› added 7 years ago

390

Short answer: Sadly, yes

Read more popsci.com

6EZ7X TIL The cliché "It was a dark and stormy night" originally opened a novel by Edward Bulwer-Lytton, about a highwayman sentenced to death by a judge who turns out to be his father. Bulwer-Lytton infamously convinced Dickens to change "Great Expectations" to give it a more conventional "happy" ending.
J1Lvk TIL that porcupines, echidnas and hedgehogs were ALL different species
KYJw9 TIL that firefighters in rural Tennessee let a home burn to the ground in 2010 because the homeowner hadn’t paid a $75 fee.
x6Nvk TIL that because all US banknotes are the same size, making telling them apart hard-to-impossible for the blind, the US Bureau of Engraving and Printing provides an electronic device (the iBill Currency Identifier) that can identify the value of the bills free of charge.
p8oy8 TIL about Drapetomania, a mental illness that Dr. Samuel Cartwright hypothesized as the cause of slaves wanting to flee captivity