Fact O' The Day

[Krandall]

"The world's first skyscraper was intended to convince hunter-gatherers to take up farming."


Jericho is possibly the oldest continually-inhabited site in the world, with a history that dates back over 10,000 years. Early in the Neolithic period, an era characterized by a movement toward farming and settlements, a 28-foot tower was constructed at the city's outskirts. The tower took around 10 years to build, and Tel Aviv University researchers suggest that it was a cosmological marker meant to symbolically connect the settlement with its outlying hills and the surrounding nomadic peoples. Researchers also argue that this makes the tower the world's first public building.

[Peelz]

Interesting...

[Krandall]

"Religious youths are twice as likely to become obese."


Even when accounting for other factors that contribute to obesity, researchers from the "Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults" study, which tracked 2,000 participants over the past 20 years, found that subjects with high religious involvement were twice as likely as their peers to be obese by the time they reached middle age. Notably, however, some studies correlate religious activity with an increased lifespan, partially attributable to a general avoidance of other unhealthy risk behaviors.

[Peelz]

GERD makes you fat?...t-shirts being made

[Colorado700R]

Therefore Jenny Craig is the antichrist?

[Krandall]

"People can accurately gauge socioeconomic status from body language."

The subtle body cues that display confidence or submission can be just as revealing as more overt displays of wealth, UC Berkeley psychologists have found. Researchers videotaped subjects interacting with each other and looked for behaviors that evinced either disinterest or engagement. Subjects from a higher-status socioeconomic background showed more disengagement behaviors, appearing more uninvolved and reserved; other participants who watched these interactions on video were able to correctly guess the participants' backgrounds.

[Krandall]

"During Prohibition, several distilleries continued to produce legal "medicinal whiskey.

The Volstead Act, which prohibited the sale of alcohol in the United States in 1919, provided for the possibility that citizens might "purchase and use liquor for medicinal purposes when prescribed by a physician." This provision was known as "the loophole," and it permitted some distilleries to remain open and functional throughout the "Noble Experiment." Most of the brands that persisted tno longer exist, but some have lasted. For example, vintage bottles of Old Grand-Dad from the era proudly declare themselves "Unexcelled For Medicinal Purposes."

[Krandall]

"Two British designers have produced a $900,000 suit."


Designers Stuart Hughes and Richard Jewels offer what they describe as "the world's most expensive suit," a diamond-studded affair made of cashmere wool and silk. The jacket contains 480 certified half-carat diamonds and, according to Jewels, is part of an effort to establish the prominence of the designers' luxury brand. Only three of the suits will be produced.

[Krandall]

"The modern keyboard layout is only designed not to jam typewriters."

Christopher Sholes, the man who developed the classic QWERTY keyboard layout, did so not to be efficient but to avoid efficiency. His design was intended to separate letter pairs that were frequently hit in succession and thus avoid causing jams. In fact, the world's fastest typist didn't use the QWERTY system at all: Barbara Blackburn, who clocked as high as 212 words per minute, used the Dvorak Simplified Keyboard, a much more intuitive design whose home row of keys includes all the vowels and the commonly used consonants.

[Krandall]

"Big Ben is technically a bell, not a clock."

Although Big Ben is contained within the iconic Great Clock of Westminster, the name initially only referred to the main bell itself and not to any other part of the tower. The original 16-ton bell was by far the largest ever cast in Britain, and it cracked while being tested. The bell was recast, slightly smaller, at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, but remained unnamed. Parliament met to rectify the problem, whereupon the portly Sir Benjamin Hall gave a lengthy speech on the subject; Sir Benjamin was known as "Big Ben" to his peers, and his speech provided an obvious moniker that has stuck with the bell ever since.

[Krandall]

"Women are attracted to at least a degree of femininity in men's features."


Psychologists at Princeton and NYU developed a computer model to test people's attraction to 50 dimensions of facial features. They divided these features into two categories, shape (actual physical features) and reflectance (color, complexion). Men, unsurprisingly, were attracted to a traditionally feminine shape and feminine reflectance. Women were attracted to masculine reflectance but feminine shape -- for example, darker complexions but more delicate features.

So... THAT's how peels got his woman.

[Peelz]

"Women are attracted to at least a degree of femininity in men's features."


Psychologists at Princeton and NYU developed a computer model to test people's attraction to 50 dimensions of facial features. They divided these features into two categories, shape (actual physical features) and reflectance (color, complexion). Men, unsurprisingly, were attracted to a traditionally feminine shape and feminine reflectance. Women were attracted to masculine reflectance but feminine shape -- for example, darker complexions but more delicate features.

So... THAT's how peels got his woman.

dick  I work hard on this figure. 

[Krandall]

"Relationships work better when the participants feel they're allowed to check out attractive strangers."


The ideal situation is that partners are so committed that they don't even want to check out the hot passersby - but among people who do have that inclination, relationships are healthier when neither partner feels prohibited from doing so. A series of experiments published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology studied couples and found that the participants who unknowingly prevented themselves from noticing attractive strangers reported lower relationship satisfaction. They were also, oddly enough, more likely to remember the fleeting glimpses of attractive strangers they did see than their nonchalant counterparts.

[Krandall]

"More adult women have advanced degrees than men."

Working women first surpassed men in college degrees in 2006, when 34% of women -- compared to 33% of men -- had degrees. But for the first time, employed American women now also report more advanced degrees than their male counterparts, with 10.6 million women over 25 having a master's degree or higher compared to 10.5 million men. Women are also more likely than men to have finished high school (87.6% to 86.6%).

[Krandall]

"Facebook improves its users' self-esteem."


A study in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking tested the theory that the internet can influence self-esteem by offering people the chance to selectively show the best of themselves (as opposed to, for example, the objectivity of a mirror). Participants were seated by a computer that was either on and showed their Facebook profiles or off. Some of the students seated by turned-off computers were also near mirrors. After the participants with Facebook access were given time to navigate through their profiles, everyone was given a self-esteem questionnaire. The Facebook group reported higher self-esteem, with the highest self-esteem coming from those who'd edited their profiles in that span.