# Post facts that opened your eye. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 11, 2008, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262 "2008-11-11T23:20:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![Telcontar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3bc359/32.png) [@Telcontar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telcontar)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/281 "2008-11-20T21:51:12Z")
> [@sherrylynn](#): > > I believe the word should not be average, which can easily be skewed by one value being much higher/lower than the others. It should be median - meaning that half of a group are higher and half are lower. Given a normal distribution, the mean, median, and mode should technically all be the same. I suspect IQ scores are more or less normally distributed, meaning that half the population is not necessarily below average in IQ…but i’d be surprised if it were off by more than a percent or two. Regarding the OP’s point, that i am surrounded by the best and brightest of America makes me seriously concerned about the other 95%. ---
**Author:** ![gurujulp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba9def/32.png) [@gurujulp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gurujulp)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/282 "2008-11-20T22:20:47Z")
> [@Bacon\_Salt](#): > > **Sampiro** , your thing about genealogy reminded me of my own eye-opener. > > The first one: > Let’s say my parents had a fight on the night I would have been conceived. It was nasty and Dad ended up sleeping on the couch. It’s okay, though because a few days later they made up and had the requisite make-up sex (Actually, it’s not because I’m now imagining my parents having sex). Or Dad had to work late or Mom took a little longer getting ready for bed. At any rate, in the jumble of life, a different sperm got to the egg. Nine months passed and out I came. Only, it’s highly statistically improbable that this person would have the exact same genetic makeup as me. If just about anything happened differently, it would be someone else walking around instead of me. > > And it’s the same for every sexually reproducing organism ever. > > As sad as it sounds, that blew my mind the first time I thought about it. I still insist that the abortion my mom had was me, and I just had to wait several years and didn’t get to be half jewish, but damnit, I wanted her as a mom! ---
**Author:** ![gurujulp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba9def/32.png) [@gurujulp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gurujulp)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/283 "2008-11-20T23:16:42Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > That fusion reactors are a much less feasible proposition than I’d always presumed, thanks to the following simple fact: the total energy output of deuterium-tritium fusion is 17.6 MeV. However, 80% of the energy, or 14.1 MeV, is in the motion of the neutron which, having no electric charge can escape the plasma without leaving its energy behind to help sustain the reaction. And much of the remaining energy leaks away in the form of x-rays that the plasma is too “optically transparent” to retain. > > Then, even if you can keep the fusion reaction going, the only practical way to generate electricity from it is by capturing the neutrons and x-rays in a surrounding themal blanket. So you’re using a millions-of-degrees plasma to create high-energy radiation, to **boil steam**. > > And on top of that, those high-energy neutrons would be perfect for inducing fission in Uranium-238, whose lower energy neutrons would then be captured to produce plutonium. So fusion reactors add to nuclear proliferation, not eliminate it. Well, to boil _ **water** _ anyway… ---
**Author:** ![gurujulp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba9def/32.png) [@gurujulp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gurujulp)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/284 "2008-11-20T23:20:22Z")
> [@UncleRojelio](#): > > Half the people you meet are dumber than average. Not me, I only meet people smart enough to live in Northern California…😉 Edit: in person… ---
**Author:** ![gurujulp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba9def/32.png) [@gurujulp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gurujulp)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/285 "2008-11-20T23:28:35Z")
> [@olivesmarch4th](#): > > This is actually exactly how I view the universe (as a massive, constantly changing, evolving organism.) What you’re getting at is pantheism, I think. Everything is god. That’s buddhism. ---
**Author:** ![WF\_Tomba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/d9b06d/32.png) [@WF\_Tomba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WF_Tomba)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2008, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/286 "2008-11-20T23:44:04Z")
> [@gurujulp](#): > > That’s buddhism. It’s not quite Buddhism unless it also includes the idea that life is suffering, that nirvana can be attained by the living, and that some people may attain nirvana but choose to remain in the world to help others get there. (At least, those are the basic concepts of Buddhism that I remember from my World Religions class in high school.) ---
**Author:** ![gurujulp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba9def/32.png) [@gurujulp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gurujulp)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/287 "2008-11-21T01:06:01Z")
> [@WF\_Tomba](#): > > It’s not quite Buddhism unless it also includes the idea that life is suffering, that nirvana can be attained by the living, and that some people may attain nirvana but choose to remain in the world to help others get there. (At least, those are the basic concepts of Buddhism that I remember from my World Religions class in high school.) Sorry- that was indeed a bit of solipsistic moment- it’s what I take as being the most important bit of buddhism and run with to create my own I-wish-it-could-be-true wanna-be belief system. I can’t bring myself to believe in any sort of life after death, but damnit, I want to, and I have cobbled together a pretty fine untrue one to pine for! I want to remember having been me! ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/288 "2008-11-21T03:24:26Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > Why is Average not so great? Because purely bell-shaped-curve speaking, it’s the most _common_ level of skill, and not a measure of actual ability. > > It’s not saying they only follow half the rules, or do everything half-assed. In fact it’s saying they are part of the majority group and follow the rules at the same level most other people do. Average is not great when you’re talking about driving skills. We are very complacent about collision statistics, but average driving skills gets you: > [@](#): > > There were nearly 6,420,000 auto accidents in the United States in 2005. The financial cost of these crashes is more than 230 Billion dollars. 2.9 million people were injured and 42,636 people killed. About 115 people die every day in vehicle crashes in the United States – one death every 13 minutes. ([From here.](http://www.car-accidents.com/pages/stats.html)) Someone might be considered an average driver, but that is in no way good enough, and it continually amazes me that we as a society think it is. ---
**Author:** ![Tenebras](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@Tenebras](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tenebras)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/289 "2008-11-21T06:17:27Z")
> [@gurujulp](#): > > Well, to boil _ **water** _ anyway… Water’s just another word for steam that got too cold. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/290 "2008-11-21T06:46:02Z")
> [@cmosdes](#): > > I don’t mean to pick on this, but why do people always assume that half of \ is less than the average? > > If Bill Gates and 9 other shmos like me sit down for dinner together, 9 of us will be well below the average income. Not 5. Nope, Gates’ income when he was CEO of Microsoft was around $350,000 per year. His net worth was in the equity, not income. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2008, 7:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/post-facts-that-opened-your-eye/472262/291 "2008-11-21T07:13:11Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > I have read that the number of intestinal fauna that you’ll have in your guts over the course of your life is greater than the number of human beings who have ever lived. Most of you, of course, is not actually you. You don’t even fart your own farts; you outsource that. Assuming that as another poster said that there have been 100 billion or so human beings, you have more bacteria in your gut right now than that. People have an estimated 10 to 50 trillion human cells in a body. [http://ask.yahoo.com/20020625.html](http://ask.yahoo.com/20020625.html) 500 to 1000 different types of bacteria live in the typical human body. [Human microbiome - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_flora) A bacteria cell is usually 1/100 the size of a human cell. [http://science.howstuffworks.com/cellular-microscopic-biology/cell1.htm](http://science.howstuffworks.com/cellular-microscopic-biology/cell1.htm) Bacteria cells outnumber people cells in a human body 10 to 1. > **[Humans Have Ten Times More Bacteria Than Human Cells: How Do Microbial...](http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080603085914.htm)** > > The number of bacteria living within the body of the average healthy adult human are estimated to outnumber human cells 10 to one. Changes in these microbial communities may be responsible for digestive disorders, skin diseases, gum disease and even... Human beings are mostly not human beings, but bacteria when measured by the number of cells. And then not even that. A virus is much smaller than a bacteria. [Bacteria vs. Viruses\