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1500 questions
85
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Did Sir Arthur Conan Doyle prank 12 men into fleeing their countries?
Purportedly, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — creator and author of Sherlock Holmes series — sent a telegram to 12 men “…of great virtue and respected in society.” The telegram read “Flee! All has been discovered.” Within 24 hours, the story goes, all 12…
Coomie
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Was there a diorama at the Chicago Museum of Science where children could play shooting at a Vietnamese village?
In books and interviews, Noam Chomsky recalls that during the Vietnam War a diorama of a Vietnamese village was built at the Chicago Museum of Science where "children were supposed to come and play, and shoot at the village with the …
pinpon
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Did Donald Trump make campaign contributions to Attorneys General who then decided not to prosecute him?
According to this Medium article and this Vox article Donald Trump made campaign contributions to two attorneys general who then suddenly decided to stop investigating his "Trump University" for fraud.
Is this true?
Paul Johnson
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84
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Are these 'French children held at gun point'?
I've come across this post on facebook several times now. The video shows a group of young people kneeling on the ground with police around them. The text attached is as follows:
School children in France held at gun-point for peacefully protesting…
Lio Elbammalf
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84
votes
3 answers
Did NOAA publish a fake map with temperature data it doesn't have?
At the Deplorable Climate Science Blog, he claims that this map was published:
When this is the reality
The map above (the first map) is fake. NOAA has almost no temperature data from Africa, and none from central Africa. They simply made up the…
user37696
84
votes
1 answer
Does this video show a water droplet in gravitational orbit?
Andrew Rader, an author and engineeer, tweeted a GIF video showing a droplet of water rotating around some sort of probe.
Everything has gravity - here's a droplet of water orbiting a needle in 0G.
No source is provided. The scale is unclear. The…
Oddthinking
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84
votes
2 answers
Do rusty nail wounds cause tetanus?
My Mother and aunties always asked with alarm how I got even a minor scratch when I was young. If an injury was caused by anything rusty, I was to be transported immediately to the doctor for a "tetanus shot" so I would not get "lockjaw". Do…
Logic Knight
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84
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2 answers
Did Colorado replace any 420 mile markers with a 419.99 mile marker to deter theft?
This claim has been circulating on Facebook:
Although marijuana is now legal in Colorado, I don't see any particular attraction to mile markers from this state, as US mile markers are pretty standard--at least along interstate highways (where this…
Flimzy
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83
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Did Sasha Johnson state “the white man will not be our equal but our slave"?
As the news of Black Lives Matter activist Sasha Johnson being shot became public in May 2021, social media contained images which allegedly show a tweet posted by her stating:
the white man will not be our equal but our slave
However, searching…
vsz
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83
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5 answers
Has the US COVID-19 lockdown resulted in more years of life lost than COVID-19 itself?
Published in The Hill on May 25, 2020, an opinion piece by Scott W. Atlas, John R. Birge, Ralph L. Keeney, and Alexander Lipton claims that as of the time of writing, in the United States, COVID-19 was responsible for 800,000 lost years of life, but…
Charlie Crown
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83
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3 answers
Were illegally immigrating children held in cages during the Obama administration?
Were children separated from their parents when they were caught on the Mexican border by US officials as illegal immigrants before Trump's introduction of zero tolerance immigration policy?
I wasn't able to find other source of that information…
Probably
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Did Steve Mnuchin's OneWest Bank foreclose on a 90-year-old woman's house after a 27-cent payment error?
Politico reports:
Two years ago, OneWest filed foreclosure papers on the Lakeland, Florida, home of Ossie Lofton, who had taken a reverse mortgage, a loan that supplies cash to elderly homeowners and doesn’t require monthly payments.
After…
ff524
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Are there vaccine ingredients which may not be disclosed ("hidden", "trade secret", or similar)?
I sometimes encounter people claiming that there are ingredients in vaccines that can be kept secret by the manufacturer. I would be surprised to hear this, because the manufacturers have to conduct studies which show that the vaccine is safe. How…
akraf
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82
votes
1 answer
Are female surgeons less likely to kill you?
A 2017 article in The Times has the following headline:
Female surgeons less likely to kill you, study finds
The article reports:
Patients operated on by a woman are less likely to die within a month than those who have the procedure under a male…
matt_black
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82
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3 answers
Could someone who sent a letter in 19th century London expect a reply within 2 hours?
The official QI Twitter account (@qikipedia) today said the following:
If you sent a letter in 19th century London you could expect a reply within 2 hours
Is there any merit to this claim?
Nzall
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