Most incorrect thing you were taught?

Hurricane Carter

gobnaitolunacy wrote: »

The worst, most demoralising thing a parent could say to a child.....'schooldays are the best days of your life'

Me bollix.

School days were the best days of my life and the best part was that I knew it at the time!

We'd great fun!

gobnaitolunacy

I Am Kong! wrote: »

School days were the best days of my life and the best part was that I knew it at the time!

We'd great fun!

Well, good for you.... It implies your life goes downhill after school!

hardCopy

wilkie2006 wrote: »

My teacher gave a classmate an absolute bo11ocking for writing "Xmas", claiming that it was "taking the Christ out of Christmas". Ignorant bitch...

the "X" comes from the Greek letter Chi, which is the first letter of the Greek word Χριστός, translated as "Christ".[2] There is a common misconception that the word Xmas is a secular attempt to remove the religious tradition from Christmas[3] by taking the "Christ" out of "Christmas".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xmas

were you in my class?

Dovakhin

We were told by our religion teacher that having sex before you were married caused STDs (gonorrhea specifically if I recall correctly) and that the rhythm method of contraception worked for her. We did point out that she had 7 kids so far but she wasn't listening....Fun days...

allibastor

I was told by my old maths teacher that because i didn not do all the working on on my math she assumed i was cheating. It so happens i am Very Duslexic and could do complex enough math in my head, but could not show the process of how i worked it out. she made me drop to pass and i lost all interest in math untila week before my leaving when my teacher finally noticed me and asked why was i wasting my time with pass, i should have done honors.

I suppose the most incorrect thing that taught me was that teachers no anything about anything.

kippy

gobnaitolunacy wrote: »

The worst, most demoralising thing a parent could say to a child.....'schooldays are the best days of your life'

Me bollix.

They generally are though.

gobnaitolunacy

kippy wrote: »

They generally are though.

'Generally'

Getting a flaking from the teacher as well as misc. 'fellow' pupils.

Right laugh so it was.

Shenshen

I have to admit I had to think long and hard about this one, so either I was really lucky to have attended fantastic schools, or I don't realise what rubbish I'm still believing

I'd have to say the most incorrect thing I was taught was in primary school, when we were taught that dinosaurs died out because their brains were too small.
I even still remember the diagram of a human and his brain size in relation to a Brontosaurus (yes, I know, those never existed) and its brain size.

I remember even then thinking how it was amazing that they populated the planet for so many millions of years if their brains were too small to keep them alive.
But I was a very shy kid and didn't say anything.

Mr Benevolent

kippy wrote: »

They generally are though.

No they aren't.

kippy

gobnaitolunacy wrote: »

'Generally'

Getting a flaking from the teacher as well as misc. 'fellow' pupils.

Right laugh so it was.

I use generally as I know there are those out there that have a difficult time at school.

I can tell you if you ask anyone of the 20 or so people that were in my class, were school days the best days of yer lives the vast majority would say they were.

jimmyjoe951

Only bout 6 years ago my fourth class primary teacher did a thing up on the board of the GOOD!! And bad facts of smoking. Some of the good were it makes you thin, gives you a nice buzz,stops you from eating:O

BlatentCheek

That "really, everything's already been invented". In the next year alone mobile phones became ubiquitous, normal people started using the internet to chat on MSN and buy things off Amazon and my peers started downloading all their music from Napster. Mind you the same genius once hypothesized that History came from the words "his - story: like the Michael Jackson album".

BlatentCheek

That "really, everything's already been invented". In the next year alone mobile phones became ubiquitous, normal people started using the internet to chat on MSN and buy things off Amazon and my peers started downloading all their music from Napster. Mind you the same genius once hypothesized that History came from the words "his - story: like the Michael Jackson album".

gobnaitolunacy

BlatentCheek wrote: »

That "really, everything's already been invented". In the next year alone mobile phones became ubiquitous, normal people started using the internet to chat on MSN and buy things off Amazon and my peers started downloading all their music from Napster. Mind you the same genius once hypothesized that History came from the words "his - story: like the Michael Jackson album".

All those things are more 'innovation' than 'invention'.

Mobiles have been around for donkeys years but they were the size of a concrete block.

BlatentCheek

Perhaps but I'd say that distinction was wasted on him. In any case I'd consider e-commerce and p2p downloading to be inventions in that they're novel processes or methods to conduct business and trading in the one case and to acquire and disseminate content in the other case. I was more trying to get across that he was claiming that everything was already invented during a time of considerable advances in electronics and communications that haven't stopped since and have transformed the world in a lot of ways, a lot of which were being widely predicted when he made the claim.

OldNotWIse

kippy wrote: »

They generally are though.

Maybe, I think that when you're an adult (whenever that is lol) the highs are higher but the lows are lower. I can't imagine not having a weekly wage, drink, cigarettes, the freedom to do what I want (within reason of course) but then again sometimes when bad things happen i find myself wishing I had the security of childhood again. I suppose it's a trade off.

Also, from experience if you go to a yuppity fee-paying school on Dublin's south side and it's full of bitchy cnuts then school days (2nd level at least) are not the best days of your life

pickarooney

stealinhorses wrote: »

She was obsessed with the Rosa Parks incident that led to the Montgomery Bus Boycott and believed the whole thing was set up by the black people of Alabama (i.e., she didn't believe that Parks refused out of her own will to give up her seat to a white man).

That's a fairly popular theory, in fairness.

j1d2c3

Told by a teacher in third year "There is no word in the english language that has all 5 vowels". Called out a couple to him, and his defence was "sure anyone could find one using a dictionary".
Following on I think teachers have a duty when they're being paid to educate not to just repeat stuff they hear in the pub as fact without thouroughly checking it first.
Had some good teachers too, Don't think they should all be assessed and compensated as one group.

Thumby

That babies are gifts from god when married people are in love. Needless to say my 1st class teacher (i was 6 at the time) wasn't to impressed when i ask her to explain how god made me then considering i was a bastard?
Oh and self taught is the fact that i will do anything, including reading this entire thread, to avoid doing the ironing.

OurLadyofKnock

That swinging a bucket of water over your head was to demonstrate how gravity works.

OurLadyofKnock

Peig

OnTheCounter

That someone wasn't riding the hole off Mary when she concieved.

Why did Joe marry her if he wasn't getting the odd shag?

Little Acorn

Shenshen wrote: »

I even still remember the diagram of a human and his brain size in relation to a Brontosaurus (yes, I know, those never existed) and its brain size.

:eek:
I liked brontosaurus..

:(

gronemeyer

Pie is a load of numbers that has it uses, not some form of tasty food.

AlmightyCushion

The maps we've been using are completely wrong. I couldn't believe it when I found out.

http://dahlecommunication.typepad.com/home/2009/10/mercator-versus-peters-projection-why-change-is-a-difficult-process.html

kowloon

mikemac1 wrote: »

There are worms in Slimfast
That's how you lose the weight

You can't see them in the powder
But leave out a milkshake for a while and you'll see the worms

Drink it up, do you good

I remember someone swearing they actually saw this. Couldn't persuade them they were just remembering an urban legend popular with the kids when Slimfast got popular.

humbert

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

The maps we've been using are completely wrong. I couldn't believe it when I found out.

http://dahlecommunication.typepad.com/home/2009/10/mercator-versus-peters-projection-why-change-is-a-difficult-process.html

Tut, we used the Waterman butterfly, the only 'correct' map projection.

partyatmygaff

jtaylol wrote: »

. Also, if you leave your can of beer open for longer than 30 mins it converts to acid and that's why we should never drink alcohol because it will convert into acid in our stomachs and kill us. I wish I was joking, but my teacher said this last week in class.

Mostly uninformed BS but there is some vague link to the truth there.

Ethanol is oxidised by the oxygen in the air in to ethanoic acid. It's also oxidised in the body by a series of enzymes in to ethanoic acid which is then used as an energy source in muscle tissue. Ethanoic acid, being the main component of vinegar, isn't very toxic or dangerous. Most of the alcohol someone consumes is metabolised in their liver.

The most toxic compound in the entire process is an intermediate known as acetaldehyde. Normally, in a healthy person with a healthy liver there would be an ample supply of the enzyme aldehyde dehydrogenase which is responsible for converting acetaldehyde to ethanoic acid. If there isn't enough of that enzyme or its mutated in some way, far too much acetaldehyde is left to roam free and poison the tissues of the body.

Capt'n Midnight

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

The maps we've been using are completely wrong. I couldn't believe it when I found out.

http://dahlecommunication.typepad.com/home/2009/10/mercator-versus-peters-projection-why-change-is-a-difficult-process.html

Thing about the Mercator projection is that straight lines on the map are straight lines in the real world. Kinda handy for ships and aeroplanes.

Capt'n Midnight

BlatentCheek wrote: »

That "really, everything's already been invented".

at this stage most stuff has been invented

it's mostly discoveries of things we have the technology to make or understand

most patents are for slight modifications or merging of existing technologies.

for new technologies it's usually a race to get there first. the history of electronics and computing is about being able to make the next step because the conditions are right


Konrad Zuse invented the computer. He wasn't the only one. But he is perhaps the person who invented more of a computer than anyone else.


The light bulb was invented by Edison
actually it had been invented many times before, it's just that this time it was commercially viable. And it wasn't really invented, since Swan invented it at the same time on the other side of the Atlantic.



TBH at this stage about the only merit patents have for innovation is in the workarounds that people go to to avoid license fees to the patent holder.