not as false as you think
Jul. 12th, 2006 09:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
calimacRecently I had an encounter here on LJ with one of those nimnuls who like to profess "little-known facts" that are not, in fact, actually true - this one supposedly that George Washington was not the first President of the United States. Now I find a whole book of them. Contrary To Popular Belief: More Than 250 False Facts Revealed by Joey Green (Broadway Books, 2005) is full of revelations that are actually false, revelations that are only technically true, and so on. Buried in among the dross are a few good ones. Here's a sampling. The boldface statements are what Green is claiming.
George Washington was the ninth president of the United States. False. Prior to the adoption of the Constitution, the Continental Congress's presiding officer was called "President of the United States in Congress Assembled," but that did not make them Presidents of the United States. It was an entirely different office - more akin to Speaker of the House - that happened to have a confusingly similar title. To argue that these presiding officers held the same office as Washington because they had a similar title is like arguing that William Pitt wasn't born in 1759 because he had already been born in 1708.
Maine is not the easternmost state in the United States. False. This false claim is based on the fact that the outer Aleutians extend past 180 degrees. It is, however, false to claim that this line represents the ultimate east or the ultimate west. Were Green not an idiot, he would know that you can keep on going. If Alaska is east of Maine, Washington is east of Alaska ... and Maine is east of that. Even if there were an ultimate East, it would make more sense to consult the International Date Line, which follows the 180-degree line -- except that it bulges and curves around the end of the Aleutians precisely in order to avoid idiotic claims that Amchitka is best described as thousands of miles east of Maine rather than fifty miles west of the next Aleutian.
The seventeenth president of the United States was not Ulysses S. Grant. False. No, the seventeenth president was Andrew Johnson. And if you accept revelation number one, above, the seventeenth president would be William H. Harrison. What they actually mean is that Grant was born Hiram Ulysses Grant. Which he was, but decades before he became president he had legally changed his name. He was Ulysses S. Grant, and the "revelation" is false.
British prisoners did not settle Australia. False. Turns out that what they mean by this mind-boggler is that the British weren't the first people there. There were already Aborigines, you see. Yes, we've heard of them. Nevertheless, British prisoners did settle Australia. They sailed to Australia and they settled there. What else would you call it?
Cleopatra was not Egyptian. False. What is meant by this is that her ancestors had only been living there for 300 years. If that's the criterion, there are a lot of people, especially but not exclusively Americans, who would have to be denied their nationality.
Illinois is west of the Mississippi River. False. Well, if you travel far enough west of the Mississippi, you'll get to Illinois, yes. The statement as given is false. What would be correct would be to say, "A tiny piece of Illinois (the town of Kaskaskia, where the river jumped its course in the mid-19th century) is west of the Mississippi River." The state of Illinois may be correctly stated to be either 1) east of the Mississippi River, with one tiny exception; or 2) spanning the river, and mostly to the east. It is wrong to say that Illinois, period, is west.
The Encyclopaedia Britannica is not British. False. It isn't now, because an American company owns it, but it turns out that Green means that it was founded in Scotland. "The British," he says, "got involved in 1910." Clearly he thinks that the English are the British, and the Scottish are not British. This is totally wrong, as the Scots who founded the Encyclopedia well knew, or they wouldn't have given it that name.
George Washington was not born on February 22, 1732. False. He was born on that day. However, Green is correct to note that at the time, that day was called February 11, 1731, due to the Julian calendar and the custom of celebrating the change of year in March instead of January.
Leonardo da Vinci did not paint the Mona Lisa. False. All that Green means is that Leonardo didn't give that title to the painting. He did, however, paint it.
Adolf Hitler was not a vegetarian. False. He did have occasional lapses. But primary sources are unanimous: by the time he came to power Hitler ate almost exclusively a vegetarian diet. Green's claim is that Hitler wasn't a "real" vegetarian because he was cutting foods out of his diet to try to eliminate his abdominal pain. I hadn't heard that before, but even if true it's irrelevant. Reasons for becoming a vegetarian vary, and whatever your reasons, if you are one then you are one.
"Here Comes the Bride" was not written for weddings. False. It was written for a wedding, the one in Wagner's opera Lohengrin.
Congress did not sign the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. It adopted the Declaration on July 4th. The engraved copy was signed later, mostly because it took time for it to be engraved. Strangely, Green misses the chance to say that the formal resolution of independence had been adopted on July 2nd, which is therefore the actual legal date of independence.
The Battle of Waterloo was not fought at Waterloo. No, it was fought four miles away. Green apparently doesn't know that battles throughout history have been named for nearby towns or natural features. The Battle of Hastings was fought about eight miles from Hastings, for instance.
The Earth is not a sphere. It is, however, closer to a sphere than, say, a dodecahedron. In fact the flattening of the Earth is so slight that, were you to make a perfectly Earth-shaped object that you could hold in your hands, you would not be able to tell by sight alone that it was not a perfect sphere. The minor flattening of the Earth's poles no more disqualifies it from spherehood than does that little 30,000-foot bump between India and Tibet.
Ferdinand Magellan was not the first explorer to sail around the world. No, he died along the way. His expedition, however, did make it.
James Watt did not invent the steam engine. He did, however, invent the first effective steam engine.
Leap year does not occur every four years. True, there are four-year occasions when it does not. They're uncommon, though. Virtually nobody living today has ever experienced, and given normal lifespans very few ever will, an occasion when four years roll by and there isn't a leap year.
The needle of a compass does not point to the North Pole. I don't know whether to classify this as a "no, but it's close enough for most purposes" or a "I didn't think anyone thought it did." It points, of course, to the north magnetic pole, and unless you're in northern Canada that's pretty close to the North Pole.
Delilah did not cut Samson's hair. She had a servant do it.
Dracula was a real person. There was a real person called Dracula, yes, but the name by itself usually refers to the vampire originated by Bram Stoker, of whom only the name was real.
Millions of buffalo never roamed the United States. They weren't buffalo, they were bison. All right, if you can say that, I can declare that a bison is what a Cockney washes his hands in.
Eating carrots does not improve your eyesight. It can, however, prevent certain types of deterioration.
The United States was not the first country to land on the Moon. It was, however, the first country to land a man on the Moon. Yes, that's the distinction Green wants you to miss.
West Virginia is not west of Virginia. Here we go again. Yes, parts of West Virginia are other directions than west of parts of Virginia, but on the whole, it is more west of Virginia than it is east, north, or south of Virginia.
Dorothy does not wear ruby slippers in The Wizard of Oz. Actually she does. Where she does not is in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Baum's book, where they're silver shoes. The Wizard of Oz is the title of the movie.
Moths do not eat clothes. Their caterpillars, however, do.
The Mayflower did not land at Plymouth Rock. It did land at Plymouth, certainly. No writings at the time mention the rock, which is the reason for doubt, but there was a later local tradition, of uncertain veracity, that the ship had used the rock as as a resting place for the gangway.
George Washington did not chop down a cherry tree as a boy. All we actually know is that the story first appeared in print in Weems's biography, and Weems had a penchant for making things up. He probably made it up, but we don't really know.
Adolf Hitler's real last name was not Schicklgruber. Schicklgruber was the name Hitler's father, Alois, was born illegitimately with. Alois was, however, adopted by a man named Hitler (who may have been his genetic father), and had started using that name decades before Adolf was born. It may be fun to mock Adolf by imagining what would have happened had Alois never changed his surname ("Heil Schicklgruber"?), but it's not accurate to say that Schicklgruber was Hitler's "real" name.
The U.S. Constitution does not require that all U.S. presidents be born in the United States. Green describes the exemption clause, which allowed citizens at the time of the Constitution's adoption to be eligible. (So it's not true that Alexander Hamilton, who was born in the West Indies, was not eligible to be president - though that's often cited as the reason he never ran.) Green does not mention the general ruling that persons born of U.S. citizens living out of the country are eligible: thus, John McCain, whose father was serving in the Navy at the Panama Canal (then belonging to the U.S., but not part of it) at the time.
The Pennsylvania Dutch did not originate in Holland. They should more accurately be called the Pennsylvania Deutsch.
Indira Gandhi was not the first woman democratically elected head of state. She wasn't head of state at all. Prime ministers are heads of government, not heads of state. She wasn't the world's first woman prime minister either.
The United States flag has not always had thirteen stripes. At first there were 13 stars and 13 stripes. Then with new states it was increased to 15 of each. After that it was thought best to keep adding stars, but revert to 13 stripes to keep the flag from becoming eye-splitting.
Lenin's first name was not Nikolai. Vladimir Ulyanov's pen-name was "N. Lenin" - the N didn't stand for anything. Why he came to be called Nikolai I have no idea. This has faded out, however, and I now see him referred to as "Vladimir Lenin" or "V.I. Lenin," never as either N. or Nikolai at all.
Not all Catholic priests are celibate. And he doesn't mean just the ones who cheat, either. It's little known, but the Roman Catholic Church accepts converted Anglican priests as priests even if they're married.
Revelations that are actually false
George Washington was the ninth president of the United States. False. Prior to the adoption of the Constitution, the Continental Congress's presiding officer was called "President of the United States in Congress Assembled," but that did not make them Presidents of the United States. It was an entirely different office - more akin to Speaker of the House - that happened to have a confusingly similar title. To argue that these presiding officers held the same office as Washington because they had a similar title is like arguing that William Pitt wasn't born in 1759 because he had already been born in 1708.
Maine is not the easternmost state in the United States. False. This false claim is based on the fact that the outer Aleutians extend past 180 degrees. It is, however, false to claim that this line represents the ultimate east or the ultimate west. Were Green not an idiot, he would know that you can keep on going. If Alaska is east of Maine, Washington is east of Alaska ... and Maine is east of that. Even if there were an ultimate East, it would make more sense to consult the International Date Line, which follows the 180-degree line -- except that it bulges and curves around the end of the Aleutians precisely in order to avoid idiotic claims that Amchitka is best described as thousands of miles east of Maine rather than fifty miles west of the next Aleutian.
The seventeenth president of the United States was not Ulysses S. Grant. False. No, the seventeenth president was Andrew Johnson. And if you accept revelation number one, above, the seventeenth president would be William H. Harrison. What they actually mean is that Grant was born Hiram Ulysses Grant. Which he was, but decades before he became president he had legally changed his name. He was Ulysses S. Grant, and the "revelation" is false.
British prisoners did not settle Australia. False. Turns out that what they mean by this mind-boggler is that the British weren't the first people there. There were already Aborigines, you see. Yes, we've heard of them. Nevertheless, British prisoners did settle Australia. They sailed to Australia and they settled there. What else would you call it?
Cleopatra was not Egyptian. False. What is meant by this is that her ancestors had only been living there for 300 years. If that's the criterion, there are a lot of people, especially but not exclusively Americans, who would have to be denied their nationality.
Illinois is west of the Mississippi River. False. Well, if you travel far enough west of the Mississippi, you'll get to Illinois, yes. The statement as given is false. What would be correct would be to say, "A tiny piece of Illinois (the town of Kaskaskia, where the river jumped its course in the mid-19th century) is west of the Mississippi River." The state of Illinois may be correctly stated to be either 1) east of the Mississippi River, with one tiny exception; or 2) spanning the river, and mostly to the east. It is wrong to say that Illinois, period, is west.
The Encyclopaedia Britannica is not British. False. It isn't now, because an American company owns it, but it turns out that Green means that it was founded in Scotland. "The British," he says, "got involved in 1910." Clearly he thinks that the English are the British, and the Scottish are not British. This is totally wrong, as the Scots who founded the Encyclopedia well knew, or they wouldn't have given it that name.
George Washington was not born on February 22, 1732. False. He was born on that day. However, Green is correct to note that at the time, that day was called February 11, 1731, due to the Julian calendar and the custom of celebrating the change of year in March instead of January.
Leonardo da Vinci did not paint the Mona Lisa. False. All that Green means is that Leonardo didn't give that title to the painting. He did, however, paint it.
Adolf Hitler was not a vegetarian. False. He did have occasional lapses. But primary sources are unanimous: by the time he came to power Hitler ate almost exclusively a vegetarian diet. Green's claim is that Hitler wasn't a "real" vegetarian because he was cutting foods out of his diet to try to eliminate his abdominal pain. I hadn't heard that before, but even if true it's irrelevant. Reasons for becoming a vegetarian vary, and whatever your reasons, if you are one then you are one.
"Here Comes the Bride" was not written for weddings. False. It was written for a wedding, the one in Wagner's opera Lohengrin.
Revelations that, while technically true, are more picky or misleading than informative
Congress did not sign the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. It adopted the Declaration on July 4th. The engraved copy was signed later, mostly because it took time for it to be engraved. Strangely, Green misses the chance to say that the formal resolution of independence had been adopted on July 2nd, which is therefore the actual legal date of independence.
The Battle of Waterloo was not fought at Waterloo. No, it was fought four miles away. Green apparently doesn't know that battles throughout history have been named for nearby towns or natural features. The Battle of Hastings was fought about eight miles from Hastings, for instance.
The Earth is not a sphere. It is, however, closer to a sphere than, say, a dodecahedron. In fact the flattening of the Earth is so slight that, were you to make a perfectly Earth-shaped object that you could hold in your hands, you would not be able to tell by sight alone that it was not a perfect sphere. The minor flattening of the Earth's poles no more disqualifies it from spherehood than does that little 30,000-foot bump between India and Tibet.
Ferdinand Magellan was not the first explorer to sail around the world. No, he died along the way. His expedition, however, did make it.
James Watt did not invent the steam engine. He did, however, invent the first effective steam engine.
Leap year does not occur every four years. True, there are four-year occasions when it does not. They're uncommon, though. Virtually nobody living today has ever experienced, and given normal lifespans very few ever will, an occasion when four years roll by and there isn't a leap year.
The needle of a compass does not point to the North Pole. I don't know whether to classify this as a "no, but it's close enough for most purposes" or a "I didn't think anyone thought it did." It points, of course, to the north magnetic pole, and unless you're in northern Canada that's pretty close to the North Pole.
Delilah did not cut Samson's hair. She had a servant do it.
Dracula was a real person. There was a real person called Dracula, yes, but the name by itself usually refers to the vampire originated by Bram Stoker, of whom only the name was real.
Millions of buffalo never roamed the United States. They weren't buffalo, they were bison. All right, if you can say that, I can declare that a bison is what a Cockney washes his hands in.
Eating carrots does not improve your eyesight. It can, however, prevent certain types of deterioration.
The United States was not the first country to land on the Moon. It was, however, the first country to land a man on the Moon. Yes, that's the distinction Green wants you to miss.
West Virginia is not west of Virginia. Here we go again. Yes, parts of West Virginia are other directions than west of parts of Virginia, but on the whole, it is more west of Virginia than it is east, north, or south of Virginia.
Dorothy does not wear ruby slippers in The Wizard of Oz. Actually she does. Where she does not is in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Baum's book, where they're silver shoes. The Wizard of Oz is the title of the movie.
Moths do not eat clothes. Their caterpillars, however, do.
Revelations that might or might not be true, but we don't know
The Mayflower did not land at Plymouth Rock. It did land at Plymouth, certainly. No writings at the time mention the rock, which is the reason for doubt, but there was a later local tradition, of uncertain veracity, that the ship had used the rock as as a resting place for the gangway.
George Washington did not chop down a cherry tree as a boy. All we actually know is that the story first appeared in print in Weems's biography, and Weems had a penchant for making things up. He probably made it up, but we don't really know.
Revelations that I knew, but might be useful for others
Adolf Hitler's real last name was not Schicklgruber. Schicklgruber was the name Hitler's father, Alois, was born illegitimately with. Alois was, however, adopted by a man named Hitler (who may have been his genetic father), and had started using that name decades before Adolf was born. It may be fun to mock Adolf by imagining what would have happened had Alois never changed his surname ("Heil Schicklgruber"?), but it's not accurate to say that Schicklgruber was Hitler's "real" name.
The U.S. Constitution does not require that all U.S. presidents be born in the United States. Green describes the exemption clause, which allowed citizens at the time of the Constitution's adoption to be eligible. (So it's not true that Alexander Hamilton, who was born in the West Indies, was not eligible to be president - though that's often cited as the reason he never ran.) Green does not mention the general ruling that persons born of U.S. citizens living out of the country are eligible: thus, John McCain, whose father was serving in the Navy at the Panama Canal (then belonging to the U.S., but not part of it) at the time.
The Pennsylvania Dutch did not originate in Holland. They should more accurately be called the Pennsylvania Deutsch.
Indira Gandhi was not the first woman democratically elected head of state. She wasn't head of state at all. Prime ministers are heads of government, not heads of state. She wasn't the world's first woman prime minister either.
The United States flag has not always had thirteen stripes. At first there were 13 stars and 13 stripes. Then with new states it was increased to 15 of each. After that it was thought best to keep adding stars, but revert to 13 stripes to keep the flag from becoming eye-splitting.
Lenin's first name was not Nikolai. Vladimir Ulyanov's pen-name was "N. Lenin" - the N didn't stand for anything. Why he came to be called Nikolai I have no idea. This has faded out, however, and I now see him referred to as "Vladimir Lenin" or "V.I. Lenin," never as either N. or Nikolai at all.
Not all Catholic priests are celibate. And he doesn't mean just the ones who cheat, either. It's little known, but the Roman Catholic Church accepts converted Anglican priests as priests even if they're married.
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no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 04:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 06:04 am (UTC)As I recall, Barry Goldwater was born in the Territory of Arizona, before it was admitted as a state, but he was still eligible to be president had he received a majority of votes of the electors.
It's little known, but the Roman Catholic Church accepts converted Anglican priests as priests even if they're married.
I was under the impression that they had to be widowers to be allowed to become Catholic priests. Is this incorrect?
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 06:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 11:11 am (UTC)It is incorrect.
As for Barry Goldwater, there are several instances of potential Presidents having been born in non-state US territories; this has never been much of an issue. More controversially, Michigan governor George Romney, who ran for the Republican nomination in 1968, was born in Mexico of American parents; there was a fair amount of back-and-forth about this in the news, but the consensus of Constitutional experts was that he was eligible for the office.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 12:15 pm (UTC)I find that the word "deacon" always summons up in my mind the late actor Richard Deacon.
PNH's discussion of Goldwater and Romney matches my understanding of the matter.
More
Date: 2006-07-13 05:58 pm (UTC)If you've never been to an Eastern Rites Catholic mass I highly recommend it. The one I went to in Florida years also was wonderful - the entire Mass is sung! Loved it.
Re: More
Date: 2006-07-13 07:39 pm (UTC)Re: More
Date: 2006-07-14 02:08 am (UTC)There's no doctrinal (if that's the right word? I could say canonical but I don't want to get into a discussion of religious mathematics) requirement that priests be celibate or unmarried; it's a policy that the RCC implemented about 1100 AD as a control measure. It could change any time a Pope decided it was time to change it.
Re: More
Date: 2006-07-14 02:12 am (UTC)No, there's no immutable reason why priests can't marry -- nor why women can't be priests.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 12:18 pm (UTC)I'd better clarify this: not all Anglicans, just Anglican priests. "Once they become priests" = once they become Catholic priests.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 02:17 pm (UTC)My own pet peeve is people who make such pronouncements regarding grammar and other language issues, usually because their fifth-grade teacher said so. (Theodore Bernstein, of course, wrote a whole book about that: Miss Thistlebottom's Hobgoblins.)
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 02:41 pm (UTC)(The only part of this that'll be on the test is the line, "Stranger than fiction, because we make them up.")
I still smile when I think of a scene in Not Brand Echh at the home of the guy who was going to become the Simple Surfer, which included a book called Little-Known Facts for Smart Alecks. I used to buy those books.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 07:41 pm (UTC)Ah, yasss, Borrin Cad and his beloved Shallo Gal. I'm glad someone else remembers NBE! I haven't seen a copy in years (though I still have a full set of The Inferior 5).
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 03:33 pm (UTC)By rite, I mean that they don't follow the Roman liturgy but they are considered just as Catholic as the Pope. There are several different rites in the Middle East. Those of us who follow the Roman rite are Roman Catholics.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-13 09:15 pm (UTC)at the time, that day was called February 11, 1731
To be technical, it was called February 11, 1731/32. Yes, they actually used that weird split designation for years back then, in speaking of dates between January 1 and March 25.
Leap year does not occur every four years. True, there are four-year occasions when it does not. They're uncommon, though. Virtually nobody living today has ever experienced, and given normal lifespans very few ever will, an occasion when four years roll by and there isn't a leap year.
Um, no. Given normal lifespans a considerable number of people will experience one. Not us, but at least half of people with normal lifespans, I would estimate. It's every four years, except leap years which end in 00. Which means 2000 would not ordinarily have been a leap year, except that there's an exception to the exception for the "00" years evenly divisible by 400, which means that those ones are leap years. So 2100, 2200 and 2300 will not be leap years. Wikipedia has a good article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leap_year) about this.
Congress did not sign the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. It adopted the Declaration on July 4th. The engraved copy was signed later
First of all, the signed copy was not engraved. Nor was it printed. They had a good-looking copy for signatures calligraphed by a professional secretary. And it was not entirely signed later. President of Congress John Hancock and Secretary Charles Thomson did in fact sign it on July 4th. The rest of the signatures were added on a sort of ad hoc basis throughout the rest of the summer.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-14 04:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-14 05:26 am (UTC)Actually, most people back then seem to have used the double year, in the hundreds of references I've seen as an historian; a considerable number of modern references, especially genealogical, "corrected" it in modern reprinting for modern understandability. Which I can certainly understand. I've seen many people correct the "11 days" thing for modern celebratory purposes, but never seen anyone correct the double-date thing to create a double date.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-14 12:34 pm (UTC)I've never seen anyone correct a transcribed original document to create a double-date, but I have seen histories in which the quoted documents didn't use the double-date but the historian, for purposes of clarity, did. I think that was more for 17th century material and earlier, though. I get the impression that contemporary usage of the double-date became more common as time went on. Actually, though, in a lot of modern writing on late 16th and early 17th century events, let alone pre-1582, it's not at all clear to me whether years are being given in March 25 or Jan. 1 style, let alone whether dates are being given in Julian or Gregorian.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-14 03:39 pm (UTC)I strongly suspect that the double dates came in during the 17th century when navigation and commerce increased the importance of accurately coordinating the calendar used by the Anglo-American world with that used by the rest of Europe.