Cutting-edge technology allows researchers to get creative with their goals. Quirkiness in the name of science is bound to produce something unusual. From octopuses that are plied with Ecstasy and people reading each other’s thoughts to a reality that exists only when looked at, scientists are breaking new ground.

However, as with all experiments, not everything was wholesome. Some results showed disturbing human-robot relationships and worse—the tendency to torture a helpless victim existed even in those who thought they were incapable.

10 Goats Like Happy People

Goats are known for their smarts. In 2018, an experiment with 20 animals revealed another cognitive ability. They can tell people’s facial expressions apart. The plucky creatures were trained to walk over to the far side of the pen, where they received snacks.

During the second phase, two images were tacked to the back. The photos included men and women, none of whom the goats had ever met in real life. One picture always contained a smiling person and the other, a grumpy frown. The animals were shown only male or female faces, and the pictures were moved around to the left and right sides of the enclosure.

Gender appeared to make no difference to the goats, which preferred to sniff at the happy faces. Curiously, they only picked the positive images posted on the right side of the pen.^[1]

This suggested that the left hemisphere of a goat’s brain deals with friendly cues. It remains unclear how goats understand the facial communication of another species, but this test provided the first evidence that they are capable of doing so.

9 The Four-Day Week

Many employees dread their work environment, especially when companies put profits ahead of workers’ needs. In 2018, one New Zealand company made a radical change. For two months, the trusts firm Perpetual Guardian gave its workforce full pay for four-day weeks.

The unique experiment aimed to determine whether reduced office hours had a positive or negative impact on business. Most business owners would view it as risky, but the results were incredible.

The staff’s stress levels dropped from 45 to 38 percent. Even healthier, their work-life balance increased from 54 to 78 percent. The most remarkable finding was that productivity showed a small improvement despite the shorter weeks. Additionally, there was an increase in the commitment and positive relationships among staff. Leadership improved, and people actually enjoyed what they were doing.

The experiment created something that is rarely seen today—a team fiercely loyal to a company that cares for them. Perpetual Guardian now wants to make the four-day week permanent.^[2]

8 Octopuses On Ecstasy

A bizarre-sounding experiment happened in 2018. Researchers gathered two octopuses, two Star Wars action figures, and some Ecstasy (aka MDMA). This drug is known to flood human brains with serotonin and turn them into social cuddle bears.

Octopuses are grouchy loners. When sober, they avoided their own kind and the toys in their tank. When high on Ecstasy, they behaved just like people and got chummy with their fellow octopuses as well as Chewbacca and a stormtrooper.

The lovestruck tentacles revealed something unexpected. The brain of an octopus and that of a human do not even have the same regions. The two groups, vertebrates and invertebrates, separated over 500 million years ago. But surprisingly, a single gene in the genomes of humans and the eight-tentacled wonders matched perfectly.^[3]

SLC6A4 is the genetic binding site of Ecstasy, which is likely why both species develop a rosy, loving outlook on life once drugged with MDMA. Nobody really expected the socially linked genetic and neurological pathways of people to exist in other creatures.

7 Rogue Kidneys

These days, scientists grow organoids—miniature versions of real human organs. In 2018, a laboratory sprouted some mini kidneys from stem cells. After four weeks of nourishing the growths in a chemical soup, they were ready.

This soup was designed to encourage the stem cells to grow only specialized kidney cells. Once the organoids were fully grown, researchers took a peek at what was happening inside them. Then the surprise hit.

For some reason, the tiny kidneys had gone rogue and also produced brain and muscle cells. These cellular oddballs accounted for up to 20 percent of the organoids’ makeup.

As interesting as Frankenstein organs are, it was a setback. Organoids are valuable as tools to study diseases, but if they do not model a real human kidney, any information gleaned would most likely be skewed.

Another unexpected discovery was that the lab-grown kidneys refused to mature, no matter how they were farmed. This was also problematic for disease studies as longer exposure to the soup caused more rogue cells.^[4]

6 Children Believe Misleading Robots

The Asch experiment is a social conformity test disguised as a vision exam. In 2018, researchers put their own spin on it. Around 43 kids, aged seven to nine, were required to find two equally long lines on a screen. The answer was obvious. When alone, the children proved correct 87 percent of the time.^[5]

Then the robots came. Whenever the child was asked to pick lines, a robot would helpfully provide the incorrect answer. Even though the right answer was easy, the kids doubted themselves and looked to the machines for answers. They did this so often that the success rate fell to 75 percent. They just followed the robots’ leads, sometimes word for word.

When 60 adults were tested in the same way, they ignored the robots. The children probably experienced “automation bias,” a powerful belief that machines have greater abilities than they really do. Researchers suspect that the adults, unaffected by the toylike robots, might have folded if they were bigger and more imposing.

5 The Tokyo Explosion

Scientists have been trying to make bigger magnetic fields for decades. Huge ones have been created, but their strength was too much for an indoor setting. However, measuring fields that are created outside fails in the accuracy department.

In 2018, Tokyo physicists built an armored room to contain what they hoped would be the strongest controlled magnetic field created under laboratory conditions. Such fields are graded in teslas. The strongest MRI machine creates three teslas, and the Tokyo team aimed for 700.^[6]

Instead, their electromagnetic device erupted with 1,200 teslas. This unexpected development made it the strongest controlled field, although “controlled” only meant being able to measure its power. The actual event blew apart the laboratory’s armored doors, right after it crumpled the iron box in which it was kept.

Despite the fright and damaged property the team got, the 1,200 teslas was a step toward limitless, clean energy. Nuclear fusion reactors need only a 1,000-tesla magnetic field to change the world’s energy crisis. Scientists now have a strong-enough field. They just need to determine how to stop the explosions.

4 Measurement Creates Reality

In 1978, physicists proposed that reality did not exist until measured. It sounded weird back then, but in 2015, the technology arrived to prove it. Australian scientists tweaked a famous theoretical experiment from the 1970s and showed that the quantum world honored this strange law.

The experiment took a single helium atom and sent it through laser barriers (the points of measurement) to see if it acted like a wave or a particle. Logic dictates that its very nature would be preexisting and that measurement could not make it behave in any other way.^[7]

However, as bizarre as it sounds, the tests showed that the atom could not decide whether it wanted to be a wave or a particle until it encountered the lasers. To start its journey, the helium atom was sent through a pair of beams meant to scatter its path.

At a later point during its travels, random lasers were added to merge the paths again. This second measurement somehow brought into existence the atom’s preference for wave- or particle-like behavior.

3 The Murdered Robot

Once upon a time (2015), there was a robot called hitchBOT. He had one ambition: to travel as far as he could by hitching rides with strangers. For two weeks, the friendly machine enjoyed the charity of drivers and clocked the longest journey ever made by its kind.

After he had traveled over 10,000 kilometers (6,200 mi) in Canada and enjoyed the views of several cities in Germany, hitchBOT wanted to see the whole of the United States of America. Had the electronic wanderer had parents, they would have warned him about the dangers of hitchhiking.

Instead, hitchBOT’s designers created him as an experiment to see how far human kindness would take him and how people interacted with a robot without supervision. Around the beginning of his great American adventure, he set off for San Francisco—and disappeared.^[8]

His decapitated body was found in Philadelphia. It had been thrown into a ditch. Worse, his killer had had fun. The person had also removed hitchBOT’s arms and rearranged them around the robot’s body.

2 BrainNet

In 2018, neuroscientists managed to connect the brains of three people. They could play a Tetris-type game just by sharing thoughts. This “network” was dubbed BrainNet.

The participants did not actually read one another’s thoughts. However, thanks to electroencephalograms (EEGs) and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), they could communicate. Two participants were the “senders” and wore EEG electrodes. A third person had a TMS cap and was the “receiver.”

The senders played each other, but only the third person could move the blocks. When a player wished to rotate a block, he stared at one of two LEDs on the screen. The flashing lights triggered signals in the brain, which got picked up by the EEG and relayed to the TMS cap. The latter’s magnetic field created phantom flashes in the receiver’s mind—a sign to rotate the block.

With a success rate of just over 80 percent, scientists hope to one day create a social network of interfaced brains, possibly over the web.^[9]

1 The Milgram Experiment

Stanley Milgram discovered a disturbing corner of the human mind. During the 1960s, this social psychologist tested how far people would go when ordered by an authority figure to electrocute another person. Most participants obeyed. The Milgram experiment was a turning point in the study of obedience and social psychology.

In 2017, researchers wanted to see if individuals today would shelve empathy for authoritative approval. Most would think themselves incapable of responding to such influence.

A recent Polish study recruited 80 people for a “memory experiment.” Their job was to shock learners who failed to memorize associations. The shocks were never real. The participants did not know this or that the “learners” were actors.

About 10 levers delivered increasingly higher voltage shocks. The participants were told to zap learners who failed to memorize something, and an authority figure encouraged those who became hesitant when the shocks grew more powerful (and they had to listen to screams). Although participants were three times less likely to use stronger shocks on female learners, a disturbing 90 percent went all the way.^[10]

Researchers are inquisitive creatures. They leave no stone unturned. Especially the weird ones. In recent times, studies were sprung on volunteers and the unsuspecting alike.

Tests to determine their neuroticism, honesty, and appreciation of bad jokes were borderline strange. The answers even more so. They also threw the common cold at cancer, considered chocolate’s extinction, and took Godzilla’s growth rate very seriously.

10 Correct Way To Pet A Cat

Some cats are confusing. One second, they love having their heads scratched. The next, they claw irritably at their owners to make them stop. A recent study blamed their ancestry.

Felines have been mewing for a saucer of milk for the past 4,000 years. While cozying up to humans, their genes stayed similar to those of their ancestor the African wildcat. As domesticated as cats are, one foot stays firmly planted in their feral past. This clashes with human nature. People touch their pets to show affection. The African wildcat is solitary and actively avoids its own kind.

The solution?

The cat must be in the driver’s seat. The study found that when kitties initiated bonding, they allowed their owners to bestow physical affection upon them for longer. They also enjoy having their chins, ears, and cheeks scratched, although not as much their backs, stomachs, or tail bases.

The owner must also watch his fuzzball’s body language for negative signs and then back off. In the end, it all comes down to respecting your cat’s wild-at-heart boundaries.^[1]

9 Canned Laughter Helps Bad Comedy

Television critics are not fond of laugh tracks. They view it as a decades-old relic that should have disappeared with the time’s bad actors and mundane story lines. However, viewers still hear laugh tracks as a cue to comedy.

In 2019, a study picked 40 jokes. They were all bad. The researchers wanted to see if canned laughing could improve their fun factor. First, 20 students were tormented with the flat lines without any prerecorded giggles. Predictably, the jokes were given low scores. On a scale of 1 to 7, none rated higher than 3.75.

Eventually, 72 adults rated the jokes without laughter, then with obviously faked laughter, and finally, with spontaneous laughs. Ratings were boosted about 10 percent with forced humor. But the best spike—between 15 and 20 percent—happened when volunteers listened to laughs that communicated real enjoyment.^[2]

The kinder ratings could have been triggered by people’s reactions to what laughter is—a primitive signal critical to human bonding. Inherently, it was more about joining the group than enjoying a bad joke.

8 Tempting People With Wallets

In 2015, a group of behavioral scientists decided to test people’s honesty. More specifically, the better side of civic workers. The scientists went all out. They traveled the world and visited 40 countries, dragging along over 17,000 wallets, a lot of cash, credit cards, and around 400 keys.

Research assistants pretended to be tourists who picked up a wallet. They handed it to staff from 355 cities’ banks, museums, police stations, and other institutions—and requested that the staff member must find the owner.

The study attempted to answer two questions. Do certain countries return more wallets, and does the amount of cash inside influence the decision?

When the outcome was published in 2019, it surprised 300 expert economists who predicted that people would swipe the wallets with more money. However, those entrusted to return the wallets were more likely to do so when they contained larger amounts of currency. The country made no difference when it came to this unexpectedly wholesome behavior.^[3]

7 Phone Movements Reveal Personality

A trusted way to determine someone’s personality is to measure that individual against the Big Five test. Originally from the 1980s, the test relies on five main traits. They include openness (curious vs. cautious), extraversion (outgoing vs. reserved), agreeableness (compassionate vs. detached), conscientiousness (organized vs. easygoing), and neuroticism (confidence vs. nervousness).

Starting in March 2010, scientists followed 52 volunteers for over a year. The group tried a different spin on the Big Five—seeing whether their personalities could be determined by the way they handled their phones.

Each phone was equipped with an accelerometer to track physical movements as well as software that logged the calls and messages. Interestingly, the method matched certain traits captured on a Big Five survey that the participants had completed.

The data was good at predicting extraversion, conscientiousness, and neuroticism. These traits produce more physical activity, which could explain why the phones failed to analyze openness and agreeableness.^[4]

6 Spiders On Drugs

In 1948, spiders annoyed H.M. Peters. The zoologist studied spiderwebs at Germany’s University of Tubingen. The orb-web spiders in his study were early birds. To watch them spin, Peters had to wake up between 2:00 AM and 5:00 AM.

He asked pharmacologist Peter Witt to dose the arachnids with something that would make them spin at later times. To delay their webbing hours, Witt fed sugar water to the spiders. The sweet drink was laced with caffeine, amphetamine, mescaline, strychnine, or LSD.

The drugged spiders happily changed the patterns and sizes of their webs, but they stuck to the ungodly hours of the morning to do so. Peters gave up, but Witt continued his study on spiked spiders.

In 1995, NASA successfully replicated Witt’s work. This time, the spiders produced certain patterns after gorging on caffeine, marijuana, speed, or chloral hydrate.^[5]

The severity of the web’s deformity hinged on how toxic the chemical was. This reaction might change how laboratories test poison. Using spiders instead of complex mammals like mice is a cheaper and more humane alternative.

5 Chocolate Extinction

Chocolate addicts reacted with horror when news outlets claimed that their favorite snack could be extinct by 2050. The reason was that cacao trees, the source of chocolate, continue to face an uphill battle against the usual evils.

Several studies tracked fungal diseases as they destroyed Central America’s cacao trees and suggested that these diseases might spread to the world’s other cacao patches. As a harbinger of epic weather events, climate change can also throttle the plantations.

Worryingly, half of the planet’s chocolate is produced by two African countries. If Ghana and the Ivory Coast experience a climate shift, it could leave the entire industry vulnerable.

Cacao trees are sensitive to temperature changes and love to roost in a rain forest environment. As predicted for 2050, an increase in temperature and dryness could spell trouble for chocolate lovers. Scientists are exploring the avenue of genetically strengthened cacao trees, but then chocolate would no longer be as natural as some might like.^[6]

4 Climate Apartheid

A scary study in 2019 suggested that climate change could divide humanity. This future hypothetical scenario is called “climate apartheid.” The United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC) released a report detailing how the dark side of human nature would rise once nature goes to hell.

The consensus is that climate change would eventually affect every living thing on Earth. A frightening thought considering that the cards predict famine, widespread death, and natural disasters. As conditions worsen, people will be divided between those who can afford to protect themselves and those who cannot.

The HRC report was the concentrated opinion of over 100 studies focused on how climate change threatens the basic necessities for human life. These included housing, food, water, and health.^[7]

The conclusion warned that millions are doomed to die without a radical shift in environmental policies and immediate plans to safeguard the vulnerable. Ironically, these citizens live in the poorest countries which are least responsible for the pollution driving climate change.

3 Anxiety Makes Godzilla Grow

In 2019, scientists pondered Godzilla’s growth rate. The monster has grown considerably from the first movie in the 1950s when it stood 50 meters (164 ft) tall. In the latest 2019 release, it towered 120 meters (393 ft) high. This spurt is 30 times quicker than anything alive on Earth. Had the creature been real, it would have smashed growth and evolutionary records.

The study looked at several possibilities to explain why the creature seemed to grow bigger with every movie. It concluded that Godzilla was a metaphor for people’s existential anxiety. Politics, environmental issues, and personal problems keep stress alive and well.^[8]

Apparently, Godzilla represented major problems that humanity must unite against—like climate change and terrorists. However, Godzilla could just be competing against itself. With moviegoers demanding bigger and better, the classic creature must evolve to please.

2 An Unknown Shape

Epithelial cells form our skin, line organs, and help embryos develop their myriad structures. As important as these cells are, scientists could never pin down their shape. For lack of a better understanding, they were assumed to resemble tubelike prisms, or a frustum—a kind of bottle-shaped pyramid.

In 2018, scientists decided to conduct a study to see which one it was. They turned to computers to unravel the shape of epithelial cells. The result was weird. Not only was it neither suspect, but the shape was unknown to mathematics and science.

Bizarrely, it resembled a Y-shaped prism. The top of one branch had five surfaces, and the other had six. The new geometric shape was named the scutoid. The data suggested that the peculiar form helped epithelial cells to bend with curving tissue.^[9]

The discovery has wider applications than merely adding a new shape to science. Understanding how scutoids construct tissues could refine the production of artificial organs for transplant patients.

1 The Common Cold Beat Cancer

The idea to attack cancer cells with a virus is almost a century old. However, it was not until 2019 that the hunch proved to be correct. A study gathered 15 patients with early-stage bladder cancer. Using a catheter, each person was infected with coxsackievirus A21. This is one of the viruses that slaps people with the common cold.

They kept the catheters in for an hour before repeating the procedure. This was to pump higher concentrations of the virus into the bladder than a natural infection would normally give a person. Then the patients were carted off to surgery to remove their tumors.^[10]

Throwing a common cold at cancer sounds flimsy, but the results were stunning. In many patients, the coxsackievirus severely damaged the tumors and drew a legion of immune cells to attack them. Best of all, one patient’s tumor was completely destroyed.

Overall, beating cancer could be as simple as using a virus that occurs in nature to refine effective treatment. Interestingly, none of the study’s superinfected patients developed a cold.

Polling is an important tool to measure the public’s feeling on any given topic. The idea of a poll is supposed to be both scientific and unbiased. 

Obviously there are some flaws in how they are executed from time to time, and results can easily be manipulated by those seeking to be unscrupulous. Likewise, polls can sometimes be gamed by the participants to produce a result that is not ideal just because it’s funny; just look at the tale of Boaty McBoatface to see that in action. 

Regardless of how it happens, sometimes poll results come back and they offer up something no one could have expected.

10. Jesus and Ric Flair Nearly Won a Time Person of the Century Poll

In the early days of online polling, few organizations realized what a can of worms they were opening by letting people online offer their own answers to questions. It’s one thing to have a poll with a yes or no toggle, or maybe a few choices they can click. It’s another to let people write in their answers.

As the year 2000 approached, Time magazine had the lofty idea to run a poll to decide who the Person of the Century might be. Millions of people voted. But Time was not aware of how certain groups might band together and vote multiple times to skew the outcome of such a poll. But skew, they did.

Fans of former wrestling superstar Ric Flair put in the effort to make their man the hero of the previous hundred years. Over 310,000 were logged for Flair putting him in second place behind another person who technically shouldn’t have qualified: Jesus.

Coming in third place with over 100,000 votes was Adolf Hitler, proving the poll had become deeply unserious. The editors of Time removed Jesus for having not been born in the century, and Hitler for being Hitler. 

Their reasons for axing Flair was that he was actually a character played by Richard Fliehr, Flair’s real name, making him unqualified as well. 

9. Astronomers Polled The Public to Choose the Name of the Color of the Universe

Sometimes you need to get creative to get people interested in science. Astronomers at Johns Hopkins University took this to heart when they revised their findings on the color of the universe.

Originally they had calculated that the universe, when everything was evened out, was aquamarine, but that was a mistake. So they went back to the drawing board, did some more colorful math, and came up with a new color. Beige. The universe is, more or less, beige. But in the interests of keeping this fun they solicited suggestions from the public about what to name the specific beige that the universe is. The answer they decided on was cosmic latte.

8. Kurt Russell Was Polled as Having Zero Unlikeability 

Are you a fan of Kurt Russell? Statistically speaking it seems like there’s a good chance you are, because polling suggests everyone likes Kurt Russell, or at least they used to at one time.

Though it’s hard to say what Russell’s best movie is, or his most popular one, he’s had plenty of memorable ones. This includes movies like The Thing, Escape From New York, Big Trouble in Little China, as well as his turn as Captain Jack O’Neill in 1994’s Stargate. The movie spawned a series of successful TV shows and even though Russell wasn’t in them, he’s still forever connected to one of sci-fi’s biggest franchises as a result. And he also got double his salary to be in it thanks to poll results.

Back in 1994, Russell was the only actor in Hollywood to poll with zero unlikeability. According to Russell, the role was not necessarily a likable one, so they needed an actor who everyone already loved to make it work. And it secured him a good payday to do it. 

7. Mountain Dew Polled Users for a New Name That Resulted in Chaos

In 2012, Mountain Dew came up with the somewhat cleverly named “Dub the Dew” contest where participants could choose a name for the newest Mountain Dew flavor. Popular vote in the poll would be the winner. 

In a twist everyone today would see coming, the top spots in the poll went to “Hitler Did Nothing Wrong,” “Diabeetus” and something vaguely offensive about grandmothers. Someone even hacked the site to include a thank you to the Israeli Mossad for orchestrating 9/11 as well as some links that rickrolled users. 

Naturally none of those names could be chosen so the whole site was scrapped and the company forgot the idea altogether. 

6. Only 15% of Americans Polled Thought We’d Reach The Moon By 1999

A poll is one of the most interesting ways to gain insight into human thought because it’s considered scientific and yet is totally unbound by any logic at the best of times. You literally just ask people what they think no matter how ill-informed they may be on a topic. You can find a fun example of this in Gallup’s polling about scientific advances from the year 1949.

Back then, the pollsters asked participants about what they thought the future held. Prognostication is, of course, one of the least accurate sciences out there but if you’re just looking for gut feelings from the rabble, then it doesn’t matter.

According to the 1949 poll, only 15% of Americans believed a person would have set foot on the moon by 1999. However, in the same poll those people proved far less cynical about medicine. Results showed 88% of responders assumed we’d have cancer cured by 1999. 

If you thought maybe the concept of a moon-landing maybe just sounded too far-fetched for the public of 1949, it’s worth noting that 63% of them were on board with the idea of nuclear-powered cars and airplanes as being a reality by 1999.

5. A Poll To Choose the Best Rock Supergroup Ever Picked a Band That Already Exists

Fan-casting movies is a pretty popular pastime these days, where people pick who they think would make the best cast for the latest superhero movie or anime adaptation. But it hasn’t always been something that only applies to TV and film. There’s a history of fan-casting musical groups as well. Just imagine right now who you think you could put together to create the absolute best musical supergroup of all time.

A British poll asked music fans to do just that back in 2005. It tasked them with picking the best lead singer, the best guitar player, the best bassist and the best drummer. Any musician could be picked to fill those positions, so you’re talking about Freddie Mercury, Slash, Jimi Hendrix, Keith Moon… anyone.

Inexplicably, the poll resulted in Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin being chosen as best singer, Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin as best guitar player, John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin as bass player and John Bonham of, you guessed it, Led Zeppelin as best drummer. So the dream team musical supergroup was Led Zeppelin, exactly as they had always been.

4. Polling Showed Justin Bieber Was More Hated Than Convicted Murderers

You may not know this if you’re a younger music fan but, once upon a time, people absolutely hated Justin Bieber. Just despised the kid. And the virulent hatred went well beyond the typical dislike you might feel for a musician you’re not particularly fond of. 

In 2013, Bieber scored high marks for unlikeability in a poll that focused only on musicians. He ranked at 54% unfavorable and only 20% likable. Only Chris Brown scored as being less likable, and this was at the height of Chris Brown’s numerous legal issues.

Just one year later, a larger poll that extended beyond the realm of music saw Bieber rank as the 5th most hated man in America. If that seems harsh, it is. But it gets worse. This poll ranked him more hated than Phil Spector who was serving a life sentence for murder at the time. He also ranked above Aaron Hernandez who’d just been arrested for three murders the year before.

So who outranked Bieber? OJ Simpson managed a little more hate, as did Bernie Madoff. Michael Jackson’s doctor Conrad Murray made the top of the list and the number one spot went to racist LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling.

3. A Japanese Poll Chose Ramen as the Country’s Greatest Invention

How much do you know about Japanese innovation? The country has a reputation as a tech hub and the source of many modern electronics. 

Historically, we have a lot to thank Japan for. The Sony Walkman, VHS video, karaoke, emojis, aircraft carriers, LED lights, the list is extensive. But what would be the best invention? The greatest thing the country ever did for themselves and the world at large?

This is a question that will come up in the media of probably every country. There are plenty of lists of the “Greatest American Inventions” or the “Greatest Canadian Inventions” so it’s no surprise Japan would have one, but what may be surprising is one the Japanese people themselves chose as number one.

In the year 2000, the Fuji Research Institute polled 2,000 adults in Tokyo to determine Japan’s greatest invention. Ramen noodles took the top spot. Karaoke ranked second.

2. 17% of AirPod Users Wear Them During Sex

So, do you wear AirPods? Since the wireless headphones first debuted they’ve become a go-to accessory for millions of people. You’ll see countless folks out and about with a pair in their ears letting them be blissfully unaware of the noise of the world around them, or at least pretend to be in the hopes that people won’t annoy them. 

A survey of just over 1,000 people conducted by a ticket selling platform was looking into the intersection of music and sex because sure, why not? Based on their results, they determined that a full 17% of respondents who own AirPods don’t bother to take them out during sex.

They did not make it clear what, if anything, the people wearing AirPods are listening to. It was also unclear if their partners were doing it as well. 

1. 4% of Americans Said They’d Been Decapitated

There is clear evidence not every poll is reliable. Pollsters know this as well as anyone. The numbers suggest between 4% and 7% of answers to an online poll are going to be bogus. There can be many reasons for this as well. Someone is intentionally skewing results, someone misunderstood a question or the answers, or someone was just rushing to get it done and didn’t pay attention chief among them. For that reason, that caveat of a plus or minus number often accompanies the results of any poll to account for results. 

You can find an example of this in the fact 4% of Americans polled said they had been decapitated at some point in their lives. As far as medical science knows, few people survive having their heads removed long enough to answer polls, so this result was worthy of some skepticism.

The fact that this happens has been great fodder for pop journalism over the years. Reports that 7% of Americans think chocolate milk comes from brown cows is probably a clear example of this. It makes a funny headline and people will joke about how stupid 7% of the country is, but in context the numbers fit. It’s unclear how the question was worded, as well. 

If respondents were asked simply “where does chocolate milk come from?” or maybe something more leading could have resulted in people thinking the question was so absurd they answer “brown cows” as a joke. If it was an option, they were able to select, some people may not have even read the question fully. It’s hard to say how it all played out but rest assured that 4% of the country has not been decapitated and most people are probably aware of chocolate milk’s origin.