• breadsmasher@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    The country claiming to have the most “freedom” of any country has the highest incarceration rate of any country.

    • Asafum@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      Not so fun fact: the constitution allows for slavery as long as it’s a punishment for a crime.

      Hmmm… Nah, those dots don’t connect at all.

    • ritswd@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      … and built its initial wealth on slavery revenue.

      It’s a shame because there are a lot of other great things to be proud about when it comes to the US. I guess when people boast about US freedom, what they mean is democracy, and starting the end of the colonial era, inspiring a tidal wave of democratic uprisings around the world, which is accurate. I wish they didn’t use the word “freedom” for that.

  • Huffkin@feddit.uk
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    2 years ago

    Oxford University is older than the Aztec empire.

    Oxford University founded in 1326, Aztec empire ~1428-1521

    • tristophe@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      Don’t mean to pick, but Oxford was founded in 1096 and Cambridge in 1209.

      I worked for cambridge in 2009 and got a nice little 800 year badge

    • floofloof@lemmy.ca
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      2 years ago

      And some of the colleges of Oxford University are older than the university. Merton College was founded in 1264.

  • ch00f@lemmy.world
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    2 years ago

    The closest planet to Earth is Mercury.

    On average that is. Mercury is actually the closest planet to every other planet in average. Because when it’s on the other side of the Sun, it’s still pretty close.

    • domage@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      Wow, you’re absolutely correct!

      The average distance from Earth to Mercury is about 1.04 astronomical units (au), which is the average distance between Earth and the Sun.

      In comparison, the average distance between Earth and Venus is approximately 1.14 au, while the average distance between Earth and Mars is around 1.7 au.

      You can check that in Wolfram Alpha.

  • swnt@feddit.de
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    2 years ago

    Oh, I have two good ones:

    1. Nuclear power causes less deaths (per energy unit produced) than wind (source)

    2. You get less radiation when living near a nuclear power plant, than if that nuclear plant hadn’t been there.

    To explain the second: A major misconception is, that nuclear power plants are dangerous due to their radiation. No they aren’t. The effect of radiation from the rocks in the ground and the surroundings is on average 50x more than what you get from the nuclear power plant and it’s fuel cells. (source). Our body is very well capable of dealing with the constant background radiation all the time (e.g. DNA repairs). Near a power plant, the massive amounts of isolation and concrete will inhibit any background radiation coming from rocks from that direction to you. This means, that you’ll actually get slightly less radiation, because the nuclear plant is there.

    Regarding the dangers of nuclear disasters. To this day, it’s been very hard to find out, if at all any people have even died to Fukushima radiation (ans not other sources such as tsunami/earthquake/etc.) Nuclear radiation causes much more problems by being an emotionally triggering viral meme spreading between people and hindering it’s productive use and by distracting from the ironic fact, that the coal burned in coal power plants spew much more radiation into the atmosphere than nuclear power plants themselves. (source)

  • Julian@lemm.ee
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    2 years ago

    Your car keys have better range if you press them to your head, since your skull will act as an antenna. It sounds like some made up pseudoscience that would never work in practice or have a negligible effect, but it actually works.

    Edit: idk if it’s actually because your skull acts as an antenna, although that’s what I’ve heard. I looked it up and it seems like it’s your head acting as a reasonance chamber. Since your body is conductive, your head can bounce and amplify the radio signal.

      • niucllos@lemm.ee
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        2 years ago

        If you’ve ever played around with an old-style lighter (think classic Zippo) you’d get it! They’re fairly expensive, and aren’t airtight so they need to be refilled every few days/weeks. If you fill them too much they need to be kept upright or they’ll spill lighter fluid on you. Super cool and can hold flames for a while but not nearly as conventient as a matchbook for quick fire lighting

      • jbrains@sh.itjust.works
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        2 years ago

        "The average person has… " is very different from “People on average have…”.

        I suspect you meant the second, but sometimes people truly mean the first.

        The difference doesn’t matter until it very suddenly matters. 😉

        • quinnly@lemmy.ml
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          2 years ago

          I was actually quoting Bo Burnham, it’s a direct quote from his 2010 special Words Words Words

  • Rikudou_Sage@lemmings.world
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    2 years ago
    • Wombat feces are cube shaped.
    • Bananas are berries and strawberries are not.
    • Oxford university is older than the Aztec empire.
    • Humans share 50% of our DNA with bananas.
  • Wanderer@lemm.ee
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    2 years ago

    The world is running out of sand.

    It’s one of the most used materials in the world for construction but islands are disappearing because of its limited supply.

    • fubo@lemmy.world
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      2 years ago

      Well, no; Theophania was a common Christian name in the Eastern Roman Empire. “Tiffany” is an English version of Theophania, a Greek Christian name referring to the feast day also known as Epiphany or Three Kings Day. The masculine form is Theophanes.

      “Jennifer” is, by the way, the English form of the Welsh name Gwenhwyfar, also known in French as Guinevere.

  • TauZero@mander.xyz
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    2 years ago

    Almost every atom in your body has been part of other living organisms thousands if not millions of times before.

    • tieme@midwest.social
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      2 years ago

      I don’t think this is true for all of them. My cube takes at least a couple hundred rotations and then you have to take the stickers off and move them around to solve it.

  • BalpeenHammer@lemmy.nz
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    2 years ago

    Moose kill more people than bears every year.

    Also Donald Trump was the president of the United States.