# Simple factual errors that drive you nuts
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [February 19, 2009, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504 "2009-02-19T03:19:24Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/21 "2009-02-19T17:22:15Z")
Bumblebees can’t fly, or so say “scientists.” But bumblebees fly anyway, because they have to, and their positive spirits give them lift, and they never let some dumb old scientist tell them otherwise.
Therefore, science is stupid.
---
### Author:  [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/22 "2009-02-19T17:28:39Z")
Everyone seems convinced that toilets drain in the opposite direction in the Southern Hemisphere.
About half the “facts” that people send around in those glurge emails.
---
### Author:  [@imfloating](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/imfloating)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/23 "2009-02-19T17:28:40Z")
People use the term Quantum Leap to describe a tremendous move forward.
Some out there actually think suposably and nucular are words.
---
### Author:  [@skylyn12](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/skylyn12)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/24 "2009-02-19T17:33:17Z")
That the No Child Left Behind law cuts funding from schools as a penalty (or from schools that fail). Completely 100% untrue. Yet, I hear this all the time, including several times on this board…
---
### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/25 "2009-02-19T17:33:23Z")
“Per say”
---
### Author:  [@Troy\_McClure\_SF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Troy_McClure_SF)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/26 "2009-02-19T17:49:36Z")
“iPods can only play music you buy from the Apple Store.”
It was amazing how many people would say this, and how long it persisted. Never mind that the Store came well after the iPod, and that this would be an insanely stupid idea, even for Apple.
---
### Author:  [@42fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/42fish)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/27 "2009-02-19T17:57:02Z")
> [@tdn](#):
>
> If we’re going to nitpick, then let’s go the Wizard of Oz. “The sum of the square roots of any two sides of an iscoceles triangle, is equal to the square root of the remaining side.”
>
> Straw-for-brains moron.
I’ve always thought the math is deliberately f’ed up to demonstrate that the Scarecrow indeed is not any smarter just because the Wizard handed him a diploma.
---
### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/28 "2009-02-19T20:04:41Z")
> [@42fish](#):
>
> I’ve always thought the math is deliberately f’ed up to demonstrate that the Scarecrow indeed is not any smarter just because the Wizard handed him a diploma.
Perhaps, but IMHO you’re reading a little more into it than is warranted. My guess is that one of the scriptwriters told another one to “Now have him say something that sounds really smart. Hey, that’s pretty good. But change ‘right triangle’ to ‘iscoceles’, because that sounds really brainy.”
There are a lot of lines in that movie that sound great as long as you don’t think about them too much. The bit about how the size of your heart is not measured by how much you love, but how much you are loved by others, pretty much says that the purpose of life is to be really popular.
---
### Author:  [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/29 "2009-02-19T20:35:58Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#):
>
> That the US Public Health Service actually _gave_ black men in Tuskegee, AL syphilis, when the actual crime was that they withheld treatment and allowed folks to needlessly suffer all in the interest of data collection.
>
> That said, it can be reasonably argued that by withholding treatment, the govt allowed people to get infected that would not have been otherwise. So I’m fine with saying that they indirectly gave syphillis to people.
This is not true, the people studied had advanced past the point of the treatments available at the time. The cure for syphillis was not found until well into the study. The previous treatment was ineffective and hard on the patient. The study was designed to see if not treating the disease gave better or worse outcomes than the poor treatments available at the time of the studies inception.
---
### Author:  [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/30 "2009-02-19T20:43:27Z")
> [@tdn](#):
>
> Bumblebees can’t fly, or so say “scientists.” But bumblebees fly anyway, because they have to, and their positive spirits give them lift, and they never let some dumb old scientist tell them otherwise.
>
> Therefore, science is stupid.
I’ve heard the same argument used with hummingbirds as well, usually with some “by the law of physics… but then the hummingbird never studied law!” punchline.
A historical error about the Civil War that always irks me: “Only about 1 in 10 southerners owned a slave”. Okay, _technically_ this is true, but it’s misleading. Slaves, like land and mules and other property, usually only had one individual legal _owner_, but about 1 in 4 southerners grew up in a slaveowning household (that’s an overall estimate; in Mississippi it was about 1:2), so reliance on slaves was far more widespread than the 1:10 makes it seem.
---
### Author:  [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/31 "2009-02-19T21:34:11Z")
> [@imfloating](#):
>
> People use the term Quantum Leap to describe a tremendous move forward.
Ding-ding-ding! I _knew_ someone was going to post this.
Tell you what, look up “quantum” in a dictionary. In mine, the Physics use is the _fourth_ definition. I’ve said it a million times, when Julius Caesar used “quantum”, he wasn’t talking subatomic particles.
(So I guess my complaint are those people who think “quantum” only refers to tiny quantities.)
---
### Author:  [@ExTank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ExTank)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/32 "2009-02-19T21:45:01Z")
Variations on a theme:
“There are no gun control laws in the U.S.” Some people seem to assume that because someone thinks we need _more_ (restrictive) gun control laws, that the default position is that we have _no_ gun control laws.
“Fully automatic weapons are unregulated.” More often than not, some newsie has misidentified a semi-auto only variant of a military-grade fully-automatic firearm like the AK-47, which has the same alphanumeric identifier for _both_ models.
“The Gun Show Loophole.” That _any_ firearm sold at a gun show is exempt from the federally-mandated background check requirement for licensed firearms dealers.
More broadly: scriptwriters who seem to think that the terms “universe” and “galaxy” are interchangeable.
---
### Author:  [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/33 "2009-02-19T21:50:59Z")
> [@ftg](#):
>
> Tell you what, look up “quantum” in a dictionary. In mine, the Physics use is the _fourth_ definition.
Even better, look up [quantum leap](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/quantum+leap), and you’ll see it means exactly what the poster says it doesn’t.
It’s also worth noting that the original term referring to subatomic particles was “quantum jump.”
---
### Author:  [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/34 "2009-02-19T22:00:24Z")
**Every single time** I discuss the unemployment rate, either in real life or on this Board, someone complains that people whose comp benefits expire no longer count as unemployed.
This is completely, provably false, and so dumb that a moment’s reflection should dispel it. There are all kinds of people who are unemployed but _never_ eligible for comp. Comp eligibility has fuck-all to do with how they measure unemployment (they use surveys). But try getting people to believe it.
---
### Author:  [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/35 "2009-02-19T23:01:55Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#):
>
> **Every single time** I discuss the unemployment rate, either in real life or on this Board, someone complains that people whose comp benefits expire no longer count as unemployed.
>
> This is completely, provably false, and so dumb that a moment’s reflection should dispel it. There are all kinds of people who are unemployed but _never_ eligible for comp. Comp eligibility has fuck-all to do with how they measure unemployment (they use surveys). But try getting people to believe it.
This.
It comes up in every discussion on the SDMB we have about recession of unemployment. Every one. It’s debunked in every one. It’s something you can Google in about seven seconds. And it just won’t die.
When I was in the Army my pet peeve was myths about weapons. the most common one was that the Geneva Conventions ban shotguns, or shooting people with .50 cals, or whatever. All false; the Geneva Conventions aren’t about weapons.
---
### Author:  [@Liddle\_Lamsy\_Divey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liddle_Lamsy_Divey)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/36 "2009-02-19T23:26:57Z")
The idea that Anne Frank and her family (…and the van Pels and Dr. Pfeiffer) had only an attic to hide in, when in fact, they had five rooms (one being a bathroom), plus the attic.
---
### Author:  [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/37 "2009-02-19T23:33:44Z")
> [@tdn](#):
>
> If we’re going to nitpick, then let’s go the Wizard of Oz. “The sum of the square roots of any two sides of an iscoceles triangle, is equal to the square root of the remaining side.”
>
> Straw-for-brains moron.
I think the misstatement of the Pythagorean theorem in WoO is a meta-joke.
---
### Author:  [@Jayn\_Newell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jayn_Newell)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/38 "2009-02-19T23:39:53Z")
The one that really gave me a headache was a letter in the local paper, back when I was in Canada, complaining about how the French name for the province was ‘Nouvelle Ecosse’. “It’s Nova Scotia, not New Scotland.” Except, Nova Scotia is LATIN for New Scotland. Dipstick.
---
### Author:  [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/39 "2009-02-19T23:41:29Z")
> [@RickJay](#):
>
> When I was in the Army my pet peeve was myths about weapons. the most common one was that the Geneva Conventions ban shotguns, or shooting people with .50 cals, or whatever. All false; the Geneva Conventions aren’t about weapons.
Does white phosphorus not count as a weapon, or am I thinking of some other international agreement?
---
### Author:  [@Wakinyan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wakinyan)
#### Post date: [February 19, 2009, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504/40 "2009-02-19T23:45:57Z")
Sorry for being an asshole, and I mean no disrespect, but
\*\*
That USA saved Europe twice during the 20th century.\*\*
Last I heard it was just the other day, by a politician during a debate in Swedish Parliament…! I get the urge to point out that there was a thing going on called the Red Army, the momentum of which was unstoppable \*well \*before 1944 (D-day). WWII in Europe was decided on the \*Eastern \*front, goddamit.
Thank you-thank you-thank you, for helping out with the fascism and everything, especially by placing large armies in Germany to stop Communism from devour more of Europe than it did.
But, as painfully as it is, USA did not “save Europe” from Hitler (though helping out a lot, for which everyone is eternally greatful) – the _Soviet Union did_. And USA did \*not \*arrive as the cavalry in WWI and killed off the Kaiser; Germany was exhausted economically, politically and strategically by that time. (Though were are ever greatful for the help; also goes to Canada and Australia et al).
Just don’t say that, it is historically incorrect.
[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504.md?page=1)
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/simple-factual-errors-that-drive-you-nuts/486504.md?page=3)