"...I think we only use 10 percent of our hearts."

Aw, the water draining one is the most disappointing for me. Damn you, The Simpsons, for lying to me all these years.

Damn, I love that picture. Gets me every time.

Well, what I've heard is that we only use 10% of our brain at any one time. All of it gets used, just not all at once.

Well this isn't scientific or anything but my theory regarding the 5 second rule is that the germs have been hit on the head and stunned and thus you have 5 seconds before they recover and crawl onto your item of food.

I'll never forget when a co-workder dropped their buttered bagle on the industrial strength rug at work. Now this office was in Philly which means at least half the folks were passing through the urine smelling subway/train terminals to get there each day. I'm no OCD Monk-alike, but the thought of what is in that rug is enough to make me cringe.

So anyways she dropped it, butter side down. Picked it up, one quick (fake) dusting and announced '10-second rule' as she popped it into her mouth. I think i gagged physically... I'm gagging just thinking about it.

Clearly she has survived but..... I dunno. I was never good about sharing food in the first place, so its like a total taboo. (I would probably turn the universe upside down and make an exception for a fallen turkey sub though, NOTHING will keep me from my turkey subs).

Ooh, the cockroaches thread made me discover another 'science' myth. I was told by my mother ages ago to never squish cockroaches because it will break their internal egg-sack and spread little roach eggs all over.
Apparently some reputable sources on the Internet claim that this is NOT the case!

As for the 5 second rule, I apply texture logic: is the thing I dropped or the surface I dropped it on sticky? If true, discard. Is the thing I dropped easily brushable/wipable and or coated with a hard candy shell? Does it pass a cursory inspection for lint or hair? If true, eat quickly.

Survived, maybe. But not without a few treatments for hepatitis.

A quick look at the brain's anatomy disproves anything regarding 10%. Every part has a specific function and is never "off."

People who continue to state "10%" can never ever say exactly where the 10% is. Is it concentrated in one location or spread throughout the brain? I've never heard a doctor say "Well, he was shot in the head but luckily the section that was damaged is part of the 90% that isn't used!"

I've seen a lot of these myths on the Mythbusters. It was very amusing to watch them consume poppy seed bagels, drop buttered toast and pennies... The "five second rule" episode was the most disgusting. And I yawned SO MANY TIMES during the "yawning is contagious" episode.

This was my reaction to this article-- so what? I've seen these all on Mythbusters!

The myth comes quite simply from the period when anatomists were only able to identify the purpose of a small portion of the brain. I know a number of groups used that as fodder for various crackpot theories - that the pineal gland was the site of the soul in the body, or an extra eye that could see spirit light. Spiritualists would cite the mysteries of the brain as hiding the ability to contact the dead, leave the body to jaunt around in the spirit and eyeball neighbors in the shower, and other such fantastical imagining designed to separate people from their money. After a while, it passed into the pop culture - I heard it as a kid, along with the old "women have one more rib than men do". (I had a Sunday school teacher who swore that was literally true. He started yelling when I pointed out that that would only apply to Eve, not every woman. Later, he was arrested for homosexual pederasty.)

So, ignorance of science leads to a short, ignoble life in prison. Quod erat demonstrandum.

I still hear the myth about scientists "not knowing" was the pineal gland does.

It's true that we DIDN'T know what it did, at the time that Descartes first postulated that it was the physiological "seat of the soul," because it wasn't mirrored across hemispheres. But today we know that it's basically just another endocrine producer/regulator that has a lot to do with sleep patterns and the circadian rhythm.