Vous êtes sur la page 1sur 66

IN WHICH SECTION DO YOU WANT TO GO ?

Tell Me Why Some Facts About Science

Welcome to Tell Me Why Fun Facts page. Here you will be learning some very interesting and amazing facts in a fun and easy categorized synopsis format. This webpage will be updated whenever I can so you can check back once in a while. Also, remember to check out my other site with a more in-depth interesting facts from around the world: Did You Know?


Some facts here will no doubt : shock you , make you ponder, make you wonder, others you will know while others you will learn and you might even yearn for

Click the category about which you want to know the FACTS :
vAstronomy vBiology vDid you know stuff vFunny Stuff vMiscellaneous

ASTRONOMY
qEarth is the only planet not named after a pagan god. qVenus is the only planet that rotates clockwise.

BIOLOGY
1.Animals 2.Humans

ANIMALS
qA cockroach will live nine days without its head before it starves to death. qThe cockroach has a high resistance to radiation and is the creature most likely to survive a nuclear war. qThe male praying mantis cannot copulate while its head is attached to its body. qThe female initiates sex by ripping the male's head off. qElephants are the only animals that cannot jump. qA pig's orgasm lasts 30 minutes. qHumans and dolphins are the only species that have sex for pleasure. qSome lions mate over 50 times a day.

HUMANS
qThe strongest muscle in the human body is the tongue. qBabies are born without kneecaps. They appear when the child is 2-6 years of age. qYour body is creating and killing 15 million red blood cells per second! qThe most sensitive finger on the human hand is the index finger.

DID YOU KNOW STUFF


qPearls melt in vinegar. qA quarter has 119 grooves around the edge. qA dime has 118 ridges around the edge. qBecause of Animal Crackers, many kids until they reach the age of ten, believe a bear is as tall as a giraffe. qThe Eiffel Tower has 1792 steps. qIt is said that sucking on a copper penny will cause a breathalyzer to read 0. qAmerica once issued a 5-cent bill.

Funny Stuff
Guinness Book Of Records holds the

record for being the book most stolen from Public Libraries.
Donald Duck comics were banned in

Finland because he didn't wear pants.


In the 40's, the Bich pen was changed to

Bic for fear that Americans would pronounce it 'Bitch.

Miscellaneous
qMost dust particles in your house are made from dead skin. If you ate too many carrots you would turn orange. qThe colder the room you sleep in, the better the chances are that you'll have a bad dream. qNo piece of paper can be folded more than 7 times.

TELL ME WHY

Questions About People Questions About Inventions and Machin Questions About The Environment, Space and Science Questions About Food, Drinks and Snacks

QUESTIONS ABOUT PEOPLE


Why do we perspire? Why do people snore? Why do we yawn? Why do we blink our eyes? Why do we dream?

QUESTIONS ABOUT INVENTIONS AND MACHINES


Why do golf balls have dimples?

Why are most Glow-in-the-Dark items green

Why are Telephone Touch Pads set-up the w Why do clocks run clockwise? Why do we get a shock from electricity?

Why do bubbles attract? Why is the sky blue? Why is snow white?

QUESTIONS ABOUT THE ENVIRONMENT, SPACE AND SCIENCE

Why do the stars twinkle? Why does the moon shine?

QUESTIONS ABOUT FOOD, DRINKS AND SNACKS


Why is Milk white?

Why is it called a "hamburger" when there Why do doughnuts have holes? Why do Onions make us cry? Why does caffeine keep me awake?

Why do we perspire?
We perspire to maintain to keep the temperature of our internal thermostat set to an average, normal temperature of 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. Our Our bodies use approximately 2,500 bodies come calories of our daily intake of caloriefully equipped laden food to fuel the body. This process, with a known as oxidation, burns the calories,

Obviously, our bodies cannot tolerate this heat, which causes the temperature of the blood to rise dramatically, and the cooling center to springs into action. The cooling center slows the calorie burning process, and dilates, or opens, the blood vessels in the skin to release the excess heat, and the fluid known as perspiration. The release of this fluid cleanses the body, as it pours through our pores, which consist of millions of tiny openings in the skin. Perspiration emerges on the surface of the skin in the form of tiny, microscopic droplets, which quickly evaporate, and cool the body to its

Why do people snore?


Vibrations of soft tissues located at the back of our throats cause the noisy, annoying sounds of snoring that sometimes preventeach non- other when someone has against snorers from too much tissue at the back of their getting their mouth or when an obstruction is

People with snoring problems tend to have one of the following conditions:
Poor muscle tone in the tongue and throat Excessive bulkiness of throat tissue Long soft palate and/or uvula tissue in the

Did you know?

back of the mouth Obstructed nasal airways Snoring can be a serious medical problem because it disturbs sleeping patterns and deprives the snorer of necessary rest.
20% of the population experiences snoring

problems.

Why do we yawn?
THE TRUTH IS that we dont completely understand why people, or animals for that matter, yawn. Its widely assumed that yawning occurs Scientists do not purport to know all of the because we are biological mechanisms of the yawn, but tend tired or bored or to agree that a yawn is an involuntary

Technically, a yawn is the reflex opening of the mouth followed by the deep inhalation and slow exhalation of oxygen. The very act of yawning is but one of a number of involuntary reflexes controlled by the spinal and nerve centers. Scientists speculate that the onset of a yawn is triggered either by fatigue, or by sheer boredom as, at those times, breathing is shallow, and little oxygen is carried to the lungs by the oxygen-toting cardiovascular

This quite plausible theory of yawning falls short of explaining many aspects of yawning. Scientists explain away the "contagious" nature of yawning, that is when one person's yawn triggers another nearby to yawn, as due to the power of suggestion, but are at a loss when attempting to explain why yawning occurs excessively in patients with lower brainstem damage or with multiple sclerosis. Other unlocked mysteries include why fetuses in

Why do we blink our eyes?


To oil, lube, and filter the eyes. Blinking, as opposed to batting, our eyes automatically supplies two forms of eyes. Eyelids themselves, our built-in moisture to our "wind-shield wipers," are merely folds of eyes, to keep skin, by muscles capable of themcontrolled from

Mother Nature lined the rims of our eyelids with 20-30 sebaceous, oil-producing glands, which are located between our eyelashes, and are invisible to the naked eye. Blinking automatically coats the eyelid and eyelashes with the lubricant it secretes, to prevent them from drying out. Blinking also protects the eye from dryness by irrigating, not by irritating, the eye, The eyelid, through suction, automatically draws the fluid we cry with from the well we refer to as the tear duct over the eyeball, to irrigate, and to moisturize the eye. The process is similar to the manner in which

his eyes from sudden sandstorms in the desert. Incidentally, the "camel eyelash" look is one many women attempt to duplicate by using an eyelash curler! Eyebrows, by the way, also serve their purpose, as they catch the run-off perspiration produces.

Why do we dream?
Two different schools of thought exist as to why we dream: the physiological school , and the psychological school. Both, however, During this we phase of sleep, our closed agree that eyes dart rapidly about, our brain dream during activity peaks, the REM, or and our muscles suffer

Thephysiological theorycenters upon how our body, specifically our brains, function during the REM phase of sleep. Proponents of this theory believe that we dream to exercise the synapses, or pathways, between brain cells, and that dreaming takes over where the active and awake brain leaves off. When awake, our brains constantly transmit and receive messages, which course through our billions of brain cells to their appropriate destinations, and keep our bodies in perpetual

The second physiological fact that lends credence to this theory is that our brain waves during REM sleep, as recorded by machines measuring the brain's electrical activity, are almost identical in nature to the brain waves during the hours we spend awake. This is not the case during the other phases of sleep.

Psychological theoristsof dreams focus upon our thoughts and emotions, and speculate that dreams deal with immediate concerns in our lives, such as unfinished business from the day, or concerns we are incapable of handling during the course of the day. Dreams can, in fact, teach us things about ourselves that we are unaware of. Connections between dreams that the human psyche have been made by many

Others have delved into more complicated explanations for dreams, such as the prophetic nature of dreams written of in the Bible, which was and is a belief held by many cultures. Sigmund Freud, one of the fathers of modern psychology, believed dreams to be symbolic of any number of things buried deep within our minds and our memories.

Why do golf balls have dimples?


So that they look cute? NO! Because thedimples maximize the distance golf balls travel. Dimpled balls used until golfers discovered that old, bumpy travel up to balls longer distances. The science four traveled times of aerodynamics helps explain the dimpled farther than

The dimples reduce the drag on a golf ball by redirecting more air pressure behind the golf ball rather than in front of it. The higher levels of pressure behind the golf balls force them to go far distances. The dimples change the levels of pressure by bringing the main air stream very close to the surface of the golf ball. The dimples, or "turbulators," increase the turbulence in the layer of air located next to the surface of the ball. This high

Why are most Glow - in - the Dark items green?


A phenomenon namedphospho rescenceis responsible for the light most Glow-in-theDark items emit. Phosphorescen If tampered ce not occurs when with, the light the object emits is dim, and is always pale blue in color light absorbed by an object is

Chemists had a bright idea to spark interest in this phenomenon and to make it visually stimulating. They discovered that when they mixed fluorescent dye with the phosphorescent material, the object emitted a glowing, brighter green, or sometimes red, light. The reason for this transformation is that fluorescent compounds absorb the light and rapidly emit it, giving the compounds a glowing appearance. This phenomenon

The most commonly used phosphorescent material used is zinc sulfide mixed with copper, and the green fluorescent dye most likely is sodium fluorescein. The most likely source or red fluorescent dye is rhodamine. Paired together, the phosphorescent material and the fluorescent material produce a ghostly, glowing green or red light, and hours of enjoyment for young and for old alike.

Why are Telephone Touch Pads set - up the way they are?
Mechanical adding machines, based on rotating wheels, always have the 0 button adjacent to the 1 button. put onto aBy pad arranged as a 3 by 3 grid with convention, one left over, the order of the numbers was mostthe old same. adding kept

On a rotary telephone dial, the 0 comes adjacent to the 9 because a 0 in the telephone number is signalled by 10 pulses on the line. When telephones acquired push buttons in a grid, the ordering of the buttons was carried over from the old telephone dial.

Mechanical clocks were invented in the northern hemisphere by inventors who were trying to make models of the sun's movement in the head to set on your right. Since the hour hand on sky.clock was made to follow the sun's motion the To watch the through the sky, it moves from left to right over sun from the

Why do clocks run clockwise?

Why do we get a shock from electricity?


Electricity shocks us, because it is an outside force that interferes with the internal electricity our bodies' nervous systems we must first understand the systems, generate. fundamentals of electricity itself. In terms, electricity is considered Toscientific fully

Further simplified, it is so basic, that it defies explanation, and is Mother Nature's way of saying "Because I said so"! Electricity comprises positive and negative charges, opposite charges attract each other, and similar charges repel each other. Those charges attracted to each other can be separated, with the end product being potential energy, that is, energy that will be released as voltage, should the two reunite. We pay electric companies to separate the positive and negative charges for us,

Unfortunately, since the human body consists primarily of water, it too provides a superb conductor for electrical energy, or voltage. If, by chance, outside electrical energy enters our bodies, now conductors, we will be shocked when the voltage encounters, and interferes with, the internal electrical energy our nervous systems produce. The shocks to our bodies, and the amount of damage the electricity does to them, depends upon the voltage our bodies are subjected to, upon its level of energy, and upon

Why do bubbles attract?


Surface tension plays matchmaker in changing the status of a bubble from being single and solitary, to being part of a couple, or part equilibrium, but once the surface tension of a multiple joins the bubbles, it establishes a new bubble group. balance.

The internal air pressure of the single, solitary bubble slightly exceeds that of the air surrounding it, because the surface tension reduces the bubble's surface as it squeezes it into its round shape. The product of being squeezed is a buoyant bubble, which rises to the top of the water's surface, because of its own inner water level. The bubble happily floats about, surrounded by uniform surface tension, guided by the momentum it picked up when being formed, and by changes in air

Because the slope's extension range is short, the range of the force between the bubbles is also short. Two or more bubbles drifting close to each other do not pass each other like ships in the night if their surface tensions overlap. This overlap destroys their equilibrium, and, to compensate for the low tension between the bubbles, the high surface tension surrounding them forces them together and restores their equilibrium. If, however, the surface tension

Why is the sky blue?


The sky appears blue to us on a clear day, because the atoms of nitrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere separate the suns light white light better than the rest, blue scatters into its many over the other colors in the predominates colors, and light spectrum, and makes the sky appear

Why is snow white?


Bright marshmallowcolored snow blinds us with its gleaming white color because it reflects beams of white light. Instead ofwhite sunlight entering a snow A beam of absorbing light, scattered by a zillion ice bank is so quickly snow's complex crystals and air pockets that most of the

What little sunlight is absorbed by snow is absorbed equally over the wavelengths of visible light thus giving snow its white appearance. So while many natural objects get their blue, red, and yellow colors from absorbing light, snow is stuck with its white color because it reflects light.

Why do the stars twinkle?


Stars twinkle for the same reason that the air shimmies above a radiator or a fire or hot pavement; because of warm air rising conductance, the heat passes trough in the something solid, such as wood or metal. This atmosphere. process is pretty slow.

Another way heat moves isradiation. In radiation, the heat passes directly through space in the form of photons, tiny packets of energy travelling at the speed of light. Radiation is the way that the sun's warmth reaches Earth. Finally there'sconvection. In convection, heat warms the air. The warm air becomes less dense (and thus lighter) than the cool air around it, so it rises. Convection is the reason stars twinkle. When air heated by convection rises, it tumbles

As air warmed by the earth rises through the atmosphere, it breaks into bubbles of warm air. As light from the stars passes through the bubbles, it's bent back and forth. This is what makes the stars seem to twinkle. If there weren't any atmosphere, as on the moon, the stars would shine steadily.

Why does the moon shine?


The moon, a satellite, or small body, rotates on its axis around the earth, and "shines" when the sun's light beams onto its surface, is the same length of time to takes theand moon reflected back orbit on its axis, as it takes for it to orbit to earth. the earth.

The lunar month is divided into halves. During the first half, lasting approximately 14 days, the sun's light unrelentingly strikes the moon, which has no atmosphere or air to protect it from these rays, and brings the temperature of the moon to above that of the boiling point. The second half of the lunar month plunges the moon into cold, dark nights. Man has learned a great deal about the moon since the days when ancient man worshipped it as a goddess who ruled the night.

Why is Milk white?


Those chalkywhite mustaches that color our lips after chugging down a refreshing icecold glass of creamy milk is caused by the that is found in milk contains white colored protein fat. The more cream in milk the more white it calledCasein. is.

Low and non-fat milk appear more grayish rather than white because they contain less cream. Another reason milk looks white to our naked eyes is because some objects do not absorb very much light. Rather than absorb light, these objects reflect light. For instance, red colored objects reflect only red light and absorb the other colors of light in the rainbow spectrum. The molecules that make up Casein and cream reflect light. That's why milk is white. Did you know?

Why is it called a " hamburger " when there is no ham in it?


Why is it "Where's the beef" when it should be where's the ham? The answer is really quite simple: more complicated. because Hambu Who actually invented the first hamburger remains a mystery. rg, Germany made the first

Some say it was a group of nomadic people called the Tartars who tenderized their beef by placing it under a horse's saddle--flattening it into a patty. Others believe it was the German immigrants who traveled to the United States during the 19th century bringing with them their favorite meal called Hamburg Style Beef-- a raw chopped, piece of beef. Some argue Americans placed the first cooked beef patty on a roll at the St. Louis World's Fair in 1921. Although beef is the most popular meat used in hamburgers, other meats such as pork and turkey

Hamburgers remain one of the most favorite foods among Americans today. Ranking #1 among all restaurants with 26,000 stores in 119 countries, McDonald's serves billions of hamburgers worldwide. Holy Hamburger!
On average, Americans eat 3 hamburgers a

week.

McDonald's has sold 12 hamburgers for every

person in the world.

60% of all sandwiches eaten are hamburgers.

Why do doughnuts have holes?


The question as to why doughnuts have holes has been raised by dozens of bakers over the years, but most agree that the answer In to this center. short, the consistency of a sticky question doughnut lacking a hole would be, quite simply, lies in the fact doughy.

Another riveting theory as to the origin of the bulls eye in the doughnut holds that a sea captain named Hanson Gregory, while manning his post one stormy night, found it impossible both to steer his vessel and to eat his fried cake. Out of sheer frustration, and probably out of hunger, he impaled his cake over one of the spokes of the ship's wheel, thereby creating a finger hold with which to grip the cake. Quite pleased with his ingenuity, Mr. Gregory

Many credit Dutch settlers to America with introducing the non-holedolykoeks, or"oily cakes,"to this continent, and with their subsequent popularity. There is no disputing the fact that the fried cake became the rage in New York and in New England, and that before long, it became the specialty of coffee shops. Fried cakes came into their own in 1673, when a self-made New York marketing guru, Anna Joralemon, made their

Why do Onions make us cry?


It is not the strong odor of the onion that makes us cry, but the gas that the onion releases when we sever this member of the lily family. Cutting an onion arouses a gas contained within the onion, propanethiol S-oxide, which The onion then couples with the enzymes in the onion to itself contains

When this upwardly mobile gas encounters the water produced by the tear ducts in our eyelids, it produces sulfuric acid. In response to the caustic acid, our eyes automatically blink, and produce tears which irrigate the eye, and which flush out the sulfuric acid. Another reflex to rid the eyes of a foreign substance, that of rubbing our eyes with our hands, often exacerbates the situation, because our hands are coated with the

Why does caffeine keep me awake?


Caffeine interrupts our daily sleeping patterns by altering the chemical reactions in our brain. An addictive our bodies-keeping us alert and hyperactive. drug that 90% of Americans consume every

After drinking a hot cup of caffeinated coffee, the caffeine causes three different chemical reactions that boost our energy levels:

It energizes us by pumping the hormone

The addictive and mood altering effects caused by

adrenaline into our systems. It increases dopamine levels within our bodies. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that stimulates our "pleasure areas" in our brain making us feel good. It blocks the connection of adenosine to nerve cells. Adenosine is the chemical that attaches to receptors in the brain and causes drowsiness by slowing down nerve cells activity.

Today, 70% of all sodas in the United States contain caffeine. Teenagers especially have become dependent on caffeinated sodas or what many refer to as "liquid candy." Teenage boys and girls drink about twice as much "liquid candy" as milk, whereas twenty years ago they drank twice as much milk as soda. While many soda companies argue that caffeine is necessary to a soft drink's flavor, many researchers have shown that most people are hooked to a soda's caffeine content-NOT its taste. Most people can't tell the difference

Vous aimerez peut-être aussi