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Common Misconceptions

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But they were lost!

 

They were sailing there because there had been rumors about there being land in that direction something to do with fishermen.

Which was basically how they went about traveling in a general direction.

 

By who?

 

It has never been confirmed what happened to them but it is assumed that the vikings that settled there either died of starvation or conflict with the native Americans

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By the way, I was saying that the native Americans were lost not the Vikings.

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Surely that would depend on the speed.

 

well, if we assume the sword was swung with killing force, then its impossible to catch. if it wasnt, id either walk backwards, or take the small cut youd get from a light blow. ive cut my self on a katana more then once. it was just like a samurai movie, looked down, had a slice out the side of my finger missing, but no blood. 3 seconds later blood was gushing!

 

By the way, I was saying that the native Americans were lost not the Vikings.

 

they were lost in the sense every one in humanity is/was lost.

 

its a widly accpeted theory that the nativ americans found the continant by crossing an ice plain during the last ice age. they would have been europians. but then people came to europe from africa. so europians were technicaly lost too.

id heard that vikings found america too. i imagine they didn't stick around because it was so far from their center of power, they couldn't realisticly support a collony that far away. doubt the indians would have much of a chance in a scrap with the vikings. indians had no knowlage of metals, all weapons were made of stone, vikings had iron and steel. a stone arrow would have problems denting steel or iron armour, i doubt they would have stood much of a chance.

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Actually wouldn't they be asians/russians? Since the way I heard it they crossed the Bering Strait, which froze over from Russia to Alaska. Looking at the facial structure I'd say they look more in common to Asians than europeans(I'm assuming that the russians were europeans that headed east right?)

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id heard that vikings found america too. i imagine they didn't stick around because it was so far from their center of power, they couldn't realisticly support a collony that far away. doubt the indians would have much of a chance in a scrap with the vikings. indians had no knowlage of metals, all weapons were made of stone, vikings had iron and steel. a stone arrow would have problems denting steel or iron armour, i doubt they would have stood much of a chance.

 

The deal with that is that according to the old sagas is that the vikings went there to settle down not to pillage and plunder which meant they didn´t go there armed for battle or anything.

But the natives didn't like that so they chased them off.

 

There never was any viking nation so there hardly couldn't be any country supporting all the settlers.

A lot of the vikings where just normal folk discontent with were they lived so they decided to take their chances moving somewhere else completely unsupported by any "major power".

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Actually wouldn't they be asians/russians? Since the way I heard it they crossed the Bering Strait, which froze over from Russia to Alaska. Looking at the facial structure I'd say they look more in common to Asians than europeans(I'm assuming that the russians were europeans that headed east right?)

 

This man is correct. If you were to get a native American and a Mongolian fellow to stand next to each other whilst naked, they'd be pretty indistinguishable.

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Little known fact:

 

Breasts are not actually balloons, if you prick them with a pin they do not pop.

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Small feet does not equal small penis. Same for the hand myth. Black people do not all have enourmous penises either apparently. Go figure (no personal research has been used to make these statements btw!).

 

Eating carrots will not make you see in the dark.

 

Eating the crusts of bread will not give you curly pubes.

 

Masterbating too much will not make you blind (or kill kittens).

 

Santa Claus was not invented by Coca Cola.

 

You can get pregnant using a condom.

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You can get pregnant using a condom.

 

No you can't....ideally there needs to be a penis involved somewhere.

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Eating the crusts of bread will not give you curly pubes.

 

Santa Claus was not invented by Coca Cola.

WTF - the myth is curly hair!

Why when pubes are always curly, would there be a myth about bread doing it? You don't have straight ones do you?

 

- And the myth about Santa and Coca Cola is that Santa was previously dressed in green, until Coca Cola turned his clothes red and white for an ad. campaign.

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No you can't....ideally there needs to be a penis involved somewhere.

 

Somewhere?! Oh dear, someone didn't pay attention in Sex Ed :p

(Thats what you get for being pedantic!)

 

You're right though Retro, pubes are always curly, but some people believe crusts will make them even curlier, probably because the myth of curly hair in general.

 

And the Santa thing again is something people see differently. Some know about the green, some dont, but the red Santa we know is always attributed to Coca Cola. So saying Coca Cola invented him is a mistake people often make.

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Somewhere?! Oh dear, someone didn't pay attention in Sex Ed :p

(Thats what you get for being pedantic!)

 

You're right though Retro, pubes are always curly, but some people believe crusts will make them even curlier, probably because the myth of curly hair in general.

 

And the Santa thing again is something people see differently. Some know about the green, some dont, but the red Santa we know is always attributed to Coca Cola. So saying Coca Cola invented him is a mistake people often make.

Ah, ok then!

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Here's a misconception: that things claimed as "facts" on QI are always as true as they are claimed to be. They're sometimes simply hearsay or even just made up - the show never cites references (which I'd forgive, but their book doesn't either which is inexcusable), and I've personally noticed instances of mistakes, where I have evidence and they don't appear to. Of course, I'm sure most of what they say is true, but the unreliability means I can't really take it seriously.

 

Anyway, I have many instances of more interesting misconceptions. I'll try and think of some interesting ones.

This man is correct. If you were to get a native American and a Mongolian fellow to stand next to each other whilst naked, they'd be pretty indistinguishable.

Hmm, there'd be some differences. Most notably that native Americans have a lower genetic diversity as a result of the founder effect. Actually, that's a nice misconception - that Caucasians have the highest genetic diversity. I think this stems from the fact that Caucasians look diverse to other Caucasians - in actual fact, native Africans have the most genetic diversity.

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Heh, that's why I can't name misconceptions. I don't know what would be considered a misconception or not.

I thought people already knew vikings were in America first. And I didn't know people thought Coca-Cola invented the entire concept of Santa Claus (I thought it was common knowledge that Saint Nicholas/Nicolau really existed)

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*Puts on Bible hat*

Misconception: There were three wise men that visited Jesus when he was born

 

In the Bible it says there were wise men and that there were three gifts, but at no point does it say that there were three wise men. Just plural, more than one, that's all that is said.

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*Puts on Bible hat*

Misconception: There were three wise men that visited Jesus when he was born

 

In the Bible it says there were wise men and that there were three gifts, but at no point does it say that there were three wise men. Just plural, more than one, that's all that is said.

So there might've been more men who didn't bring presents? Ungrateful fuckers.

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No you can't....ideally there needs to be a penis involved somewhere.

 

Haha very witty.

 

Actually you can get pregnant using a condom, this is why there's so many checks for it, technically it's STI's you cannot get using a condom..the pill has a higher rate of success compared to it..:blank:

 

/ramblings.

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You're right though Retro, pubes are always curly, but some people believe crusts will make them even curlier, probably because the myth of curly hair in general.

You could have just said hair from the start, but no, you went straight for the pubes talk. This is why we worry about you jav

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About the katana, I think I've read somewhere that the katana are in fact no stronger or better than medieval broadswords - that the katana's superiority over other swords is simply a myth.

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So there might've been more men who didn't bring presents? Ungrateful fuckers.

 

Or just two and one of them brought two prezzies.

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Or just two and one of them brought two prezzies.

Didn't they name three of them? [another misconception?]

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About the katana, I think I've read somewhere that the katana are in fact no stronger or better than medieval broadswords - that the katana's superiority over other swords is simply a myth.

 

Makes sense since broadswords are like 2x the width of a katana.

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Number 6 is wrong. The myth is that people thought that the world was flat and Columbus set out to prove that it was round. The actual reason for him setting out was that he believed the Earth to be much smaller than believed (as people believed that the circumference was 20000miles.)

 

4. Mr Crapper invented the flushing toilet

As appropriate as his name may be, Thomas Crapper did not invent the flushing toilet. Crapper was a famous Victorian plumber whose achievements included installing the drains at Westminster Abbey, but it was Edward Jennings who, in 1852, first took out a patent for the flush-out toilet and forever improved the sanitary world.

 

This is incorrect. The ancient Chinese invented the flushing toilet.

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