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You said you moved bigfoot to a disputed facts section. This section is not at
disputed facts, it's not in this article, and it's not in
controversy. So I guess I'm asking where is it?
~ender 2003-09-20 07:20:MST
Should a person or group religious view point be called a misconception ? Smith03 17:09, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Whether the "world was created in seven days" by God is an unfalsifiable hypothesis and a matter of faith. -- Smerdis of Tlön 01:07, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)
The creationism v evolutionism argument over how the world was created is POV stuff Graham :) 16:49, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Look at the dates... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.118.214.224 ( talk) 21:35, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
This page was listed on VfD on September 20.
Wikipedians in favour of deletion:
Wikipedians in favour of keeping:
Wikipedians whose position is not obvious:
Deletionist: All the items in the list are POV - you can't write neutrally on this topic. Furthermore, they're not misconceptions: they're semantic disputes or disputed facts.
Inclusionist: But I can think of NPOV misconceptions, like the Mary Celeste or "play it again Sam". People will accept that they've got a misconception on being confronted with the full details.
Deletionist: Even if there are NPOV misconceptions, the article will invariably attract POV additions: it'd be a lot of work to make this thing neutral, and keep it that way.
Inclusionist: Perhaps, but I think it'd be worth the effort. This would make a fun entry point into a range of articles, and be educational to boot.
Deletionist: In the end, it just isn't encyclopedic now, and it won't ever be encyclopedic. Let's delete it and move on.
Inclusionist: I disagree: like a butterfly, this article will turn into something beautiful. Just wait and see.
Deletionist: Nearly every article in an encyclopedia has information that someone didn't know, or was incorrect about. These pieces of trivia belong in the articles about that subject, which is where encylopedia users will look for answers to their question. If they want to learn a random fact, they can click on Random Page.
Inclusionist: It's not stated, but this entry is about "common and widespread" misconceptions, not just all possible misconceptions. Students tend to always aquire the same misconceptions. "Education by debunking" is a valid technique, especially in gradeschool physics, and this entry brings it all together in one place.
If my rewrite of the article sticks (ha!) then I'd like to move this thing to list of misconceptions. Objections? Martin 00:33, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Some coments by Chris:
Some comments by Neo:
Some comments by Dotchan:
Some comments by tcsetattr:
Some comments by fafnir: 12:19, 10 October 2006 The magnetic pole stuff is meaningless. You can take any magnet, and lable the pole 'north and south' arbitrarily. The north pole is the north magnetic pole, little magnets people carry around and call compasses have the south magnetic pole on the compass painted red and labled 'north' so people know which direction is north. The only misconception is on the author's part. Though the poles have switched in the past, throughout man's history they have remained constant enough for countless people to use them for navigation and such.
in the section on electricty, the theory of relativity is quoted as to why electrons cannot move at the speed of light, but isnt that why we have quantum physics, because when you get down to atomic and subatomic particles, the theory of relativity no longer applies, hence the search for a uniform theory of realitivity, that works for both regular items and atomic and smaller particles? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 214.13.212.26 ( talk) 05:21, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Hosepipe:"It is not true that a nozzle (or a person's thumb) on the end of a garden hose makes the water squirt farther because of the Bernoulli principle. The pressure at the end of a hose depends very much on the speed of the water which flows through miles of pipe. ". I don't agree with this - i think simple force/area pressure. I don't have access to the reference, but there is: http://amos.indiana.edu/library/scripts/hose.html and https://www2.hcmut.edu.vn/~huynhqlinh/olympicvl/tailieu/physlink_askexpert/ae185.cfm.htm.
I'm also slightly concerned about a paragraph just about beginning "Due to Archimedes's principle,"; there are lots of details but no references, I'm feeling possibly politically motivated as it stands. Or, very interesting indeed if true.
Apologies for any poor wikiquette, I'm very new.-- Davini994 ( talk) 23:10, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Some comments by smcanby:
Smcanby ( talk) 23:56, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
In this article, it is told that cold weather can decrease the strenght of the immune system and thus facilitate the common cold. But in the "Old wives' tale" article, the opposite is told: cold weather and decreased immunity have no correlation. At least one of them is wrong.
Deleted the following: BEGIN
END
The above is original research, and also wrong, or at least heavily debated. From the common cold page: "a rhinovirus cannot survive at elevated temperatures for more than a few minutes.[8] Because of this weakness, the rhinovirus infects the outer membranes of the throat and sinuses, where it is not exposed to normal human body temperature."
In the winter, the extremities are more likely to be cold. Is it winter? Touch your nose. Bingo. Also:
"It is not known conclusively whether cold weather or a humid climate can affect transmission by other means, such as by affecting the immune system, or ICAM-1 receptor concentration, or simply increasing the amount and frequency of nasal secretions and frequency of hand to face contact."
"researchers at the Common Cold Centre at the Cardiff University attempted to demonstrate that cold temperatures can lead to a greater susceptibility to viral infection. In the experiment, 29% of a group of 90 people who sat with their feet in ice-cold water for 20 minutes a day for five days developed cold symptoms during the five days, while 9% of a control group of 90 people who were not similarly exposed developed symptoms."
This page is hardly the place for stuff that's open to debate. If scientists are still asking questions about whether it is the case or not, then it is clearly not a "misconception" it is "not yet established". DewiMorgan 19:45, 13 May 2007 (UTC) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/4433496.stm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.86.248.180 ( talk) 01:49, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Also see http://www.medpagetoday.com/Pulmonary/URIstheFlu/tb/2136. This states that "many of us carry around a subclinical cold infection and that chilling the feet opens the door for it to become a full-blown cold.". So exposure to cold temperatures clearly does lead to one developing a cold. This clearly is not a misconception. The comments about colds should be removed from the page.-- 81.106.184.50 ( talk) 20:31, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
Shouldn't the misquotes from the "Entertainment" section be moved to the article List of famous misquotations? -- 153.1.150.24 10:34, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
Some believe that the sky looks blue because it reflects the ocean...
Who are those fools?! This is a list about "common misconceptions", not "misconceptions held by a tiny minority of people who probably think the moon is made of cheese as well".
I hope there aren't people who believe the sky over a desert is yellow, because it reflects the sand. Psychonaut3000 03:10, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
It is quite widespread. Explanation I was given as a kid was that the earth, in general, is a blue/white sphere when seen from space; the average colour is blue. In the same way Mars' atmosphere is thought of as red. (Note: the sky over the desert can well be yellower than that over the sea, due to dust particles, which to the naïve might appear to support the ground-reflecting hypothesis). DewiMorgan 12:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
This appears to be an indiscriminate list, I strongly urge deleting the entire ugly mess. However, it seems I just missed the deletion debate by a few days... Can we get some honorable, capable editor to merge the content back into the articles where this stuff belongs, and after this article has been whittled down, delete this thing for good? linas 15:12, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
There's a reference to pirates that needs five different citations. Its just not needed on the list, I mean complete accuracy is a hope but little more, But we can only go so far. As well I don't think its accurate, I have read several good (historical, non-fiction) books on pirates and privateering and was always lead to believe that well the jolly roger was different in many ways from ship to ship it still existed. Regardless, I can't stand looking at a three sentence paragraph with five needed citations. Colin 8 20:13, 22 April 2007 (UTC) "An old (and surely dying) superstition is that toads can give people warts" that its old and a superstition is indisputable, but whether its dying is opinion and little more, I am removing the bracketed info. Colin 8 20:18, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
I want to propose merging the Evolution section with the Biology section on this same page. I am just unsure of how to format the template. The Evolution section might get a separate subheader but it really belongs under Biology. Cthompson ( talk) 03:54, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
I love this page :) I added a whole swathe on evolution, but now I'm thinking maybe this should be copied to the evolution page itself. These misapprehensions about evolution are, so far as I can tell, the only reason it is not universally accepted. [edit: Oops forgot to sign] DewiMorgan 22:32, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
Made some changes. In particular, I returned the two sections:
You hear this one so often it's painful: definitely a misconception/strawman, but which one to link to as a ref?
Same again. Not so much a question of whether it's a misconception, but rather, link to use to show that it is?
Also did some cleaning up, added a link to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_misconceptions#Evolution and so on. DewiMorgan 18:47, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
Spaghetti Bolognese did not originate in Italy. [citation needed]
This is not supported by the current article on SB or anything else I have ever read. Perhaps it is a confusion based on the well attested fact that "Bolognese sauce" is called ragu in Bologna. 1Z 16:16, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
"Spaghetti bolognese did not originate in Italy. The actual name in Italian is spaghetti con ragù, which means spaghetti with ragù. Spaghetti bolognese is actually the German name." FALSE. First of all, the common way of saying is "spaghetti AL ragù" not "spaghetti CON ragù". Moreover, "ragù" is a meat sauce that can be done in many ways, and "ragù alla bolognese" is one of them. You can say "Spaghetti alla bolognese" (omitting the preposition is an error) to mean "Spaghetti (al|con) ragù alla bolognese". Writing from Italy, not that far from Bologna :) Barabba 14:05, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Would this article benefit from a discussion of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, which is often misinterpreted to mean "everything is uncertain" is some sweeping way. 1Z 16:25, 19 August 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the formula from the section on the Coriolis force affecting bathtub draining.
Spiel496 16:10, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
What about adding this misconception - that 'uncivilised' peoples couldn't see the Europeans' ships because they didn't have the concept for it? I've heard this idiocy from various intelligent British people. Malick78 07:46, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | → | Archive 5 |
You said you moved bigfoot to a disputed facts section. This section is not at
disputed facts, it's not in this article, and it's not in
controversy. So I guess I'm asking where is it?
~ender 2003-09-20 07:20:MST
Should a person or group religious view point be called a misconception ? Smith03 17:09, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Whether the "world was created in seven days" by God is an unfalsifiable hypothesis and a matter of faith. -- Smerdis of Tlön 01:07, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)
The creationism v evolutionism argument over how the world was created is POV stuff Graham :) 16:49, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Look at the dates... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.118.214.224 ( talk) 21:35, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
This page was listed on VfD on September 20.
Wikipedians in favour of deletion:
Wikipedians in favour of keeping:
Wikipedians whose position is not obvious:
Deletionist: All the items in the list are POV - you can't write neutrally on this topic. Furthermore, they're not misconceptions: they're semantic disputes or disputed facts.
Inclusionist: But I can think of NPOV misconceptions, like the Mary Celeste or "play it again Sam". People will accept that they've got a misconception on being confronted with the full details.
Deletionist: Even if there are NPOV misconceptions, the article will invariably attract POV additions: it'd be a lot of work to make this thing neutral, and keep it that way.
Inclusionist: Perhaps, but I think it'd be worth the effort. This would make a fun entry point into a range of articles, and be educational to boot.
Deletionist: In the end, it just isn't encyclopedic now, and it won't ever be encyclopedic. Let's delete it and move on.
Inclusionist: I disagree: like a butterfly, this article will turn into something beautiful. Just wait and see.
Deletionist: Nearly every article in an encyclopedia has information that someone didn't know, or was incorrect about. These pieces of trivia belong in the articles about that subject, which is where encylopedia users will look for answers to their question. If they want to learn a random fact, they can click on Random Page.
Inclusionist: It's not stated, but this entry is about "common and widespread" misconceptions, not just all possible misconceptions. Students tend to always aquire the same misconceptions. "Education by debunking" is a valid technique, especially in gradeschool physics, and this entry brings it all together in one place.
If my rewrite of the article sticks (ha!) then I'd like to move this thing to list of misconceptions. Objections? Martin 00:33, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Some coments by Chris:
Some comments by Neo:
Some comments by Dotchan:
Some comments by tcsetattr:
Some comments by fafnir: 12:19, 10 October 2006 The magnetic pole stuff is meaningless. You can take any magnet, and lable the pole 'north and south' arbitrarily. The north pole is the north magnetic pole, little magnets people carry around and call compasses have the south magnetic pole on the compass painted red and labled 'north' so people know which direction is north. The only misconception is on the author's part. Though the poles have switched in the past, throughout man's history they have remained constant enough for countless people to use them for navigation and such.
in the section on electricty, the theory of relativity is quoted as to why electrons cannot move at the speed of light, but isnt that why we have quantum physics, because when you get down to atomic and subatomic particles, the theory of relativity no longer applies, hence the search for a uniform theory of realitivity, that works for both regular items and atomic and smaller particles? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 214.13.212.26 ( talk) 05:21, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Hosepipe:"It is not true that a nozzle (or a person's thumb) on the end of a garden hose makes the water squirt farther because of the Bernoulli principle. The pressure at the end of a hose depends very much on the speed of the water which flows through miles of pipe. ". I don't agree with this - i think simple force/area pressure. I don't have access to the reference, but there is: http://amos.indiana.edu/library/scripts/hose.html and https://www2.hcmut.edu.vn/~huynhqlinh/olympicvl/tailieu/physlink_askexpert/ae185.cfm.htm.
I'm also slightly concerned about a paragraph just about beginning "Due to Archimedes's principle,"; there are lots of details but no references, I'm feeling possibly politically motivated as it stands. Or, very interesting indeed if true.
Apologies for any poor wikiquette, I'm very new.-- Davini994 ( talk) 23:10, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Some comments by smcanby:
Smcanby ( talk) 23:56, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
In this article, it is told that cold weather can decrease the strenght of the immune system and thus facilitate the common cold. But in the "Old wives' tale" article, the opposite is told: cold weather and decreased immunity have no correlation. At least one of them is wrong.
Deleted the following: BEGIN
END
The above is original research, and also wrong, or at least heavily debated. From the common cold page: "a rhinovirus cannot survive at elevated temperatures for more than a few minutes.[8] Because of this weakness, the rhinovirus infects the outer membranes of the throat and sinuses, where it is not exposed to normal human body temperature."
In the winter, the extremities are more likely to be cold. Is it winter? Touch your nose. Bingo. Also:
"It is not known conclusively whether cold weather or a humid climate can affect transmission by other means, such as by affecting the immune system, or ICAM-1 receptor concentration, or simply increasing the amount and frequency of nasal secretions and frequency of hand to face contact."
"researchers at the Common Cold Centre at the Cardiff University attempted to demonstrate that cold temperatures can lead to a greater susceptibility to viral infection. In the experiment, 29% of a group of 90 people who sat with their feet in ice-cold water for 20 minutes a day for five days developed cold symptoms during the five days, while 9% of a control group of 90 people who were not similarly exposed developed symptoms."
This page is hardly the place for stuff that's open to debate. If scientists are still asking questions about whether it is the case or not, then it is clearly not a "misconception" it is "not yet established". DewiMorgan 19:45, 13 May 2007 (UTC) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/4433496.stm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.86.248.180 ( talk) 01:49, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Also see http://www.medpagetoday.com/Pulmonary/URIstheFlu/tb/2136. This states that "many of us carry around a subclinical cold infection and that chilling the feet opens the door for it to become a full-blown cold.". So exposure to cold temperatures clearly does lead to one developing a cold. This clearly is not a misconception. The comments about colds should be removed from the page.-- 81.106.184.50 ( talk) 20:31, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
Shouldn't the misquotes from the "Entertainment" section be moved to the article List of famous misquotations? -- 153.1.150.24 10:34, 30 May 2006 (UTC)
Some believe that the sky looks blue because it reflects the ocean...
Who are those fools?! This is a list about "common misconceptions", not "misconceptions held by a tiny minority of people who probably think the moon is made of cheese as well".
I hope there aren't people who believe the sky over a desert is yellow, because it reflects the sand. Psychonaut3000 03:10, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
It is quite widespread. Explanation I was given as a kid was that the earth, in general, is a blue/white sphere when seen from space; the average colour is blue. In the same way Mars' atmosphere is thought of as red. (Note: the sky over the desert can well be yellower than that over the sea, due to dust particles, which to the naïve might appear to support the ground-reflecting hypothesis). DewiMorgan 12:18, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
This appears to be an indiscriminate list, I strongly urge deleting the entire ugly mess. However, it seems I just missed the deletion debate by a few days... Can we get some honorable, capable editor to merge the content back into the articles where this stuff belongs, and after this article has been whittled down, delete this thing for good? linas 15:12, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
There's a reference to pirates that needs five different citations. Its just not needed on the list, I mean complete accuracy is a hope but little more, But we can only go so far. As well I don't think its accurate, I have read several good (historical, non-fiction) books on pirates and privateering and was always lead to believe that well the jolly roger was different in many ways from ship to ship it still existed. Regardless, I can't stand looking at a three sentence paragraph with five needed citations. Colin 8 20:13, 22 April 2007 (UTC) "An old (and surely dying) superstition is that toads can give people warts" that its old and a superstition is indisputable, but whether its dying is opinion and little more, I am removing the bracketed info. Colin 8 20:18, 22 April 2007 (UTC)
I want to propose merging the Evolution section with the Biology section on this same page. I am just unsure of how to format the template. The Evolution section might get a separate subheader but it really belongs under Biology. Cthompson ( talk) 03:54, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
I love this page :) I added a whole swathe on evolution, but now I'm thinking maybe this should be copied to the evolution page itself. These misapprehensions about evolution are, so far as I can tell, the only reason it is not universally accepted. [edit: Oops forgot to sign] DewiMorgan 22:32, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
Made some changes. In particular, I returned the two sections:
You hear this one so often it's painful: definitely a misconception/strawman, but which one to link to as a ref?
Same again. Not so much a question of whether it's a misconception, but rather, link to use to show that it is?
Also did some cleaning up, added a link to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_misconceptions#Evolution and so on. DewiMorgan 18:47, 4 July 2007 (UTC)
Spaghetti Bolognese did not originate in Italy. [citation needed]
This is not supported by the current article on SB or anything else I have ever read. Perhaps it is a confusion based on the well attested fact that "Bolognese sauce" is called ragu in Bologna. 1Z 16:16, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
"Spaghetti bolognese did not originate in Italy. The actual name in Italian is spaghetti con ragù, which means spaghetti with ragù. Spaghetti bolognese is actually the German name." FALSE. First of all, the common way of saying is "spaghetti AL ragù" not "spaghetti CON ragù". Moreover, "ragù" is a meat sauce that can be done in many ways, and "ragù alla bolognese" is one of them. You can say "Spaghetti alla bolognese" (omitting the preposition is an error) to mean "Spaghetti (al|con) ragù alla bolognese". Writing from Italy, not that far from Bologna :) Barabba 14:05, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Would this article benefit from a discussion of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, which is often misinterpreted to mean "everything is uncertain" is some sweeping way. 1Z 16:25, 19 August 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the formula from the section on the Coriolis force affecting bathtub draining.
Spiel496 16:10, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
What about adding this misconception - that 'uncivilised' peoples couldn't see the Europeans' ships because they didn't have the concept for it? I've heard this idiocy from various intelligent British people. Malick78 07:46, 10 September 2007 (UTC)