WTF • Fun • Fact    ( /dʌb(ə)lˌju/  /ti/   /ef/ • /fʌn/ • /fækt/ )

     1. noun  A random, interesting, and overall fun fact that makes you scratch your head and think what the...

WTF Fun Fact 13028 – Lifespan of a Dollar Bill

The U.S. Federal Reserve estimates that the average lifespan of a dollar bill is just 6.6 years. Since larger bills get passed around less often, a $100 bill has an average lifespan of 22.9 years.

The lifespan of paper bills

According to the Federal Reserve website (cited below):

“When currency is deposited with a Federal Reserve Bank, the quality of each note is evaluated by sophisticated processing equipment. Notes that meet our strict quality criteria–that is, that are still in good condition–continue to circulate, while those that do not are taken out of circulation and destroyed. This process determines the lifespan of a Federal Reserve note.”

They continue:

“The lifespan of Federal Reserve notes varies by denomination and depends on a number of factors, including how the denomination is used by the public. For example, larger denominations such as $100 notes are often used as a store of value, which means they pass between users less frequently than lower-denominations such as $5 notes, which are more often used for transactions.”

Average currency lifespans and their ultimate fates

A U.S. $5 bill lasts roughly 4.7 years while a $10 may be around for around 5.3 years. Twenty-dollar bills typically stay in circulation for 7.8 years, and $50 bills last over a decade (12.2 years).

The Federal Reserve puts new currency into circulation each day and reclaims damaged money to destroy it. The cash is typically handed over by banks.

Every year, around $200 billion of “unfit currency” gets taken out of circulation.

According to Yahoo Finance: “What makes money too unfit to use? According the Fed, bills that have holes larger than 19 millimeters, or about the size of an aspirin, can no longer be used. Bills that are torn, dirty, or worn out are also removed. And 5-, 10- and 20-dollar bills produced before 1996 are removed automatically because of their age, regardless of condition.” — WTF fun facts

Source: “How long is the lifespan of U.S. paper money?” — U.S. Federal Reserve

WTF Fun Fact 13027 – Computer Mouse Measured in Mickeys

A good computer mouse will move across pixels quickly and without requiring too many clicks of the bottom wheel (or centimeters across the mouse pad if you’re using a mouse with a sensor). The unit of measurement used for a computer mouse is called a Mickey. The devices may be measured in Mickeys per second or Mickeys per centimeter, for example.

Measured in Mickeys

Mickeys are also used to measure the horizontal, vertical, and diagonal speed at which a cursor can travel over pixels on a computer screen.

Presumably, this unit of measurement is a cute way to summon to mind the Disney character Mickey Mouse. However, Disney has a tight hold on the copyright for their creations, so you won’t see a deliberate reference to the Mouse himself on your equipment.

Other quirky units of measurement

According to Mental Floss (cited below), a Mickey isn’t the only unofficial unit of measurement with personality.

For example: “If a light-year is the distance traveled by light in one year (i.e. approximately 6 trillion miles), then a beard-second is the length that a beard hair grows in one second—or, according to Google’s unit converter, 5 nanometers.”

And “One sydharb is equivalent to 500,000,000,000 liters, namely the approximate volume of Sydney Harbor.” But why is this useful? “Well, just like using the relative sizes of countries or regions to compare one against another (as in “Brazil is the same size as five Alaskas”), the volume of Sydney Harbor can be used to give context to otherwise incomprehensibly vast quantities like the annual water consumption of a city or country, the size or impact of a flood, and the capacities of lakes and dams.  In comparison, it takes two full days (49 hours to be precise) for 1 sydharb of water to flow over Niagara Falls.” — WTF fun facts

Source: “10 Ridiculously Precise Units of Measurement” — Mental Floss

WTF Fun Fact 13026 – The Lowest Vocal Note

A man named Tim Storms holds the record for the lowest vocal note a living human is capable of singing. He’s had the record since 2012.

What is the lowest vocal note?

Storms can since the lowest ever vocal note. The note is eight octaves below the lowest G note on a piano. The note is called G -7 (0.189 Hz).

According to Classic FM (cited below), he “holds the Guinness World Records for both the ‘lowest note produced by a human’ and the ‘widest local range.'”

An international competition from Decca Records called “Bass Hunter” was searching for a bass singer who could sing a low “E” – an exceptionally hard and deep note. The goal was to find someone who could since composer Paul Mealor’s newest composition called De Profundis, which featured the note. The low E is the lowest tone ever written in a piece of classical music).

Classical FM notes (no pun intended) that “Storms submitted his tape and won the competition by a landslide. The singer and composer could not only get down to a low E but, so he says, two octaves lower than that.”

The low note

G-7 is so low that it’s difficult for human ears to process. But Storms’ lowest note is pretty much imperceptible to human ears. However, elephants can hear it just fine!

According to the Guinness World Records re: the record-setting note:

Storms “is the bass singer for the vocal group ‘Pierce Arrow’. The attempt was witnessed by two college music professors and an acoustician. The frequency output of Timothy’s voice was measured using Bruel & Kjaer equipment (low frequency microphone, precision sound analyser and laptop for post analysis).”

Storms has a vocal range of 10 octaves.

No doubt you’d like to hear it all, so check out the video below. (And grab an elephant if you want to be sure of what you’re hearing.) — WTF fun facts

Source: “Listen to the man who holds the record for lowest vocal note sung by a human” — Classic FM

WTF Fun Fact 13025 – Turkeys Can Blush

You may be able to tell when a turkey is embarrassed (or sick or scared or otherwise agitated). That’s because their skin can change color. In other words, turkeys can blush.

How do turkeys blush?

According to Live Science (cited below):

“When a turkey becomes frightened, agitated, excited or ill, the exposed skin on its head and neck can change from its usual pale pink or bluish-gray color to red, white, or blue. And during mating season, the male turkey’s wattle turns scarlet to reflect his elevated sex hormone levels. The fleshy flap of skin that hangs over the gobbler’s beak is called a snood and also turns bright red when the bird is excited.”

You’d probably have to pay pretty close attention to notice the difference, but you could always try telling a bawdy joke to the next turkey you see to test it out.

Other cool turkey facts

While many of us only think of turkeys around Thanksgiving, there’s a lot more to them that makes them fascinating creatures. For example:

  • Turkeys have periscopic vision. With eyes on the sides of its head and good neck rotation, a turkey has a 360-degree field of vision and can see things not in its direct line of sight. Of course, that doesn’t always mean they can outrun the threats they encounter.
  • A turkey’s wishbone is not a common creature feature. However, dinosaurs such as the T-rex and velociraptors also had these bones, meaning the turkey could have evolved from dinosaurs.
  • Turkeys swallow stones that stay in one of their two stomachs (in a section called the gizzard). The stones allow food to be ground up in the stomach, which is important since turkeys don’t have teeth!

Did you know any of these fun facts about turkeys? — WTF fun facts

Source: “10 Terrific Turkey Facts” — Live Science

WTF Fun Fact 13024 – The Original Kleenex Gas Mask Filter

What we now know as Kleenex tissues were originally designed to be gas mask filters. The original kleenex gas mask filter wasn’t nearly as soft and gentle as our current tissues though.

Kleenex’s original purpose for gas masks

According to the Kimberly-Clark website (cited below):

“The Kleenex® Brand’s story began during the First World War when Kimberly-Clark developed a crepe paper used as a filter within gas masks.”

However, the material wasn’t fully developed by the time the war ended, so the company pivoted into developing soft and smooth facial tissues. They were so popular that today that the words “Kleenex” and tissue are often used interchangeably.

However, there is a chapter in between the gas masks and tissues, according to Kimberly-Clark:

“In the early 1920’s, that very crepe paper innovation was cleverly adapted into a consumer product called Kotex® Brand which helped women with their periods.”

In 1924, the tissues hit shelves in the US as a cold cream and makeup remover.

From gas mask to facial tissue

It wasn’t until 1929 that “Kimberly-Clark’s head researcher was suffering from hay fever and started using the tissues in place of his handkerchief.” A tweak to the marketing to encourage people to use them for their noses doubled sales in the first year.

Of course, it’s much more sustainable to use a handkerchief than a disposable tissue, but it would be many decades before the environmental toll of disposable products became clear to the public.

Today, Kleenex is still the most popular brand of tissue used in the U.S. by far. In 2020, 170.79 million Americans reported using Kleenex brand tissues.

The tissues are also available in 150 countries throughout the world. In addition to facial tissue, Kleenex also makes bathroom tissue, paper towels, tampons, and diapers. — WTF fun facts

Source: “The Tale of Kleenex®” — Kleenex UK official website

WTF Fun Fact 13023 – The Samsung Butt Robot

Putting your phone in your back pocket is dangerous business (at least for the phone). So to ensure their materials were sturdy enough to withstand the crush, Samsung invented a robotic butt. The Samsung butt robot exerts 220 pounds of pressure on their phones during testing.

How Samsung phones are robot butt-tested

Clad in a pair of blue jeans, the butt repeatedly sits on phone to see how they’ll react to the common real-world beating their bound to take.

According to Tech Radar (cited below), whose writer was invited to tour the facility;

“On a recent trip to Korea, we were invited by Samsung to take a tour of its dedicated testing facility, and as we made our way through the company’s labs (each more diabolical than the last) we came to understand just how seriously the company takes its quality control – even if one of these tests does involve an undeniably quirky robot butt (dressed in blue denim jeans, no less) repeatedly sitting on handsets.”

Other Sumsung quality testing

The facility did a number of quality tests on their phones. They tested durability, sound quality, and battery power, among other important functions.

While we’re sure the phones still break from time to time, they have been through a lot. Tech Radar also reported:

“Using a number of different mechanical devices that look like the world’s most brutal skill testers (including auto drop testers, tumble testers and continuous free fall testers), Samsung’s handsets are repeatedly dropped from varying heights and angles onto a variety of hard surfaces, such as metal and marble.”

The butt test is still our favorite and when the first tech writers got a chance to see it around 2014, the company was met with so much public interest that they finally released a video so people could see it for themselves. Enjoy! — WTF fun facts

Source: “Samsung built a robot butt just to test its smartphones’ durability” — Tech Radar

WTF Fun Fact 13022 – The World’s Fresh Water

Seventy-one percent of the Earth is covered in water, but that doesn’t mean we can use it all. But what percent of the world’s water is fresh (and therefore useable for humans to ingest)? Just 2.55 – and much of that is trapped in glaciers. Only 0.007% is available to us for use. The rest is saline and ocean-based. Interestingly, that’s roughly the same amount of freshwater that has always existed on Earth.

The world’s freshwater

Water is a valuable resource. If you’ve ever been without fresh water, even for a short time, you probably know exactly how panic-inducing a lack of fresh water can be. But for many people, fresh water is something we’ve always had and never really questioned. Those are the lucky minority.

It’s a bit startling to realize that the Earth’s freshwater resources have been around for hundreds of millions of years. What we drink has been recycled many, many times, whether it’s via the atmosphere or through our drinking water cups (and we’ll leave you to figure out how that works and then appreciate your local water treatment facility on your own).

Because we have very limited means of creating potable water out of saltwater through desalinization technology, it’s very hard to make enough new freshwater to sustain more humans. And that’s bad news when you think about how much water goes into things we enjoy – NatGeo says “the average hamburger takes 2,400 liters, or 630 gallons, of water to produce.

Fresh water keeps us alive

An increasingly large human population means we will need more water for hygiene, cooking, and drinking.

According to National Geographic (cited below): “Water scarcity is an abstract concept to many and a stark reality for others. It is the result of myriad environmental, political, economic, and social forces.” It has always been this way – people have fought wars over access to freshwater supplies for thousands of years.

“Due to geography, climate, engineering, regulation, and competition for resources, some regions seem relatively flush with freshwater, while others face drought and debilitating pollution. In much of the developing world, clean water is either hard to come by or a commodity that requires laborious work or significant currency to obtain,” they note.

— WTF fun facts

Source: “Freshwater Crisis” — National Geographic

WTF Fun Fact 13021 – The Scully Effect

The way we see scientists portrayed in books, movies, and television shows shapes the way we think about science in general. It also affects whether we can relate to the idea of being a scientist. This is especially important for women, who are underrepresented in most science fields. That’s part of what makes the Scully Effect so remarkable.

What is the Scully Effect?

Dana Scully was a character on the iconic television show The X Files. She was one of the first visible examples of a female scientist on a long-running television show. And it turns out that Gillian Anderson’s portrayal of the character changed the way viewers thought about the role of women in science.

According to a blog published by Westcoast Women in Engineering, Science, and Technology (WWEST) on Simon Fraser University’s website (cited below), “a phenomenon called ‘The Scully Effect’ has been anecdotally reported among fans of the TV show The X-Files and women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) fields.”

In 2017, WWEST started a project called Media Depictions of Women in STEM “to evaluate how woman characters in STEM are depicted in popular media and how this might shape viewers’ ideas of women’s role in STEM (especially viewers in elementary and secondary school).”

They also reported that “a study by the Geena Davis Institute has examined just how much the character of Dana Scully has influenced girls and women to focus on STEM in their schooling and careers.”

What does the research show?

There were 2,021 participants in the study, in which :
– 63% of women who were familiar with Dana Scully said she increased their belief in the importance of STEM.
– 50% of those same women said Scully increased their interest in STEM.
– 43% of women who were medium to heavy viewers of The X-Files were influenced to consider working in STEM fields by Scully.
– 27% were convinced to actually study STEM.

Gillian Anderson said of “The Scully Effect”:

“At the time that Scully showed up [in 1993], we didn’t see that type of female represented very much at all out in the world of television, which is what we look to more and more as examples of who we are and to help make sense of us as human beings. And so, to suddenly have an appealing, intelligent, strong-minded female who was appreciated by her pretty cool male coworker was an awesome thing to behold, and I think that a lot of young women said, ‘That’s me. I’m interested in that. I want to do that. I want to be that.’”

Other research has shown that children tend to associate men with science around age seven due to cultural depictions of men in books, shows, and films. But when this can be prevented by also showing women as scientists, girls are more likely to believe that science is a general career path open to them as well. — WTF fun facts

Source: “The Scully Effect” — Simon Fraser University

WTF Fun Fact 13020 – Some of the World’s Oldest Advice

One of the oldest pieces of literature known to mankind is called the Instructions of Shuruppak, which contains some of the world’s oldest advice. This was found on the Abu Salabikh Tablet which was excavated in Central Babylonia (which is now southern Iraq). This Sumerian text has been dated to roughly the mid-third millennium BCE (2500 BCE).

Ancient advice via “wisdom literature”

The oldest recorded advice is written in the voice of a Sumerian king named Šuruppak to his son, Ziusudra. Some of it is similar to the biblical 10 Commandments, while other gems include how not to engage with prostitutes (in other words, a warning to lead a virtuous life) or act while drinking beer.

It begins:

“My son, I would instruct you,
Take my instructions,
Ziusudra, I would utter a word to you,
Give heed to it,
Do not neglect my instruction,
Do not transgress the word I uttered,
The father’s instructions, the precious,
Carry out diligently.”

The oldest fatherly advice

This ancient advice is only available to us in fragmentary form and (obviously) through translation. Still, it’s fascinating to see how much of it still applies, such as:

You should not locate a field on a road…
You should not place your house next to a public square: there is always a crowd there.
You should not loiter about where there is a quarrel; you should not let the quarrel make you a witness.
You should not steal anything…A thief is a lion, but after he has been caught, he will be a slave. My son, you should not commit robbery…
You should not speak improperly; later it will lay a trap for you.
You should not curse strongly: it rebounds on you.
My son, you should not use violence (?); ……. You should not commit rape on someone’s daughter; the courtyard will learn of it.
You should not boast in beer halls like a deceitful man.

It contains much more advice than this, which you can find here.

— WTF fun facts

Source: “The Instructions of Shuruppak, Some of the Earliest Sumerian Literature” — HistoryofInformation.com