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TIL that the first Apple computer in schools was hand-delivered by Steve Wozniak, is still with the computer education center he gave it to, and barely worked at all.
The latest
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TIL that Alexander the Great may have been buried alive. Historical records show he didn't decompose for six days after being declared dead. Modern scientists believe he suffered from Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a neurological disorder that paralyzed him.
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TIL that the Great Salt Lake was originally Lake Bonneville which was so large it extended into modern day Idaho and Nevada.
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TIL that babies under 6 months cannot have water. Their small stomachs easily fill up, reducing their intake of calorie-dense breast milk or formula. Additionally, their developing kidneys struggle to filter extra water, which can trigger water intoxication and dangerously low sodium levels.
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TIL that this fish species, Amazon Molly, survived 100,000 years without males. Scientists thought it should be long dead but it's thriving.
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TIL that Marlon Brando refused to memorize lines for The Godfather. Cue cards were hidden all over set — including taped to other actors' faces and chests — so he could read them mid-scene. He believed not knowing his lines made his reactions feel genuinely unscripted.
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TIL Marshmallow is just a candy made from sugar and gelatine. It doesn’t contain any Althaea officinalis, the marsh-mallow plant.
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TIL in 2018 after a Swedish mother got a tattoo of the first names of her two children at the time: her daughter Nova & her son Kevin, she realized that the artist had misspelled 'Kevin' as 'Kelvin'; it read 'Nova & Kelvin'. However, instead of correcting it, they legally changed his name to Kelvin.
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TIL a man in China lived with a 12cm-long metal chopstick lodged in his throat for 8 years after he swallowed it while drinking. He then decided to live with it because he was afraid of having surgery. However after it was finally removed, it was revealed his vocal cords hadn't been harmed at all.
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TIL about Snake Detection Theory (SDT), which proposes that snakes contributed to the development of advanced visual systems in primates. Individuals with stronger vision would be better able to recognise snakes and escape from them, therefore passing on their genes to the next generation.
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TIL that ancient celts used to clean their teeth with piss (it’s really good at cleaning your teeth)
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TIL that dung beetles improve soil quality, disperse seeds, and remove food sources for pest insects. They have been introduced throughout the world for their beneficial effects; in the US, their annual economic benefit is estimated at $380 million.
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TIL for the last few decades a former Cold War spy and mathematical savant has been card-counting at casinos to fund his creation of complex calendrical puzzle-paintings targeted towards a future audience of hyper-intelligent robots
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TIL moose are natural prey of orcas
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TIL of The Day of the Tiles (June 7, 1788), when the townspeople of Grenoble, France responded to government thugs in their midst by climbing onto the roofs and pummeling the shit out of them with roof tiles. After seeing the troops forced back, the whole country soon exploded into revolution
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TIL that in 2018, singer Akon announced the development of "Akon City," a planned community in Senegal which he claimed would be a "real life Wakanda," using blockchain and cryptocurrency technology. Construction began in 2023, but as of 2025 the site sits abandoned
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TIL Osama bin Ladens translator was so mad about LeBron James going to the Miami Heat he wanted LeBron to apologize to Cleveland
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TIL the War Powers Act of 1973 requires a president to get congressional approval within 60 days of starting a war but in its 50+ year history it has never once been legally enforced against a sitting president, making it effectively unenforceable
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TIL scientists originally thought melting Arctic sea ice would boost marine life by letting in more sunlight, but it actually triggered a chemical reaction that destroys vital nutrients, permanently starving the base of the food chain.
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TIL a man attempting to establish a world record by crying for 100 hours straight had to stop 6 hours into his attempt because he began to experience several symptoms including headaches, puffed eyes, a generally swollen face, and partial blindness that reportedly lasted about 45 minutes.
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TIL that Sherpas have evolved so that the mitochondria in their muscle cells convert more oxygen to energy than other people.
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TIL When Leicester City won the Premier League in 15-16. Because of the 5000/1 intial odds, a woman named Clarke was given a ticket that had a 10 pound bet for Leicester to win the league as a joke. She ended up winning 50,000 pounds at the end of the season.
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TIL that in the late 1960s, the Beatles wanted to make the first live-action film adaptation of “The Lord of the Rings,” seeking Stanley Kubrick to direct with plans to feature their music. However, Stanley Kubrick called it unfilmable; J.R.R. Tolkien hated the band and thus refused the rights.
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TIL that Saul Bellow, Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, and Tony Randall are all among the top 50 oldest fathers on record
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TIL a couple walking their dog found 1,427 buried gold coins valued at about $10 million, the largest known buried gold-coin discovery ever recovered in the United States.
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TIL about the 1877–1878 El Niño event, which led to the deaths of 50 million ppl, or 3% of the global population
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TIL Stalin was arrested several times in the years after he led a bank robbery killing 40 guards and bystanders, but he escaped exile each time.
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TIL the last remnant of the Mongol Empire ruled by a direct descendant of Genghis Khan lasted until 1930.
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TIL a photon starting at the center of the Sun and changing direction every time it encounters a charged particle would take between 10,000 and 170,000 years to get to the surface
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TIL that no matter how fast or slow a language is spoken, every human language transmits information at approximately 39 bits per second. Fast languages like Japanese pack less meaning per syllable, slow languages like Mandarin pack more, the brain has a hard speed limit.
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TIL Sonderkommandos were forced labor units of Jewish prisoners in Nazi death camps. Under threat of death, they were compelled to work in gas chambers and crematoria. the SS routinely murdered these prisoners after a few months and replaced them.
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TIL that some archeologists have theorised that the Trojan Horse story is a metaphor for a massive earthquake which destroyed Troy's walls and let the Greeks in.
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TIL all humans have the "Sonic Hedgehog" gene
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TIL some white blood cells fight infections by suicidally bursting open and casting their own DNA like a net to trap pathogens.
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TIL only a fraction of Isaac Newton's total written output was dedicated to science and math. 60% of his surviving written works were dedicated to Biblical prophecy and alchemy.
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TIL the 30 dynasty system used by historians today to categorize ancient Egyptian pharaohs was actually created by a 3rd century BC egyptian priest named Manetho
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TIL that the original bassist of Steppenwolf (best known for the songs “Born to be Wild” and “Magic Carpet Ride”) Rushton Moreve was fired the band after missing gigs in Los Angeles after being convinced by his girlfriend that the city would be hit by an earthquake and leveled into the Pacific Ocean
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TIL in 2009 EA offered a day-one "nudity DLC" for WW2 game The Saboteur, enabling topless women in game and the ability to watch topless dances, among other benefits. The DLC existed as an incentive for new copies of the game and had to be purchased separately for pre-owned copies for $3
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TIL At the onset of the American Revolution, the Continental Army tried to secure Quebec as the 14th colony.
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TIL Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria — the 19th-century inspiration for Disney's Sleeping Beauty Castle — had electric lighting, central heating, flush toilets, and a telephone when it was built in the 1880s, despite its medieval appearance.
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TIL Harry Houdini became fascinated with aviation in 1909. He bought a biplane for $5,000 ($172,768 in 2025) and hired a full time mechanic. He made his first successful flight in Germany later that year and then became the first to fly a powered aeroplane in Australia.
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TIL of Dougls Crofut. A radiographer, he died in 1981 after suffering from radiation poisoning. His is the only known U.S. case of someone suspected of committing suicide by radiation exposure
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TIL that human-made materials outweigh all life on Earth; plastics alone weigh twice the combined mass of all animals
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TIL that one single teaspoon of a neutron star weighs roughly 1 billion tones, equivalent to the weight of Mount Everest.
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TIL the gene that builds the mammalian placenta came from a virus. A retrovirus infected our ancestors over 100 million years ago, integrated into their DNA, and the gene encoding its cell-fusion protein got repurposed to bond mother and fetus.
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TIL that the flag etiquette for Memorial Day is to lower it to half staff from sunrise to noon
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TIL there's a disorder called "ACHOO Syndrome". It's a disorder where the person has to sneeze when in the sun or looking at the sun. Roughly 18-35% of all humans have this disorder.
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TIL that Brian Eno - the musician who pioneered ambient music and produced David Bowie, Coldplay, U2, and Talking Heads - wrote the iconic Microsoft Windows 95 startup chime on a Mac. He later admitted he'd never owned a PC and didn't like them.
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TIL that "Zeppelin" only technically refers to airships built by one specific German company. The actual type of aircraft is called a "rigid airship," whereas blimps are "pressure airships" that lack an internal framework and rely entirely on gas pressure to keep their shape.
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