Random Factoid Thread

[Thubin]

Thought I'd start this thread since I am a huge fan of random, nerdy factoids. Feel free to add any as you wish.

Today's factoid: If you were to replace Sol (the sun, in case you're not familiar with the term 'Sol') with a black hole of equivalent mass; the Earth would remain in it's current orbit and would not be sucked in. A surprisingly large number of people people believe this would happen, even though black holes do not suck at all. In fact, it would take eight minutes for us to even notice, as this is how long light travels from Sol to Earth.

Of course, we'd die very shortly thereafter without any Solar energy entering Earth's "system," so it might be a good idea to start building your interstellar ship now!

[Semmy]

Let me add one that always amazed me.

Spam is so resistant to spoilage that, if kept in the closed can, it may well outlast eternity and will certainly live longer than you.

[Hypolite]

I learned today that the Moon will eventually leave Earth's orbit and become an independent planet in the Solar System.

[Leird]

The only food that never spoils is Honey.

[Semmy]

to get away from the food d-;

In Utah, birds have the right of way on all highways.

[Leird]

The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

I can do it in 2!

[Produno]

You can only go back in time if you can somehow go faster than the speed of light. But even then you would need to bend space and time.


Also, time is only relevant to ourselves. If you asked someone to travel into space for 5 years then come back to earth, for them it would take 10 years. For us it would be considerably different.

[enystrom8734]

Maine is the only state (in USA) whose name is just one syllable.

[Produno]

One of the only things powerful enough to actually bend space and time is a black hole. Although if you go near one it will disintegrate you into thousands of atoms.

[enystrom8734]

Coca-Cola would be green if coloring weren’t added to it.

[Galileus]

One of the only things powerful enough to actually bend space and time is a black hole. Although if you go near one it will disintegrate you into thousands of atoms.

Every gravitational body bends space. It's called a curvature of space

For example, if you preform a slingshot manoeuvre, in euclidean space you fly in a curve. In curved space you fly in a  straight line.

[Produno]

Light travels at  299,792,458 mtrs/s

[enystrom8734]

Ethernet is a registered trademark of Xerox, Unix is a registered trademark of AT&T.

[DeltaV]

Similarly to what other people have said, if you went into space and orbited around for a long time, you would eventually come back and more time would have passed on Earth than you spent in space. It's still only a few seconds at most, but if you were to travel at sub-light-speed a huge distance and back you might find that, say, everyone you knew was dead.

[Galileus]

Statistically speaking, blackjack (or 21 on two cards) is dealt once per every 21 hands.