It is interesting. Large selection of questions and answers: p. 2

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To help the erudite. Database on the history, geography, biology, science, technology, sport, culture, traditions of the peoples of the world. According to the materials of the press and the Internet.

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Hair is a dervate of the skin and consists of a follicle root placed in the dermis (skin) at an angle to its surface, and a shaft emerging through the hair funnel. Of the vertebrates, only mammals have hair. (chat.ru/~troffer/mainpage.html)

Even ancient Greek and Roman writers and historians reported numerous fatal mushroom poisonings. The Roman emperor Claudius, who did not get along with his wife Agrippina and, unlike her, did not know how to recognize edible pains from pale grebes, was far from the only titled victim of mushrooms. It was their fault that the French king Charles VI, Pope Clement VII and many others died.

Lead was used as a bonding material in the construction of Osaka Castle (1583-1587). Although, when laying walls from huge blocks of stone, the mortar was of little practical importance, because the stones, well-hewn, held on to themselves due to their enormous weight, nevertheless, for greater strength, the gaps between the stones were filled three times with liquid lead. (japantoday.ru/encyclopaedia/)

In 1999, China's population increased by 10,99 million, and more than 5 million government officials lost their jobs.

On August 12, 1915, the English pilot K. Edmonds for the first time destroyed an enemy ship with a torpedo from an aircraft. The torpedo was dropped from a Short-184 seaplane at a distance of 300 m from the target. It happened in the Dardanelles. (Bruce J., British airplanes 1914-1918. London, 1957)

In the UK, a project has been approved to turn several merchant and military ships into floating camps for refugees from other countries. (Observer, 1.03.2000)

The painting of the Sistine Madonna was painted by Raphael in 1516 for the Benedictine monastery of San Sisto in Piacenza, and is now in Dresden.

The Babylonians carried their sick out to the square, and the whole people was a doctor, every passer-by, who, out of compassion and courtesy, inquired about their condition and gave them, according to his experience, this or that useful advice. (Montaigne, Experiments)

The words "if there is no God, then everything is permitted" belong to the hero of the novel The Brothers Karamazov, Ivan Karamazov, and not to Dostoevsky himself, who was a resolute opponent of ethical relativism and nihilism, subjecting them to sharp criticism from the standpoint of a religious worldview. (A. Yakovlev, Twilight of the Gods)

Until the 1920th century, free-range chicken farms were the only source of domestic egg production. But in 1980, cage keeping of chickens began to be used in the USA, and this trend then moved to Europe. (Eggs & Cheese, Amsterdam, XNUMX)

Noodles are called noodles in English, nouilles in French, and Nudeln in German. All these words come from the Latin word nodellus (knot), because on a plate, noodles usually look like a tangled ball of thread. (Grains, Pasta & Pulses, Amsterdam, 1980)

If in the preparation of an alcoholic drink, not spring, but distilled water is used, as in the Swedish Absolute, then this product is not vodka for two reasons. The first is that the spring water of Russian rivers has a unique taste. Distilled water is dead - tasteless. The second reason is that VODKA, both the product itself and the name of the product - VODKA, belongs to Russia by birthright and production technology, and Sweden has no right to call its spirit drink VODKA. (Sergienko N., Russian vodka, M., Krugozor, 1997)

If all table salt were isolated from the water of the World Ocean, then it could cover the surface of Europe with a layer 5 km thick. (Material of the 8th grade textbook in chemistry)

The original meaning of the term chemistry has not yet been elucidated. Some scientists believe that this term is borrowed from Ancient Egypt, where khem or khame meant black, black soil. Therefore, there is reason to believe that chemistry is the art of Ancient Egypt. Later, Arab scientists called this science alchemy. (Material of the 8th grade textbook in chemistry)

The record holder among the dead in terms of movements is, perhaps, the conqueror of Mexico, the Spanish conquistador Cortes. The location of the ashes of Cortes changed 6 times. (Lavrin A., Chronicles of Charon)

The usual speed of the AN-2 aircraft when landing paratroopers is 140 km / h.

There is an equilibrium speed of a body falling in the atmosphere - this is the speed at which the force of gravity becomes equal to the force of air resistance. Once this speed is reached, free fall acceleration is no longer in effect. A person reaches this speed after 12-14 seconds of free fall. Depending on the position in which the person falls, this speed is 45-60 m/s.

At parachute jumping competitions for accuracy of landing, zero is considered the best result - a circle whose diameter is less than the diameter of a person's heel. In this case, the jump itself is made from a height of 1000-1400 meters.

In the World Ocean, 1 ton of water contains approximately 7 mg. gold. This means that the total mass of expensive metal in the ocean water is 10 billion tons. (Material of the 8th grade textbook in chemistry)

Most of the fresh water (85%) is located at the Earth's poles in the form of glaciers. (Baklan. 8th grade textbook material in chemistry)

About 1 tons are spent on growing 1500 ton of wheat. water, and for 1 ton of cotton - 10 tons. water. (Baklan. 000th grade textbook material in chemistry)

Every second on the Sun, 4 million tons of hydrogen are converted into helium. (Baklan. 8th grade textbook material in chemistry)

The speed of water movement through pipes is measured in meters per second. Usually this speed is 0,6 - 2,5 m/s. (Skywalker, M. M. Sapozhnikov, Fundamentals of Plumbing, Lenizdat, 1963)

The Internet is a set of public information and telecommunication networks, the interaction between which is ensured by the use of an internetwork protocol of the same name. (Draft Federal Law On the State Policy of the Russian Federation on the Development and Use of the Internet)

In the middle of the XNUMXth century, Pope Pius V issued an edict banning bullfighting on pain of excommunication. But the Spanish king Philip II, although he was known for his harsh attitude to all sorts of spectacles, managed to get the papal curia to cancel the edict. He believed that it was this spectacle that tempered courage - one of the main features of a real Spaniard. (corrida.hobby.ru/history.html)

In different countries, the sword takes on a wide variety of forms, both blade and hilt: Italian swords are distinguished by their great length, flexibility and developed guard; the Spanish bretta resembles a rapier and has a deep cup; German swords are shorter, but their blade is wider (chat.ru/ ~teningv/)

Pompey divided the entire Mediterranean Sea into 30 districts, allocating to each district the required number of ships and troops. within 60 days, Pompey and his assistants managed to catch all the pirate ships.

The obsolete name for the Nenets among Russians is Samoyeds and Yuraks. The first name was common in the European and Ob North, the second - in the Yenisei. Until the XNUMXth century the first name sounded like samoyed, samoyed also extended to the Enets and Nganasans. (nsu.ru/icen/grants/etno/)

The height of St. Isaac's Cathedral is 101,5 m. On the porticos and around the drum of the dome, 72 columns made of granite monoliths weighing from 64 to 114 tons are installed. For the first time in construction practice, columns of this size rose to a height of more than 40 m.

In honor of the cruiser Novik (built in 1902), the village of Novikovo, Cape Novik, Mount Novik and the Novikovka River are named on Sakhalin. The name Novik was given to an island in the Severnaya Zemlya archipelago; the island of Menz-Sari in the Vyborg Bay, on which the old cemetery of sailors is still preserved, has now been renamed Novik. The Palace of Culture in Vyborg became the owner of the painting by the artist V. S. Pakhomov Cruiser Novik in Port Arthur. (battleships.spb.ru/novik/index.html)

In mechanics, the ability to rotate around or move along some axis is called the degree of freedom. In conventional mechanisms, parts have one degree of freedom, and in complex ones (planetary gearboxes, for example) - up to three. And the tip of the index finger of a person has 21 degrees of freedom relative to the shoulder. (METEOR, from lectures on Applied Mechanics)

The cruiser Aurora has been visited by 1956 million people since 27.

Following Canada and Australia, New Zealand abolished knighthood and ladies (with the right to use the titles Sir and Dame). Prime Minister Helen Clark personally came up with this initiative, and the British Queen Elizabeth II, nominally head of New Zealand, was forced to agree.

Quentin Tarantino was born on March 27, 1963 in Knoxville, Tennessee. His mother, Connie Intercede, was only sixteen when she became pregnant. A gifted student, she left school at fifteen and married only to become an independent woman. (Jeff Dawson, Tarantino)

Monkir and Nekir - judges of the dead - prepare sinners for eternal torment. If the dead man answers the questions of the judges unconvincingly, they cut him with a scythe and beat him with a red-hot mace. (Piskunov A., Melee weapons in hunting and combat)

Chinese writing has about 50 thousand characters, but 4-7 thousand are used in the modern language (Soviet Encyclopedic Dictionary, p. 583)

Aureolus-Philip-Theophrastus-Bombast von Hohenheim-Paracelsus was born in 1493 in a small village near Zurich. In 1541, Paracelsus was invited to Salzburg by the bishop there, but in the same year he was treacherously killed at the intrigues of hostile doctors. (A. Lehmann, History of superstition and magic)

The preparation of beer is described in detail on cuneiform tablets, which are more than 5 thousand years old. The Sumerians even had a saying: Not to know beer is not to know joy. (V. Dougan, Book about beer)

Glassmaking has been around for centuries. In ancient Egypt, it arose in 3000 BC. A glass cylinder was found in Tel Asmar near Baghdad, which was made in the middle of the 3rd millennium BC. In Russia, the first glass factory began producing glass in 1635.

The largest of all Cullinan diamonds found was found on January 25, 1905 in South Africa. Its weight is 3106 carats (621 g). It got its name in honor of Sir Thomas Cullian, who discovered the deposit. Presented to the English King Edward VII in 1907.

The Diamond Fund of Russia holds one of the largest and most beautiful cut diamonds in the world - Orlov 189, 62 carats (37,92 g). It was found in India in the XNUMXth century.

Rodrigo de Forez is the first European who started smoking (drinking tobacco) in 1492.

Over the past 600 million years, there have been approximately 2000 asteroid collisions with the Earth. (Guinness Book of Records)

In 1999, the kilogram turned 110 years old. Since 1889, at the International Bureau of Weights and Measures in Paris, at a depth of nine meters underground, the kilogram standard, a cylinder made of platinum-iridium alloy, with a height and diameter of 39 millimeters, has been kept.

Cardiovascular disease is extremely rare in horses. The English veterinarian S. Littlejohn explains it this way: Horses do not smoke, do not drink, follow a strictly vegetarian diet and do a lot of exercise. (New scientist, 1986)

The first important event for Helsingfors took place in 1812, when the Russian Emperor Alexander I approved it as the capital of the newly formed Grand Duchy of Finland.

The first insurances were introduced in Iceland in 1151 against plague and fire.

Opel Astra Coupe was recognized as the most beautiful car in the world at the exhibition Design in Motion 2000, which ended in Milan.

Mohandas Gandhi was nicknamed Mahatma, which means Great Soul.

American biologist David Rash managed to develop tomatoes that taste salty.

For humans, the lower lethal body temperature is 24-25 degrees. C, and the upper 43-44 degrees. C. There are cases of human survival even after reaching the indicated temperatures.

For the first time, time control when playing chess was carried out in 1853 with the help of an hourglass in a London match between D. Harvits and I. Leventhal. The move was given 10 minutes, and if the time was overdue, then a fine was imposed.

Vanadium got its name in honor of the Old Norse goddess of beauty Vanadis.

The longest river in Russia is the Ob (with the Irtysh) with a length of 5410 km.

On one side of the two-dollar bill is a portrait of T. Jefferson, and on the other a reproduction of the painting The Proclamation of Independence (1776)

In 1920, Karel Capek created the play RUR - Russum's Universal Robots. The word robot for this play was coined by the writer's brother, artist Josef Capek. (E. Vartanyan, Journey into the word)

Beaumarchais is the pseudonym of Pierre-Augustin Caron, taken by him from the name of his wife's small estate, the forest of Marchais (bois Marcher).

The first police in Russia was established in St. Petersburg on May 27, 1718. Its first head was Adjutant General A.M. Devier, former orderly of Peter I.

Molière died in 1673 playing a role in his comedy The Imaginary Sick.

French artist Paul Gauguin spent his childhood in Peru with relatives.

The first science fiction film Journey to the Moon was made by the French director J. Méliès in 1902.

The Huguenots once took a huge cannon with them on a campaign, which they called the Queen Mother. Catherine de Medici asked why the cannon was named after her, and one of the courtiers, without hesitation, answered her publicly: Because, madam, it has the largest caliber compared to others. And Catherine was the first to laugh at this unequivocal witticism.

Two special servants had to appear every morning in velvet camisoles with swords in a sling to the chambers in Versailles in order to empty the night dishes and take them out; each such position brought 20000 livres a year.

In contemporary Thailand, there is still evidence of close ties with Russia. These are, first of all, the Thai national anthem, written by the Russian composer Pyotr Shchurovsky in 1888, and the dress uniform of the Thai royal guard, which was based on Russian uniforms that Rama V liked during a visit to Bangkok by a group of Russian guards in 1902. (siamdata.webjungle.org/english/history.html)

Clove spice - blanched in boiling water and then sun-dried unopened flower buds of the evergreen tree Caryophylius aromaticus. The birthplace of the clove tree is the Moluccas (Indonesia).

At the end of the evening prayer on the ships of the Russian Imperial Navy, the officer on duty commanded to cover himself, which meant putting on headgear, and at the same time, the prayer end signal was given. Such a prayer usually lasted 15 minutes. (Docenko V., Sea Temples of Russia)

The first performance of G. Verdi's opera La Traviata ended in failure.

The colophon is an afterword on the last page of the book.

The name of the Hekla volcano comes from the Icelandic - cap, hood - because of the fog that envelops the peak.

Nefertiti's husband's name was Amenhotep IV (Akhenaton).

The first album of the Rolling Stones released in 1964 in England was called The Rolling Stones.

One of the old meanings of the word test is the probationary oath, the English religious oath that every person entering into a position of responsibility must take to prove that he is not a secret Catholic. (Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary, St. Petersburg, 1877)

The total weight of bacteria living in the human body is two kilograms. (Syans ev, February 2000)

There are cases when lizards did not completely drop their tail, and a new one began to grow from the place of the break, while the old one was preserved. This is how two- and even three-tailed lizards appear.

Sherlock Holmes' brother's name was Mycroft.

In the fight of sumo wrestlers, the winner is the one who makes the opponent touch the floor with any part of the body - knee, hand, head, or forces him to leave the ring. (A. Dolin, Kempo - a tradition of martial arts)

The Vulgata is the name of the Catholic Latin Bible, the text of which was recognized by the Council of Trent (1546) as the only correct Latin translation and is considered equal in inspiration and authority to the original.

Halloween is celebrated in Britain, Scotland and Wales. In Scotland it is called Samhay.

Borussia is the Latin name for Prussia.

The English passed on to the Scots the ability to cook ale, bacon, roast beef, drink tea in large quantities, which can be said to have saved the Scots as a nation from Scotch whiskey. (A. Milskaya, English cuisine)

The surname of the protagonist of the film Afonya is Borshchev.

The Anglo-Saxons invaded in the XNUMXth century. to the British Isles, were barbarians, while the Britons had already adopted Christianity.

Bordeaux - during the Hundred Years War belonged to the British and supplied London with its wine.

During the years 1348-1349, when the plague first hit England, more than half of the country's population died from the Black Death. The previous figure of 4 million people was reached only under Elizabeth. The plague raged intermittently in England until the beginning of the XNUMXth century.

Until 1829, theft was punishable in England by death.

According to the Catholic monastic charter, the monastery consisted of twelve monks, according to the number of apostles, with the thirteenth monk (prior) at the head, and a larger monastery was made up of a number of cloisters.

Placebo - means toady; from lat. placebo - I will please you.

Hermes Trismegistus is the mythical initiator of alchemy. Alchemy was named after him as the hermetic art.

The Arctic Ocean annually loses 37000 sq. km. ice, which exceeds the area of Wales. (Harper's Magazine, New York)

The house where Bill Gates and his wife Melinda live has 24 bathrooms and only 7 others. The house is surrounded by a fiberglass cable with a total length of 84 km. (Poine, Paris)

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New record for quantum superposition 10.01.2016

A team of researchers from Stanford University (USA), led by Mark Kasevich, set a new record for quantum superposition at the macroscopic level - 54 centimeters.

In the experiment, physicists created a Bose-Einstein condensate cloud of 10 rubidium atoms inside a special supercooled chamber (billionths of a degree above absolute zero), all atoms were in the same initial state. Next, with the help of lasers, the researchers raised this cloud to a height of 000 meters, which forced the atoms to go into another state. When the cloud reached the top of the chamber, it "split" into two separate streams flying through the vacuum chamber along different trajectories.

By observing which paths the falling atoms left behind on the detectors, the scientists were able to prove that at the time of the measurement, the atoms were in a superposition of two positions 54 cm apart from each other.

Physicists say they have created the largest "Schrödinger's cat" to date: this famous thought experiment just introduced the term superposition, that is, the properties of particles to be in two positions at the same time.

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