Your Favourite Common Misconceptions

[Sorcerer]

Thought I'd make this little just-for-fun thread. We all know that knowledge changes in light of new studies and information over time, but sometimes knowledge remains stuck in the past or becomes misinterpreted over time so that we end up repeating information that is factually incorrect but otherwise common. So with that, let's have a little fun and go over some of our favourite common misconceptions relating to almost anything. I'll start off with a few myself.

• Blood in humans is always red, never blue. While it changes shade based on it's exposure to oxygen, the colour of human blood is mostly determined by iron content. This myth probably stems from how our veins appear blue when light penetrates the skin pigmentation and also how blue might be used on medical diagrams to differentiate between veins and arteries. However, it always remains red regardless of oxygen content.
• The Great Wall of China is not the only man-made structure visible from space or the moon. None of the Apollo astronauts reported seeing any specific human-built monument from the moon, and Earth-orbiting astronauts can only see it through magnification. By contrast city lights on the night-side of the Earth are visible from orbit.
• Bats are not blind. While most bat species use echolocation to navigate, all bat species are capable of sight. In fact some bats cannot echolocate at all but still have excellent night vision.
• Giant Pandas are not evolutionary dead-ends. This one is a personal frustration of mine because I see it in comments on videos of them being silly. The truth is, they were perfectly adapted to eating bamboo in the forests and are no different than most other mammals with their mating windows, and it was only because of human encroachment that they became threatened.

I could list plenty more but I would like to hear some of your favourite common misconceptions, be it railway-related or not. Spread that little bit of extra knowledge most of us don't have!

 

[jfollows]

That it’s is the possesive form, whereas it should be its. Very common here. But I know what the poster means so I don’t personally care too much.

 

[Sun Chariot]

Railway Standard-gauge
A popular myth claims the width was designed specifically to match the wheels of Roman chariots.
The truth is a bit more grounded in the industrial evolution of Northern England.

"What have the Romans ever given us?"​

There is a grain of truth to the Roman story. Ancient Roman roads across Europe were built with ruts carved by heavy carts and chariots. To avoid breaking axles, builders of subsequent horse-drawn wagons throughout the Middle Ages spaced their wheels to fit those pre-existing ruts.
By the time the early coal mines in North-East England were being developed, the local carts (and the wooden tracks they ran on) naturally settled around a width of roughly 5 feet.

Foot feet, eight inches.​

In the late 1700s, wooden rails were replaced with iron. George Stephenson worked on the Killingworth Colliery railway. Its tracks there were spaced 4 feet 8 inches (4' 8") apart.
Stephenson was commissioned to build the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825. He simply stuck with the gauge he knew: 4' 8".

The xxtra half-inch.​

When Stephenson began work on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway (1830), he made a slight technical adjustment. He realized that adding a tiny bit of "play" or clearance between the wheel flanges and the rails reduced friction on curves and prevented the locomotives from binding.
He added half an inch; resulting in 4' 8.5".

 

[styles]

• It's against the law to sell energy drinks to under-18s
• All swans are owned by the King
• It's against the law to drive in flip-flops
• Gavels in court rooms
• If a shop advertises a product at £1 on the shelf they have to sell it for £1
  • If they don't, they have to take it off sale for 24 hours
• Trespassers will be prosecuted (excl. e.g. rail, MOD, SOCA property)
• If you're an Englishman you can shoot a Welshman from the rows in Chester at midnight
• It's lawful for pregnant women to pee into a police officer's helmet
• You're never more than 6' from a rat
• Schools aren't allowed to let pupils play conkers/British bulldog/climb trees
• You can't put plasters on children because of potential allergic reactions
• You should put a wooden spoon into the mouth of somebody having a seizure to stop them biting their tongue
• Can't sell candy floss on sticks
• It's illegal to shake your charity collection bucket

 

[gg1]

• India withdrew from the 1950 football world cup because they weren't allowed to play barefoot - They actually withdrew because the Indian FA couldn't afford the travel costs to Brazil
• It's illegal to drive a car with the interior light on.
• In WW2, Germany built a fake airfied complete with wooden planes, the RAF responded by dropping wooden bombs on it - dummy aircraft intended as bait for enemy bombers were used by both Axis and the Allies, but there is no evidence at all for the wooden bomb side of the story.
• At the time of Columbus, most people thought the world was flat - by that time it was accepted as scientific fact in Europe that the earth was spherical and was common knowledge
• A swan can break your arm with it's wings
• Goldfish have a 3 second memory
• Bats are blind - no bat species is blind, many of them have night/low light vision far superior to humans

 

[pdeaves]

Bats can get tangled up in your hair. I've never understood this; they avoid crashing into other things just fine!

 

[bahnause]

That a genetic mutation is not "good" or "bad" in itself but indifferent. It was only at school that I truly grasped the difference between gene mutations, the raw material of evolution, which are random, and natural selection, the absolutely non-random, deterministic process that shapes them. This discovery greatly simplified my understanding of how all species develop from a single cell. Thanks to Darwin and Richard Dawkins for that.

 

[Ediswan]

Bats can get tangled up in your hair. I've never understood this; they avoid crashing into other things just fine!

I got a facefull of bat when cycling (legally) on a towpath at dusk.

 

[Leyland Bus]

• India withdrew from the 1950 football world cup because they weren't allowed to play barefoot - They actually withdrew because the Indian FA couldn't afford the travel costs to Brazil
• It's illegal to drive a car with the interior light on.
• In WW2, Germany built a fake airfied complete with wooden planes, the RAF responded by dropping wooden bombs on it - dummy aircraft intended as bait for enemy bombers were used by both Axis and the Allies, but there is no evidence at all for the wooden bomb side of the story.
• At the time of Columbus, most people thought the world was flat - by that time it was accepted as scientific fact in Europe that the earth was spherical and was common knowledge
• A swan can break your arm with it's wings
• Goldfish have a 3 second memory
• Bats are blind - no bat species is blind, many of them have night/low light vision far superior to humans

I've always known it as 'A swan can break your arm with its beak' geographical difference or what??

 

[AY1975]

That it’s is the possesive form, whereas it should be its. Very common here. But I know what the poster means so I don’t personally care too much.

And that you should always put an apostrophe before the letter s to make a plural - a very common mistake among children and even quite a lot of adults.

 

[gg1]

I've always known it as 'A swan can break your arm with its beak' geographical difference or what??

Quite possibly, I definitely remember being told the wings could do it when i was a kid.

 

[The exile]

And that you should always put an apostrophe before the letter s to make a plural - a very common mistake among children and even quite a lot of adults.

Which is strange, since that is never the case. (the it’s / its one is understandable since an “apostrophe of possession” is the norm - albeit not with pronouns)

 

[AY1975]

Which is strange, since that is never the case. (the it’s / its one is understandable since an “apostrophe of possession” is the norm - albeit not with pronouns)

Indeed, you don't use an apostrophe with his or hers but you do with one's.

 

[Strat-tastic]

That it’s is the possesive form, whereas it should be its. Very common here. But I know what the poster means so I don’t personally care too much.

Have a word with @gg1 then

 

[stadler]

It is actually perfectly legal for shops to sell individual items out of a multipack even if it says "not to be sold separately" on the packaging. The manufacturers only write that because they do not want them to be broken up and sold separately. But it is perfectly legal for the shop to do so. It seems to be a common misconception that people think it is illegal for shops to do that.

 

[The exile]

Indeed, you don't use an apostrophe with his or hers but you do with one's.

Almost certainly because it’s a relatively recent coinage rather than a good old Anglo-Saxon pronoun!

 

[OuterDistant]

That roads are paid for by drivers paying something called "road tax", or "road fund licence".

 

[The exile]

It is actually perfectly legal for shops to sell individual items out of a multipack even if it says "not to be sold separately" on the packaging. The manufacturers only write that because they do not want them to be broken up and sold separately. But it is perfectly legal for the shop to do so. It seems to be a common misconception that people think it is illegal for shops to do that.

As an aside, I am currently working my way through a lii of as of assorted canned drinks left over after an event. I’ve noticed that none of the ones bought as multipacks has the usual date stamped on the base of the can (or anywhere else) - presumably because it was on the multipack wrapping.

 

[Uncle Buck]

In Scotland many people think that the Jacobites were Scots fighting against the English. In fact most Scots supported the Hanoverian government and indeed the Jacobite claimants were raised in either France or Italy. There were also many English, Welsh and especially Irish Jacobites.

 

[sprunt]

As an aside, I am currently working my way through a lii of as of assorted canned drinks left over after an event. I’ve noticed that none of the ones bought as multipacks has the usual date stamped on the base of the can (or anywhere else) - presumably because it was on the multipack wrapping.

Yeah. It's not illegal by default to sell items from split up multipacks that have "Not to be resold separately" on them, but the manufacturers often label the individual items so that they can't be sold singly - no best before, no nutritional information, no ingredients etc.

 

[Acey]

That people on forums know what they're talking about

 

[Harpo]

It is actually perfectly legal for shops to sell individual items out of a multipack even if it says "not to be sold separately" on the packaging. The manufacturers only write that because they do not want them to be broken up and sold separately. But it is perfectly legal for the shop to do so. It seems to be a common misconception that people think it is illegal for shops to do that.

In most cases it is technically illegal to sell separate items from multipacks because usually all of the legally required information on ingredients, calorific values, product weight/volume, allergy advice and (as noted above) sell by dates etc. only appear on the outer packaging.

 

[bleeder4]

I did a Christmas job once working for a tour company doing admin for their Christmas bookings. Apparently it is relatively common for Londoners to think that the "stand on the right" rule used for escalators at Tube stations is actually the rule for all escalators everywhere else in the country.

 

[styles]

As an aside, I am currently working my way through a lii of as of assorted canned drinks left over after an event. I’ve noticed that none of the ones bought as multipacks has the usual date stamped on the base of the can (or anywhere else) - presumably because it was on the multipack wrapping.

From experience, these do eventually go off.

I had 2 year old Pepsi Max once and it was absolutely rank. Despite it being in a can, it had managed to lose half its colour and become translucent.

 

[AndrewE]

From experience, these do eventually go off.

I had 2 year old Pepsi Max once and it was absolutely rank. Despite it being in a can, it had managed to lose half its colour and become translucent.

I take it that was the drink rather than the can!

 

[styles]

I take it that was the drink rather than the can!

Yes

When I worked in a wholesalers as a teenager though I did come across some faded cans of Strongbow. Can't remember how much by, but they were very out of date. I walked away for 5 minutes, came back, and a forklift driver had slashed the cases. The place absolutely reeked of vinegar for weeks. Before that, at like 16, I assumed alcohol never went off. Turns out, pretty much everything goes off!

 

[pokemonsuper9]

I did a Christmas job once working for a tour company doing admin for their Christmas bookings. Apparently it is relatively common for Londoners to think that the "stand on the right" rule used for escalators at Tube stations is actually the rule for all escalators everywhere else in the country.

Generally I do see (and as a fast walker - appreciate) that rule being followed all over the country.

 

[AlterEgo]

Which is strange, since that is never the case.

Never? Quite possibly the biggest misconception anyone has posted so far. Dot your i's and cross your t's, and mind your p's and q's. 0's and 1's also acceptable. Also perfectly acceptable to use apostrophes to clarify confusing forms like some abbreviations where an additional S would change the meaning of what was being said.

 

[najaB]

It is actually perfectly legal for shops to sell individual items out of a multipack even if it says "not to be sold separately" on the packaging. The manufacturers only write that because they do not want them to be broken up and sold separately. But it is perfectly legal for the shop to do so. It seems to be a common misconception that people think it is illegal for shops to do that.

It may be illegal if the individual items aren't properly labelled though.

(Didn't read all the way through the thread, so apologies to those who already raised the same point!)

 

[The exile]

Yes

When I worked in a wholesalers as a teenager though I did come across some faded cans of Strongbow. Can't remember how much by, but they were very out of date. I walked away for 5 minutes, came back, and a forklift driver had slashed the cases. The place absolutely reeked of vinegar for weeks. Before that, at like 16, I assumed alcohol never went off.

Most teenagers never give it the chance!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Mar 2026 ==

Never? Quite possibly the biggest misconception anyone has posted so far. Dot your i's and cross your t's, and mind your p's and q's. 0's and 1's also acceptable. Also perfectly acceptable to use apostrophes to clarify confusing forms like some abbreviations where an additional S would change the meaning of what was being said.

Ah but it should be “p”s and “q”s… Take your point though, though it’s unlikely that many would draw inferences from niche cases they’d hardly ever see. That said - any teacher will tell you that the one thing all the kids will remember is the thing you tell them wrong.