You might have heard the fable of the boiling frog.

Here's Ted Ed giving one variation on it.

Two frogs are minding their own business in the swamp when,

wow, they're kidnapped.

They come to in a kitchen, captives of a menacing chef.

He boils up a pot of water and lobs one of the frogs in, but it's having none of this.

The second its toes hit the scalding water, it jumps right out the window.

The chef refills the pot, but this time he doesn't turn on their heat.

He plops the second frog in, and this frog's okay with that. The chef turns the heat on very low, and the temperature of the water slowly rises,

so slowly that the frog doesn't notice.

In fact, it basks in the balmy water. Only when the surface begins to bubble does the

frog realize it's toast. What's funny about this parable is that it's not scientifically true.

As noted, the fable of the boiling frog is false. A frog in water that's gradually being heated

will jump out before being boiled, while a frog thrown into boiling water will be burned immediately

and stand no chance at survival. In the end, the fable of the boiling frog seems harmless

unless someone tries to test it out on a real-life frog. And it can even be helpful as a

reminder to people not to remain complacent when there's a slow brewing crisis. On the other hand,

there's a much more pervasive and pernicious myth surrounding death and water, which is this,

that a person taller than the water they're in won't drown. After all, they could just stand up.

This was one of the central arguments made by the state at the Amanda Lewis trial,

along with the claim that her daughter, Adriana,

was afraid of the water to the extent that she would have avoided it like the plague.

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