Questions regarding the structure of an organism or its parts.
Questions tagged [anatomy]
26 questions
136
votes
2 answers
If you shave or wax, will the hair grow back stronger or thicker?
Many people believe that if you shave or - especially - wax your legs, arms, chest, pubic hair or armpits then the hair will grow back stronger, or thicker, or more black, or more rapidly, or any combination of those.
Is it actually true?
smzs
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79
votes
1 answer
Does milk make your bones stronger?
It's a common notion that milk makes bones stronger; milk contains calcium and bones contain calcium. But obviously it's not the case that calcium ingested is immediately deposited into bones. In fact, there seem to be no studies suggesting this at…
Dapianoman
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54
votes
3 answers
Could an adult mind automatically adjust if a person was to wear glasses that inverted/flipped all vision?
It is known that the human eye anatomy makes it so that all images we see with our eyes are flipped upside down.
Without noticing it, at an early age, the brain is adjusted to this. What I mean is that we at an adult stage don't walk around troubled…
AndroidHustle
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48
votes
2 answers
Are people taller in the morning than at night?
I've heard this claim quite a few times and have even repeated it as fact. The basic claim is that 'gravity compresses the spine' during the waking hours and since (most people) sleep at night, they are tallest first thing in the morning.
I can…
Rob P.
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34
votes
2 answers
Length of uncoiled human DNA
I recently came across this fact:
There's enough DNA in the human body to stretch from the sun to Pluto and back.
A couple of "Bollocks!" alarms began to chime in my head. While I expect that it will stretch a long way, Pluto seemed a little…
user7920
31
votes
1 answer
Is the heart symbol based on female anatomy?
I recently read, and read before that the origin of the heart shape is based on the female anatomy. I have tried researching it and every source I find gives differing opinions on the matter.
On a Facebook page I follow they posted this but gave…
Cruril
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27
votes
2 answers
Is any unconscious person capable of full splits?
The following popular article on stretching claims that lack of flexibility is purely neurological (or even psychological) and that [almost] any unconscious person would be very stretchy, e.g. can be put into a full horizontal split:
When…
amoeba
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16
votes
1 answer
Is T. Rex more similar to sparrows than to stegosaurus?
From XKCD:
XKCD comic 1211 claims that the anatomy of sparrows and T. Rex are more similar than those of T. rex and stegosaurus. While it looks like neither T. rex nor sparrows would be any good at boxing (unless they used the Mike Tyson approach),…
Andrew Grimm
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13
votes
1 answer
Does parsley help in cleansing the kidneys?
A quick Google with "Parsley Kidney Cleanse", would return a search results of blogs and personal articles where it claims how regularly drinking refrigerated filtered water boiled with Parsley helps in cleaning Kidney from accumulated Salt.
Some of…
Abhijit
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12
votes
2 answers
Are male and female brains connected in a completely different manner?
I found this claim on Focus, an Italian pop-sci magazine:
Le reti di connessioni cerebrali nel cervello dei maschi (in alto) e in quelle donne (in basso): in blu sono visibili i collegamenti all'interno dello stesso emisfero, in arancione quelli…
Sklivvz
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12
votes
1 answer
Does Guillermo Ochoa have six fingers on his right hand?
http://www.friendsoffulham.com/forum/index.php?topic=8451.0
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/606/A82916067
The claim is that Guillermo Ochoa has six fingers on his right hand. Is this true?
user5582
11
votes
2 answers
Do the ulna and radius in the left arm take up more volume than the ulna and radius in the right arm?
The creative commons licensed 3D anatomy model BodyParts3D lists the volume for various bones.
It lists for the left ulna 81.9 cm3 while it lists 73.3 cm3 for the right ulna. It lists for the left radius 88.0 cm3 while it lists 77.8 cm3 for the…
Christian
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10
votes
1 answer
Do individual heart cells "beat" when isolated?
In his book The Third Ear, author Chris Lonsdale makes the following claim in chapter 14:
Some years ago, scientists did a very interesting experiment. They placed a single, live, heart cell into a Petri dish in a lab. This lonely little cell was…
Flimzy
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9
votes
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Can humans functionally move their eyeballs independently of one another?
Recently I see a lot of links to Ed Macy's book "Apache" (related from Google glass articles' comments).
It took me two years to learn how to "see" properly -- how to see in an Apache World. I once filmed my face during a sortie with a video…
J-unior
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7
votes
3 answers
Does too much sex, or STDs, cause urination after sneezing?
From Billy Baldwin (verified user, 109 RTs, 805 likes, Wikipedia biography), referring to Jenna Jameson, who used to be a porn star:
Curious to know what might've caused that sneeze-pee condition of
yours... anybody care to venture a guess?
You…
Andrew Grimm
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