Groucho's Fact Hunt

[TheFinnFan]

Ah! Boss thread this @Groucho

 

[ToffeeDoug]

The first bullet fired in the Spanish Civil war actually occurred in Morocco (at a Spanish army barracks).

 

[Whistlin' Dixie]

This is correct.

The clock faces on the Liver Building are biggest in UK I think. That needs to be checked out but deffo bigger than Westminster.

Largest roman-numeral dial, I think. AFAIK the shellmex building has the largest clockface in the UK.

Liver building's clocks were started at the exact moment George V was crowned. They are known as 'George clocks'.

Stanley Dock tobacco warehouse is the largest brick warehouse in the world.

EDIT: Brick-built warehouse.

 

[Jamo Martinez]

An adult is made up of around 7,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (7 octillion) atoms.

The red colour of blood arises because the iron is bound in a ring of atoms in haemoglobin called porphyrin and it's the shape of this structure that produces the colour.

Our DNA includes the genes from at least eight retroviruses. These are a kind of virus that makes use of the cell's mechanisms for coding DNA to take over a cell. At some point in human history, these genes became incorporated into human DNA. These viral genes in DNA now perform important functions in human reproduction, yet they are entirely alien to our genetic ancestry.

Saw this on a superb documentary the other day (The Life in us). Amazing the amount and variety of lice, ticks, microbes, viruses and bacteria that live on and in us. The majority of the microbes and bacteria in our bodies are actually beneficial to us or even essential to our existence.
I wish I had more of a basic grasp of science so I could have understood it more and remembered more than a fraction of the programme. One of the best things I've seen on tv in a long time.

 

[Jamo Martinez]

View attachment 9981

The last manned lighthouse in the UK was the North Foreland Lighthouse in Kent.

It became fully automated in Nov 1998 and the changeover ceremony was presided over by the Duke of Edinburgh .

Truly is a thing of beauty that.

 

[COYBL25]

An adult is made up of around 7,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (7 octillion) atoms.

The red colour of blood arises because the iron is bound in a ring of atoms in haemoglobin called porphyrin and it's the shape of this structure that produces the colour.

Our DNA includes the genes from at least eight retroviruses. These are a kind of virus that makes use of the cell's mechanisms for coding DNA to take over a cell. At some point in human history, these genes became incorporated into human DNA. These viral genes in DNA now perform important functions in human reproduction, yet they are entirely alien to our genetic ancestry.

So they came from an unknown source ?

 

[Groucho]

So they came from an unknown source ?

I don't know which virus in particular mate.

As a "viral" aside, I read the other day that it's thought that while we may become resistant to AIDS/HIV, it will take about 200,000 years for us to do so.

Ah! Boss thread this @Groucho

@Cels breathed a bit of new life in to it too.

 

[Whistlin' Dixie]

For all those wacky American laws......And there are some right weird ones there.......

http://www.dumblaws.com/

But here's a wacky UK one....

It is illegal for a woman to be topless in public except as a clerk in a tropical fish store.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/11/07/absurdest_laws/

 

[Groucho]

For all those wacky American laws......And there are some right weird ones there.......

http://www.dumblaws.com/

But here's a wacky UK one....

It is illegal for a woman to be topless in public except as a clerk in a tropical fish store.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/11/07/absurdest_laws/

That topless one is an urban myth mate, as are most of the "dumb laws".

 

[PITA]

That topless one is an urban myth mate, as are most of the "dumb laws".

Groucho, you are a bad man. I'll have to start reading this thread from page 1. This is going to take up valuable time.

 

[Groucho]

Groucho, you are a bad man. I'll have to start reading this thread from page 1. This is going to take up valuable time.

All I'd ask folk is that, if you're going to add a fact, please try to at least do a quick google search to make sure it's not false.

 

[Jamo Martinez]

.....MIck Jagger sings backing vocals on Carly Simon's hit 'You're so Vain'. Not a lot of people know that.

I heard that Jagger and Harry Nilsen were in the studio to do backing vocals. After many takes that didn't sound quite right, Nilsen said he needed a break and headed off for a coffee. When he came back and heard the take they'd just done without him he apparently said 'You don't need me now, that's perfect.'

 

[Whistlin' Dixie]

Tom Selleck was forced by the producers of 'Magnum PI" to turn down the part of Indiana Jones.

It turned out shooting of the pilot for Magnum was delayed for over six months by a writers' strike, which would have enabled him to complete Raiders of the lost Ark.

 

[ToffeeDoug]

All I'd ask folk is that, if you're going to add a fact, please try to at least do a quick google search to make sure it's not false.

How dare you, as if we would post rubbish.

 

[Jamo Martinez]

How dare you, as if we would post rubbish.

Nothing off Metro ffs.