Pretty sure you've heard that we humans only use 10 percent of our brains. You probably heard it from teachers or from movies. But, like many things school lied to you about, this is one fact that definitely doesn't stand up to actual science.
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Dr. Phylis Canion, a rancher/nutrionist in Cuero County, caught sight of a bluish, hairless, dog-ish creature on her property in 2007 that supposedly sucked all the blood from her goats, chickens, and other livestock. Canion's story spread because of an episode of The Unexplained Files.
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The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) started a campaign to ensure the safety of planes' drinking water after a sample of 300 planes showed 15 percent of them tested positive for coliform, which in turn indicates that other, potentially harmful, bacteria might also be present in the water.
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With a normal wave, water only moves on the surface, which is why if you want to get out of a wave, you dive below it. But tsunamis reach deep down, so they're almost impossible to escape. This also means a tsunami can be faster or slower, depending on water depth.
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Elon Musk described his childhood as "miserable," claiming that his dad was capable of carrying out "evil" deeds.
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Cats also tend to sleep all day, luxuriating in the knowledge that someone will be around to care for them anyway. Or so it seems. In truth, your cats aren't being lazy or acting like they own your house. Their sleeping patterns are a holdover from their previous life as hunters.
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ROYGBIV, of course, stands for red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet or the seven colors of a rainbow. It's the easiest way to remember colors, and it's also the least annoying way. But ROYGBIV may be incorrect. (Be careful when breaking this news to a little kid).
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Pop quiz: How many senses does the typical human have? Is it A) three, B) five, C) twenty-one, or D) thirty-three?
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From afar, the clump looks like debris floating on top of the water, but upon closer inspection, you can see that it's made up of what looks like hundreds of insects clinging for dear life. If the visual of ants happily floating along doesn't scare you, congratulations. What a brave person you are.
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The World Health Organization doesn't think it's likely for you to catch something from somebody clear on the other side of the plane, but those immediately near you could easily cough into your airspace. The CDC says crowded flights, security lines, and terminals are breeding grounds for COVID-19.
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One of the most iconic scenes in the film The Wizard of Oz involves a crazy tornado but many don't know the details behind the making of this legendary moment. It wasn't an easy task and needed a lot of ingenuity and patience. Here's what you didn't know about the tornado in The Wizard of Oz.
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This might come as a shock to all the cat lovers out there, but Fluffy isn't actually an adorable demon from hell. He's just smart because his brain is similar to ours.
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The discovery of phosphine doesn't immediately capture the imagination. It might become more striking, however, when we consider that the gas is closely associated with life on Earth.
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What causes the seemingly otherworldly, colorful display known as the Northern Lights, or, more formally, the Aurora borealis in the north and Aurora australis in the south?
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Sometimes, animals display behaviors that are weirdly human. Most often, this can be a fluke, such as when a photographer manages to capture animals in an unusual pose, with hilarious results. But what happens when a species displays new behaviors time and time again that aren't necessarily cute?
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Astronauts living onboard the International Space Station 250 miles above Earth experience life a bit differently. On the space station, the effects of microgravity mean astronauts are strapped in while they eat, exercise, and use the toilet. Living on the space station can affect height and aging.
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The fish is native to Southeast Asian peat swamp forests and is found in the waters of the Indonesian islands of Sumatra and Bintan Island. A mature female Paedocypris progenetica measures only 7.9 millimeters, or just over 0.3 of an inch.
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"Aardwolf" means "Earth wolf," says Britannica. The name might come from the creature's yellowish-tan fur that kind of resembles the dry dirt of its homelands -- that being east and south Africa -- but it's more likely from the animal making its den in previously abandoned burrows.
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According to LiveScience, there have been many studies trying to link how the moon affects people, particularly in regard to sleep patterns. One of the prevailing theories being studied by scientists is that the full moon's light may disrupt sleep cycles.
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Bee hummingbirds are exclusively found in Cuba and are so tiny that they are often mistaken for insects. Male bee hummingbirds measure an average of 57 millimeters (2.24 inches) in length and weigh about 1.6 grams (0.056 ounces), which is less than a dime; female birds are a bit larger.
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An Australian team set out to create a model of what humanity would look like if it had evolved to survive car crashes. The results are a little jarring.
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Folklore and fears aside, though, is there any hard data that demonstrates the potential for the existence of ghosts?
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The Hippopotamus, or "water horse," as the Greeks called it, is the third-largest land mammal in the world. They're kind of cute and kind of funny-looking, and they use that cuteness to hide just how murderous they can be.
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This month, a study led by Maëlle Lefeuvre, a PhD student at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, studied both the different ways elephants could use their trunk to manipulate food and how each elephant displayed a preference for individual tactics.
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The Nile River turns to blood. Boils coat the bodies of the Pharaoh, his servants, and his animals. Hail shatters the landscape and destroys the crops of Egypt ... and a plague of locusts swarms over Egypt, and swallows up every last green thing.
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At the end of February, officials from the Brazilian state of Para's health, sanitation and environment department who were following a large congregation of scavenging birds stumbled upon the carcass of a humpback whale deep in the mangrove swamps of the Amazon.
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The whole to-do wasn't started by the plagues or crusades generally associated with the historical ballpark of the millennium in question. In point of fact, this age of cultural and financial stagnation was brought about by the meekest of all the Earth's forces: the humble gigantic volcano.
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