› added 2 years ago

47

TIL of Barthélemy de Chasseneuz, a French lawyer who made his reputation as a criminal lawyer by successfully defending a group of rats that were put on trial for destroying barley crops in 1508.

Read more beatlyzer.com

via beatlyzer.com

YjGW TIL that if Helium is cold enough, it will form a “superfluid” where it acts like a liquid with zero viscosity, meaning it will actually try to “climb” out of containers against gravity to escape.
grbL TIL that there is a theory called “The Phantom Time Hypothesis” in which it is stated that the years from 614 to 911 AD didn’t actually exist and where faked by Roman Emperor Otto III so he could reign in the year 1000 AD.
b9mbN TIL about Robert Cocking who tried to invent an improved parachute design. He was so convinced of his invention that he tested it himself, hanging below a balloon and releasing the parachute in the height of 5,000 ft. He was the first person who died in a parachute accident.
pZpQ TIL in 1998, a man was tricked into being a Japanese reality-show where he was kept solitary in a room for 15 months until he could win $10k in mail-in sweepstakes. Also, he had to be naked the whole time and had no idea he was being broadcast on TV, being watched by millions of people.
DQv8r TIL a very valuable painting called "Christ Mocked" was found to have been just hanging in an elderly woman's kitchen for years. She had been thinking of throwing it out, but her family called in an appraiser.