# Tell us an interesting random fact you stumbled across (Part 2) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 25, 2024, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785 "2024-07-25T15:06:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 222
**Author:** ![Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de053/32.png) [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackknifed_Juggernaut)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2026, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4421 "2026-03-29T14:52:27Z")
I’m sure these days an LLM can do this kind of thing lickety split. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2026, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4422 "2026-03-29T15:30:54Z")
Can you get a LLM to do this? I just tried using Google by telling it to translate the first sentence of a particular French novel into English without using the letter e. It didn’t do it. It just told me that all the published translations of that novel into English have the letter e in the first sentence. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2026, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4423 "2026-03-29T16:49:23Z")
You could get an LLM to do something that it claims is this, but there’d still be Es in it. I think they’re a bit blind to any pieces of text shorter than whatever they’re using as tokens (see also the Strawberry Problem). ---
**Author:** ![Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de053/32.png) [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackknifed_Juggernaut)\ **Post date:** [March 29, 2026, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4424 "2026-03-29T16:51:42Z")
Thanks! I just assumed it would be easy. ---
**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 29, 2026, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4425 "2026-03-29T23:23:38Z")
I just learned that [Scott Reiniger](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Reiniger), who portrayed ‘Roger “Trooper” DeMarco’ in _Dawn of the Dead_ (1978), is an Afghan prince. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4426 "2026-03-30T11:18:30Z")
> [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](#): > > Doc Smith is credited with creating the “attractor beam” in the 1930s, later shortened to just “tractor beam” or “tractor ray,” but the Buck Rogers comic strip took the term and used it repeatedly into the 1950s. He didn’t Jules Verne’s son Michel took his father’s novel _The Meteor Hunt_ (_La Chasse au météore,_ 1908\*)\* and added extra chapters, which included use of a “helicoidal ray” to pull the meteor down to earth. No such item exists in Verne’;s original 1901 manuscript – the meteor simply falls to Earth in the usual way. But Verne’s original version wasn’t printed in English until 2006a century after its appearance. Original editions have an illustration showing a cleaning woman coming into the scientist’s room and seeing the device sitting on a chair. I find this hilarious – if the ray projector is pulling on the meteor, then by Newton’s third law the meteor is pulling on the ray projector as hard as the projector is pulling on the meteor, and the net result should be the projector being pulled from the chair it’s sitting on (it doesn’t appear to be fastened down in any way) and being pulled out the window and up into the sky. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4427 "2026-03-30T14:26:36Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Original editions have an illustration showing a cleaning woman coming into the scientist’s room and seeing the device sitting on a chair. Perhaps what appears to be the device is a mere casing for a softball-sized neutron star. Why the items in the immediate vicinity aren’t crushed flat and stuck to the softball is an exercise left for the reader. ---
**Author:** ![Frodo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/frodo/32/302_2.png) [@Frodo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frodo)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4428 "2026-03-30T14:28:43Z")
It’s pretty obvious that the device has _two_ rays, one is pulling on the earth and the other is pulling on the meteor, the balance brings the meteor to earth without moving the device… (which must be built with unobtanium to avoid getting pulled apart by the opposing forces, but that’s another matter) ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4429 "2026-03-30T14:59:37Z")
Years ago, the firm I worked for used a device that measured acceleration, which we placed in shipping containers to see how badly they were banged about in transit. We discovered that Canadian Rail was the worst culprit, with S Africa a close second. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4430 "2026-03-30T21:32:39Z")
The thing in the chair could also just be the control box for the actual device. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4431 "2026-03-30T22:06:02Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > if the ray projector is pulling on the meteor, then by Newton’s third law the meteor is pulling on the ray projector as hard as the projector is pulling on the meteor We are talking about spooky action at a distance here, helicoidal and instantaneous, so Newton’s laws of motion do not apply. The device acts on the meteor, but the meteor does not act on the device, otherwise it would not be instantaneous (remember, that was before Einstein’s general relativity!). And just to nitpick, Newton’s Laws are overrated. Just read the second law carefully and you’ll see that the first one is not an independent law but a corollary of the second, thus the third is the second. The man couldn’t count to three without calculus! ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4432 "2026-03-30T22:38:07Z")
Nowadays, the first law is usually taken as the definition of an inertial reference frame, which is in turn required for the second. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4433 "2026-03-30T22:45:24Z")
I knew _you_ would nitpick my nitpick. Ah, well… ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2026, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4434 "2026-03-30T23:52:04Z")
TIL learned that Steve Marriott (Small Faces), Davy Jones (The Monkees) and Phil Collins (Genesis) all got their start in music by playing various kids in the musical Oliver! in London in the mid 60s. Not at the same time, child labour laws prevented children playing the same role every night. As I believe they do today; when I saw Matilda a few years ago there were three girls credited as the lead. ---
**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:** [March 31, 2026, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4435 "2026-03-31T04:55:44Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > TIL learned that Steve Marriott (Small Faces), Davy Jones (The Monkees) and Phil Collins (Genesis) all got their start in music by playing various kids in the musical Oliver! in London in the mid 60s. As did British actor/singer Dennis Waterman (New Tricks, Minder, The Sweeney). ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2026, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4436 "2026-03-31T08:20:20Z")
And before Oliver, Dennis Waterman was (one of several) “[Just William](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_William_(book_series))”. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2026, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4437 "2026-03-31T12:03:16Z")
Paintings of Napoleon Bonaparte of showed him wearing a bicorn hat. He is always shown wearing it sideways. This was Napoleon’s choice; it made him stand out on the battlefield ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2026, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4438 "2026-03-31T22:08:33Z")
He probably didn’t actually wield a purple lightsabre, though. ---
**Author:** ![Treppenwitz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treppenwitz/32/3445_2.png) [@Treppenwitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treppenwitz)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2026, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4439 "2026-04-01T17:39:02Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > > [@Askance](#): > > > > TIL learned that Steve Marriott (Small Faces), Davy Jones (The Monkees) and Phil Collins (Genesis) all got their start in music by playing various kids in the musical Oliver! in London in the mid 60s. > > As did British actor/singer Dennis Waterman (New Tricks, Minder, The Sweeney). You’ll remember that in Minder, Dennis Waterman’s character was a former boxer. IRL Waterman’s older brother, Peter, was the European welterweight champion. > **[Peter Waterman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Waterman)** > > Peter Waterman (8 December 1934 – 16 January 1986) was an English boxer and a British and European welterweight champion. > Waterman was born in Stepney, East London, England, one of nine children of Rose Juliana (née Saunders) and Harry Frank Waterman. His younger brother, Dennis Waterman, became an actor and singer. His father had been an amateur boxer and made all of his sons box. > He began boxing at the age of 11 and had an amateur career winning 121 of his 130 bouts. He won the 1952 Amateu... j ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2026, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/4440 "2026-04-03T01:15:07Z")
> [@PatrickLondon](#): > > And before Oliver, Dennis Waterman was (one of several) “[Just William](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_William_(book_series))”. Dennis Waterman had an _amazing_ career. 60 years as a teenager, young man, older adult, middle aged, and elderly.. Mostly sort of in character, which is perhaps the only way to sustain a career like that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785.md?page=221) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785.md?page=223)