› added 3 months ago

39

TIL that the Makapansgat pebble, a small rock estimated to be around 3,000,000 years old, may represent the earliest evidence of symbolic thinking in the early hominid species. It is believed that an early hominid carried the pebble into a cave because its natural shape resembles a face.

PLrZ TIL I learned that a “rat king” is a rare phenomenon when a number of rats become intertwined at their tails, which become stuck together with blood, dirt, ice, excrement or simply knotted. The animals reputedly grow together while joined at the tails and spread plague.
VMLwD TIL that in the 1920s, Bhagat Singh Thind, an Indian Sikh man, tried to argue to the Supreme Court of the United States that he was "white" on the grounds that anthropologists at that time classified people from India as "caucasian." The Court rejected his argument.
xVW51 TIL There is a religion in Vietnam called Caodaism. Its followers believe in a single god who sent many prophets. Some of these prophets include Buddha, Confucius, Jesus Christ, Muḥammad, Pericles, Julius Caesar, Joan of Arc, Victor Hugo, and Sun Yat-sen. It even has a Holy See and Pope figure!
QJGwE TIL actor Robert Pattinson dealt with an obsessed fan who had been camping outside his apartment by taking her out on a dinner date. "I just complained about everything in my life and she never came back."
oKlL TIL in early 2015, the unmanned spacecraft, “Dawn”, is scheduled to arrive at Ceres, a dwarf planet and the largest object in our solar system’s asteroid belt.