› added 10 years ago

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TIL A WWII messenger pigeon named GI Joe was awarded a bravery medal for “Making the 20 mile flight from British 10th Army HQ, in the same number of minutes … just in time to save the lives of at least 100 Allied soldiers” 31 other pigeons have been awarded for bravery during service.

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grjJ7 TIL the codex, the precursor to modern books, emerged in the 1st century CE as a better alternative to scrolls. Inspired by Roman wax tablets, it used durable parchment folded into sheets, making it more practical and compact—one of the biggest advances in bookmaking before the printing press.
Y6yd TIL that most ‘wasabi’ sold outside Japan is really horseradish with green food coloring added. If it contains '5%’ wasabi plant, they can call it 'wasabi’. The part added is usually the leaf, which does not have the wasabi flavor at all.
v1XED TIL that killer whales, or orca whales have a highly developed ‘limbic system’, which suggests that they feel a stronger level of empathy and social cohesion towards their peers than any other mammal, including human beings and other cetaceans.
OGnmX TIL that a well-respected British academic known for his work on the dead sea scrolls, argued that Jesus was a mushroom
N7088 TIL measuring 4086mi^2, the largest salt pan Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia is so flat that rain can’t drain, creating the world’s largest natural mirror. It’s also 5x better for satellite calibration than the surface of the ocean, and an elevation measurement accuracy of 0.8 inches