Digging Up Super Facts

Digging Up Super Facts
Daily writing prompt
What change, big or small, would you like your blog to make in the world?
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I have two blogs, Leonberger Life and this one called Superfactful.

Leonberger Life feature amusing and heartwarming stories about our late Leonberger dog Bronco, as well as other Leonbergers. It also has a lot of information about the Leonberger breed, the history, care, training, Leonberger organizations, etc. I also wrote a Leonberger book, which I am featuring in the sidebar. With my Leonberger Life blog I want to spread information about the Leonberger breed, a rare, large, furry, friendly and fun dog breed and also bring attention to my book The Life and Times of Le Bronco von der Löwenhöhle, stories and tips from thirteen years with a Leonberger.

The goal of Superfactful, which is this blog, is to create a long list of facts that are important, not trivia, and that are known to be true and yet are either disputed by large segments of the public or highly surprising or misunderstood by many. I call these kinds of facts Super facts because they could potentially be very impactful on how we view the world.

Humans have accumulated an enormous amount of knowledge. Science does not know everything, but it knows a lot. The same cannot be said for us as individuals. We know next to nothing and harbor a lot of false beliefs. I think that is pretty much true for all of us, including me, but we may not know it. With this blog I am trying to correct some of that, at least regarding important facts. In addition, along the way, I am hoping to learn a lot myself and have some of my own false beliefs corrected.

In short, the change I would like to make in the world with my blog is to correct as many false beliefs as possible and educate my readers, and myself, about facts that are both important and mind blowing.

A blue brain is splitting up into pieces.
Smash your old beliefs with new surprising facts, super facts. Expand your mind. Shutterstock ID: 1685660680 by MattL_Images

What is a Super fact?

A super fact is:

  • An important fact but it can be simply stated.
  • Very surprising, shocking, widely disputed, misunderstood, or mind-blowing.
  • Yet it is true with a very high degree of certainty.

The first two criteria are subjective. The last criteria can be determined from longstanding scientific consensus, my own expertise and education (valid for just a few topics), agreement between multiple reliable online or offline sources such as agreement among research papers, reputable scientific organizations, NASA, NOAA, Pew Research Center, Our World in Data, etc. I should say I also link to less academic sources such as Wikipedia, but I do not solely rely on them.

You can read more about how I choose super facts here. Also, I am open to challenges based on good data (not opinions), as well as questions. With that I don’t mean that you cannot give your opinion in a comment. I just won’t update or remove a super fact based on an opinion. In addition, I am happy to receive suggestions for super facts. I am trying to collect a few hundred super facts and need all the help I can get. In the end I want to pick the 100 best ones. I might use a poll for that.

Sometimes a super fact involves doing myth busting of a popular myth and sometimes a super fact is stating something that is well known but disputed by many. In these cases, the evidence is likely to be conclusive, but the fact is still disputed by those who don’t know much about the evidence, or don’t want it to be true. In this case, I will include a substantial amount of evidence, and it might be lengthy. People get bamboozled all the time, and that includes me. It is not easy to admit that you have been bamboozled. You can read about my own experiences with that here.

Picture shows a scale held by a pointing finger. Fact is on the left shown as a bright light bulb. Myth is shown on the right as grey ball | Digging Up Super Facts
Fact or myth. Shutterstock Asset id: 2327968607

Examples of Super Facts

At the time of posting this I have made plans for 150 super facts and so far, I have posted 54. I will post a lot more. Below I am listing a few of my first 54 super facts.

Superfact 5 : Two events may be simultaneous for some but not for others. Click to visit post.

Two events may be simultaneous for some but not for others. This means that two events that are simultaneous to an observer may happen at different times to other observers. If two lamps A and B turn on at the same time according to observer #1, lamp A may turn on first for observer #2, and lamp B may turn on first for observer #3. All three observers are correct because time is relative.

The picture shows three pairs of lamps and three people. The setup is used to show three situations.
Amy is traveling at a high speed to the left compared to two lamps A and B. Alan is standing still compared to the lamps. Adam is traveling at a high speed to the right compared to two lamps A and B. Alan turns on the lamps at the same time. After considering the travel time of the light she sees, Amy concludes that lamp B turned on first. After considering the travel time of the light he sees, Adam concludes that lamp A turned on first. I should add this non-simultaneity can only happen if the lamps are separated by a distance.
Superfact 7 : Poverty and child mortality has been sharply reduced worldwide. Click to visit post.

Extreme poverty as well as child mortality has been sharply reduced the world over. The countries that are the worst-off today are still better off than the countries that were doing the best at the beginning of the 19th century. Over the last 20 years extreme poverty and child mortality have continued to decline sharply.

This graphics contain two graphs one for the world (blue) and for the United States (red) | Digging Up Super Facts
Child mortality in in the world since 1950. The spike you see around the end of 1950 to 1960 is the great leap forward famine in China. In 1950 the child mortality rate was 22.7% and in 2023 the child mortality rate was 3.6%.
Superfact 25: Global Warming is Happening and is Caused by us – click to visit post.

Global warming is happening. Or if you call it Climate Change or Climate Disruption is indeed happening. And it is happening very fast. We also know that it is caused by us primarily as a result of our burning of fossil fuels. There is a long-standing scientific consensus on these two facts because the evidence is conclusive. Check the evidence in the post.

Superfact 28: That Earth is round was well known long before Columbus – click to visit post.

That Earth is round, or spherical (or closely spherical) had been known for at least a couple of thousand years by the time Columbus set sail. Columbus did not set sail to prove that earth was round, and he knew it was round.

On the left a wheel with spokes. On the right there is a sphere and sun rays that hit in two places. One without a shadow and one with a shadow | Digging Up Super Facts
Illustration of the measurement of the Earth circumference by Eratosthenes (2,300 years ago). On June 21st there is no shadow in Syene/Aswan but there is one in Alexandria. Asset id: 2319651251 by Javier Jaime
To see a list of the Super Facts click here

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Author: thomasstigwikman

My name is Thomas Wikman. I am a software/robotics engineer with a background in physics. I am currently retired. I took early retirement. I am a dog lover, and especially a Leonberger lover, a home brewer, craft beer enthusiast, I’m learning French, and I am an avid reader. I live in Dallas, Texas, but I am originally from Sweden. I am married to Claudia, and we have three children. I have two blogs. The first feature the crazy adventures of our Leonberger Le Bronco von der Löwenhöhle as well as information on Leonbergers. The second blog, superfactful, feature information and facts I think are very interesting. With this blog I would like to create a list of facts that are accepted as true among the experts of the field and yet disputed amongst the public or highly surprising. These facts are special and in lieu of a better word I call them super-facts.

28 thoughts on “Digging Up Super Facts”

      1. We’ve heard that one about the early neuter/spay. Bean coming off the streets of Mexico at a little under a year and Lulu being three years old (and, we are pretty sure, having had multiple litters) before she landed at the shelter, this doesn’t apply to either of them, fortunately.

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  5. Interesting about time relativity, though I don’t completely understand the details. At first, I thought maybe the differences had to do with people perceiving the same thing at different speeds which I learned about in cognitive psychology, but that’s something different. The other three superfacts make sense and are important to know. I appreciate your variety of good news, bad news, interesting facts, and a bit of history.

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    1. Thank you so much JoAnne. About non-simultaneity. No, it is not that people are perceiving the same thing at different speeds, and it is not even that light takes a longer time to travel from lamp A than from lamp B. If you calculate that difference and account for it, indivdually for each person, the lights will still turn on in a different order for Amy, Adam and Alan. It is as if Amy, Adam and Alan live in different Universes in which the lamps turn on in a different order, and yet they live in the same universe. It is a fundamental characteristic of physical time (not perceived time) that is difficult to comprehend, and it appears contradictory, but it is really not contradictory. But it is mind blowing. I refused to accept it when I first encountered it, but now I understand how it is possible. Time and space too, are quite different from what we first thought.

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    2. I just thought of another way of viewing it. In relativity time is a dimension just like space (x, y, z). In space there is no specific up and down. If Adam is hanging upside down from Amy’s perspective then it is Amy who is upside down from Adam’s perspective. Amy’s perspective : If you put a lamp A above Amy’s head and a lamp B above lamp A, then lamp B is above lamp A from Amy’s like I just said, whilst lamp B is actually under lamp A from Adam’s perspective. Under and above switched when you swicthed person. Now replace under and above with before and after. Before and after switched when you changed person.

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  6. Always appreciate you sharing these facts. There’s so much I don’t know about the world especially when it comes to science and physics and stuff like that. I always leave your blog having learnt something new.

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    1. Thank you Cindy. About neutering, it is difficult question, health risks versus unwanted procreation, and I know pound puppies don’t get an option. However, the dangers of neutering is mostly for certain large breeds like Leonbergers.

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      1. You’re so welcome! It’s so true! You never know who will adhere to the regulations so they make a blanket deduction but I still think it’s better for the growth and development of the dog to wait a bit if possible.
        🩷

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        1. Yes I remember our breeder telling us to wait 2 years while our veterinary told us to do it sooner. We waited almost 2 years but not quite. Now it is common that you have to sign a contract to wait at least two years when you buy a Leonberger.

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