Open Mike: Surprising Facts (OT)

["Open Mike" is the often off-topic Editorial Page of TOP. It appears on Sundays, allegedly and theoretically.]

Photo by Douwe C. van der Zee

—>The first thing made by humans that was taller than the Great Pyramid of Giza was the spire of Lincoln Cathedral in Lincoln, England, completed in 1311. That meant that the Great Pyramid held the record as the tallest structure built by humans for some 3,800 years. Lincoln Cathedral held the title until 1548, when the spire collapsed and was not rebuilt.

—>Buzz Aldrin's mother's maiden name was Moon.

—>The Slovenian basketball player Luka Dončić, 24, who plays for the Dallas Mavericks and has been in the NBA for six years, currently holds the third-highest lifetime scoring average of all time in the NBA, 28.3 points per game (PPG). The only two players ahead of him are Wilt Chamberlain and Michael Jordan. In playoffs, Dončić has a career PPG of 32.5, second only to Michael Jordan. A week ago last Friday, he scored 73 points in a game, a tie for fourth-highest in League history. The two players who have scored more than 73 points in one game are Wilt Chamberlain, who did it twice, and Kobe Bryant.

—>Humans are the only animals that cry tears in response to emotions, and the only animals that have chins.

—>The worst business move in history might not have been such a bad move. You probably know that there was a third founder of Apple Computer, Ronald G. Wayne, who immediately sold his 10% interest in the company back to Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak for $800. A year later he was paid an additional $1,500 to forfeit any future claims to the then newly-incorporated business. Today, his share would be worth approximately $95 billion. Wayne has stated on numerous occasions that he does not regret his decision. The reason is that he was intended to be the tiebreaker in disagreements between the two intense and headstrong Steves, the stress of which, he believes, would have made him "the richest man in the cemetery."

—>Human beings have been recognizably human for somewhere between 90,000 and 300,000 years, depending on how you look at it. Even if we survive as a species for that many more years, no human being will ever again experience the climate that existed in 1970.

—>Australia is wider than the moon.

—>The economy of the State of California is larger than that of all but four countries on Earth: China, Germany, Japan, and the United States itself (although India is close and the U.K. not too far behind India). Vermont's economy, the smallest in the U.S., is higher than that of 108 countries.

—>In 2018, there were more immigrants to the U.S. from both China and India than from Mexico. In addition, Mexico in recent years has seen an undetermined but large flow of former immigrants returning to Mexico. The same was true of Irish immigrants in the 1800s, many of whom eventually returned to Ireland.

—>The number of bacteria in our bodies outnumbers our human cells; we are about 56% bacteria. However, bacteria are very light, so we are still approximately 99.7% human by weight.

—>In photography's first seventy years or so, it was considered childish to smile while having one's picture taken, and adults said "prunes" before the picture was taken to remind them to remain appropriately serious*. Eastman Kodak eventually changed this with its ad campaigns by encouraging people to smile and say "cheese." Now, the custom among Americans of grinning all the time is considered an oddity by some Europeans.

Mike

*I've requested a copy of the scholarly paper that purports to document this, but haven't received it yet. If I am sent a copy I'll let you know.

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Comments

[Calvin Amari]

My bet is that the prunes bit does not pan out, no matter how often it has been repeated. There are reports that saying “prunes” was attributed to a single Daguerreotypist but (a) even that makes little sense given exposure times and (a) even if true, it does not suggest common practice, let alone common practice decades later when exposure times were short enough to capture lip movements associated with articulating a single-syllable word.

[Chris Kern]

Mike: . . . the custom among Americans of grinning all the time is considered an oddity by some Europeans.

Well, I’m not a European, but I certainly agree. I refer to the ubiquitous cellphone photos that people take of their families, their friends, and themselves goofily grinning at the lens as “smirks.” The pictures are always the same; only the background changes. I can’t imagine anyone looks at these tedious snapshots after the immediate moment has passed. Every new venue apparently demands its own smirk, yet these compulsive snappers never seem interested in making candid photographs of the everyday lives of their subjects—something that (as anyone of a certain age will tell you) can provoke fond memories many years later.

[Bob Rosinsky]

Well, that was an interesting compendium of facts!

[John Camp]

I sort of doubt the 70s climate thing. If you look at earth population projections, a very few hundred years from now the earth's population may well be in the hundreds of millions, rather than billions. When you subtract that much energy use -- and probably the elimination of oil and coal -- I would expect temperatures to eventually collapse as well. The earth may well pass through the 1970s climate on the way to something colder. We won't see,

[Zyni]

Upper & lower Egypt were unified in about 3,150BCE. If you say end of ancient Egypt was start of Ptolomy I's reign, 305BCE, then ancient Egypt lasted 2,845 years ... and ended 2,329 years ago: it lasted longer than all the time since it fell.

Another way: great pyramid was 4th dynasty (so, really early, old kingdom), about 2,570BCE. Last known hieroglyphic inscription, which likely is in fact the last one made, was 24 August 394CE, 2,964 years after great pyramid. Time since then: 1,630 years.

Future historians of the world, which is of course coterminous with Egypt, will say that we are currently living in the fourth intermediate period. The restoration of the pharoahs in the last years of the 21st century will mark the transition to what will be known as the first modern kingdom, after the wars which so decisively ended the intermediate period.

[ronin]

Interesting facts!

I've often heard that about California's economy, but do have to question how it is measure. Because much of the California economy is subsidized, or invested in, by the United States, and much of Cali's expenses are paid by the collective United States.

Else, Cali would have to find its own self-sufficient water supply, power supply, raw materials, manufacturing, defense, military based, parks... or have to pay much more to others for same.

[Albert Smith]

Strange but true, 4 out of 5 dentists make up 80% of all dentists.😀

[Jez Cunningham]

‘When someone’s taking a picture of French people, they don’t yell out “Say Cheese”. No, they don’t even yell out “Say fromage“, as you might have suspected. But they do often yell out “Ouistiti”.
What’s a ouistiti? Well, apparently it’s a marmoset, which is a small monkey with an outlandish haircut.’

From: https://theearfultower.com/2017/07/23/eight-more-unusual-things-i-learned-about-how-to-speak-french-when-i-moved-to-france/#:~:text=When%20someone's%20taking%20a%20picture,often%20yell%20out%20%E2%80%9COuistiti%E2%80%9D.

[Adam R]

My grandparents had a farm in Lincolnshire, and when they retired they moved to a house steps away from Lincoln cathedral. It really is a beauty - I'd put it up against any cathedral in the UK, even the fabled Notre Dame in Paris. Well worth a visit if you're in the area.

[Richard Tugwell]

To which I might add, gorillas are the only primates that don't masturbate. However I never plucked up the courage to ask one

[Daniel]

When you look at the basketball records of Wilt Chamberlain they become even more impressive when you realize he did not have the benefit of a 3 point basket. One season he averaged 50 points per game. The whole season, not just a few games.
Track athlete and high jumper.
Kansas City Chiefs had him try out for their football team. Would throw the ball over the crossbar in the end zone and Wilt could jump up and catch it. He decided he didn't want to play pro football - our loss.

[KeithB]

Ronin:
I don't know exactly what you are getting at, but California receives less per person from the Feds than most states:
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/3531/2

As far as smiling, there was an impoderables article about this, and most early photos were serious, posed works with long exposure times.

Though Feldman does quote Lewis Carroll's Hiawatha parody:
https://universification.wordpress.com/2012/08/28/hiawathas-photographing-lewis-carroll/

[Earl Dunbar]

I have what I consider to be a pathetic open mouth smille, so I now refuse to “smile” for photos. A slight closed mouth smile is the best you’ll get.