Archive for April 20th, 2011

April 20, 2011

Factoids (and using R as a simple calculator)

Wikipedia defines factoid as “a questionable or spurious—unverified, incorrect, or fabricated—statement presented as a fact, but with no veracity.”

Last night I was enjoying a TV documentary series, The Story of Science, when I heard a startling factoid, namely:

If the “empty space” inside the atoms that make up people were removed, the entire human population would fit inside a sugar cube.

What the? Can we improve the veracity of this factoid?

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