CULTURAL QA 01-2024-14A All the BELOW QA are from Quora digest to me on 14-01-2024.
Quora answers need not be 100%correct answers .Compiled and posted byR. Gopala krishnan, on 14-01-2024 Q1 Do youknow a joke about Jerusalem? A1 Andras Lu,Sep 9 In Jerusalem, a female journalist heard about a very oldJewish man who had been going to the Western Wall to pray, twice a day, every day,for a long, long time. So she went to check it out. She went to theWestern Wall and there he was! She watched him pray and after about 45 minutes, when heturned to leave, she approached him for an interview. “Sir, how long haveyou been coming to the Wall and praying?” “Since 1967, for about55 years.” “55 years! That’s amazing! What do you pray for?” “I pray for peace. I prayfor all the hatred to stop and I pray for all our children to grow up in safetyand friendship.” “How do you feel after doing this for more than 50 years?” “Like I’m talking to a wall!” Q2 What isthe funniest joke you've been told that you still think about to this day? A2 KevinKillian Cureton,21h A man goes on vacation and asks his brother to look in ontheir mother and his cat. After a few days he calls his brother to get areport. “How are things?” he asks. “The cat died,” his brotheranswers. “That’s not how yougive someone bad news!” he says. “How should I tellyou?” his brother asks. “You could say the cat went outon the roof. You crawled out after it, but it jumped to a tree. Youcalled the fire department, and they brought a hook and ladder and went upafter the cat. But the cat jumped and fell to the ground. You took the cat to the vet, andthey did everything they could, but the cat died. That’s how you givesomeone bad news.” “I’ll keep that in mind,” hisbrother said. “So how’s Mom?” the man asks. “She’s on the roof.” Q3 Who isthe most badass scientist that has ever lived? A3 GaryMeaney, passionate fan of all things animal4y In my opinion, AlfredRussell Wallace would be up there. Born in 1823, in Wales,this Englishman is one of the most famous naturalists in history. He co-inventedthe idea of natural selection along with Darwin, and discovered thebiogeographical border now known as the Wallace Line. A whole region of Indonesia,Wallacea, is named after him. In 1848, he decided to embark on an expedition to thethen-mysterious Amazon rainforest, with nobody else except for his friend HenryWalter Bates, later discoverer of Batesian mimicry. This was extremely daring, and yet Wallacesurvived a full four years collecting specimens in the Amazon - Bates spent afurther seven before returning to England. During the last year of his trip, Alfred’s brother Edwardjoined the two friends in the Amazon. Tragically, they both caught yellow fever- Edward died, but Wallacerecovered and soldiered on. On the voyage home, in 1852, Wallace was aboard the brigHelen. After 26 days at sea, the ship caught fire, and sank. Not only was thisa terrifying near-death experience for him, but the vast majority of his mostinteresting and valuable specimens were lost. In a letter to his friend, Richard Spruce, he describespoignantly the losses: My collectionshowever were in the hold and were irrevocably lost. And now I begin to think,that almost all the reward of my four years of privation and danger were lost. What I had hitherto sent home hadlittle more than paid my expenses and what I had in the “Helen” I calculatedwould realise near £500 [nearly $40,000]. But even all this might have gonewith little regret had not far the richest part of my own private collectiongone also. All my private collection of insects and birds since I left Pará waswith me, and contained hundreds of new and beautiful species which would haverendered (I had fondly hoped) my cabinet, as far regards American species, oneof the finest in Europe. You’d think that such a catastrophe, the ruin of one’sentire life work, would be pretty demotivating for a man. Not so for Wallace; in that same letter,written just two months after the shipwreck, he considers going to the Andesnext, or the Philippines. Eventually, he settledon Indonesia and the surrounding regions - one of the least-explored places in the world atthe time. During this expedition, which started in 1854, Wallace was incrediblyprolific, collecting: 110,000 insects 7,500 shells 8,050 bird skins 410 mammals and reptiles Not only this, but he is credited with the discovery of over5,000 species!! That’s got to be a world record. In any case, the conditions onthe trip were, as you’d imagine, far from luxurious. Most of the time, Wallace slept in tiny woodenhuts, and ate what the natives did - including fruit bat. One time, he and several local friends had to altercate witha huge python which entered Wallace’s hut. It was allegedly over 4 metres in length,and he described it as being “well capable of swallowing a dog or a child.”This plate shows the python being unceremoniously extracted from the roof ofthe hut. The python’s skin ispreserved today in a museum owned by the Linnean Society. The skins collected by Wallace andhis loyal sidekick Ali (who later voluntarily adopted the surname Wallace) wereunder constant threat of loss. Many rotted, and on some islands they wereplagued by ravenous stray dogs in the night who stole their specimens. Small animals were a big problem too. In 1858, four years into his trip,Wallace fell terribly ill with an attack of malarial fever. The illnesswas severely debilitating and he was confined to lie in his hut on a remoteIndonesian isle for some time. And, believe it or not, it was during this time - of alltimes - that Wallace conceived the theory of evolution by natural selection,completely independent of Darwin! He wrote about it to CharlesDarwin, who - unbeknownst to Wallace - had long been developing the samehypothesis in secret, for fear of ridicule. The twonaturalists corresponded for years, and later became friends, or at least penpals.Eventually, after a staggering 8 years in what was then a godforsaken,unexplored corner of the world, Alfred Russell Wallace decided to return toEngland in 1862, having become a rich man from selling his prized specimens. Seven years after coming home, Wallace wrote hisworld-famous book, perhaps the greatest of all the great Victorian travelogues- The Malay Archipelago. I myself have read it, and strongly recommend it. The book wasenormously popular when it was published and is one of the only books which hasnever gone out of print, at least for anything like 150 years. Again, his remarkable prolificness is clear - he, up until his death, wrote over 1,000 articles and 22 books; many ofthem defending the theory of natural selection from creationist skeptics. Manyof his books are also still available today. Although he was not quite done travelling throughwildernesses (he later explored the Rocky Mountains in Colorado), Wallace largely settled down after the end of his eight-year adventure.He died in 1913, at the age of 90, of natural causes. I think it’s clear to seethat Alfred Russel Wallace was a man of many virtues - courageous, determined,optimistic, modest and above all very hard-working. His brushes with death inremote jungles make him, for me, one of history’s most badass scientists. Q4 Can youtell Some of the most mind-blowing facts? A4 JaiNarayan,22h HERE I AM SHARING SOME OF THE BEST AND SOUNDS UNREAL FACTS,BUT TRUST ME GUYS IT IS REAL: 1.Banana is one of thethree most consumed fruits in the world. 2. The richest dog in the world is Gunther IV with a networth of more than 370 million dollars. 3. China producesalmost 50% of the world’s apples. 4. The only bird that can fly backward is the hummingbird. 5. The only bone in thehuman body not connected to another is the hyoid, a V-shaped bone located at the baseof the tongue between the mandible and the voice box. Its function is tosupport the language and its muscles. 6. The Hawaiian alphabetcontains only 12 letters: a, e, i, o, u, h, k, l, m, n, p and w. Every word ends in a vowel. 7. Lake Bosomtwe in Ghanawas formed in a hollow made by a meteorite. 8. A massiveunderground river runs underneath the Amazon, with the same length as the riverabove but not thesame quantity. 9. Tourism is the world’s biggest industry, affecting over240 million jobs. 10. The palace of the Sultan of Brunei, the Istana Nurul Imanhas 1788 rooms but is not the largest in the world. That honor goes to theForbidden City in Beijing, China. 11. The world’slargest recorded gathering of people was at a Hindu religious festival. About150 million people attended it.(My note-Kumbhamela might be the destival) 12. Abraham Lincoln wentto school for less than a year. He taught himself to read and write. 13. The longest recorded swim was 5268 kilometers down theAmazon River by a Slovenian, Martin Strel. The swim lasted 66 days. 14. Humans are no match for some animals. The rhinocerosbeetle can carry 850 times its weight on its back. The emperor moth can detectsmells more than 10 kilometers away. 15. Women need an averageof 20 minutes more sleep than men each night, and those who get enough sleepwill feel healthier and live longer than men. 16. On average, menmake at least 12 full-body twists and turns once asleep. They move or twitchmore than 70 times a night. Q5 Whyshould North Indians learn South Indian languages when they are only migratingto South India for only making money? A5 PrasannaBhalerao, M. Sc. in Electronics & Physics, Fergusson College, Pune1h If someone wishes to migrate somewhere, they must learnthe local language. There are no if’s and but’s about it.Period. NorthIndians cannot expect local South Indians to change for them - you made achange in your life - this is another change you must bring into you. Timeduration is not the issue. This applies everywhere andvice-versa also (South to North). An Indian migrating for a job to France or Germany orItaly must learn French, German or Italian. The only exception is if this isfor a very short duration, say up to three months. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Thatha_Patty" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/thatha_patty/1349724647.846594.1705240578834%40mail.yahoo.com.
