Answers to Questions Kids Ask! - Where "Why?" Turns to "Wow!"
Born on this day
September 19, 20111931 - Brook Benton
1934 - Brian Epstein
1928 - Pete Murray
1933 - David McCallum
1940 - Zandra Rhodes
1940 - Bill Medley
1945 - Kate Adie
1946 - Michael Elphick
1948 - Jeremy Irons
1949 - Twiggy
1963 - David Seaman
No, that’s just an urban myth.
A common misconception in popular culture is that the water in toilets or bathtubs drains in one direction in the Northern Hemisphere, and then drains the other direction in the Southern Hemisphere. They say it is the consequence of the Coriolis effect. For the earth the Coriolis effect would cause “moving objects on the surface of the Earth to appear to veer to the right in the northern hemisphere, and to the left in the southern.” This idea has been incorrectly perpetuated by several television programs, including an episode of The X-Files and one episode of The Simpsons. There have also been several science broadcasts and publications (including at least one college-level physics book) have made this incorrect statement, but it’s just not true.
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Why don’t you feel upside down in the southern hemisphere?
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Why was the Eiffel Tower built?
The Eiffel Tower was made for the Universal Exposition of 1889, which was a huge international fair that was intended to show off France’s achievements to the world. There were…
How many oceans are there in the world?
The planet is approximately 71% water and although the oceans of the earth are all connected (you can sail in a boat in every known “ocean” and “sea”) and truly…
What does “FTP” stand for?
In computer science, FTP stands for “File Transfer Protocol,” which is a way of transferring files between computers. A file can be anything — a spreadsheet, a word document, a…
What is Depletion of the Ozone layer?
The oxygen molecules in the air that we breathe are made up of two oxygen atoms bound together. But up in our stratosphere, there are molecules of ozone, which are…