Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

Facts People Were Taught In School That Were Later Disproven

Facts People Were Taught In School That Were Later Disproven
Photo by Firmbee.com

"Reddit user yepvaishz asked: 'What was a fact taught to you in school that ended up being disproven during your lifetime?'"

A malleable fact isn't a fact, it's an opinion.

So it feels like much of early education has been a big bag of opinions heeped onto generations prior.


No wonder those standardized tests were such a mess.

On the flip side of that thought, life, and science evolve, so facts do change.

Once you're out in the real world, so much has to be relearned and disproven.

Who can keep up?

It feels like we should be paid as participants in the school of life.

So let's do some relearning.

Redditor yepvaishz wanted to hear about the times we've learned some new things about some old things, so they asked:

"What was a fact taught to you in school that ended up being disproven during your lifetime?"

The amount of lies we were fed in school is too high to count.

So let's sift through memory lane and make some corrections.

RECOUNT!

My Work Animation GIF by Andi Giphy

"From an educational filmstrip: 'Saturn has four beautiful rings...' The Voyager photos of the thousands of rings had come in like a week before we watched this."

robaato72

Never say Never

" Germany would never reunite. The French would never allow it."

Powerful-Ad9392

"I'm German and I was 11 when it happened. We housed our East German part of the family for a couple of weeks when they came over to visit. My cousin was my age and had never been shopping (just wandering around a mall looking at things) and my uncle begged my dad to take him to a hardware store just to see what stuff was available."

"Just three months before the wall fell, my dad had been over to visit them, just by himself, saying it was too dangerous for us kids (and I imagine it would have been a hassle getting permission for the whole family). It was such a wonderful time. A peaceful revolution without a single gunshot."

"I'll never forget the moment when the people who had fled to the German embassy in Prague got told they were allowed to leave. That collective scream of joy and relief by 4000 people still makes me tear up every time I watch the video. https://youtu.be/Qh9EwNurawE"

best-in-two-galaxies

200 MPH

"Pompeii was buried slowly by falling ash. They pointed out that remnants of people were found, right in the middle of doing things, but didn't realise this contradicted the burying being slow. It's now thought that it was buried very quickly by pyroclastic flows - superheated gas travelling over 200mph."

ablativeyoyo

"It’s also blew my mind to find out the 'bodies' you see at the site were the hollow spaces where a body once was, filled with plaster, and the hardened ash removed. As a kid I never thought about it I just saw shapes of bodies and thought 'that's a body.'"

Zanzoken814

Bye Kraken

"When I was a kid, the Giant Squid had never been captured or photographed, and some people talked about it like it was el chupacabra. My little brother always said he'd be the first person to get footage of one. Sadly, it has since become an ordinary animal that we know exists. RIP the Kraken."

EarthExile

"I’ve seen the preserved corpses at the Smithsonian. It’s pretty fascinating to think no evidence existed until our lifetime."

UnihornWhale

Crack Away

Sonic 2 Punch GIF by Sonic The Hedgehog Giphy

"Cracking your knuckles causes arthritis."

panda388

"They just wanted us to stop."

Admiral_Minell

I've cracked for years and probably will for life.

My fingers are still slender.

Diet Lies

Season 7 Nbc GIF by The Office Giphy

"Food pyramid."

OutrageousEvent

"Of all the facts that have since been disproven, this might be the worst. We have a generation of adults who are getting diabetes and fatty liver disease because of what these people said."

calumin

Bad Illustrations

"Your tongue has different areas for tasting different tastes:sweet on the tip, sour on the sides, bitter in the back, etc. I feel like this was some elaborate prank played on my generation. But I remember seeing this in my elementary school biology textbook. I don’t even think it was disproven, like, they just stopped telling this lie. WTF."

"From what I have read, more like a game of telephone.Study results got slightly distorted, and then changed into a graph which didn’t have meaningful numbers, which lead to an illustration, which got re-purposed. That an illustration got put into textbooks for years and years."

danneedsahobby

Exposure

"Blood is blue until exposed to oxygen."

mwjb86SFW

"This one triggers me. I had an old lady teaching my 6th grade science class that sent me to detention for arguing with her when she said the blood in your veins was blue but red in your arteries. To be fair, I argued with her on a lot of things she was wrong about, but this is the only one that resulted in detention."

"That's the only time I can remember my dad, a chemist, actually go to the school to confront a teacher for being wrong. Incidentally, she also counted off on a test because I said sound was one of the senses. She wanted hearing. I said you sense a taste, you sense a sight, you sense a smell, and you sense a touch, so why don't you sense a sound? That argument lasted several days, but she did give me my points back."

pacer_3iii

The Science of It All

"Neurons can never regenerate. This was from my then-one-year-old anatomy and physiology textbook, and my private, Catholic school actually took - and still takes - its science seriously; we never talked about creationism or the divine influence on our natural world, not to mention our solid AP Physics and AP Chemistry scores. It turns out that that the peripheral neuron system actually can regenerate; as of now, it doesn’t seem that the central nervous system has much in the way of that capability."

Brunt-FCA-285

Jokes on Them

muppets computers GIF Giphy

"Playing with computers is a waste of time and won’t lead to a career. Said to me by a very old, and bitter teacher. 25 years in IT and counting."

zerbey

Who knew computers would take over the world?

They seemed just like big cumbersome machines at first.

Now they build and destroy lives and careers.

More from Trending/best-of-reddit

Marjorie Taylor Greene; Megyn Kelly; Mark Levin
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images; Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for TIME; Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Radio Hall of Fame

MTG Applauds Megyn Kelly For Her Brutal 'Micropenis' Dig Against Fox News Host Mark Levin In Clash Over Iran

Georgia Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene applauded conservative host Megyn Kelly amid her ongoing social media clash with Fox News host Mark Levin over the war in Iran after Kelly made a dig about Levin's "micropenis."

Kelly has broken with the Trump administration over the war in Iran, attracting attention for her open admonishment of key figures like South Carolina Republican Representative Lindsey Graham, whom she referred to as a "homicidal maniac" after reports that Graham helped convince President Donald Trump to authorize the bombing campaign.

Keep Reading Show less
Screenshot of Donald Trump
Fox News

Trump Repeats Debunked Claim He Predicted 9/11 'A Year Before' It Happened In Bizarre Rant During Iran Remarks

President Donald Trump was called out for repeating his debunked claim that he predicted the September 11 terror attacks "a year before" they happened—all while speaking at the White House about his war with Iran.

Trump was addressing growing concerns about tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow passage at the entrance to the Persian Gulf that carries roughly 20% of the world’s oil supply. While the strait falls under international maritime law, Iran maintains substantial influence over the corridor.

Keep Reading Show less
Donald Trump
Alex Wong/Getty Images

MAGA Influencer Says Trump Seems 'Demonically Possessed' In Brutal Post Slamming Iran War

A 2024 study found a stronger belief in the existence of demons and adherence to a "shadow gospel" was associated with more favorable views of MAGA Republican President Donald Trump. The shadow gospel refers to versions of Christianity and conservatism conjured through anti-liberal messages with little to no basis in actual scripture.

Trump traded on the beliefs of Christian nationalist factions among his MAGA minions by calling the Democratic Party "demonic."

Keep Reading Show less
The Underwhelming 'Snack Box' That Was Served At The Oscars Is Getting Dragged Hard
@instyle/TikTok

The Underwhelming 'Snack Box' That Was Served At The Oscars Is Getting Dragged Hard

As much as there was already to talk about the 98th Oscars celebration, one detail from the night has viewers especially intrigued: the snack boxes that were made available to the attendees, hidden under their seats.

The minimal contents were reminiscent of the small servings at the Critics Choice Awards, only including a few simple snacks.

Keep Reading Show less
Unique and unusual LEGO collection in the toy aisle at the Target store in Queens, New York City.
Lindsey Nicholson/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Redditor Opens New Lego Set Only For It To Be Filled With Pasta—And It's A Scam That's More Common Than You Think

A Redditor thought they had scored a brand-new Lego set online, until the box revealed something far stranger than missing pieces.

Early on Tuesday, Redditor u/Bernardowss posted a photo showing labeled Lego bags sitting beside a Star Wars cruiser box filled with raw pasta. In the image, there are five bags of noodles total—and not a single brick in sight.

Keep Reading Show less