35 "Facts" You Learned in School That Are Completely Wrong

Fortune cookies were an American invention, not Chinese. There are debates about who was the originator, however. One well-known version is a Chinese immigrant living in Los Angeles created the cookie, while another claims that a Japanese immigrant started it in San Francisco. Regardless, it was made in California.

The Coriolis effect of direction changing on either side of the equator is indeed a real thing. It's the very reason cyclones spin differently in the northern and southern hemisphere. But it's way too small to be noticed in a sink or toilet.

We've had an interesting relationship with Pluto over the years, from the ninth rock from the sun to not being a part of the solar system altogether. Although the small planet was reclassified in 2006 as a dwarf planet, it's still technically a planet nonetheless.

There are several flaws in this story, one being that Ben's discovery occurred when he was flying a kite with a key tied. The founding father was already interested in electricity before even conducting the famous experiment that many others tried first. Some historians are skeptical as to if the kite thing even happened at all based on his vague reports. But regardless, Ben's hypothesis sparked curiosity (no pun intended) and encouraged others to confirm it themselves.

The North Star, aka Polaris, is actually 46th in brightness. But it is the closest brightest star to the north celestial pole.

It's not the specific color that riles them up, it's the waving object. Bulls will react with the same amount of aggression to a moving flag of any shade.

The "Mozart effect" is not a real thing, nor can any particular genre boost intelligence. A study was conducted to test this theory, which did result in improved spatial tasks when students listened to Mozart. Though it did help them create shapes in their minds, this effect only lasted for about 15 minutes.

This may be the common notion, but there's actually a small amount of gravity everywhere in space. It's what keeps the moon and Earth in orbit, but it's not the reason things float in a spacecraft. Astronauts float because they're in free fall.

Fingernails can only grow if new cells are produced, which is not possible long after death. Once the heart stops beating, nerve cells die within three to seven minutes. A corpse's nails might appear longer because the skin surrounding them shrivels.

The Great of Wall of China is not visible from space and is even more difficult to photograph, at least with the human eye in low Earth orbit. Parts of the man-made structure can be seen with radar imagery taken from space, but generally, the Wall's materials are too similar in color and texture to its surroundings to be distinguished.

We have many, many more. Proprioception (awareness of our bodies in space), hunger and thirst, the need to use the bathroom, and our inner ear's fluid-filled vestibular system (responsible for balance) are just a few other senses we have. There are so many different categories we could explore.

Man's best friend can see the world in more than just black and white. Dogs can actually see in combinations of blue and yellow, which includes a lot of grayish-brown varieties. Their sight can be compared to a human with red-green colorblindness.

The ability for camels to survive for seven days without water isn't due to the fact that they store water in their humps. All their humps are fat, but the fat is what provides them with about three weeks of energy. Camels' kidneys and intestines are really the ones that retain water.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. It may be true that we're only using 10 percent of our brains when we're at rest, but for the most part, the brain is pretty much active at all times and humans use virtually every part of it.

NASA-funded scientists have proved that lightning can strike in two or more places. It's also possible for a flash to strike the same spot more than once.

First of all, spiders have no interest in humans. And second, they'd probably be afraid of snoring, moving, breathing sleepers. It's not to say that swallowing a spider while you sleep is impossible, but that high number is definitely all myth.

Albert Einstein received good grades, but he did not like the learning system. He didn't fail math as many believe, but he did fail the entrance exam to the Zurich Polytechnic his first try. He passed the math portion but failed the language, botany, and zoology sections — all were written in French, which he wasn't fluent in. He also took it at an impressive age of 16, about a year and half away from graduating high school. For someone who began reading college physics books at 11, he probably wasn't the worst student.

It makes sense that Summer occurs when the Earth is closest to the sun and Winter happens when it's furthest away. But it's the Earth's tilt that causes seasons, not its distance. Its tilted axis points in the same direction at all times as it orbits around the sun, and different parts of the planet receive the sun's rays throughout the year.

False. MythBusters put it to the test and fired a gun with a penny inside with the same speed of it dropping to the ground. Though it stung, it didn't cause any injury, proving that it's just not possible for the penny to gain enough velocity to really hurt someone.

Bigger bats can see even better than humans can — three times better, in fact.

Though we share a common ancestor with some primates, we did not magically jump directly from primate to man. Humans, apes, gorillas, and chimps, for example, all branch off to different evolutionary paths.

As most of us know, Rosa Parks was arrested in 1955 for refusing to give up her bus seat for a white passenger. Though it's commonly said that her reason for not getting up was because she was simply tired, her autobiography says otherwise. "People always say that I didn't give up my seat because I was tired," she wrote. "But that isn't true. I was not tired physically. . . . No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in."

Edison shouldn't be the only person who gets credit for the light bulb because several others contributed to its invention before him. He was, however, the one who filed a patent for it.

If you swallow a piece of gum, the longest it'll stay in your digestive system is a week. Nothing will live inside your body for years at length unless the food item was so big (like larger than a quarter) that it becomes trapped in your stomach or intestine. Gum will eventually come out one way or another.

Most of what you've heard about Thanksgiving as a kid was inaccurate, but that's probably because you were also too young to learn the truth about what really went down. As you probably now know, Thanksgiving was more than just an Autumn harvest between the colonists and Wampanoag Indians.

When more settlers arrived in the New World, they brought a plague with them, which wiped out more than half of the native population. This sparked a fight for land and a rough relationship between both parties. Though there was a three-day feast, it's still not clear whether the Wampanoags were invited or if they crashed. There are several versions and theories of the truth about Thanksgiving, but none of them are a nice tale.

Evidence shows that fish are just as smart as birds and mammals. According to studies, they can even remember things for three to five months.

Most dogs do not brush their teeth twice a day or floss, so no, their mouths are not cleaner than ours. You won't find humans eating trash or licking out of toilet bowls, either. It is true, however, that the healthier the dog, the cleaner they are. It's believed that this myth comes from the fact that dogs' wounds heal after they lick them. It's not their mouths are especially clean, it's just a similar practice to us washing a wound to prevent infection.

Contrary to what you were probably taught in elementary school, Christopher Columbus was apparently smarter than what we give him credit for. The Italian explorer knew the world was round even before embarking on his expedition. The fact that the world was a sphere was actually known 1,300 years before Columbus set sail, but it is true that many Europeans did start to believe the flat rumors during the Middle Ages.

You may have heard that Newton discovered the law of gravity one day when he was sitting beneath an apple tree, which is somewhat true. An apple was involved, but the revelation didn't come to him because of one hitting him on the head. He did see one fall from a tree, which made him wonder why apples fall straight to the ground instead of sideways. It's still a cool story, though.

The real reason chameleons change color is to control their body temperature and to express mood. Cool, huh? As you can guess, darker colors absorb more light, so they'll swap to a lighter color to stay cool. In terms of emotion, they'll darken their shade when they're scared and brighten when they're excited.

The famous painter is equally known for his iconic works as the fact that he supposedly cut his own ear off. But historians believe the real story is that van Gogh actually lost his ear in a heated argument with his friend and fellow artist Paul Gauguin. Apparently Gauguin, also a fencer, severed his ear off with his sword and Van Gogh was only trying to protect him.

Although the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam stands by the original story, several books dedicated to the artist's life support this lesser-known theory.

Despite what you see when you look at your forearms, blood is red, period. Your veins may appear blue because of how light reflects and how it's absorbed by your tissue. Your veins pump deoxygenated blood, which absorbs more red light and as a result appears more blue. The deeper the vein, the bluer it looks.

Your parents probably told you to wear a hat so you don't get sick. While it can help keep you warm, your heard doesn't allow for any more heat than any other part of your body does. Any exposed part of the body will release heat equally.

Waking up sleepwalkers won't frighten them into a heart attack or hurt them in any way, but the tip comes from the possibility of him or her attacking you by instinct. They'll most likely be startled and disoriented when they're woken up, so you might want to guide them back to their bed to avoid scaring them. They're also more likely to hurt themselves while unconsciously walking around, making it the better option to wake them up than to leave them alone.

Bye, yellow, you're not a primary color after all. The three "light" colors include red, green, and blue, while the "pigment color primaries" consist of cyan, magenta, and yellow. The first color model is actually off because it was discovered before modern science and isn't representative of the true range of color.