› added 5 years ago

225

TIL of Noor Inayat Khan, an Indian woman who was posthumously awarded the George Cross for her service during WWII. She was the first female wireless operator to be parachuted into France to assist the French resistance. Later betrayed by a a member of the resistance, she would be executed in Dachau

Read more bbc.co.uk

via reddit.com

j6RKQ TIL that the one-way speed of light is still undefined. All measurements of light speed are done using two-way (mirror) setups.
rRb6e TIL about Marvin Creamer an American college professor who became the first person to sail around the world without any navigational equipment. He relied on the sun, stars and moon to guide him instead of a compass, sextent, clock or any other type of navigational instrument.
e586 TIL that Scientists in 1916 felt America was degenerating into a second rate nationality. They listed the Top 20 threats to USA: #8 America leads all nations in murders #12 Hearty eating without exercise #18 Remarkable cancer mortality increase
p8OZ TIL Some Paralympic athletes gain an unfair advantage by purposely injuring themselves on areas of their body with no feeling. It’s called “boosting” and the goal is to trick the body into triggering a kind of fight-or-flight response, and in doing so, increase performance.
9wJV6 TIL The native population of the entire continent of Europe is shrinking with no country having a fertility rate at replacement level (2.1 children per woman). France has the highest at 1.79 but all the other most populous Euro countries have rates of between 1.15 and 1.6.