===== Random Facts =====

Every so often I come across a very interesting fact or topic that I hadn't known of before. This will be a collection of those so they don't just slip away.

  * For several hundred years (~ 800AD - 1500AD) the Islamic world was at the [[http://www.globalcomment.com/v2/sci13.asp | forefront of medical knowledge and technology]] with great medical scholars such as [[wp>Avicenna]] and [[wp>Rhazes]] - part of a greater [[wp>Islamic Golden Age]] in sciences and arts (~ 9th - 13th Centuries AD) . Within the past 500 years however, there has been a [[http://ptonline.aip.org/journals/doc/PHTOAD-ft/vol_60/iss_8/49_1.shtml |decline in science and technology in the Islamic world ]].

  * A [[https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/96unclass/farewell.htm | CIA operation]] ([[ http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F00E6DF173BF931A35751C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all| NYTimes article]] , [[wp>Farewell Dossier|Wikipedia article ]] ) starting in 1982 fed tailored misinformation to a KGB technology espionage program called Line X. This included "Contrived computer chips found their way into Soviet military equipment, flawed turbines were installed on a gas pipeline, and defective plans disrupted the output of chemical plants and a tractor factory. The Pentagon introduced misleading information pertinent to stealth aircraft, space defense, and tactical aircraft. The Soviet Space Shuttle was a rejected NASA design." The greatest success came when tailored (trojaned) software running a pipeline triggered and "reset pump speeds and valve settings to produce pressures far beyond those acceptable to the pipeline joints and welds" causing "the most monumental non-nuclear explosion and fire ever seen from space".

  * [[wp>Female hysteria]] used to be treated as a commonly occurring disease (up to 25% of all females) caused by sexual deprivation or dissatisfaction. It was treated by "pelvic massage" of the genital area until "hysterical paroxysm" (now better known as orgasm) by a doctor or midwife. So the vibrator was originally designed as a medical device which was sold before many other electric appliances such as the vacuum cleaner and the iron. So the urban myth of a sexually dissatisfied female expressing certain emotional traits was actually believed as medical fact for thousands of years (at least 350BC to 1900).