I was reading the dowsing thread again and one side comment lept out at me:
In a similar way that we don't know what the 90% of our brain that we don't use is for
This old myth has become "fact" over the years. However, it reminded me how all sorts of spurious conclusions are reached by misinterpretation of an initial fact. Examples that come to mind are a researcher (not into mines, but employed by a public body) I met wanting to guage the (major according to him) impact of a trial at Llawr y Glyn, which was due to the fact that some Victorian had called it North Van to bring in the investors and he'd confused it with the other one. Or the numerous tales of site A joined to site B by underground tunnels. Most recently I was hoping to find an underground artifact that I had been told about, only to find from the original source there had been a misunderstanding.
The internet is a wonderfull tool, but not always verifiable.
Has anyone any other examples or comment?