When I was a child, I was told that it could kill someone on the sidewalk if you dropped a penny from the Empire State Building. The acceleration of the penny would increase to the point that it would become like a speeding bullet. And I had to wonder who tested that out, but it was fake news.

Debunked because the penny would reach a terminal velocity of about 30-100 miles per hour depending on the wind. So yea, it might hurt it if it hit someone, but it wouldn’t kill them. If you consider the average bullet travels at 1700 miles per hour.

Another Myth exposed from when I was a kid. Toilets flush in different directions depending on the hemisphere. Toilet flushes go in both directions, clockwise and counterclockwise.

That myth was based on science, but they got it wrong. The Coriolis Effect elicits that kind of response when it comes to the gulf stream and hurricanes. But toilets and tornadoes are too small to be influenced by the Coriolis Effect. The direction of the toilet is created by water pressure, the plumbing, and the design of the toilet.

This last myth was one I’ve never heard of: Glass is a high viscosity liquid. So I wondered, does glass have such a viscosity that it feels solid?

This myth arose back in the days when it was hard to get an even pane in glass-making. So when the glass-maker got a reasonably precise pane and cut it, one side was always thicker than the other. In windows, they would mount the wider side on the bottom for stability. So no glass does not sag. It’s still the solid substance I remember.