The other day I had to explain to a colleague that doves are not female pigeons. She also thought mice were baby rats.

The other day I had to explain to a colleague that doves are not female pigeons. She also thought mice were baby rats.

What's the dumbest idea about natural history that you've personally encountered? (Excluding creationism).

  1. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    I thought that muskoxen were a type of cow, but they are more related to sheep.

  2. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    I had a teacher who taught the whole class that mammoths were ten times larger than elephants. I don't know where she got it from, but probably from cool looking drawings or her own imagination.

  3. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    My mom has the bizarre notion that succeeding generations of plants will produce weaker and weaker seeds, until she has to buy new ones from the store. I asked her how she thinks plants reproduce in nature forever, and she says plants in the wild are different.

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      It's not the right logic but it's sort of true in many cases, the soil loses nutrients over time and the plants and vegetables do get worse/less nutritious

      I had a teacher who taught the whole class that mammoths were ten times larger than elephants. I don't know where she got it from, but probably from cool looking drawings or her own imagination.

      kek reminds me of this
      https://www.youtube.com/shorts/_DZKwCVKneg

  4. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    When I was in middle school there was a movie coming out with a sloth in it and my teacher was talking to me about "the movie with the monkey coming out". I had to find pictures of sloths to show my teacher what they were.

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      I thought sloths were monkeys until a few years ago.

  5. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    >"just buy a new one"

  6. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    I can not believe how many fucking people still believe the "snakes will size you up to see if they can eat you" urban myth.

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      Especially the amount of people who claim it’s happened to someone they know
      >hmmm yes constrictors are well known for their ability to do math

  7. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    For me, it's the complete human inability to distinguish any yellow wildcat species that has black markings. I go to zoos fairly regularly, it's more rare for me to overhear someone correctly identifying a cheetah/leopard than it is for them to mix the two up. Even heard an adult ask "is that a baby cheetah?" while looking at a serval.

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      I get the average person not knowing jaguars vs leopards but cheetahs are pretty distinct so I'm surprised when people mix them up

  8. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    My mom still thinks bugs aren't animals even after telling her multiple times they are

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      They are insects

      • 9 months ago
        Anonymous

        insects are bugs but bugs are not insects

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          You know most people are not being specific when they say bug

          • 9 months ago
            Anonymous

            ??? thats what I said isn't it?
            snails, roly polies, centipedes, millipedes, spiders, etc
            they are all bugs but not insects

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          ??? thats what I said isn't it?
          snails, roly polies, centipedes, millipedes, spiders, etc
          they are all bugs but not insects

          Hemipterans are true bugs, the rest are not. It’d be more correct to say all bugs are insects but not all insects are bugs

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          You know most people are not being specific when they say bug

          ??? thats what I said isn't it?
          snails, roly polies, centipedes, millipedes, spiders, etc
          they are all bugs but not insects

          [...]
          Hemipterans are true bugs, the rest are not. It’d be more correct to say all bugs are insects but not all insects are bugs

          what about superbugs, are they bugs?

          • 9 months ago
            Anonymous

            No, they’re supers

  9. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    That all humans are classified as the same species/sub species and that people believe we somehow aren't affected by evolution and population genetics.

  10. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    people thinking goats are male sheep

  11. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    My mom once said ''isn't it weird how animals, like for example a giraffe and a bat, look completely different from one another whereas humans look pretty similar''
    She did instantly recognize her mistake and doesn't want to reminded of it.
    Also recently she thought monkeys (including apes) were a single species

  12. 9 months ago
    Anonymous
  13. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    That only female cows have udders, which reminds me of the Barnyard
    >The reason all the male cows were designed like this in the franchise is because Steve Oedekerk figured that city folk thought that all cows would look like this.
    Kek

  14. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    I've had to explain to people multiple times that you can touch non parrot birds in places besides the head and that it won't make them horny. Theres over 10,000 species of birds out there, they don't all work or respond to stimuli like parrots do

  15. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    Porcupines being the same as hedgehogs
    Pangolins being the same as armadillos

  16. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    My aunt thinks bears and pigs are the same species because female bears are called sows. My whole immediate family stared at her dumbfounded for a few seconds when she dropped that little bomb.

    Another relative on that same side of the family was horrified when she learned ham is pig meat, and refused to believe it when we told her. She was (and is) an elementary school teacher.

  17. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    >Ostriches burrow their head in the ground
    >Mixing up ducks, geese and swans for the millionth time
    >Lions and Tigers live together in the wild
    >Mixing up leopards, jaguars and cheetahs for the millionth time
    >Snakes are satanic and should be killed on sight cuz muh bible
    >Dolphins and whales are fish
    >Bats are flying mice (I know that's their name in German, but still)
    >Humans aren't animals (in the literal sense)
    I don't expect the average person to be an animal expert, but come on

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      >Mixing up leopards, jaguars and cheetahs for the millionth time
      Literally meeeee

  18. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    I have only recently learned that porcupines are rodents. I thought they were their own thing.

  19. 9 months ago
    Anonymous

    One of my friend's step-dad might be the most retarded person I have ever seen on this subject. Birds, reptiles, fish and bugs aren't animals and mammoths are dinosaurs with T-Rex being a synonym for them.

  20. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    My teacher told me reptiles weren't animals "they're reptiles."
    American education. It was this that led me to realize 99% of ~~*school*~~ is horseshit and ultimately it's just an asylum for children and not intended to actually educate children in any way.

  21. 10 months ago
    Anonymous
  22. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    >spiders are insects
    >leeches are fish
    >it’s okay to kill iguanas because they eat people
    >x% of the ocean is unexplored, therefore megalodon is still alive
    >koko actually knew sign language

  23. 10 months ago
    Anonymous
  24. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    I have met a concerning number of people who think ferrets are rodents

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Well they are basically just long rats.
      VOOT VOOT VOOT

      • 10 months ago
        Anonymous

        They look nothing like rats.

  25. 10 months ago
    Anonymous
  26. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    I've had people be real cunts when I told them that killer whales aren't whales and that crane flies aren't lethally venomous insects whose fangs are too small to pierce skin (actual myth)
    With the crane fly one I could tell by the silent glare on the guy's face after we went to google that he was just going to keep repeating it in future anyway. At least most of you fags aren't dealing with willful ignorance

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      >killer whales aren't whales
      They are, you dumb fuck.

      • 10 months ago
        Anonymous

        They're porpoises, technically they're dolphins, the largest species of them.

        • 10 months ago
          Anonymous

          Dolphins are also whales, genius.

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          You’re right that orcas are dolphins, but they’re not porpoises. Also both porpoises and dolphins are toothed whales, hence orcas are whales

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      I just don’t worry myself about what others think anymore. Better to assume someone is an idiot about zoology and be pleasantly surprised if they say something intelligent.

      I know what you mean, because people are only thinking about baleen whales, but orcas are still toothed whales.

  27. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    My only 2 examples are meeting several people who thought you could tell a male or female cow apart by their horns (having horns means it's a bull).
    I also sent a picture of a cock pheasant to a friend and he thought it was female based on the size alone.

    Small examples but I couldnt imagine not knowing either

  28. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    After getting chickens and telling people about my adventures, I learned that a lot of people don't know a cock/rooster is a male chicken and that hens are female chickens. The follow up question usually then "well, what's a chicken, then?" The idea that animals have a general and gender-specific names is a foreign concept to many people.

  29. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    I unironically thought jackalopes were real until I was a college student.
    Not my proudest moment.

  30. 10 months ago
    Anonymous
  31. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    Pigeons are not real. They are government surveillance drones

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Then how come they were around before the 20th century?

      • 10 months ago
        Anonymous

        Time travel

  32. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    Sorry if im inviting pol but i still dont understand the thought process behind the cardboard
    Pussied out of damaging the lawn or something?

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      I'm guessing because they were too lazy to till the lawn and just thought the cardboard would eventually decompose after a few months. I'm not sure how long they thought their retarded commune would last.

      • 10 months ago
        Anonymous

        they're unable to plan 1 second ahead

        Multiple reasons. Cardboard starves the grass of light and kills it. This is an alternate to tilling the ground and destroying the bacterial and fungal communities that already exist. The cardboard will break down if covered with soil as seen in pic and worms will hang around it as it stays damp so worms help make the soil better. It's not a foolproof system, but it's a good use to reuse something that would just go into a landfill.

        Ah.
        Makes sense.

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      they're unable to plan 1 second ahead

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Multiple reasons. Cardboard starves the grass of light and kills it. This is an alternate to tilling the ground and destroying the bacterial and fungal communities that already exist. The cardboard will break down if covered with soil as seen in pic and worms will hang around it as it stays damp so worms help make the soil better. It's not a foolproof system, but it's a good use to reuse something that would just go into a landfill.

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      Well, you'd usually mount the soil thicker than that too
      WHY IS THERE SO LITTLE SOIL ON TOP OF IT?
      WHY ARE THEY ARRANGED LIKE THAT?

      • 9 months ago
        Anonymous

        It's a black owned garden

      • 9 months ago
        Anonymous

        You're talking about people far removed from their food production who, in their ignorance and hubris, likely thought they knew better than those redneck, hick farmers and could do just as good as them(in reality far better than them considering how little acreage they had to work with) after seeing some guerilla gardening course/video somewhere.

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          Farming is a dead stupid job that is mostly automated these days. There's a reason 4H clubs are mostly girls and slow kids. I'm not sure where you annoying homosexuals get this idea that running a farm requires genius level mind games and the raw grit of Daniel Boone but I suspect it's because you don't leave the house much. People tend to romanticize things they know nothing about.

  33. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    >China thinks dogs are foods
    >India thinks cows are gods
    >/k/ thinks deer are fleshlights
    >/vp/ thinks owls aren't birds

  34. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    I had to explain to a girl raised on a farm that chickens do not have buttholes.

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Why is it that some male birds have willies aand others don't?

  35. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    Someone I knew in university thought the yellow-flowered dandelions and the puffy white ones were different kinds of plant.

    That's the only one I can remember right now, but I feel like I must've encountered more

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Oh right. On university campus, group of students were passing by trying to figure out what the difference between astronomy and astrology once. I heard one guy say, "Astrology is, like, asteroids?"

      • 10 months ago
        Anonymous

        And here am I being embarrassed that I confused astrology with astronomy when I was 10 because every other "real" area of study is named with the -logy suffix.

  36. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    my adult sister wasn't 100% sure if elephants laid eggs or not.

  37. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    My mother keeps saying that ducks are not birds.

  38. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    I used to think cats were female dogs

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      No you didn't.

  39. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    Had to clarify to friend once that cows arent female buffalo.

  40. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    Fish aren't animals.

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      They're animals but they're not meat. Chicken isn't meat either.

      • 10 months ago
        Anonymous

        Clearly they're plants

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      what kingdom do they belong in? Are fish plants?

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      And also insects

  41. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    >Wait, snakes have a spine?!
    Some girl I overheard in class back during high school upon learning that snakes are, in fact, reptilians.

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      I've known two people who thought snakes were basically big worms.

  42. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    Some muslim guys were trying to figure out if it’s halal to eat crabs because they can’t eat amphibians, and crabs live in “both land and water”.

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      I mean, that's a valid discussion depending on the definition of "amphibian" used.

      • 10 months ago
        Anonymous

        Considering they're following rules made before biological classifications, the question was likely not biological in nature. It's more of a "what did Allah mean by this"

        No, amphibians are members of the class Amphibia, there's no room for discussion.
        An animal can't be called an amphibian just because is amphibious, it's like saying that all flying animals are birds.

        • 10 months ago
          Anonymous

          According to The Pope beavers are fish.

        • 10 months ago
          Anonymous

          But that's true, bats are a kind of bird. You're classifying shit according to common descent, they're classifying shit according to how you hunt and eat them, and neither way is wrong. Yes, one is better when you're trying to understand the world around you, but the other is better when you're hungry.

          You can't just take a word and claim ownership of it like that. Crabs are amphibian.

          • 10 months ago
            Anonymous

            >You can't just take a word and claim ownership of it like that. Crabs are amphibian.
            kek good one

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          >Noooooo, thats not an amphibian vehicle because it didn't evolve from frogs

          • 9 months ago
            Anonymous

            >Claaarrksoooon!

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          Some muslim guys were trying to figure out if it’s halal to eat crabs because they can’t eat amphibians, and crabs live in “both land and water”.

          Imagine being this confidently retarded. Amphibian can refer to the taxonomic class, or anything which is amphibious

          • 9 months ago
            Anonymous

            Yeah, like some cars are amphibious right? Crazy how far science has come.

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Considering they're following rules made before biological classifications, the question was likely not biological in nature. It's more of a "what did Allah mean by this"

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      [...]
      No, amphibians are members of the class Amphibia, there's no room for discussion.
      An animal can't be called an amphibian just because is amphibious, it's like saying that all flying animals are birds.

      Amphibian is an adjective for something that can live both on land and in water. It predates the taxonomical term used to classify frogs, salamanders and caecelians.
      So when the Quran or whatever said that it's halal to eat "amphibious" animals, it means to not eat animals that are semi-aquatic basically, and not exclusively the amphibians (as in the frogs and the rest). So they shouldn't eat crabs

      • 9 months ago
        Anonymous

        What about land crabs?

        • 9 months ago
          Anonymous

          As far as I'm aware, all crabs start life in water, so they're amphibious

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      In their defense, catholics had a similar issue when they traveled to SA and categorized capybaras as sea food so it wouldn't be wrong to eat them during certain times of the year. It's because they had no idea of what a capybara actually looked like so they just rolled with how they were described through letters.

  43. 10 months ago
    Anonymous
    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Thank you for your service.

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      rly meks u think

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      Reminds me of this.

      • 9 months ago
        Anonymous

        Someone thought otherwise?

    • 9 months ago
      Anonymous

      The other marine is really dumb (if the story is true), but you must be some special kind of human trash to post stuff like this.

  44. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    I had to explain to a biology student that sea anemones don't have a brain. This is not the most stupid thing I had to explain, it just baffles me that I had to explain to someone studying biology in the university level.

  45. 10 months ago
    Anonymous

    pigeons are doves doe

    • 10 months ago
      Anonymous

      Doves aren't does doe.

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