'"ATM machine" is an example of RAS syndrome.'

Coined in 2001 by New Scientist magazine, RAS syndrome is an acronym of sorts for Redundant Acronym Syndrome syndrome, an acronym which, for a variety of reasons, retains that last word of the acronym in common usage.

Other examples include the HIV virus (Human Immunodeficiency Virus virus), PIN number (Personal Information Number number), and of course, RAS syndrome itself.

 'A married man is 4 times more likely to die during sex if his partner isn't his wife.'

A 2004 study by researchers at the Center for Forensic Medicine in Frankfurt, published in Bild der Wissenschaft magazine, found 56 men who suffered fatal heart attacks while having sex. Of those 56:

25% (14) died in arms of spouse or partner;
50% (28) died in arms of a lover or a prostitute;
and the remaining 25% (14) died in the act of masturbation.

Researchers speculated that those who died with lovers or by themselves suffered from the extra strain they put upon themselves in those situations.

'The average yawn lasts about 6 seconds.'

We yawn when tired, nervous, and bored. It might be one way the body regulates temperature, a reaction to carbon dioxide buildup in the blood, a way of stabilizing the pressure on our ear drums, all of these reasons, or none of them.

Meanwhile, cultures throughout history have entertained superstitions about yawning drastic enough to include high-profile concepts such as your soul and the devil.

Nonetheless, the ultimate biological purpose of a yawn continues to elude modern science.

'Coca-Cola used to contain cocaine.'

The name of this great American soft drink makes perfect sense: Its inventor, John Pemberton, had originally created a cocktail called Pemberton's French Wine Coca in 1885. This was a version of "cocawine," which was little more than wine and cocaine. When authorities in Georgia introduced prohibition laws in 1886, Pemberton removed the wine from the cocktail, kept the cocaine (using South American coca leaves, from which cocaine is derived) and added African kola nuts (which have a high caffeine content) for flavor. However, he removed the blow in 1903.

'Most dust particles in your house come from dead skin.'

On average, a typical home collects about 6mg of dust per day, or about 2.2 grams (.08 oz) per year. Along with human biological cast-offs like dead skin cells and hair, dust also features pollen grains and fungi like mold and lichens.

In a single sample of dust, you can also find wood and paint particles, paper fibers, fabric fibers from nylon to rayon, plant and vegetable matter, dead dust mites and various insect body parts, and microscopic samples from the whole range of pollutants, from cigarette smoke to car smog to hydrocarbon waste from oil and gas heaters.

'Thigh bones are stronger than concrete.'

The femur bone is the longest, strongest, and heaviest bone in our skeletal system and is charged with providing strength and support to the entire body.

Femurs don’t fracture easily, and when they do, it is often as a result of high-energy trauma. People under age 25 and older than 65 suffer femoral fractures with three times the frequency of the rest of the population.
 

'50 Cent has become the first recording artist since The Beatles to hold 4 positions in the U.S. Top 10 at the same time. '

Quite a remarkable feat for a kid born with the cards seemingly stacked against him.

By the age of 11, Curtis James Jackson III, aka 50 Cent (or "Fiddy" ) had lost his mother to murder and was dealing coke and crack on the streets of Queens, NY. Arrested for dealing in the mid-'90s, he was sent to a type of prison boot camp, where he decided to make a change in his life: He started rapping.

'We are about one centimeter taller in the morning than we are in the evening.'

The moral: Never allow your height to be measured at night.

The vertebrae in your spine are separated by spongy intervertebral discs made of layers upon layers of fibrocartilage on the outside and a jelly-like substance on the inside. While you're lying down or asleep, these discs will expand slightly, amounting in total to about a centimeter or more by the time you get up.

During the day, you lose that centimeter when activity and gravity combine to compress the spine.

'Contrary to popular belief, hair does not grow back darker and thicker after it has been shaved.'

This myth is a matter of perception. Your hair is thicker near the scalp and it tapers into a finer shaft the longer it gets. A tree offers the most visible analogy: at the trunk, branches are thick, and as they stretch away from the trunk, they get progressively thin and weaker.

If you cut the branch near the trunk, the remaining stump will seem especially strong, but nothing fundamental about it has changed. The same holds true for human hair.

Common sense alone can debunk this myth. Many people shave some body part every day. If hair grew back according to the myth, it would get progressively thicker and thicker.

'The moon is actually moving away from Earth at a rate of 1.5 inches per year.'

Put more accurately, every year the moon's orbit around the Earth expands by about 1.5 inches (3.8 cm).

The moon's gravitational pull on the Earth is evident in bodies of water, where it leads to tides. These are called tidal bulges, and they actually cause the Earth's rotation to slow down, a phenomenon known as tidal friction. But the bulges don't take getting fatter lying down: They exert gravitational force right back on the moon.

Since the Earth's rotation is much faster than the moon's orbit (24 hours vs. 27.3 days) the tidal bulge pulls on the moon, in effect trying to hasten its orbit. In accord with the principle of conservation of energy, the bulge slows the Earth's rotation a little bit and that amount of lost energy is passed from the Earth into the moon's orbit. In consequence, the moon's orbit becomes bigger and the Earth's rotation slows down.

In 100 years, our descendants will have 2 milliseconds more every day to appreciate the fact that the moon is 12.5 feet (3.8 meters) further from the Earth than it was a century prior.