Common knowledge that doesn't make any sense at all
Posted on: December 30, 2012 - 7:00am
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Common knowledge that doesn't make any sense at all
A long time ago I was collecting examples but then lost interest and my examples. I just realized this example.
Everyone has heard of the lion called the king of the jungle. Has anyone ever seen an image, a film clip, anything actually showing a real lion in a real jungle?
It is something everyone says, everyone knows yet has no connection whatsoever with reality.
Is it any wonder that religion that consciously argues in favor of things which have no connection with reality are sucessful?
Jews stole the land. The owners want it back. That is all anyone needs to know about Israel. That is all there is to know about Israel.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_misconceptions
The Asiatic Lion used to be common and live in forested areas. In the mid 1800's they were nearly eradicated by the British and now the entire population lives in a series of conservation areas in the Gir National Forest in India. These forests tend to be dry deciduous forests so they don't really fit the definition of what most people today probably think of as "jungle" which has pretty much been conflated with rainforest. However, "jungle" is a term that used to be used to describe an area of heavy vegitation, roots or brambles that was impossible or extremely difficult for a human to traverse on foot without literally cutting a way through, say with a machete. A definition by which much of rainforests are not jungles, although rainforests will have areas that are a "jungle".
The monsoon forests and mangroves in which these lions lived have many jungles using this definition. It is likely that the phrase "king of the jungle" originated as hunters returned with their trophies and described how they has to go "into the jungle" in order to get the predator.
From my reading of old hunting stories I have seen the bush areas of Africa described as "jungle" although pretty much anyone after Roosevelt has referred to African "jungles" as "bush". I'm not sure exactly when that change took place.
Just a short quote from Teddy Roosevelt's book to illustrate my point.
https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=Q41Oony9asgC&rdid=book-Q41Oony9asgC&rdot=1
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
i think i can corroborate this. an area of kosice (the city in eastern slovakia where i now live) that is full of ravines and was one of the last to be cleared is known in slovak as "dzungla," i.e. jungle.
"I have never felt comfortable around people who talk about their feelings for Jesus, or any other deity for that matter, because they are usually none too bright. . . . Or maybe 'stupid' is a better way of saying it; but I have never seen much point in getting heavy with either stupid people or Jesus freaks, just as long as they don't bother me. In a world as weird and cruel as this one we have made for ourselves, I figure anybody who can find peace and personal happiness without ripping off somebody else deserves to be left alone. They will not inherit the earth, but then neither will I. . . . And I have learned to live, as it were, with the idea that I will never find peace and happiness, either. But as long as I know there's a pretty good chance I can get my hands on either one of them every once in a while, I do the best I can between high spots."
--Hunter S. Thompson