Some popular misconceptions

Snake is not the most poisonous creature on Earth, as it's widely believed. Instead, the Golden Poison Frog is.

It is commonly claimed that the Great Wall of China is the only man-made object visible from the Moon. This is false. None of the Apollo astronauts reported seeing any man-made object from the Moon. The misconception is believed to have been popularized by Richard Halliburton decades before the first moon landing.

The most common incorrect explanation of the lunar phases is that they are caused by the Earth's shadow. Instead, as the Moon orbits Earth, we see its illuminated half from differing angles in relation to the Sun.

It is a common misconception that seasons are caused by the Earth being closer to the Sun in the summer than in the winter. In fact, the Earth is actually farther from the Sun when it is summer in the Northern Hemisphere. Seasons are actually the result of the Earth being tilted on its axis by 23.5 degrees. As the Earth orbits the Sun, different parts of the world receive different amounts of direct sunlight. In July, the Northern Hemisphere is tilted towards the Sun giving longer days and more direct sunlight; in winter, it is tilted away. The seasons are reversed in the Southern Hemisphere, which is tilted towards the Sun in January and away from the Sun in July. In tropical areas of the world, there is no noticeable change in the amount of sunlight.

Different tastes can be detected on all parts of the tongue by taste buds, with slightly increased sensitivities in different locations depending on the person, contrary to the popular belief that specific tastes only correspond to specific mapped sites on the tongue. The original "tongue map" was based on a mistranslation by a Harvard psychologist of a discredited German paper that was written in 1901.

The claim that a duck's quack does not echo is false, although the echo may be difficult to hear for humans under some circumstances.

Bats are not blind. While most bat species do use echolocation to augment their vision, all bats have eyes and are capable of sight.

Nowhere in the Bible is the fruit eaten by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden referred to as an apple. The fruit is called the "fruit of the tree" (that is, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil), and neither the fruit nor the tree is identified by species. In Middle English, as late as the 17th century "apple" was a generic term for all fruit other than berries but including nuts. However, in continental European art from that period representing the Fall of Man the fruit is often depicted as an apple. The apple myth comes from a Latin word likeness: Latin mălus = "bad", mălum = "an evil", mālus = "apple tree" and "mast of a ship", mālum = "apple (fruit)". Other traditional claims for the fruit include grapes, figs, wheat and pomegranate.

Nowhere in the Bible is Mary Magdalene ever referred to as a prostitute. Before her seeing the risen Jesus, the only other mention besides the listing of her name is the mentioning in Luke 8:2 that she had been possessed by seven demons. In fact there are several sinful women mentioned in the gospels, one of whom is "caught in adultery". The earliest recorded mention of this connection was in a sermon of Pope Gregory.

Nowhere in the Bible does it say exactly three wise men came from afar to visit "Baby Jesus", nor that they rode on camels. It was assumed that there were three Biblical Magi because three gifts are described. Additionally, the wise men did not visit on the day Jesus was born, but they saw Jesus as a child, in a house as much as two years afterward. (Matthew 2:11).

The Black box, used for aviation accident investigation, is actually painted bright orange as to aid in recovering it from the crash site.

One popular misconception about human brain is that humans use only 10% or less of their brain. There is no scientific basis for this assertion. Many functional brain imaging studies show activated regions encompassing well over 10% of the brain. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this myth is that nobody has ever been able to pin down its origin. This misconception most likely arose from a misunderstanding (or misrepresentation in an advertisement) of neurological research in the late 1800s or early 1900s when researchers either discovered that only about 10% of the neurons in the brain are firing at any given time or announced that they had only mapped the functions of 10% of the brain up to that time.