We’ve taken another trip to one of our favorite places on the internet, the Today I Learned subreddit, to find out some information that you probably didn’t learn in school but you might still want to know! So enjoy finding out more about history, animals and even our own species, and be sure to upvote the facts that you won’t ever forget!
#1
TIL about a cat named Room 8 that lived in a public school for 16 years. During his time their he would disappear during the summer and return, like clockwork on the first day of school. He became so well known that poems and songs were sung about him.
Image credits: Houndguy
#2
TIL elderly pedestrians in Singapore get more time to cross the road at traffic lights. By taping their concession card on the crosswalk button, the green man stays lit for up to 13 seconds longer.
Image credits: griefofwant
#3
TIL Ubisoft offered to share their detailed 3D model of Notre Dame from Assassin’s Creed: Unity, some 5,000 hours of research, with the French government reconstruction effort after the fire in 2019.
Image credits: Funk5oulBrother
#4
TIL the Kootenai Indian Tribe of Idaho and Montana harvests millions of dollars of sturgeon caviar a year, but put all the eggs back in the rivers. They are desperately try to save the shrinking white sturgeon population which they believe are “sacred messengers.”
#5
TIL : about the game “Foldit”, a puzzle game about protein folding. In 2011, its gamers helped decipher a protein of a HIV-like virus, solving a scientific problem that went unsolved for 15 years in as little as 10 days.
Image credits: 12a357sdf
#6
TIL Highway hypnosis, also known as white line fever, is an altered mental state in which a person can drive a car, truck, or other automobile great distances, responding to external events in the expected, safe, and correct manner with no recollection of having consciously done so.
Image credits: gullydon
#7
TIL that sharks don’t make sounds. Across 400-500 species, no one has ever found an organ even capable of producing sound.
Image credits: Jangles2000
#8
TIL that just before Laika went into space, one of the scientists using her for testing brought her home to play with his children. Knowing that she would not survive her journey.
Image credits: Alaskan_Tsar
#9
TIL in 2001, Mattel made a vibrating Harry Potter broomstick that led to many questionable Amazon user reviews. They discontinued the toy after adult stores in Times Square started selling them for twice their original retail price.
Image credits: SappyGilmore
#10
TIL about the “Tanganyika-Laughter Epidemic”. A student in 1962 in Tanzania started laughing in a school in Kashasha. The laughter quickly spread to hundreds of people, causing schools to close for months. Researchers believe it was caused by stress, social tensions. No official explanation was given.
Image credits: UnlimitedDuck
#11
TIL when Captain Francesco Schettino was asked why he abandoned the sinking Costa Concordia cruise ship in 2012 while the ship’s passengers were either dying or trying to escape, his excuse was that he accidentally fell into a lifeboat. He received 16 years in prison for his role in the incident.
Image credits: waitingforthesun92
#12
TIL that there is a type of octopus, an argonaut, where the male fills its sex organ with sperm, then rips it off and presents it to a female.
#13
TIL It has been scientifically proven that stroking a cat can lower one’s blood pressure.
#14
TIL that when Johannes Rebmann, the first European to see Mount Kilimanjaro, published his discovery in 1849, it was dismissed as a malaria-induced hallucination because it was believed that snow at this latitude was impossible. It took 12 more years for scholars to accept the mountain’s existence.
Image credits: ShabtaiBenOron
#15
TIL that, on 16 November, 1949, students in Ghent (Belgium) stormed the medieval castle, lowered the portcullis and threw fruit from the walls at the police to protest a new tax on beer. The event is still commemorated yearly by the city as the greatest student prank in its history.
Image credits: EliteTusken
#16
TIL that three years after winning gold at the 2004 Olympics, wrestler Rulon Gardner and two friends’ plane crashed into Lake Powell Utah. The three men swam an hour to the shore through 44F (7C) degree water to the shore and waited all night without shelter for rescue. All three men survived.
Image credits: HasSomeSelfEsteem
#17
TIL that not only are the mountains on Saturns moon Titan named after mountains and ranges from works J.R.R. Tolkien, but the plains are named after locations from the Dune Universe.
#18
TIL the Black Death contributed greatly to the rise of the British Pub and pub culture. Thanks to the plague, scarcity of labor greatly improved the standard of living for peasants, who in turn spent their extra money on beer.
Image credits: TheMadhopper
#19
TIL. MSG isn’t bad for you and it’s bad reputation stemmed from what’s called the Chinese Restaurant Syndrome.
Image credits: Oztravels
#20
TIL: about Nebraska’s “safe haven” law that didn’t have an age limit to drop off unwanted babies. A wave of children, many teenagers with behavioral issues, were dropped off. It has since been amended.
Image credits: LaUNCHandSmASH
#21
TIL birth rates in the U.S. have dropped more than 20% since 2007.
Image credits: SAT0725
#22
TIL that when the Bible was first translated into Finnish, there was no word for lion since nobody had ever seen one. The translator instead used the word “jalopeura” which means “noble deer”.
#23
TIL only a slim majority of Americans realize Puerto Ricans are American citizens.
#24
TIL elephants are capable of recognizing themselves in a mirror, which is a sign of self-awareness. Elephants were shown a mirror and their reactions were observed. They went through a series of behaviors, including touching their own bodies and inspecting their mouths.
#25
TIL: In 1880, the average ages of consent in the US were set at 10 or 12 years old in most states, with the exception of Delaware where it was 7.
Image credits: SilentWalrus92
#26
TIL that there are at least 5 species of shark living in the Thames estuary (which runs through London), and that one of those species is venomous.
#27
TIL that when Zlatan Ibrahimovic signed for MLS club LA Galaxy, LeBron James sent him one of his Lakers jerseys as a “welcome to LA” gift. Zlatan’s response was to sign it and send it back.
Image credits: JimPalamo
#28
TIL of “Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome” where the body doesn’t respond to testosterone so they have the genetic makeup of a man while showing the physical traits of a woman.
Image credits: bigbananaNo
#29
TIL that out of 400-500 species of shark, the Sand Tiger Shark is the only one known to fart.
#30
TIL that the morning after the Titanic sank, a man on a nearby vessel who was unaware of the sinking photographed an iceberg with a red streak he suspected to be paint from a ship. For years the law firm for White Star Line, the Titanic’s owner, had the original displayed in their office.
#31
TIL during its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed twice, besieged 23 times, attacked 52 times, and captured and recaptured 44 times.
Image credits: volossaveroniki
#32
TIL Domino’s Pizza was unsuccessful in its attempt to expand into Italy, they failed to win over the local Italians as they preferred their local pizzerias.
#33
TIL that the crew of the sinking Daniel J. Morrell believed they were moments from being rescued, only to discover in horror that the lights were from the stern section of their own severed ship, still under power and barreling towards them.
#34
TIL that in 2002 members of a simulated Mars mission in Utah uncovered an actual dinosaur fossil when on a mock spacewalk.
#35
TIL that Sweden has 267,570 islands, the most of any country in the world.
#36
TIL that the most powerful earthquake ever recorded in the continental US occurred in New Madrid, MO, in 1812. It was so violent that the shaking was felt in New York, made church bells ring in South Carolina, and made part of the Mississippi River run backwards.
#37
TIL Brontosaurus is a valid dinosaur again. As of 2015 it is no longer considered to be the same species as Apatosaurus.
#38
TIL: Castrati were singers who were castrated before puberty to develop a unique voice for singing. They were primarily in church choirs and operas. Italian operas without one would be doomed to fail. The Pope tried to ban them in 1748, but failed as it would drastically reduce church attendance.
Image credits: Flares117
#39
TIL that lower class Germans are stereotyped as giving their children names that sound exotic in German, such as “Kevin.” Prejudice against people with such names is strong enough that the term “Kevinism” was coined to describe it.
#40
TIL in 2012 in Cebu, Philippines, after a 6.9 earthquake struck the city, someone shouted while finding their daughter whose name is “Chona Mae”. This was misheard as “Tsunami” and eventually caused a mass panic.
Image credits: PotatoCatPi
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Author: Rugilė Žemaitytė
