› added 11 years ago

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TIL hundreds of chimpanzees were bred for AIDS research in the 1980s, only to find out that HIV doesn’t cause AIDS in chimps.

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WGZd TIL Swedish millionaire Johan Eliasch purchased 400,000 acres of the Amazon Rainforest from a logging company for $14,000,000 for the sole purpose of its preservation.
e07Zb TIL that in 1856, an Indian surveyor calculated the peak of Mount Everest to be exactly 29,000 ft. Fearing that nobody would believe that this was the exact height and nothing more than an estimate, he publicly declared the height to be 29,002 ft.
GPQN TIL Sylvester Stallone’s mother is a psychic, specializing in rumpology, who reads butts.
YpwOA TIL Monarch butterflies migrating North take 3-4 generations to make it to their destination. Gen 1 does not get to its Northern destination; Gen 3 or 4 does. To return, Gen 3 or 4 flies the entire route South. Then Gen 3 or 4 begins flying N. laying eggs along the way that start Gen 1 migrating N.
47Vg TIL that when South Park did an episode on Tourettes, the Tourettes Association said they expected it to be offensive. After broadcast, they conceded there was “a surprising amount of accurate information conveyed”, adding that the episode “served as a clever device” for providing accurate facts.