BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know

Subject: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: bobad
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 08:26 PM

1. A rat can last longer without water than a camel.

2. Your stomach has to produce a new layer of mucus every two weeks or
it will digest itself.

3. The dot over the letter "i" is called a tittle.

4. A raisin dropped in a glass of fresh champagne will bounce up and
down continuously from the bottom of the glass to the top.

5. A female ferret will die if it goes into heat and cannot find a mate.

6. Chewing gum while peeling onions will keep you from crying.

7. A 2 X 4 is really 1-1/2" by 3-1/2".

8. During the chariot scene in "Ben Hur," a small red car can be seen
in the distance (and Heston's wearing a watch).

9. On average, 12 newborns will be given to the wrong parents daily!
(That explains a few mysteries....)

10. Sherlock Holmes NEVER said, "Elementary, my dear Watson."

11. Because metal was scarce, the Oscars given out during World War II
were made of wood.

12. The number of possible ways of playing the first four moves per
side in a game of chess is 318,979,564,000.

13. There are no words in the dictionary that rhyme with orange,
purple and silver.

14. Astronauts are not allowed to eat beans before they go into space
because passing wind in a spacesuit damages them.

15. The very first bomb dropped by the Allies on Berlin in World War II
killed the only elephant in the Berlin Zoo.

16. If one places a tiny amount of liquor on a scorpion, it will
instantly go mad and sting itself to death. (Who was the sadist who
discovered this??)

17. Bruce Lee was so fast that they actually had to s-l-o-w film down
so you could see his moves. That's the opposite of the norm.

18. The first CD pressed in the US was Bruce Springsteen's "Born in
the USA."

19. The original name for butterfly was flutterby.

20. The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law which
stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your thumb.

21. The first product Motorola started to develop was a record player
for automobiles. At that time, the most known player on the market was
Victrola, so they called themselves Motorola.

22. Roses may be red, but violets are indeed violet.

23. By raising your legs slowly and lying on your back, you cannot
sink into quicksand.

24. Celery has negative calories. It takes more calories to eat a
piece of celery than the celery has in it to begin with.

25. Charlie Chaplin once won third prize in a Charlie Chaplin
look-alike contest.

26. An old law in Bellingham, Washington, made it illegal for a woman
to take more than three steps backwards while dancing!

27. The Guinness Book of Records holds the record for being the book
most often stolen from public libraries.

28. The glue on Israeli postage is certified kosher.

29. Bats always turn left when exiting a cave!

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: wysiwyg
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 08:38 PM

I knew four or five of them....

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,know all
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 08:46 PM

The red car in Ben Hur is a porsche...left on the set by mistake.
Celery is in the Guiness book of records as being the least fattening food.
Why do bats turn left?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: bobad
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 08:46 PM

Was one of them the tittle?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: curmudgeon
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 09:01 PM

#20 is urban mythology. Maybe I can find the correct derivation tomorrow - Tom

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 09:05 PM

I disagree with No.27. Having worked in a library for 8 years, the book that was ALWAYS, without fail, stolen; was 'The Joy of Sex'. The Guinness book of Records is a weighty tome and was usually in the reference section - ergo no borrowing. But TJOS is a non fiction book and therefore borrowable... but it was never there to borrow.

And here's another little snippet... rats cannot vomit, which makes them susceptible to poisons.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: bobad
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 09:06 PM

Rule of thumb

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ebbie
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 09:27 PM

IMO, 5, 9, 14, 21 and 29 are suspect too or at the very least more than a little misleading.

Motorola: "Its first product was a "battery eliminator," (not record player) allowing consumers to operate radios directly from household current instead of the batteries supplied with early models."

"In the 1930s, the company successfully commercialized car radios ( not record player) under the brand name "Motorola," a word suggesting sound in motion."

From a ferret breeder's website: "If females are not bred, they can develop a condition that is often fatal, as they will not ovulate until bred and will stay in heat perpetually. This seriously affects the health of the female. " Not quite what the 'Strange Things' post claims.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Jeri
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 09:30 PM

No one knows for sure how many are urban legends and how many are true.

LtS is right about rats not barfing. Not related to vomiting, Warfarin is a major rat poison. Warfarin is basically Coumadin, an anti-coagulant. Rats squeeze through some very narrow spots and their rib cages compress, not without some minor and normally insignificant bruising and tearing. When they're loaded with anti-coagulant though, they bleed to death.

The astronaut/beans thing is (I believe) partially full of hot air. They're probably not worried so much about space suits. Even a pressurized cabin is only pressurized to a fraction of what it is at ground level. If someone has intestinal gas, and the ambient pressure drops rather quickly, they're going to be in some serious discomfort. Since the suit has already got to deal with the change from earth to space cabin pressure, an occasional fart in a space suit shouldn't be a big deal. You're gonna have methane anyway because people just fart.

The Bruce Lee thing (#17) is right, because I just heard it on TV recenttly.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: mack/misophist
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 09:53 PM

I think #1 is only true for kangaroo rats, who live in the desert. IIRC, they can get all the water they need from the food they eat.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 12:36 AM

30. There is more discussion on non-musical topics than musical topics on the Music Site Mudcat.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 12:51 AM

Where is the nearest quicksand...I have a drunken neighbor who likes to "dare" I would like to send him into quicksand and "dare" him to relax the leg.....adventure is "his way of life"...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 12:52 AM

Bats turn left for the same reason that pilots tend to usually break left in air combat: The joystick is in the bat's right hand. This makes it easier to push hard left when taking sudden evasive action, because you've naturally got more leverage on the joystick that way than when you try to break to the right.

If bats were left-handed, then it would be the other way around.

(chuckle...)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 02:21 AM

Remember those documentaries that show the bats exiting Carlsbad Cavern( I think it is)? The cameraman is filming from the front as the bats pour out in a huge cloud. And unless the film has been reversed- those bats swirl out and swoop to the cameraman's left, i.e. the bats' right. ??

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Gurney
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 02:37 AM

And yet another argument. 4x2 is indeed 4"x 2" if it is rough-sawn timber. If it is processed for construction work, i.e. planed to size, then this loses a little timber, because they start off with 4x2.

This information is out of date with us here, we've gone metric. 100x50 now.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Paul Burke
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 03:45 AM

"30. There is more discussion on non-musical topics than musical topics on the Music Site Mudcat."

That's because, whenever someone posts a musical point or question, some smart arse posts back within minutes, with a sarcastic comment, along with a link to a half- misheard transcription in Digitrad or some thread from 1972.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 05:09 AM

Was Max even BORN in 1972?

I was 8 years old..... so I seriously doubt it!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,noddy
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 05:20 AM

31. According to the theory of aeronautics bumble bees cannot fly. However bumble bees being ignorant of this carry on flying.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 05:21 AM

#6 isn't necessarily gum. Chewing anything helps.
Not only is the glue kosher, but toilet-bowl cleaner also must be certified.There was a scandal ages ago where one Rabbinate had certified HAM as kosher after accepting a substantial bri- err, um, 'donation'.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Bunnahabhain
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 06:07 AM

Ahh Liz,

You may be right on #27, but who is it who keeps the records? This is why the Guniness book of records is the oficially most stolen book.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 07:02 AM

I must get my wife to test number 23, whilst holding an accordion.

eric

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 09:02 AM

"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It is simply too painful to acknowledge-even to ourselves-that we've been so credulous". Carl Sagan

"War should ONLY be declared by the authority of the people, whose toils and treasures are to support its burdens, instead of the government which is to reap its fruits" James Madison

"A ruling group is a ruling group so long as it can nominate [or select jm] its successors..Who wields power is not important, provided that the hierarchical structure remains always the same." George Orwell-1984

"Most of the greatest evils that man has inflicted upon man have come through people feeling quite certain about something which, in fact, was false." Bertrand Russell

"A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a ruler whom they consider god-fearing and pious. On the other hand, they do less easily move against him, believing that he has the gods on his side." Aristotle

"God gave the savior to the German people. We have faith, deep and unshakeable faith that he was sent to us by God to save Germany." Herman Goering

"If this were a dictatorship, it would be a heck of a lot easier---just so long as I'm the dictator." GWB-Dec 18-2000

"They have always taught and trained you to believe it to be your patriotic duty to go to war to have yourselves slaughtered at their command. But in all the history of the world you, the people, have never had a voice in declaring war, and strange as it certainly appears, no war by any nation in any age has ever been declared by the people." Eugene Debs

"My kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to its institutions or its office-holders. The country is the real thing----to watch over. Institutions are extraneous, they are its mere clothing and clothing can wear out or become ragged. To be loyal to rags, that is the loyalty of un-reason. It is pure animal. The citizen who thinks he sees that the commonwealth's political clothes are worn out, and yet, holds his peace, and does not agitate for a new suit, is disloyal; he is a traitor. That he may be the only one who thinks he sees this decay, does not excuse him; it is his duty to agitate anyway." Mark Twain


"I can hire half the working class to kill the other half." Jay Gould

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: JennyO
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 10:34 AM

Did you know that flies take off backwards at an angle of 60 degrees - so if you want to swat a resting fly, sneak up on it from behind.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 12:15 PM

Re: "17. Bruce Lee was so fast that they actually had to s-l-o-w film down"

Who is it that assumes we are all so stupid we can't simply read and understand the word "slow"?

Probably the same person that goes around capitalizing and underlining "not".

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 12:30 PM

Leeniea, don't you think that was a visual gag of sorts?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: open mike
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 12:47 PM

i got a similar list in the e-mail yesterday with a few differences:

THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW (??)


1. Money isn't made out of paper, it's made out of cotton.

2. The Declaration of Independence was written on hemp paper.

5. Susan Lucci is the daughter of Phyllis Diller.

6. 40% of McDonald's profits come from the sales of Happy Meals.

7. 315 entries in Webster's 1996 Dictionary were misspelled.

8. The 'spot' on 7UP comes from its inventor, who had red eyes. He
was albino.

10. Warren Beatty and Shirley MacLaine are brother and sister.

11. Chocolate affects a dog's heart and nervous system; a few ounces
will kill a small sized dog.

12. Orcas (killer whales) kill sharks by torpedoing up into the
shark's stomach from underneath, causing the shark to explode.

13. Most lipstick contains fish scales (eeww).

14. Donald Duck comics were banned from Finland because he doesn't
wear pants.

15. Ketchup was sold in the 1830s as medicine.

16. Upper and lower case letters are named 'upper' and 'lower'
because in the time when all original print had to be set in
individual letters, the 'upper case' letters were stored in the case
on top of the case that stored the smaller, 'lower case' letters.

17. Leonardo da Vinci could write with one hand and draw with the
other at the same time ... ( hence, multi-tasking was invented.)

19. There are no clocks in Las Vegas gambling casinos.

20. The name Wendy was made up for the book Peter Pan; there was
never a recorded Wendy before!

21. There are no words in the dictionary that rhyme with: orange,
purple, and silver!

22. Leonardo Da Vinci invented scissors.

Also, it took him 10 years to paint Mona Lisa's lips.

24. The mask used by Michael Myers in the original "Halloween" was a
Captain Kirk mask painted white.

25. If you have three quarters, four dimes, and four pennies, you
have $1.19. You also have the largest amount of money in coins
without being able to make change for a dollar (good to know.)

27. The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law,
which stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider
than your thumb (sign of a true civilized society ... not.)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: curmudgeon
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 01:08 PM

Rule of Thumb:
An inch is the outer part of a man's thumb, 25.4 millimeter to be exact. 12 inches to a foot, two feet to a cubit or three feet to a yard.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 01:29 PM

open mike,

#25 on your list is obviously wrong. With coins in denominations of 1/2, 1 cent, 2, 3, 5, 10, 20, 25, and 50 cents, and 1, 2.5, 3, 4, 5, 10, 20, 25, 50, and 100 dollars ( all US coins), there is no limit to the amount that one might have and still not be able to make change for a dollar.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 02:13 PM

The soul doesn't inhabit the body, it's the other way around. ;-) The body lives, briefly, within the far greater reality that is the Spirit/soul.

You see, the soul/spirit first of all builds a body for itself, through the normal Earthly biological processes: sex, conception, building by one cell at a time, gestation, growth, birth, maturing process, etc...

The spirit/soul animates that body, giving it consciousness, awareness, a functioning nervous system and brain, and a purpose. The most superficial purpose of the body is survival. The next obvious purpose is experiencing pleasure/avoiding pain. The next, procreation. After that...one moves into much more subtle and powerful purposes, like: spiritual evolution, the development of Love and selflessness, the awareness of spiritual Oneness with others, etc...

Many people are entirely unaware of the more subtle and powerful purposes of Life. They remain concerned primarily with survival, sense enjoyment, and procreation...plus prestige, in most cases. Accumulating possessions becomes a powerful motivation too.

That's their decision. If a god wants to pretend it's just a worm, then the Universe freely allows that... ;-)

The body is just a vehicle and it never would have happened, if not for the purposes of the Spirit which built it in the first place. When the body breaks down and dies, the Spirit continues. Presently it may well build another body. Spirit cannot die.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 07:13 PM

The finished size of the "2X4" is more complicated than Gurney told us.

Up until World War I, the finished size of the "2x4" was in fact--you guessed it!--two by four inches. As a wartime economic restraint matter, its official size was reduced by some fraction of an inch, and the size was not restored when the lean times were over.

Then in the middle of the 20th Century--I think I remember it as being some time in the 50s-- the official size was reduced again, to its present size. I recall when it happened, but not just when it happened. I'm not sure what the argument was to the Standards Bureau at that time.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: jpk
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 08:25 PM

sorry little hawk;the turn left in an a/c is to do with the engin torque.in a single engin a/c the engin will fight a right role but will speed up the roll rate to the left,makes changing direction faster,usefull in a dogfight.does apply to multies also[but to a lesser extent]one noteable exception was the p38 with counter rotating engins it rolled just as fast left or right.
and i have seen bats turn right on leaving their laire as well as left.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Bill D
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 08:31 PM

when I started working in my college wood shop, it was still 3 5/8" X 1 5/8"

...and Little Hawk..*grin*...how about sharing your sources for all that heady info about soul & spirit?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 08:37 PM

"Sources? We don't need no stinkin' sources!"

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 09:35 PM

Sources? Child's play, my dear Watson! ;-) I could direct you to at least 50 brilliant books on the general subject, but I doubt you'd read them. I could direct you to a number of brilliant people in the field, but I doubt you'd be interested in them. You're interested in other stuff, I think, and that's fine, because that is your chosen path for now.

Anyway, sources aren't actually needed. All you need to do is totally still your own busy mind...while still awake. Most people do not find that easy. They find it virtually impossible. They're too impatient and restless. They can't shut up their own internal dialogue.

YOU are the source, my friend. Just still the chattering mind for 15 or 20 minutes, and listen. Observe the thoughts as they go by and let them pass until you experience complete inner silence. If you ever succeed in doing that, you will have all the sources you could ever need to know the Truth.

Don't rely on me. Don't rely on religious leaders. Don't rely on sacred books. Don't rely on spells or ceremonies or icons. Rely on the voice within you. The voice of "God" (as they call It) is within you, but you have to shut up for awhile in order to hear it.

Your mind doesn't want to do that...it's afraid it will die! Your mind thinks it IS you. That is not the case. You're something far greater than your busy little mind.

"If you want somebody you can trust, trust yourself." - Bob Dylan

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: bobad
Date: 16 Aug 05 - 09:41 PM

Grasshopper will try master.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Skivee
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 01:55 AM

Bobo
I really know more about this than I should.
#14 on your list is totally untrue
Astronauts fart all the time
They fart while they are ascending during launch.(did I just type "ass-ending")
This is necessary because the cabin pressure in much lower in a spacecraft and is bled down to the operating pressure as the rocket launches.
I was just reading transcripts of the Apollo 17 launch.
There is a very odd section discussing the effect suspended gases in the drinking water had on the crew.
One of them remarked that he typically would begin passing gas immediatly after eating. He noted that following one meal, he passed gas for two hours, with great volume and that his cabinmates remarked on the events.
I admired the understatement of the report.

And the bumblebee thing is bogus too. Oft repeated.
It's frequently used by fundamentalist preachers to mock arrogance of scientists
Could you imagine an aeronautical engineer really stating that bumble bees can't fly.
What was said was that the wing area of insect , when viewed as a conventional wing would not support the weight of it in flight.
The original statement was made during the 40's. It was more a puzzle than a statement..."What don't we understand about this situation,...what's wrong with our mathmatical model, since our results clearly don't match reality."
Aeronautics and applied entomology have both advanced a bit since then.
Of course, insect wings are not stationary in a smooth airflow, but use a figure 8 motion to generate downward thrust.
It's actually very elegant when seen in super s-l-o-w motion like a Bruce Lee film.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,clogger
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 05:54 AM

"Beeswings"
I was taughht that the arguement was that the force produced by the wing on it's down stroke (mathamatically)could not support the bee in flight. The authour was correct. (s)He did not take into account the vacume produced when the wings are pulled away from each other at the top! It doesn't matter whether it is true or not...it does make you think ;-)
Anyway its Burntwood then Bridgenorth (last one) then Fylde so see you in three weeks!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 07:18 AM

A:
25. If you have three quarters, four dimes, and four pennies, you have $1.19. You also have the largest amount of money in coins without being able to make change for a dollar (good to know.)

B:
#25 on your list is obviously wrong. With coins in denominations of 1/2, 1 cent, 2, 3, 5, 10, 20, 25, and 50 cents, and 1, 2.5, 3, 4, 5, 10, 20, 25, 50, and 100 dollars ( all US coins), there is no limit to the amount that one might have and still not be able to make change for a dollar.

B misses the point of the original statement entirely.

For example, to demonstrate that A is correct, take the coins (and numbers) specified, and try to make up a dollar exactly from just those coins.

Hint: try adding another penny...

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 08:00 AM

97% of all statistics are made up...

:D

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 08:06 AM

No - it's 68.37%...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Le Scaramouche
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 08:31 AM

Depends on the percentage of people polled against the percentage of pollers.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Paul Burke
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 08:54 AM

The body is just a vehicle and it never would have happened, if not for the purposes of the Spirit which built it in the first place. When the body breaks down and dies, the Spirit continues. Presently it may well build another body. Spirit cannot die.

I rather suspect you don't have any evidence for this. (hint- just feeling it to be true isn't evidence)

In any case, what does it ever need a body for?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: MMario
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 09:04 AM

24. Celery has negative calories. It takes more calories to eat a
piece of celery than the celery has in it to begin with.

incorrect as stated - it takes more calories to eat and DIGEST celery then the celery contains.


12. Orcas (killer whales) kill sharks by torpedoing up into the
shark's stomach from underneath, causing the shark to explode.

actually by ruptering the internal organs.

22. Roses may be red, but violets are indeed violet

"violets" are also white, yellow, blue, multi colored, etc. I've even seen some that could be classed as pink

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Amos
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 10:39 AM

Don't follow leaders!
Watch thuh parkin' meters!

Most of what LH says is individually discoverable, and would have very little meaning in any other context. In a heuristic or academic or lab-experimental framework, his information would have little bearing, because it essenetially a description of thenature of the aware viewpoint behind all formal frameworks.

I admit he gets a little free with imponderables (like Capital-S Spirit) but essentially the separation between mortal form and spiritual self is purdy much as he describes it. The body is much like a highly evolved smart-card, designed to prove identity and prove that one is present in material scenarios.

That doesn't mean, however, that it is "what you are" or that there are not other kinds of scenarios. The SUV is not the driver; the telephone is not the speaker behind the voice; and the body is not the owner.

The strangest thing that we do not really know is who we each really are in full.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Paul Burke
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 11:02 AM

essentially the separation between mortal form and spiritual self

If by 'spiritual self' you mean a feeling (which could be invalid in that it has no objective reality) of individuality, nihil obstat. But I don't think 'spirit' can possibly be a useful word to use for it, as it means too many things, and could lead to the assumption that, since we have 'spiritual' aspects- those aspects not immediately examinable by external physical means, such as our feelings- there must be an object called a spirit, somehow separate from the body, which feels them- the 'ghost in the machine'. It assumes the existence of an observer, separate from the biological workings of the body, which monitors its operations.

If, on the other hand, the potential for self- awareness is simply a property of matter- that it is the appropriate organisation of that matter that makes the matter aware of its existence- there is no separate 'spirit', the ghost IS the operation of the machine.

I really think that words with less historical baggage should be used- perhaps 'awareness' is neutral and descriptive enough?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Amos
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 11:10 AM

the potential for self- awareness is simply a property of matter

Wal, I don't see as how something not objective is invalid. Most spiritual phenomena is non-objective, of course -- it's tautological that the spirit is subjective because it is the ultimate in subjectivity, the very viewpoint and seat of awareness itself.

As for self-awareness being a property of matter, the proposition strikes me like the farmer who just saw his first giraffe. "Maw, there ain't no such animule!".

Far and strange are the boundaries of non-objective universes, and somewhat uncomfortable sometimes, too.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 11:19 AM

Yup. That sums it up. The greatest question in human existence is: "Who am I?"

This is what people think they are: A body, a mind, a personality, a personal history (based upon memory). Well, all those are temporary things that pass away. What a person really is, is the eternal presence from which those temporary things emanate...manifest...and later pass away.

Paul Burke - So....you want me to provide physical evidence for what is not physical? ;-) Don't hold your breath waiting for that. You yourself (if you think carefully about it) know all kinds of stuff you cannot provide physical evidence for, and you know it beyond the shadow of a doubt. You know it by direct awareness, not observable evidence.

What does Spirit need a body for? It doesn't need a body. It doesn't need anything.

It may freely choose a body, however, in order to experience certain things. What is itself unlimited can become curious as to what would happen when one operated instead within an arbitrary frame of limitation...like a body in a material world. It's fascinating. It's like playing a chess game, and seeing what will happen. It is the playing out of a chosen role.

What is referred to as the spiritual "fall of man" was what happened when Spirit deliberately descended into physical form, and in the process forgot that it was Spirit! That is exactly how a god becomes a frightened, scrambling, ego-driven little mortal creature, in fear of its own eventual demise, competing with others, and in such cases it can even invent crazy religions to appease its tremendous levels of fear and imagined need...or it can concoct equally unlikely concepts like atheism or existentialism in its efforts to compensate for its general level of insecurity and discomfort.

And that is what you see around you. The reason people fight like tigers to be "right" in a debate about anything is that they subconsciously equate being "wrong" with the death of their own identity. The ultimate fear of the embodied spirit that has forgotten that it IS spirit is the fear of death. But Spirit cannot die. Spirit is organized energy and awareness. Energy and awareness change, they change outer form and conscious purpose, but they do not die.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Amos
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 11:21 AM

The reason people fight like tigers to be "right" in a debate about anything is that they subconsciously equate being "wrong" with the death of their own identity.

Nicely put, old Hawk!

A

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Torctgyd
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 11:41 AM

There are no words in the dictionary that rhyme with orange,
purple and silver

Shouldn't that be or as otherwise it's not surprising that no words rhyme with three other randomly chosen words?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: jpk
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 10:08 PM

when i was in the airforce,the bumbe bee thing was said to have been that the same eng. that proved that the c-5 galaxy cound not fly had also shown that the bee[bumble]could not fly because of bad areodynamics.
wrong on both i reckon.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: jpk
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 10:15 PM

as for the 2 x 4,[number 7],the rough cut size[little used in most building is actually 2inch by 4 inch,it is the finish grade[smooth cut],that is one half inch smaller in size

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: jpk
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 10:17 PM

on number 8,if you look close you can also see tire tracks from the camera truck at the races start

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: jpk
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 10:19 PM

23 is true,you try to float like in was water,since it really is water logged sand.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 17 Aug 05 - 10:40 PM

"the largest amount of money in coins without being able to make change for a dollar "


ANY number of coins of larger denomination than one dollar would still leave you unable to make change for a dollar.

The listed denominations greater than one dollar would be available in unlimited number, ( if one had the means) thus one could have a large amount, in coins, and still be unable to make change.

The given figure of $1.19 is still incorrect, as the addition of a half-cent would STILL leave one unable to make change for the dollar.
Or, instead of the four pennies, use 4 three cent pieces...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 12:12 AM

Not being a numismist, I can't express any great authority here, but I have not heard of any fractional cent US coins, or of any "larger than a dollar" US coins except for very rare ones, none larger than the 20 dollar gold piece of a century or so ago.

A few local jurisdictions did some minting on their own in odd denominations, in areas later incorporated into the US, but have there actually been any of these strange ones minted by the US?

Now IFF one should produce a coin with a value of 7/19 of a dollar, one could have any number of them and not be able to make exact change for much of anything, but I don't believe postulating the existing of never-before-minted coin values, or even of coins not commonly in circulation, is within the scope of the original statement.

"You can always win the argument if you're free to change the rules."
-Anon?

John

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: coldjam
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 12:31 AM

From: Jeri - PM
Date: 15 Aug 05 - 09:30 PM

The Bruce Lee thing (#17) is right, because I just heard it on TV recenttly

Am I the only one who finds this hilarious?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 12:45 AM

coldjam -

One of the comics in my newspaper today had the punchline -

"If it weren't for shallow people like you there'd be no entertainment industry."

Jeri probably looks like a little chipmunk with tongue that deep in cheek.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: kendall
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 08:52 AM

I also thought Jeri's comment was funny.

Little Hawk, I believe as you do, so it must be true.

And, by the way, the original name for the bumble bee was the Humble bee.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 09:30 AM

"You can always win the argument if you're free to change the rules."


True. But does it really matter? The Universe doesn't care whether or not you win the argument. ;-) Only your own ego cares, and your ego is an ephemeral thing that passes away.

The great thing about discussing things is not winning the argument, but discovering and learning new things (or from the Spirit's point of view: remembering what you had temporarily forgotten, due to the descent into matter and duality).

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Amos
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 10:08 AM

LH:

I demur. I am profoundly certain the the Great Mission of Spirit is, in fact, to Win the Argument.

(Any more room on that fallen tree, Chipmunk?)


A

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 12:09 PM

JohnInKansas,

ALL of the denominations I listed have been or are presently being produces by the US government as coinage. The half cent, two cent, three cent, twenty cent, three dollar (gold) and four dollar (gold) coins are not in present production- the others are. Check the FACE VALUE of the US 1/10, 1/4, 1/2 and 1 ounce gold and platinum coins.


I did NOT include the local/private issues, which would give even more possibilities. ALL the ones I have mentioned are presently legal tender in the US.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_coinage#Historical_denominations

Of some interest should be the last paragraph on the following article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stella_%28U.S._coin%29

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 12:17 PM

As far as I'm concerned, Amos, there IS no argument. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 12:31 PM

From the manual of Epicetus


Sign of someone who is progressing:
he blames no one,
he praises no one,
he complains of no one,
he accuses no one,
he never speaks of himself
as of someone important
or who knows something.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Amos
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 01:05 PM

Oh, Little Hawk, how downright god-like!!!! :>)

(Scampers off to tree-trunk stage left....)


A

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,Pseudolus at work
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 01:27 PM

I'm 47 years old and no one has ever given me change that included half cent, two cent, three cent, twenty cent or a three dollar coin. I've never seen any one of them. Either way, 25 doesn't say how many coins but how much total money in coins which would still be $1.19 and a half cent even if the 1/2 cent is included. It is certainly not limitless.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 01:31 PM

If you have a $100 coin, how do you make change for a dollar? If you had a million of them, how would you make change for a dollar?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 01:37 PM

"If you have three quarters, four dimes, and four pennies, you have $1.19. You also have the largest amount of money in coins without being able to make change for a dollar"

The given figure of $1.19 is still incorrect, as the addition of a half-cent would STILL leave one unable to make change for the dollar.
Or, instead of the four pennies, use 4 three cent pieces...



3x25 = 75
4x10 = 40
4x3   = 12
1x 1/2= 1/2
      -----
      127 1/2


The problem is that the statement is worded poorly.

"the largest amount of money in coins" is what is stated.

This thread is supposed to be about strange things- thus the odd values of coins...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 01:53 PM

From the manual of Little Hawk...

Sign of someone who is progressing:
he blames no one,
he praises everyone when they are praiseworthy (and all are praiseworthy at times),
he complains of no one,
he accuses no one,
he never speaks of himself
as of someone important
or who knows something, because he knows that he is no more important, relatively speaking, than anyone else.

Including you, BB! ;-)

My manual above accurately describes the people I learn from. I'm working toward that level of awareness as best I can, but I still slip into blaming people sometimes. And I still complain about people sometimes. I regard myself as no more or less important than you. What I know, I know. What you know, you know. The rest is conjecture and opinion.

Epicetus was clearly a pretty advanced fellow...I like his comments that you posted. But maybe his definition of "praise" is different (or intended in a different context) from mine. I find that praise, when deserved, greatly helps people. Try it with a child or an employee or a student, and see what happens.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 02:04 PM

more...

Do not boast of any advantage
that belongs to someone else.
If a horse said with pride,
"I am beautiful,"
this would be tolerable;
but you, when you say with pride,
"I have a beautiful horse,"
know that you are boasting
of an advantage that belongs to the horse,
What then is yours?
The use you make of your ideas.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 02:06 PM

Do not ask for what happens
to happen as you desire it;
rather desire that things should happen
as they happen,
and you will be happy.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,Chongo Chimp
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 02:21 PM

Wise words, baby, wise words. A man or chimp that lives by those words will always be happy.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 05:39 PM

I just may be wrong*, but I think that's not "Epicetus", (whoever he may be) but Epictetus.   It certainly sounds like what Epictetus said.

Dave Oesterreich

*(A handsome admission, if I ever heard one!)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 07:05 PM

Dave

You are correct, I was careless in proofing. I never said I could type...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 09:08 PM

As Chongo said, wise words indeed, BB. Keep up the good quotes.

I am steadily learning to be happy by accepting things (that I can't change) as they are, rather than as I think they should be...but it ain't always easy! ;-) Still, it does get a lot easier as time goes by.

I figure it isn't the World that's there to make me happy, but that I must instead find happiness within. I sure didn't see it that way when I was younger. I thought happiness was "out there" somewhere. (usually in the form of a girl or a possession of some kind) And I went looking, and looking, and looking, and looking......

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ebbie
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 09:19 PM

"in the form of a girl" Nice pun there, LH.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 09:24 PM

It was an unconscious slip, but it said a lot, eh? ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 09:53 PM

When you do something
after having recognized that it is
necessary to do it,
do not fear being seen doing it,
even if the crowd must
judge it unfavorably.
If you are wrong to do it,
avoid the action itself;
if you are right, why do you fear
those who will be wrong to blame you?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beardedbruce
Date: 18 Aug 05 - 09:56 PM

You can be invincible
If you do not engage
in any struggle
in which it does not depend on you
to be the winner.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,Pseudolus at Work
Date: 19 Aug 05 - 09:43 AM

OK, next time you're in a bank, ask them if they can change a penny. they'll probably ask you, "To what?". The coins you talk about may exist in someone's collection but they simply are not used. I think that is the point of the statement.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 19 Aug 05 - 10:21 AM

Here's a common one in spiritual literature, BB. It may be a cliche by now, but it's true (for most people most of the time).

"You are not the victim of the world you see...you're the victim of the way you see the world."

(This does not, however, apply to certain extreme situations, such as: a child who is abused by an adult, for example. It does apply to most common everyday situations involving adults who chronically feel like victims of a "cruel world". As such, it's a very useful piece of advice to people who need to change their negative thinking habits and empower themselves.)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Kim C
Date: 19 Aug 05 - 01:41 PM

I can't stand lists like that because they are mostly rubbish; and people will believe them and keep passing the rubbish along.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Aug 05 - 03:01 PM

" 1. Money isn't made out of paper, it's made out of cotton."

The semantics are skewed here. The significant thing is that paper can be (and traditionally was) made of cotton, or linen, or hemp, not just of wood pulp.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Mr Happy
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 11:58 AM

In January 2003, the toothbrush was selected as the number one invention Americans could not live without, beating out the automobile, computer, cell phone, and microwave oven, according to the Lemelson-MIT Invention Index.[5]

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 05:16 PM


Re: "17. Bruce Lee was so fast that they actually had to s-l-o-w film down"

Did they slow the film down in the camera?   

Or in the projector at the theater?

If you slow the film down in the camera (which, as a registered cynic, I rather suspect is what was actually done), the projected action on the screen will appear faster.

If you slow the developed film down in the projector (which is implied by the statement, I think) the movement on the screen will appear slower.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 05:32 PM

Wendy's name in Peter Pan was inspired by JM Barrie hearing a couple of Scots lassies discussing their "friendy-wendy", using a fairly common way of forming a diminutive. cf bunny-wunny, pussy-wussy.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,Blind DRunk in Blind River
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 07:34 PM

Geez Loueeze! I didn't flippin' know ANY of this weerd stuff, eh?

Holy flip.

I am gonna mentalize it all and go arround makin' my friends and my brother Don feel like they was a buncha morons!

- Shane

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 07:57 PM

10. SH said that several times in the Rathbone/Bruce film series, never in the original novels or stories.

13. "Orange" is pronounced OR-inj (at least that's the way I pronounce it), so technically speaking, all words ends in -inj (hinge, fringe, singe, binge) rhyme with it.

"Door hinge" rhymes perfectly, though admittedly two words.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 08:08 PM

Orange would normally take a feminine rhyme, so you need two syllables to rhyme.

Door hinge has a different vowel in the first syllable, plus the "h", so doesn't rhyme perfectly.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 08:19 PM

1. Orange would normally take a feminine rhyme, so you need two syllables to rhyme.

2. Door hinge has a different vowel in the first syllable, plus the "h", so doesn't rhyme perfectly.

1. OK - see 2.

2. I pronounce or and door with exactly the same vowel, but you've got me on the 'h', unless, of course, the h is dropped as in some dialects.

Now, with regard to purple, may I submit 'burple', "the color of a belch".

Also, for those who remember the old 'Laugh-In" TV show, there was Fred Farkle's next-door neighbor, Ferd Ferple.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Smokey.
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 09:14 PM

The word 'gullible' does not appear in any dictionary of the English language.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 09:49 PM

The word 'gullible' does not appear in any dictionary of the English language.

Do tell. I just checked three, and it's in all of them.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Little Hawk
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 10:05 PM

LOL!!! That's the whole point. You, sir, have just been had...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Smokey.
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 10:16 PM

A true gentleman wouldn't have said that, LH, yet ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 25 Mar 10 - 11:09 PM

LOL!!! That's the whole point. You, sir, have just been had...

Well, that occurred to me right after I posted it, reminds me of an old joke:

He: You have beautiful legs!

She (blushing): Oh, thank you!

He: Now can I pull your other one?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,CrazyEddie
Date: 26 Mar 10 - 04:19 AM

13. There are no words in the dictionary that rhyme with orange,
purple and silver.

Hurple: (Scottish) An impediment similar to a limp.

Curple: the hindquarters or the rump of a horse, a strap under the girth of a horse's saddle to stop the saddle from kicking forward

Burple (Proper noun, so it can be argued that this one shouldn't count)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: GUEST,Steamin' Willie
Date: 26 Mar 10 - 04:36 AM

One half of the world are trying to have fun

The other half are trying to stop them.


Source; Andy Capp, Daily Mirror circa 1975 (Reg Smythe)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Mar 10 - 04:58 AM

If you lay all the posts on Mudcat end to end they still wouldn't reach an agreement...

:D (eG)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Don Firth
Date: 26 Mar 10 - 05:05 AM

In the OP, number 20, the one about "rule of thumb," is bogus. It was hatched up sometime in the 1950s or 1960s by someone like Gloria Steinem or Germaine Greer.

On most adult, the distance between the end joint of the thumb and tip is almost exactly an inch, and carpenters and tailors used to use it for making rough measurements. I have big hands, so mine is more like an inch and a quarter. But knowing that, I can still use it to make approximate measurements if I don't have a ruler handy.

Burple is the color of a belch.

Did you know that ping-pong spelled backwards is gnop-gnip? (It's funnier when you say it.)

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Mar 10 - 07:09 AM

Regarding the "gullible" joke..........This same thing came up on another forum I use about a month ago and this "joke" has actually been added to the definition of the word in the latest edition of the Merriam-Webster on-Line Dictionary.

I don't know if it is included in the 2010 print edition.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Mar 10 - 07:09 AM

100

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Smokey.
Date: 26 Mar 10 - 06:00 PM

Thanks, Spaw - that's where I got it from.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Gurney
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 03:37 AM

Leonardo maybe didn't invent scissors. I've sure I've seen some in a museum, labelled 'Roman.' Long ago.   He might possibly have invented the modern form, pivoted, as opposed to the spring type, all in one piece. Wiki says at least 3-4000 years ago, for this 'shear' type.

The name Wendy appeared in an American census in 1828, long before the fantasy was written in 1904. Also in an English census in 1881, as a boys name. Wiki.

Dolphins attack sharks by ramming, too.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Gurney
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 03:43 AM

When Billy Connolly was in Alaska, he found that the lumberjacks didn't call "Timber' and mushers didn't shout "Mush."

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: HuwG
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 04:11 AM

13. There are no words in the dictionary that rhyme with orange,
purple and silver.

The question of words that rhyme with "orange" came up on the BBC programme "QI", hosted by Stephen Fry, some years ago. American comedian Rick Hall insisted that it rhymes with "Dorange". That's a door hinge in Orange County.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 04:22 AM

Roses are red,
Violets are purple,
Sugar is sweet,
An so is maple surple.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 09:27 AM

Number 7.

Incorrect!

A 2 X 4 sawn (ie. rough cut) is 2 inches by 4 inches exactly

A 2 X 4 PAR (planed all round) is one and seven eighths inches by three and seven eighths inches.

The latter, (in timber lists in the UK at least) is normally listed as Ex 2 X 4, indicting the original from which it was planed.

Anything that measures less is either very heavy handed planing, or a special order size.

Don T.(Ex Joiner and Cabinet Maker)

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 09:59 AM

""Now, with regard to purple, may I submit 'burple', "the color of a belch".""

Or you could follow the Ogden Nash route.

Roses are red,
violets are purple,
sugar is sweet,
and so's maple syrple.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Wesley S
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 10:04 AM

I just read a biography of Jimmie Stewart. He turned down the role of Atticus Finch in "To Kill A Mockingbird". Also the leads in "Broadcast News" and "On Golden Pond". All three roles landed Oscars for the men who played them.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 10:09 AM

OOPS!

Dave beat me to it.

DT

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 07:41 PM

I can get away with rhyming orange and porridge!

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ed T
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 08:47 PM

In 2006, Finland outlawed the circumcision of healthy boys.

From Finland's Central Union for Child Welfare (2003):

"The Central Union for Child Welfare considers that circumcision of boys that violates the personal integrity of the boys is not acceptable unless it is done for medical reasons to treat an illness. The basis for the measures of a society must be an unconditional respect for the bodily integrity of an under-aged person."

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 11:00 PM

An interesting 'rule of thumb' that depends on human anatomy that works for astronomy and other 'rough guide' measuring.

Hold out your arm with with thumb up. Close one eye. The angle subtended by your thumb is now 2 degrees. There are other fixed numbers for the palm out with fingers closed and palm out with fingers outstretched, but I can't recall them at the moment.

It is now believed by some archaeo-astronomers that is how neolithic astronomers measured the sky. Funnily enough that seems to be why there are 360 degrees in a circle...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 27 Mar 10 - 11:21 PM

In 2006, Finland outlawed the circumcision of healthy boys....unless it is done for medical reasons to treat an illness.

Surely there is an exemption for religious observance.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 03:01 AM

Ref above to famous film actor James Stewart ~~ The in-his-time equally distinguished British film actor Stewart Granger was actually called James Stewart, but had to adopt another name as his own was already pre-empted.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: s&r
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 05:57 AM

The actors' trade union Equity will not admit you to membership under a name already registered as a member. So every Equity member must find a unique name

Stu

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 08:27 AM

There were two William Boyds and a Bill Boyd (all unrelated) concurrently in the 1940's-50's.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: bobad
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 08:49 AM

"Surely there is an exemption for religious observance."

Superstitious belief is no justification for non-consensual genital mutilation.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 10:04 AM

Well, if this subject is going to be discussed at length here (no pun intended) it should probably be spun off into a new thread.

I'm not sure what 'superstition' you're referring to. Circumcision, like many other rules of Judaism, is hygienic in origin.

Jews today realize that pork, properly processed, is perfectly safe to eat. They don't eat it out of respect for their heritage. If you consider that 'superstition', you're entitled to your opinion.

Uncircumcised penises are not safe at all. Cancer of the penis is virtually unknown in circumcised penises, one of the most common cancers in the uncircumcised. Of course, the treatment for cancer of the penis is just what you think it is.

Add to that the fact that uncircumcised penises are ugly as hell and you are way beyond 'superstitious belief'.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 10:19 AM

"Uncircumcised penises are not safe at all. Cancer of the penis is virtually unknown in circumcised penises, one of the most common cancers in the uncircumcised. Of course, the treatment for cancer of the penis is just what you think it is.

Add to that the fact that uncircumcised penises are ugly as hell and you are way beyond 'superstitious belief'."

Fact, opinion or superstitious belief?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: bobad
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 10:49 AM

"Circumcision, like many other rules of Judaism, is hygienic in origin."

"Many theories have been advanced to explain the origin of genital mutilation. One theory postulates that circumcision began as a way of "purifying" individuals and society by reducing sexuality and sexual pleasure. Human sexuality was seen as dirty or impure in some societies; hence cutting off the pleasure-producing parts was the obvious way to "purify" someone.

It is now known that the male foreskin, or prepuce, is the principal location of erogenous sensation in the human male (see Anatomy.) Removal of the prepuce substantially reduces erogenous sensation.12,16 Therefore (in the appropriate cultural context), circumcision is revealed as a sacrifice of "sinful" human enjoyment (in this earthly life), for the sake of holiness in the afterlife.12"


"Add to that the fact that uncircumcised penises are ugly as hell ...."

"It may have been at this time that the Pondus Judaeus (also known as Judaeum Pondum), a bronze weight worn by Jews on the residual foreskin to stretch it back into a foreskin,8,18,23 gained popularity amongst Jewish males. This lessened the ugly appearance of the bare exposed circumcised penis.18 This restorative procedure was known by the Greek word epispasm,8 or "rolling inward."

http://www.cirp.org/library/history/

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 10:58 AM

From an orthodox Jewish website:

Finland's Supreme Court ruled in 2008 that male circumcision carried out for religious and social reasons and in a medical manner does not constitute a criminal offence.

That is as I expected, and answers my original question.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 12:10 PM

bobad, your link is a joke. See any statistics re penile cancer there? I couldn't find any.

That circumcision lessens male sensitivity during the sex act is not in dispute. One of the main impediments to sexual harmony in marriage is premature ejaculation. Any stats on PE in uncircumcised vs. circumcised men?

How about polling the nation's housewives on whether they would prefer that intercourse last thirty seconds or thirty minutes?

Beyond that, I'm not going to comment further unless a new thread on the subject is opened, and I'm not gonna open it.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ed T
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 12:22 PM

Some interesting discussion on "circumcision", male and femal, can be found here (scroll down to discussion):

http://worldofweirdthings.com/2009/05/27/sex-culture-and-religion-with-greta-christina/

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: michaelr
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 06:54 PM

Lengthy previous discussion here.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Rowan
Date: 28 Mar 10 - 07:29 PM

Add to that the fact that uncircumcised penises are ugly as hell ....

Perhaps now is not the time to remember the adage "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 12:29 AM

"That circumcision lessens male sensitivity during the sex act is not in dispute."

Disputed!

All I'm going to say is that I don't NEED any MORE sensation..... :-P

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 02:48 AM

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, get it out with Optrex. [ Milligan ]

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Rowan
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 05:48 PM

Milligan never was circumspect, was he.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: frogprince
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 07:04 PM

Ugly circumsized ones? Ugly uncircumcized ones? Let's face it; those things are ALL ugly as hell! How can you blame any woman for becoming a lesbian, and messing around with ATTRACTIVE things?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 07:42 PM

My wife does not agree with you, unless she's been lying to me all these years.

Seriously, when I was a kid, maybe 10-11 years old, I swam nearly every day during the summer at the local YMCA. We all swam nude, and out of, oh I dunno, maybe 25 or 30 kids, there were maybe three or four who were uncircumsized.

Having led up to that point a rather sheltered life, I thought they were DEFORMED or somethin'.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Rowan
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 08:09 PM

On the same theme, has anyone ever wondered how Michelangelo forgot that the original "David" was circumcised?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 10:25 PM

Getting off the topic of pricks & back to main theme of thread:

As a cruciverbalist, the fact that schoolmaster is a perfect anagram of the classroom is one of the very few facts that make me think that perhaps there is a God after all.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Rowan
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 10:48 PM

cruciverbalist
Somehow I got that confused with crucilexiphile, in a manner of speaking.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ed T
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 11:26 PM

The giraffe's tongue is 18 inches long. It uses it's tongue to rip leaves off branches for consumption. It also uses it's tongue to clean it's nose when unwanted visitors like tree ants decide to visit. In comparison, if a human had such a tongue, one would be able to clean the top of one's head, one's nostrils and one's ears.

A giraffe can go without water longer than a camel.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ed T
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 11:32 PM

Arriazia - The complete absence of breasts.

Diphallic terata - The presence of more than one penis.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ed T
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 11:33 PM

Contrary to popular belief, there are almost no Buddhists in India, nor have there been for about a thousand years. Though Buddhism was founded in India around 470 B.C. and developed there at an early date, it was uprooted from India between the seventh and twelfth centuries A.D. and today exists almost exclusively outside that country, primarily in Sri Lanka, Japan, and Indochina.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ed T
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 11:36 PM

The name Lucifer means "light bearer" (hence a match is known as a "lucifer"), and has none of the evil connotations of some of the devil's other names. The planet Venus, when seen in the morning sky, is known to astronomers as Lucifer --that is, the star that heralds the coming light of day.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Ed T
Date: 29 Mar 10 - 11:42 PM

In one year the average human heart circulates from 770,000 to 1.6 million gallons of blood through the body, enough fluid to fill 200 tank cars, each with a capacity of 8,000 gallons. That's 4000 gallons of blood each day. The heart creates enough pressure to squirt blood 30 feet (9 m). Blood travels 60,000 miles (96,540 km) per day on its journey through the body.

If all the blood vessels in a single human body were stretched end to end, they would form a rope capable of going around the world or 60,000 miles of blood vessels.

The average adult has around 10 pints (1.25 gal) of blood in their body. The Ketchua Indians of the Andes Mountains in South America have 2 to 3 more quarts of blood in their bodies than people who live at lower elevations.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 30 Mar 10 - 12:50 AM

The name Lucifer means "light bearer" (hence a match is known as a "lucifer"), and has none of the evil connotations of some of the devil's other names.

The 'evil connotation' is that it is used in the Bible (Isaish 14:12) to describe the king of Babylon, a devilish, though not supernatural, individual.

"...the fact that schoolmaster is a perfect anagram of the classroom is one of the very few facts that make me think that perhaps there is a God after all."

How about "Washington Crossing the Delaware" = "A Hard, Howling, Tossing Water Scene".

Anagrams (= "Ars Magna") might merit a separate thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Gurney
Date: 30 Mar 10 - 03:28 AM

There was a time, some 30 years ago, when I had a trick question.
"Which country has the best record in the Olympic Games?"


The Isle of Saint Vincent. One entry, one gold medal. Impossible to better.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 30 Mar 10 - 03:45 AM

"...the fact that schoolmaster is a perfect anagram of the classroom is one of the very few facts that make me think that perhaps there is a God after all."

How about "Washington Crossing the Delaware" = "A Hard, Howling, Tossing Water Scene".
===
Contrived to my mind, rather than having the natural perfection of my example. Nobody set out to construct that one; except, as I say, the Almighty himself!

~Michael~

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 30 Mar 10 - 09:51 AM

Contrived to my mind, rather than having the natural perfection of my example. Nobody set out to construct that one; except, as I say, the Almighty himself!

OK, as long as we're bringing the Almighty into it, how about "Presbyterians = Best in Prayers"?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 30 Mar 10 - 10:27 AM

And,

What does the Free Church of Scotland stand for?


Prayers!

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: jonm
Date: 30 Mar 10 - 01:34 PM

My favourite anagram pair is "woman Hitler" and "mother-in-law."

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 02 Apr 10 - 07:46 PM

The Women's Beach Volleyball Team have on the rear of their Bikini Top of their playing suits the word BRA...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 02 Apr 10 - 07:52 PM

Try again...

BTW, did you know that The Brazilan Women's Beach Volleyball Team have on the rear of their Bikini Top of their playing suits the word BRA...

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: gnu
Date: 02 Apr 10 - 08:05 PM

Rowan... "Perhaps now is not the time to remember the adage "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

Sometimes the beholder gets a beauty in the eye.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: frogprince
Date: 03 Apr 10 - 02:08 PM

Or a bust in the mouth.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 14 Apr 10 - 06:20 PM

"Around 400 men are diagnosed with penile cancer each year in the UK, compared with the 35,000 cases of prostate cancer.

.......

Risk factors include:......smoking;......circumcision......"

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Rowan
Date: 14 Apr 10 - 06:38 PM

gnu and frogprince;
It took a while for the shoes to drop, but thanks.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: beeliner
Date: 14 Apr 10 - 06:54 PM

"Around 400 men are diagnosed with penile cancer each year in the UK, compared with the 35,000 cases of prostate cancer. Risk factors include:......smoking;......circumcision......"

Surely they mean 'lack of circumcision'.

If not, what is the source? Anybody wanna bet that it's an anti-circumcision website?

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 14 Apr 10 - 07:18 PM

Sarah Dunn, The Independent, 13 April 2010.

The problem appears to be related to personal hygiene, and the practice of safe sex decreases the risk.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: LadyJean
Date: 14 Apr 10 - 08:46 PM

Now there's one of those bits of trivia I picked up that may or may not be true.
I have been told that the Hebrews circumcised their sons, because men went into battle in the buff. Hebrews were circumcised so that they could distinguish themselves from their adversaries, who were also nude.
I don't know if that's true. I don't think I'd have the mental wherewithal to check out willies in the heat of battle. But I heard it somewhere.

I worked for a little paper, published by a British company. The publisher, who was British, liked us to write up christenings. Which is practical in a nation where most people belong to the same church, and NOT practical in a nation where there's a Catholic Church a Swedenborgen Church and a Methodist church within walking distance of a Conservative synagogue. I asked the editor (American, but not brainy.) if she wanted me to write up brises too. After a long pause, she said "I guess they had baptisms back in Bible times too." A bris, for those of you who didn't grow up in a Jewish neighborhood, is the Jewish circumcision ritual.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 15 Apr 10 - 03:04 AM

"one of the most common cancers in the uncircumcised"

Very rare in Europe, where circumcision is also very rare. Any medical intervention will carry a risk of adverse side effects. We're still waiting for sources to back up your assertions, beeliner, some of which are denonstrably untrue.

Subject: RE: BS: Strange Things You Likely Didn't Know
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 15 Apr 10 - 10:33 AM

Ladyjean suggested:

I have been told that the Hebrews circumcised their sons, because men went into battle in the buff. Hebrews were circumcised so that they could distinguish themselves from their adversaries, who were also nude.

Sounds suspiciously like Urban Legend to me, Ladyjean. Sort of similar to the "pluck yew" story for why we have the insulting middle finger signal.

Dave Oesterreich