› added 12 years ago

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TIL Mayhem is an actual crime and means the intentional maiming of another person.

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wEXE TIL In 2012 Mathematician Vi Hart sent an open letter to Nickelodeon proving Spongebob’s Pineapple was geometrically impossible. Pineapple designer Kenny Pittenger responded on his blog (in video description) by posting a new “mathematically correct” design. This new design is now used on the show.
pYJO8 TIL Sun Yat-sen's translator Dai Jitao had a son from an affair who he gave to Chiang Kai-shek for adoption to avoid scandal. The son, christened Chiang Wei-kuo, later led a Panzer division during Anschluss. He was called home to China to fight the Japanese just before Germany invaded Poland.
yQeDv TIL that in 1913 Hitler, Stalin, Trotsky, Tito and Freud were all living in Vienna at the same time
OoP41 TIL that having power actually reduces a person's ability to empathize neurologically. When given power, a person's ability to adapt their behavior to the behaviors of other people diminishes, which explains why people are often mean to their subordinates.
8aKk8 TIL modern fire departments were the creation of insurance companies. Insurance companies hired private brigades to put out fires for their policy holders. Each insurance company had their own brigade and would extinguish the fires of their customers while leaving non-customer properties to burn.