10 Things You Might've Been Better Off Not Knowing About Your Body

Posted by Alex in Medicine, Mentalfloss on September 7, 2007 at 2:03 am



Andreas Vesalius De humani corporis fabrica libri septem (On the fabric of the human body in seven books), 1543

1. The average human body comprises enough fat to make seven bars of soap, enough iron to make a medium sized nail, enough potassium to explode a toy cannon, enough lime to whitewash a small chicken coop, enough sugar to fill a jam jar, and enough sulfur to rid a dog of fleas.

2. A complete skeleton is worth between $5,000 and $7,500 to a medical student; your skull alone would fetch only about $450.

3. Your mouth produces about one quart of saliva per day.

4. Demodex folliculorum has eight stumpy legs and a tail, is about a third of a millimeter long, and loves nothing more than to recline in the warm, oily pits of your hair follicles. Most adults have this mite, usually on the head, but especially in eyelashes. And often, they’re in nipples.

5. You have approximately 4,000 wax glands in each ear.

6. The average adult stool weighs about 4 ounces. And half of the bulk of your feces comprises the dead bodies of bacteria that live inside your intestines.

7. The average male foot exudes half a pint of sweat each day.

8. If it weren’t for the slimy mucous that clings to and lines the walls of your gut, your stomach would readily digest itself.

9. The average person will pass about 11,000 gallons of urine in a lifetime.

10. A man weighing 200 lbs. would provide enough meat to feed 100 cannibals in one sitting.

The article above appeared in the Scatterbrained section of the September – October 2007 issue of mental_floss magazine. It is excerpted from 5 People Who Died During Sex (and 100 Other Terribly Tasteless Lists) by Karl Shaw. It is reprinted here with permission.

Don’t forget to feed your brain by subscribing to the magazine and visiting mental_floss‘ extremely entertaining website and blog today for more!


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COMMENT

30 comments to "10 Things You Might've Been Better Off Not Knowing About Your Body"

  1. Blaze
    September 7th, 2007 at 2:57 am

    This might have been even scarier if it was in metric values.

  2. Sid Morrison
    September 7th, 2007 at 3:06 am

    OK, what the heck are "boxies" ? Was this supposed to be "bodies" ?

  3. Ibod Catooga
    September 7th, 2007 at 6:40 am

    I like to poop on cats.

    Cats.

    I like to poop on them.

  4. Justin
    September 7th, 2007 at 7:01 am

    mmm, nothing stories of mucus, urine, and drool to make my breakfast look that much more appealing... :)

  5. L.B.
    September 7th, 2007 at 10:25 am

    What about a 400 lb. person? Is that extra goo edible?

  6. Alex
    September 7th, 2007 at 10:26 am

    Yes, bodies! Thanks Sid Morrison!

  7. Rich
    September 7th, 2007 at 10:36 am

    Watch for my skull on ebay. Bid early and bid often.

  8. Lasse
    September 7th, 2007 at 2:26 pm

    This proves one more time the need for robots.

  9. Chris
    September 7th, 2007 at 2:39 pm

    100 cannibals? not in my family. Roughly 65.

  10. SDC
    September 7th, 2007 at 10:30 pm

    100? 65? I have a freezer, a grill, and barbecue sauce. I think a Cookout for the nearby Church would be a wonderful idea! The question remaining is which "friends" to invite. Please remember class, you can't have a friend without fiend.

  11. onur
    September 10th, 2007 at 6:23 am

    hard job

  12. The China Tattler
    September 11th, 2007 at 9:32 am

    "You have approximately 4,000 wax glands in each ear."

    Cool!

    Time to open that candle factory!

  13. monkeynipples
    September 14th, 2007 at 6:14 am

    I love to feed my cat earwax he really enjoys the taste.

  14. Jeff
    September 14th, 2007 at 2:55 pm

    Do mites have humans living in their nipples? Imagine if what we think is the universe is just the nipple of mite living in the nipple of a human.

  15. dick hertz
    September 14th, 2007 at 8:57 pm

    Ha!Whos ever heard of a small chicken coop?

  16. B.A.
    September 16th, 2007 at 5:04 am

    Awesome.

  17. shamalamadingdong
    September 16th, 2007 at 10:11 am

    lovely, seems like dinner time in iraq

  18. joanne
    September 17th, 2007 at 4:46 am

    awesome,,,really needed 2 know that,,,,not ha ha

  19. Wendy Piersall
    September 18th, 2007 at 5:02 pm

    Oh. That's just gross.

  20. J.I.T
    September 18th, 2007 at 5:43 pm

    AWSOME! THAT WAS SO COOL!i'M GOING TO SHOW MY SCIENCE TEACHER THIS.

    AWSOME!

  21. Conny
    September 19th, 2007 at 5:33 pm

    I'm not exactly sure, but I think where you wrote "comprises", you should have written "is comprised of". I believe the former means "to make up". The latter definitely means "is made up of". I could be wrong though.

    Either way, those were definitely amusing. My favourite was that 4 ounces of poo yields 2 ounces of dead bacteria.

  22. milo
    September 20th, 2007 at 2:06 am

    Actually, the article uses comprises correctly. The incorrect usage of the word has become so commonplace that it is starting to be accepted.
    See dictionary.com for a note on the change in the usage.

    This message brought to you by your local grammar police.

  23. Turd Ferguson
    September 20th, 2007 at 8:13 pm

    onur: you spelled "hand job" wrong.

  24. Zew
    September 21st, 2007 at 3:27 pm

    Conny, who gives a fuck

  25. Bowen
    September 21st, 2007 at 4:35 pm

    Wow... I need a life :P

  26. soccerchick
    September 22nd, 2007 at 12:59 am

    wow that is a =mazing i like this site!! i want to be a doctor so it is awesome

  27. conure11
    September 25th, 2007 at 10:38 pm

    then number 4 (Demodex folliculorum) must be an arachnid? Hmmm. I like nipples, but not Spiders and Scorpions.

  28. Holly
    October 6th, 2007 at 6:05 pm

    @lasse:
    two words- robot apocolypse.

    believe me.. it's becoming more and more possible these days.. pay attention to the news.

    awesome article... human beings are just as dirty as the rest of the animanls on this planet. hooray for dirty! who needs a shower?

  29. Tami
    February 29th, 2008 at 7:15 pm

    Ill , I can say is EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!
    Thats why i use the vacum on my bed...

  30. andry
    May 7th, 2009 at 1:16 pm

    Ih7PeZ comment1 ,


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