Random facts

[exnihilo]

A standard Slinky™ is 87 feet in length.

Empires...

The British Empire
The greatest extent of the British Empire was achieved between 1918-22.
14,157,000 sq. miles

The Mongol Empire
The greatest extent of the Mongol hegemony was reached in roughly 1238-68.
12,800,000 sq. miles

(And, just as a point of interest, the Soviet Union at its greatest extent was around 13,800,000 sq. miles, so the Mongols are third.)

[Guest]

One third of jewellry made in the UK is produced within a mile of Birmingham city centre.

additionally the Birmingham Assaying office (founded in 1773) is the largest in the world, assaying between 40,000 and 70,000 items every working day.

[Prophet Tenebrae]

Creatures in the genus Chlamydomonas, a type of single-celled algae, have no less than 10 sexes. Rather than regard them as "male" and "female", most biologists simply refer to them as mating type plus and minus (mt+ and mt-), and note which plusses mate with which minuses (though they don't have too--all chlamydomonas organisms are perfectly happy reproducing on their own). The record holder for the most number in a species is the single-celled Paramecium amelia, which has eight different sexes. Makes sense--if bisexuality doubles one's chances of getting a mate, just think of how well octosexual critters do.

The current holder of the guinness world record for the largest breast implants in the world is the feature performer, Maxi Mounds - with an underbust measurement of 36 inches and and a chest-over-nipple measurement of 60.5 inches, giving her a bra size of 42J.

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[DrAlex]

"Google Maps" uses actual satelite footage. Sometimes this leads to slight anomalies...

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=duchesne+ ... rt=0&hl=en

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RUSH KATO '05!

rush.kato@gmail.com

[flarewearer]

Quoting DrAlex from 18:00, 28th Jul 2005
"Google Maps" uses actual satelite footage. Sometimes this leads to slight anomalies...

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=duchesne+ ... rt=0&hl=en

or this...

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Tulagi+Ro ... &t=k&hl=en
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image:www.magnificentoctopus.com/x/blackback.png

[Duggeh]

3 people are killed every year when they try to shake things out of vending machines and the vending machines fall on top of them.

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IMAGE:www.macintyre42.plus.com/images/tubular100.jpg
[hr]Duggeh: Master Of Ceremonies
[s]http://www.maxeh.co.uk [The Music Community][/s]
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[bramble]

The town with the highest percentage of beer-bellied men in the UK is Bristol



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"Everything will turn out fine....i dont know how, its a mystery"

[flarewearer]

Quoting exnihilo from 13:25, 28th Jul 2005
The British Empire
The greatest extent of the British Empire was achieved between 1918-22.
14,157,000 sq. miles

[img]http://www.seadogsportswear.com/Site%20images/New%20Designs%20Page/New%20Designs/British%20Dive%20Flag.jpg[/img]

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image:www.magnificentoctopus.com/x/blackback.png

[Guest]

Almost 4 cans of spam are eaten every second of everyday.

[Dave]

22% of American women aged 20 gave birth while in their teens. In Switzerland and Japan, only 2% did so.

The United States spends more money on its military than the next 12 nations combined.

Mental and behavioural disorders due tocannabinoids, cocaine, hallucinogens, opiods, sedatives and hypnotics, and volatile solvents killed 1,789 people. Those due to alcohol killed 32,622.

Saudi diplomats have 367 outstanding parking fines in Britain.

Two-thirds of the world's executions occur in China

The average criminal sentence length is 137 years in Colombia

All taken from http://www.nationmaster.com/facts

[The Dude]

Ok this is a bit convoluted but I am pretty sure the facts are correct. The American rail standard gauge (the space between the rails) is 4' 8 1/2''. This is a pretty random number but here is the explanation. The railroads in America were originally built by brits who modeled them on British railroads of the time. These early British railroads were based on the standards used by horse drawn light rail. This early light rail was based on wagons which were 4' 8 1/2'' because that was the width of the ruts in the roads. The road system in Britain was based on the old Roman roads. The Roman roads were built with grooves that accommodated chariots that had wheels 4' 8 1/2'' apart. This is because that was the relative space two horses took up placed side by side. Now to bring in modern relevance, the space shuttle has 2 booster rockets. Engineers would actually have wanted them to be wider in circumference than they presently are. The problem is that they are mad in Utah, and are put on a train to go to cape canaveral. In between there are some tunnels which are built to the specification of 4' 8 1/2'' track and not much more. The Boosters were made thinner so that they could pass through these tunnels. The ultimate result of this is that part of the space shuttle is built around the standard of a couple horse's asses.

[exnihilo]

An interesting story, but not actually true. The only thing that can be said with certainty about the width of Roman chariot wheels (and Romans didn't actually use chariots that much in war, so were far from mass-producing them) is that their wheels were roughly five feet apart.

The 4 ft 8.5 inch gauge was the one used by Stephenson, for no better reason than that it was the one used in mine railways which were drawn by pit ponies, which was his background. That number is, itself, arbitrary.

When rail began, there was no such thing as standard gauge and they varied from a little over three feet to in excess of seven feet. The Great Western Railway, for example, used the 7 ft 3 inch gauge which Brunel considered optimal. The original Stephenson gauge was 4 ft 8 inches, and was only later amended by half an inch, for reasons unknown.

Britain standardised on Stephenson's gauge slowly, and it wasn't until the late 1890s that the broad gauge was finally replaced on all main lines, and that only because a Royal Commission of 1845 reported it to be more widespread than Brunel's more stable and faster rail system.

As for the US, their rail network was not built in large part to the standard gauge. That gauge was prevalent only in the north east, others were used across the country. The South, in particular, used broad gauge tracks until their rail network was destroyed in the Civil War.

Even now only 60% of all track is standard gauge.

[Guest]

A full seven percent of the entire Irish barley crop goes to the production of Guinness beer.

A pregnant goldfish is called a twit.

There are more chickens in the world than people.

More people in China speak English than in the United States.

The strongest muscle in the body is the tongue.

The average person laughs 13 times a day (come on people laugh more)

40,000 Americans are injured by toilets each year.

The average person spends 30 years mad at a family member.

The higher the income, the more likely an American man will cheat on his wife.

[novium]

what is it with these random facts? Especially by unreg users, they're extremely fishy, or at best they're of the type of "lies, damn lies, and statistics.." The ones that stand out most to me are about America, but that's probably because I, as an american, are more likely to notice them.

Here's a random fact straight from the Economist (look under their survey of America)-
40 million americans move (from one residence to another) every year. That's like if the entire population of spain packed up and decided to live elsewhere.

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I have no witty signature.

[Nickel]

According to US research, first-born children are less creative but more stable, while last-born children are more promiscuous.

--
nickel

[flarewearer]

Quoting from 01:20, 30th Jul 2005
The strongest muscle in the body is the tongue.

Thats not true neither, but it is the only muscle joined only at one end.

And since when did Guiness pass for beer? Canned mud it may be, a tasty alcoholic beveradge it is not.

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[DrAlex]

Quoting flarewearer from 10:32, 30th Jul 2005

And since when did Guiness pass for beer? Canned mud it may be, a tasty alcoholic beveradge it is not.

Blasphemer!

Speaking of Guiness, a pint of Guiness contains 196-210 calories (depending on who you ask). A pint of skimmed milk or of orange juice, though probably healthier, contains between 10 and 70 more callories.

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RUSH KATO '05!

rush.kato@gmail.com

[flarewearer]

IT doesnt matter how few or many calories are in it, its still shit. Its like U2, just because it's Irish and sells well, doesnt count for fuck. When it comes down to it, its still banal corporate drivel that may have been good at one point, but will now sell its soul to the highest bidder.

Back to facts, the width of the reaction vessels in the worlds' first commercial nuclear reactors, at calder hall power station in cumbria (now part of Sellafield) was dictated by the width of the high street in the Cumbrain village of Egremont, the narrowest point at the only route into the site at the time from where the reactors were assembled at Aldermarston.

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[Duggeh]

Guiness when served from a proper cask and at room temperature is a glorius, tasty and complex beer, with several layers of flavour.

Sadly i am unable to confirm this description because Guiness has set itself up these days as some sort of piss porr black lager. Served super cold.

Back to the original topic though.

Mike Oldfields Tubular Bells is the biggest selling instrumental album of all time and continues (depending on what statistics you read) to sell between 250,000 and 1,750,000 more copies year on year.

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IMAGE:www.macintyre42.plus.com/images/tubular100.jpg
[hr]Duggeh: Master Of Ceremonies
[s]http://www.maxeh.co.uk [The Music Community][/s]
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[jennyo]

Quoting flarewearer from 18:18, 30th Jul 2005

...the Cumbrain village of Egremont...

Cool, I didn't know there was another Egremont (I live in the American version)

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I was staring at the mirror when I had a religious experience. Which is unusual. Normally when I have a religious experience, the mirror stares at me.