Scientist Dr Karl Says Daddy’s Long-Legged Spiders Can Bite You

Australian scientist Dr. Karl Kruszelnicki has tackled an age-old myth about the long-legged daddy spider that thousands believe to be true.

Many believe arachnids are the “most poisonous” spiders in the world and their fangs are too short to cause harm – but Dr Karl said that was not the case.

In brief TikTok videothe 73-year-old boffin said the fangs can sometimes penetrate the skin, but the venom is “incredibly mild” and “won’t kill you”.

“I guess we’ve all woven a web of lies,” Dr. Karl said in the now-viral clip.

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“We’ve all heard the story that the long-legged daddy spider is the most poisonous spider on earth, but it can’t kill you because the fangs are too short,” he said.

Dr Karl added that fangs are “sometimes long enough” to bite into skin, but that is unlikely.

“The toxin is there but it’s incredibly, incredibly, incredibly sweet – it won’t kill you,” he said.

The myth that daddy long-legged spiders have been circulating for decades, but there is no scientific evidence to support it.

In the video, Dr. Karl also pointed out other facts about these spiders, saying that many are “opilionids” with only two eyes instead of eight.

He also mentioned that spiders can be “venomous” and non-“venomous” because venom is not ingested through the mouth.

Within 24 hours, the video went viral, topping over 360,000 views.

“I am now years old at 38 and just got properly educated on daddy long legs. My childhood was a lie,’ one person wrote in the comments.

Another added: “Who started it?!?”

“Thank you Dr Karl for this information, I will impress my friends with this next week,” said a third.

In another video, Dr. Karl revealed that cracking your knuckles won’t lead to arthritis, but may hamper your ability to open jars later in life.

He cited two studies that debunked the myth that cracking your joints will give you arthritis.

‘When you pull your finger to break the joint, you enlarge the joint space – the space between the bones – and it sucks in the ligaments and causes a gas bubble to appear,’ Dr Karl explained in the now clip. viral. .

“However, the energy released is only about seven percent of what you need to damage cartilage.”

The doctor referred to a study involving a doctor who cracked his knuckles in his left hand for 50 years.

“Ultimately no difference in arthritis between this hand and this hand, but one person is not an adequate sample size,” he said.

Another study that Dr. Karl pointed to involved a much larger sample of 300 people who cracked their joints in both hands for 35 years.

“They had no additional cases of arthritis, but they had slightly swollen joints, which in itself is not serious, and their grip strength is about a quarter of what it should be” , did he declare.

“So there’s no solid evidence that cracking your joints will give you arthritis, but it might make it difficult to unscrew a jar of Vegemite.”