When You're Wrong, You're Right Quiz

Answer: 400

Saccharin was discovered in 1878 by Constantine Fahlberg. He was working on an analysis of coal tar at John Hopkins University. At the end of the day, we did not wash his hands before he ate some bread. He noticed that it tasted sweet, so he began tasting all of the chemical compounds that he'd worked with that day (not something recommended in a chemistry lab today!).

He discovered the substance resulted from combining o-sulfobenzoic acid with phosphorus chloride and ammonia. He patented the substance.

It was discovered that the body cannot metabolize saccharin, so diabetics started using it as a sweetener in 1907. It was also popular as a sweetener during wartime because of sugar rationing.

Answer: Play-Doh

"Play-Doh" didn't start out as a kids' toy. Instead, it was created by Noah McVicker, owner of a soap factory, as a wallpaper cleaner. In the days when coal was used for heating and cooking in many homes, walls became coated with soot. One way to remove it was to use a layer of clay - push it on the wall and pull it off complete with the soot. Unfortunately for Mr. McVicker, vinyl wallpaper was invented at around the same time as his wall clay, and it could be washed with water.

A relative was a teacher and she gave some to her students. Apparently, they loved it, so the detergents were removed and colouring was added before the original name was changed to what we know today.

Answer: Chocolate

Percy Spencer was an engineer who was working on a radar project for the Raytheon Corporation when he noticed that a bar of chocolate or candy that he had in his pocket melted more quickly than he would have expected. He started aiming a vacuum tube that he had been working on at other items such as eggs and popcorn, and soon realized that the other objects also experienced heat.

He concluded that the heat was being generated by microwave energy. Raytheon filed a patent for the first microwave in 1945.

It weighed 750 pounds (340 kg) and stood 5′ 6″ (168 cm) tall. The first countertop microwave was introduced in 1965 and cost US$500. When inflation is taken into account, the first microwaves would cost about $4,133.14 in 2020!

Answer: South America

Quinine is a compound that comes from the quina-quina tree. It was accidentally discovered as an anti-malarial compound as early as 1600 by Jesuit missionaries who worked in the Andes. Legend has it that a feverish and parched man stumbled across a pool of water at the base of a quina-quina tree.

When he drank it, he was worried that is would make him sicker because of the bitter taste. The opposite happened and he became well. This discovery is not as well-documented as other discoveries in this quiz, but quinine is still used in the 21st century, both in the manufacturing of anti-malarial drugs, and to flavour tonic water.

Answer: D-lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD)

Albert Hofmann was a chemist who studied Lysergic acid, a powerful chemical that was first isolated from a fungus that grows on rye, which he first synthesized in 1938. In 1943, he accidentally ingested some of the chemicals he was working with. When he became dizzy, he went home to lie down.

He wrote some notes about the experience, including the one in the question. He also noted that "As I lay in a dazed condition with my eyes closed (I experienced daylight as disagreeably bright) there surged upon me an uninterrupted stream of fantastic images of extraordinary plasticity and vividness and accompanied by an intense, kaleidoscope-like play of colours".

He experimented with, and ingested the chemical again, and it eventually moved into popular culture by the 1960s.

Answer: No

When Pfizer completed trials on their new heart medication, they discovered that it did not make any difference to the heart conditions of those who took it. However, men who took the medication reported stronger and longer lasting erections. Even those who had suffered from erectile dysfunction before taking the pill reported the ability to achieve and maintain erections. Pfizer then completed a new clinical trial on 4,000 men with erectile dysfunction, and saw the same results.

They named the "accidental" pill "Viagra", and the rest is history.

Answer: 1903

Edouard Benedictus, a French scientist, was working with cellulose nitrate in 1903. He accidentally dropped a glass flask that had been filled with the solution, which is a sort of liquid plastic. The glass broke, and the liquid evaporated, but it didn't shatter.

The pieces of glass were broken, but they stayed in place and maintained the shape of the container. When he checked it out, Benedictus realized that the plastic coating had helped the glass stay together. This accidental discovery led to the use of safety glass in cars, safety glasses, and many other places where shattering glass is not an ideal situation.

Answer: Rod wax

In 1859, 22-year-old chemist Robert Chesebrough was working at an oil well in Pennsylvania. He heard a strange rumour among the oil rig workers that a jelly-like substance that they called "rod wax" was a by-product of the oil pumping process that constantly got into the machines and caused them to malfunction.

However, Chesebrough noticed that the workers used rod wax to soothe cuts and burns on their skin, so he took some home to experiment with. The product of his experimentation, another accidental discovery, was what we know today as petroleum jelly.

Answer: Dog

Oscar Minkowski and Josef von Mering were two doctors at the University of Strasbourg. In 1889, they were trying to determine how the pancreas affected digestion. After removing the organ from a healthy dog, they noticed flies swarming around the dog's urine a few days later.

After testing the urine, they found very high levels of sugar in it. These two scientists accidentally discovered that the diabetes was caused by a non-functioning pancreas. Although they were never able to determine what the pancreas produced that regulated blood sugar, their accidental discovery led to research that occurred between 1920 and 1922 at the University of Toronto where other scientists (Drs. Banting and Best) were able to isolate a pancreatic secretion that they called insulin.

Answer: Refrigeration

In 1938, Roy Plunkett was a scientist with DuPont. He was working on ways to make refrigerators more home-friendly. At that time, the main chemicals in refrigerants were ammonia, sulfur dioxide, and propane. He stored some tetrafluoroethylene (TFE) gas one day, but upon opening it again, he found that his experimental gas was gone.

In its place was a strange, slippery resin that was resistant to extreme heat and chemicals. There was no immediate use for it, so it was shelved. In the 1940s the material was used by the Manhattan project.

In the 1950s, it found its way into the automotive industry. In the 1960s, Teflon would finally be used for nonstick cookware.