› added 4 years ago

194

TIL of the Giant Pyrosome; a “free-floating, colonial tunicate that is made of thousands of identical clones, together forming a hollow cylindrical structure that can be 60 feet (18 m) long and wide enough for a person to enter”

Read more oceana.org

via reddit.com

xV9nD TIL Author Robert Howard created Conan the Barbarian and invented the entire 'sword and sorcery' genre. He took care of his sickly mother his entire adult life, never married and barely dated. The day his mother finally died, he he walked out to his car, grabbed a gun, and shot himself in the head.
R7XDQ TIL gin and tonic was invented to make antimalarials more palatable
AgDx TIL there are more than 83,000 Americans who are still listed as Prisoners of War or Missing in Action. Also, the third Friday of every September is National POW/MIA Recognition Day.
BrMyD TIL that the most accurate simulation of the human brain ever has been carried out, but a single second’s worth of brain activity took one of the world’s largest supercomputers 40 minutes to calculate.
jNa8N TIL that we still don’t know what greek fire is or how to make it.