The Great Rift Valley extends some 4,000 miles southward from Syria north of Israel, through the Gulf of Aqaba, through Ethiopia, and all the way to Mozambique in southeast Africa. It harbors a giant fault, which has been under investigation as a model for sea floor spreading. A recent geologic event rent a gaping crack through the desert of Ethiopia, causing safety concerns for locals.

For decades, museums and textbooks confidently asserted that mud rocks—such as limestone, siltstone, mudstone, and shale—were formed over vast eons as super-fine sediments slowly settled to the bottom of shallow lakes or seas.

A TV ad several decades ago stated with an air of authority that "dogs love cheese." No reports were cited and no canine polls performed, yet marketers hoped its mere repetition would drive the public to buy the cheese-flavored snack for their dogs, regardless of whether the claim was true.