To ask you to post the most intellectual thing you have learned recently?

[ethelfleda]

I dont care what subject it is about or how specific or random it may seem. I'm just in the mood to soak up some knowledge! I've been doing a lot of free course on the openlearn website and some of them are fascinating and I feel my self esteem is increasing just through learning. I didn't get the chance to study past GCSE level when I was younger and I have always regretted it.

I will start:

That I think in art history, it can almost be considered a hindrance to try and relate the artist's work with details of their life. This can discount many other factors influencing their work such as patronage or available materials and can cause you to read a painting 'incorrectly' - that is not in the manner in which it was intended'

[Gwenhwyfar]

"Today, probably that the Welsh name for the Welsh Leader is Prif Weinidog Cymru. Is that intellectual or just a random thought that whimsied through my head"

It means literally 'Prime Minister of Wales". We don't differentiate between the titles Prime Minister and First Minister.

[Gwenhwyfar]

"The younger a society is demographically, the more violent it is. I came across this fact a few years ago, it seems so obvious once you think about it but then sheds new light and perspective on so many conflicts."

It was a factor in the Arab Spring wasn't it?

[Curlyshabtree]

The word crikey means Christ killed the Lord....
Avocado and latex have the same proteins.
Crikey!

[Gwenhwyfar]

"In Scottish Gaelic grass and the sea are the same colour."

Languages that don't have separate words for blue and green are called 'grue' languages:
theconversation.com/the-way-you-see-colour-depends-on-what-language-you-speak-94833

Welsh now uses blue and green in the same way English does, but used to use glas (which now mean blue) for green. This is the same origin as for the name Glasgow (green valley).

[SirGawain]

A cow is not actually considered to be a cow until it has birthed a calf.
They are Heifers if they have never had a calf.

Not quite correct. She is a cow but belongs to a sub-group called heifers. (Just as child is a sub-group of humans).
She remains a heifer until her second calf is born. Before her first pregnancy she is called a maiden heifer. I hope this set the facts straight.

[Thymelord]

I have nothing to contribute but this thread is fascinating. It can't just be me who wants to go for a drink with ErroltheDragon just to listen to her speak. You know so much!

[LastOneDancing]

Sorry that I'm late to the party! I'm amazed anyone found my sociological nugget interesting!

But yes thecriminalmind functionality theories...

Bernard de Mandeville came up with this idea that if we all became 100% perfect overnight we'd be up the creek -
All the members of the police force, all the lawyers, all the judges become jobless overnight. The architects building the prisons, they have nothing to do anymore. Mandeville, who was a doctor in London at the time, said that if the members of the medical profession admit to their patients that they really do not know how to heal them, which was quite true in the 18th century, all hope is lost. So they would stop doing what they did. The rich do not want to show off their riches to their neighbors, so no more work for the painters, no more work for the sculptors...
There's also a thing about a society of saints. If nobody commits 'real' crime, then human nature will find the most mild deviations criminal e.g. picking your nose in public would become an arrestable offence.

Can I stress I'm not an academic, I'm learning this stuff from a freebie course, but I do find Sociology fascinating.

[ErrolTheDragon]

It's largely a function of age, ThymeLord.

[Andromeida59]

That a new methodology previously used in measuring craters on Mars is now helping to fight cancer and also reduce the number of test subjects whilst also increasing the accuracy of the data.

Really impressive stuff!

www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/technology-map-mars-measuring-treatment-tumours/

Linear Poisson Modelling

[kateandme]

anyone know of any great podcasts that have interesting facts/stuff talked about.
coughs shyly not too intellectual stuff more fun facts/interesting things and QI type thing.

[BlueUggs]

That there is gender bias in the research of whales' reproductive systems?! There has been a lot of research on male whales' penises (10' long and 30" in diameter!!) but not match research into whale vaginas.

[BertieBotts]

2 euro coins all have different images depending on the country and the ones from Moldova and the Vatican are the rarest.

That's not very intellectual, just the 2.7 popes thing reminded me.

It's thought there is a link between ADHD and local anaesthetic acting poorly/slowly. Learned that from a midwife when registering my medical history with a hospital the other day. It's certainly true for me and I never knew why.

[StealthPolarBear]

Do you have any links bertie? Sounds interesting.
And for all the people saying they don't understand the point of the thread, it's a random facts thread, without people like me adding "did you know tigers aren't female lions?" :o

[MongerTruffle]

2 euro coins all have different images depending on the country and the ones from Moldova and the Vatican are the rarest.
All euro coins have different designs on one side, depending on the country where they were minted.
Moldova doesn't use the euro.

[UsedToLoveMorrissey]

That in the US, prison and jail are different. Jail (I think) is where you go until trial, prison is where you get sent once convicted. Or it could be the other way round, not sure 🤔 I just assumed the two words were interchangeable.

[UsedToLoveMorrissey]

Meant to add, love this thread.

[ChazsBrilliantAttitude]

Defenestration is the act of throwing somebody (or something) out of a window.
(The term is believed for go back to 1618)

[ErrolTheDragon]

Age, curiosity and the power of google...

So, Moldova doesn't use the euro, yet it seems there are some Moldovan euro coins available to collectors - uncirculated 'pattern sets'. Not sure if these were 'official' productions in anticipation of joining the euro in the future or what

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Moldova-Euro-Pattern-Set-2010-Essai-Probe-Prova-Prototype-Specimen/222738561277?hash=item33dc40b8fd:g:2jAAAOSw4PxaIDcJ

There are even 'trial' British euro patterns....

www.eurocoins.co.uk/britain.html

[REOLay]

I'm reading The Art Of Logic by Eugenia Chang at the moment. Only in the third chapter but it's brilliant.

Focus is on how to make sense of misleadingly rhetoric, fake news and social media emotion storms that warp facts.

Particularly interested in how it will apply to untangling the out of control rhetoric of some perspectives on current social/political hot potatoes.

I'd love to be able to understand what brings people to such entrenched positions, and to be able to communicate with them better.

At the moment it seems any angle I go in at provokes personal insults and defensive anger, no matter how careful I am with what words I use and how I phrase things.

So I want to learn how to engage better so that actual discussion might happen, rather than just a slanging match.

[ethelfleda]

REO

That sounds very interesting! DH and I were discussing something similar the other day. The internet is such a potentially wonderful tool, and yet most use it for attacking others and their views. People don't seem interested in having their views on anything challenged. You see it on here all the time. They dont listen to each others point of view, they're more interested in who appears to be the more witty of the two sides by attempting to make the other seem stupid. That's why nearly every thread (and nearly every discussion on the internet in general) ends in a bun fight! It's such a shame- if we weren't so emotionally attached to our views we could debate with an open mind. But we are so defensive, it's so hard for anyone to say "Yes, I see your point. I shall learn from that"

I think not enough importance is placed on emotional intelligence. If we strived for emotional intelligence as well as being 'fact smart' then we could potentially have much more interesting discussions.

Incidentally, I have been trying to improve my emotional intelligence lately as well as general intelligence!

[AdmiralJaneway]

Read something on Twitter this morning that make me think....

“Why have cars got brakes? So they can go faster (without them they’d have to go incredibly slowly!).”

[Notquiteagandt]

Pluto didn't even get to complete one orbit around the sun between the time it was discovered and the time it was declassified as a planet.

This is a really good read that will confuse your concept of time.

www.buzzfeed.com/andyneuenschwander/23-mind-blowing-facts-about-time-thatll-make-you-say-whoa?utm_term=.drY7rV9l8#.kvXpjdQNw

[TheKrakening3]

Freshwater eels spawn in the ocean. They can be spawned thousands of kilometres away, and end up living in lakes and rivers, often high in mountains. To breed, they leave their freshwater home and travel thousands of kilometres back to their spawning area in the ocean. There must be a reason for all their ridiculous hard work but I don’t know what it is!

[Chocolatelavender]

According to anthropology humanity was egalitarian (equality) before the advent of agriculture and trade. While we were hunter gatherers our survival depended on equality, sharing, co-operating. Taking more than your fair share or acting more important than others was strongly discouraged. Men and women were regarded as equal. There was no personal property or possessions. (Makes me think of John Lennon's Imagine: imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can) Agriculture and trade introduced personal property, possessions, having more than others. We seem to have created this inequality where we are ruled by the few who have more. I wonder if we could ever achieve egalitarianism again and what would it take to achieve equality. We cannot go back to being hunter gatherers. But perhaps we could find another way. Or maybe we won't. I wonder at what point will humanity's survival depend on being equal again.

Link to interesting, related article:
www.newscientist.com/article/dn22071-inequality-why-egalitarian-societies-died-out/

[StealthPolarBear]

Notquiteagandt

Pluto didn't even get to complete one orbit around the sun between the time it was discovered and the time it was declassified as a planet."
Wow! Surely not