The Bullet in the Brain - S6-E11
Factual error: Bone mentions Booth holds the "official record for the longest shot, almost a kilometer", and Booth corrects her to "over a kilometer." The record at the time was actually well over 2km, held by Corporal Rob Furlong, a Canadian sniper (since been beaten, it currently stands at 3.5km). In fact plenty of sniper kills had been recorded at over a kilometer since the late 19th century.
Dr. Temperance Brennan: What exactly am I supposed to be squinting at?
Seeley Booth: It's like pornography. You'll know it when you see it.
Question: When Doctor Brennan is examining the victim's skull, she states that a "straight suture across the palatine bone" indicates that the victim was a native Japanese speaker. I've studied linguistics, but I've never heard of a person's native language actually affecting their anatomy. So, for example: would a person of Japanese heritage who was born and raised in the US and spoke only English be distinguishable from a person who grew up in Japan and spoke only Japanese, purely by their palatine bones? (00:06:10)
Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.
Answer: Since the palatine bone is a bone that helps form the mouth it has a lot to do with speaking. The shape of it differs a lot depending on your ethnic background. I would guess that they, in the show, meant that the person's bone tells that they were Japanese and that it was "made for the purpose of speaking Japanese." That's what I'd assume anyway. I've studied molecular biology though, so I'm not an expert on bones.