What have you always wanted to know?

[PurleaseSqueeze]

I was wondering today whether GPs see other GPs if they are ill? Can anyone tell me? I'm assuming yes as they wouldn't be allowed to prescribe medications for themselves?

What other random things have you always wondered/wanted to know?

@Chocolatekitty

Based on the music things: if you're very musical, do you 'recognise' the notes and name them in your heard as you hear them? I feel it would really devalue music if I was thinking 'A, E, C, B sharp..." as I was listening to it!

I don't name notes as I hear them. But I do notice if someone has got something wrong (key, rhythm, etc.) when listening to live music.

@Houseofvelour

I've always wanted to know what sea creatures haven't been discovered yet and what is the coolest thing at the bottom of the ocean.

The locket elderly Kate Winslet threw down there in Titanic.

@perspicaciousGreen - I haven't yet RTFT, so apologies if someone has already mentioned this, but it's not just coma patients.. If you have a csection, you can't get out of bed immediately so the HCAs have to change your maternity puppy pads.

@NotMeItsYou

How do you do eye tests on young toddlers who can’t read or recognise letters?

My daughter had to have sight tests when she was 2.5 - 3 yrs.

The optician looked into her eyes the same as they do for adults. I guess they can measure parts.

Also, they gave her a flip book with a basic silhouette pic on each page. Then they held one up and she had to flip through the book to find one the same.

Her eyesight was so bad a 3 that she had to be referred to a specialist.

@Allmyarseandpeggymartin > "I’ve thought of another.

What language do people “think” in if they are bilingual?"

I knew someone who was English and taught language in a French school. She said she thought more in French than English. She did have a French husband.

When I learned shorthand (about 40 years ago), if someone was speaking to me I would automatically transcribe their words into shorthand in my head. It was frustrating but I couldn't stop myself from doing it. These days shorthand is really useful to me. It's a dying art, so I can write notes to myself and leave them around the place, knowing no-one around here can translate them.

I do love music in a way that I’ve noticed not everyone does. I have definite likes and dislikes. I used to be able to play many tunes on the piano ‘by ear’ before I was formally taught.

Music affects my mood and I feel like I am ‘swimming’ in some types of music. It seems to engulf my sense and I feel emotionally part of the mood. If it is classical I can close my eyes and feel the ‘bigness’ of it, or the sadness.

I love music loud so it completely surrounds me. Which is unusual I’ve been told for a middle aged woman! I’ll turn it up in the car like a gangster

Often it can really lift me, so that I feel like the world is an exciting place to be in again. I can’t not dance to some music and have to get up and move around.

I’m sensitive to the sounds in it so if the bass is not that rich, and levels are off I get annoyed. Tinny music or music I don’t like makes me feel irritable and I have to turn it off.

I’m sensitive to sounds generally which makes it really hard for me to get to sleep.

But sorry @Chocolatekitty I don’t recognise the ‘notes’ in music in my head. In fact I hated being formally taught music - I had taught myself to hear music, and then play it intuitively. I still only really enjoy music once I’ve learnt it from the page - and THEN memorized it so I can play without the sheet.

Love this thread! I started a similar one a while ago but it fizzled out after about 20 posts, several of which expresses amazement at me not knowing the answers... So here goes:

How are small plastic items produced? Surely they don't build a whole new machine for each tiny item? Do they use different moulds?

How do stock exchanges work? Are companies listed on just one or multiple? If multiple, how is the value of their shares calculated? Surely it can't be worth £100 in London but $3 in NY?

How do you get a job that isn't a vocation? I applied for 100+ jobs after my politics degree but ended up doing a PGCE as I struggled to get a foot in the door in most places. I'd like to think I'm not some kind of weirdo, but there were often hundreds of applicants for each (crappy) post.

How do diseases jump the species barrier? It's not just through sex is it?

Why do babies cry to get attention? I know it's such an annoying sound that you'll try to make it stop, but there's always the risk the caregiver will walk away instead. Wouldn't it make more sense for the baby to be as cute as possible?

WHY is my son so vehicle obsessed? Pre-kids I would have said it's unconscious bias but honestly, I've tried to counter it to no avail...

I often wonder what the vinters buy one half so precious as the stuff they sell. (answers on a postcard, please, to Fitzgerald, Omar's Fine Tents.)

Babies cry at a certain pitch that mum’s find very difficult to ignore - it is vital for survival and thought to be evolutionary (those kids that cried survived)

[quote Silversun83]@perspicaciousGreen - I haven't yet RTFT, so apologies if someone has already mentioned this, but it's not just coma patients.. If you have a csection, you can't get out of bed immediately so the HCAs have to change your maternity puppy pads.[/quote]
That feels different to me, though, because you're awake and it's expected! It just... never struck me that unconscious women would still have periods. Like, you could be in a coma for a year and your periods would start and stop even though you had no idea. I wonder if coma patients' brainwaves change on their period? Mine are always painful and I wonder if you'd see that somehow.

@notthissticky How are small plastic items produced? Surely they don't build a whole new machine for each tiny item? Do they use different moulds?

Injection moulding, I would think. But there are loads of videos of factories on YouTube. I like to watch foods being made. I'm sure you can find one of Polly Pockets or something!

~ Are supermarket flowers dyed? Some of them seem so garish.
~ How are supermarket roses grown with such long, straight stems, like no rose bush I've ever seen? What do these bushes look like?
I have an enquiring mind and I want to know.

Yes, some supermarket flowers are dyed.

@Wiebsa

I don’t know about lions but I do have a big boxer dog who is very docile and spends most of his time chilling. He is in superb condition, very muscular, people praise me for all the hours of walks/runs I take him on. Even vets praise me for all the exercise he clearly gets . Not at all, I am pretty sure it’s all down to testosterone.

Same. Short bursts of energy here seem to do it.

@MagicSummer

Allmyarseandpeggymartin

At what stage are you actually legally married?*

I got married 5 years ago and the Registrar was very clear that you are legally married when the wife says the word 'husband' in this vow:-

" I call upon these persons here present to witness that I (your name) do take thee (your partners name) to be my lawful wedded husband."

That is really interesting because when I got married the vicar stopped us from saying our vows in the rehearsal or “we’d be married” I thought he was joking!!

Thank you to the numerous people who answered my question about thinking languages

@Startingagainperson

Babies cry at a certain pitch that mum’s find very difficult to ignore - it is vital for survival and thought to be evolutionary (those kids that cried survived)

Kids that cry also attract predators.

If I was in a war situation where soldiers were going from house to house. How do I stop my baby from crying and giving away my location. Did all families with small babies get killed.

Allmyarseandpeggymartin

I’ve thought of another.

What language do people “think” in if they are bilingual?
I think and have dreams mostly in English but if I'm on holidays in my native country after a week or so, I start thinking in my first language.

I really want to know how those security thingies you use for online banking work - the fobs that look like calculators that give you secure codes when accessing your account, transferring money and whatnot.

How does HSBC.com know what code my fob is coming up with? 🤔

Not sure I can explain what I mean but hopefully, somebody clever knows?

And to the pp who asked about why everybody uses the same words...

Up until about 500 years ago, the UK was a mess of languages. There was a deliberate attempt to push English as a language. It was expanded at a rate of knots (literally tens of thousands of words invented) so that it could compete as a sophisticated language. The invention of the printing press helped to roll the language out and English was enforced in church, in the courts etc. Bibles were only printed in English. It was a really deliberate attempt to promote an idea of 'Englishness' as an identity.

Similar things have happened in different countries. Germany for example. They united the territories that existed in that region as 'Germany' by promoting a common language.

Just read up about the Dyatlov Pass.

What makes me think the avalanche theory doesn't add up is that they were found covered in traces of radioactive material and weird lights were seen in the sky.

That's military activity. Or aliens. Got to be. 👽

Where do viruses or colds start? You normally catch them off somebody, but the first person who had it, how did they get it?

Stomach bugs I know are probably from poor hygiene in the first instant. But what about flu, colds etc?

@blueshoes Kids that cry also attract predators. all mammal babies cry in a pitch that gets their mother’s attention, and turn on chemical ‘nurturing’ parts of the brain - so it must be worth more to their survival than attracting prey - especially as often this means they need feeding which quietens them too.

Colds initial would jump species, like Covid, into a human. The virus would need a protein to bind to a receptor in a human cell. They must also learn how not to ‘alert’ the human immune system. It’s not easy so it’s really rare, thank goodness. It’s called zoonotic spillover.

The first virus - they don’t know where it came from. Was it genetic elements that learned how to move between cells? Some people think they were pre-date cells, and were the first replicating entities, that they are ancient.

The first person ever to catch the common cold, they think, was from a camel in the Middle East, early in human history!