. AFAIK, stimulation is needed. And I think it lasts a few hours. I think some people do take Viagra daily as **RickJay** suggests. I’ve heard about it in the context of people taking antidepressants, which can have sexual side effects. Apparently daily Viagra can alleviate the problem. > [@](#): > > Here’s one that I just remembered. “Yes he was. Dude, he totally was. Uh huh! Dude, you don’t know what you’re talking about. Of course he was. Hold on, I’ll ask a coworker. Hey tdn, Barry Manilow was a member of Jethro Tull, right?” He was probably thinking of Barriemore Barlow. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/618 "2012-03-27T19:19:33Z")
Yesterday I agreed to meet a woman at 2:45. She asked me, “Is that the same as a quarter to three?” ---
**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:** [March 27, 2012, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/619 "2012-03-27T19:33:53Z")
> [@mnemosyne](#): > > Underwater cables as long as the ocean. Wow. > > ETA: I mean, seriously - how cool is [this](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a5/1901_Eastern_Telegraph_cables.png), from 1901?! If you find undersea cables that interesting, you may enjoy [“Mother Earth Mother Board”](http://www.wired.com/wired/archive//4.12/ffglass_pr.html) by Neal Stephenson. He writes at length about the history and technology of undersea cables, and includes a lot of fascinating details. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416/620 "2012-03-27T19:37:10Z")
> [@Hypnagogic\_Jerk](#): > > I think some people do take Viagra daily as **RickJay** suggests. I’ve heard about it in the context of people taking antidepressants, which can have sexual side effects. Apparently daily Viagra can alleviate the problem. Huh, interesting. Must get expensive though. > [@](#): > > He was probably thinking of Barriemore Barlow. I never thought of that! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416.md?page=30) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ever-been-shocked-at-what-some-people-dont-know/615416.md?page=32)