Hamburgers were invented in Hamburg, right?
In fact, the hamburger was first sold in America.

Well, at least Napoleon was a dwarf, wasn’t he?
Erm, no. At 5ft 6in, he was the average height of
a European man in the 1800s.

These are some of the myths exploded in a new
book, True Or False. But, as it also reveals, some
of the great urban myths are, in fact, true.

Falling cats do tend to land on their feet. And,
sadly, pessimists are right - toast does usually
land butter-side down.

Here are some of the most famous myths - and
the truth that lies beneath...

1) There are seven seas

FALSE: The expression was coined by sailors
thousands of years ago, but it is as mythical as
the mermaid. In truth, there are five oceans and
more than 50 seas.

2) A cockroach can live without its head

TRUE: Cockroaches survived the extinction of
the dinosaurs. And, yes, they can live without air
for 45 minutes, and without their heads for at
least three days.

3) A coin dropped from a high building can kill
you

FALSE: However high the building, a coin is very
unlikely to kill you if it lands on your head.
Because it is small and flat, it is subject to lots of
wind resistance and won’t hit lethal speeds. If
hit, you’re more likely to end up feeling as
though your head’s been stung.

4) Camels store water in their humps

FALSE: A camel’s hump is really a huge lump of
fat. This is a food store, allowing the camel to
survive for long periods in the desert.

5) It is warm in summer because Earth’s orbit is
closest to the sun

FALSE: This cannot be true — after all, when it is
summer on one side of our planet, it is winter on
the other. The changing seasons are a result of
the tilt in Earth’s axis, with the northern
hemisphere turning towards the sun in our
summer, and away in our winter.

6) We’re taller in the morning than evening

TRUE: We are bigger after a spell lying in bed.
The backbone doesn’t have to support your body weight, so the discs between the vertebrae aren’t squashed, as they are during the day. So you are 0.2in taller in the morning than in the evening.

7) An opera singer can shatter glass

TRUE: Italian opera singer Enrico Caruso
claimed his high notes could shatter champagne
flutes. He was right — ear-piercing tones have
been known to break glass.
Glass has a natural resonant frequency — the
speed it will vibrate when tapped, or disturbed
by a sound-wave. If a professional sings at the
right pitch and volume to vibrate the air particles
around the glass at its precise resonant
frequency, the glass will vibrate. Raising the
volume can result in the glass breaking
altogether.

A rainbow has seven colours

FALSE: The reality is not so black and white.
Reflecting sunlight off water droplets,a rainbow
bounces back every wavelength from infrared to
ultra-violet, with colours running into millions of
kaleidoscopic shades.

9) The sun is yellow

TRUE: Children’s drawings of bright yellow
sunshine capture its true colour. This big ball of
glowing gas is indeed a yellow star. The Sun
looks yellow from space, but it is more yellow
from Earth due to it being seen through our
planet’s atmosphere. If you viewed the Sun from
a mountain-top, the yellow intensity would
reduce because the atmosphere is thinner. We
are so familiar with depictions of the yellow Sun
that astronomers enhance images to make them more yellow.

10) Starlight is millions of years old

TRUE: When you look up at the stars, you’re
seeing their original light created many
thousands or even millions of years before. A
light-year is the distance light travels in a year —
5.88 million-million miles. So the light of a star
millions of light years away has indeed taken
millions of years to reach us.

11) Goldfish have three second memories

FALSE: Goldfish have a reputation for stupidity.
But it’s an unfair one. In truth, they are fast
learners and punctual time-keepers, with the
ability to remember colours and music months
later.

12) Elephants never forget

TRUE: Elephants do have exceptional memories.
They recognise old friends after long periods
apart, and they know the scent of around 30
relations. Mourning elephants touch the skulls
and tusks of dead elephants, and return to the
site in a grieving ritual.

13) A black hole sucks in everything near it

FALSE: The gravitational pull of a black hole (a
place in space where gravity pulls so much that
even light can’t get out) is undeniably strong, but
it cannot absorb all matter. Mysterious so-called
dark matter (undetectable matter known to
make up perhaps 90 per cent of the mass of the
universe) seems able to resist it.

14) We use only 10 per cent of our brains

FALSE: This is a myth dating back to the 19th
century when scientists had many strange ideas
about the human brain. In fact, sensors and
scanners reveal that we use all of our brain, and
most tasks involve activity in many different
areas at the same time.

15) Neanderthals were very hairy and spoke in
grunts

FALSE: This unflattering description comes from
popular stereotypes of early peoples. Scientific
studies reveal that Neanderthals were not overly
hairy and talked similarly to people today.

Source: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2785876/Opera-singers-shatter-glass-true-false-You-surprised-answers-new-book-explodes-myths.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490