› added 2 years ago

120

TIL that movement of the tides causes a loss of energy in the Earth-Moon system. In the last 620 million years the period of rotation of the Earth (length of a day) has increased from 21.9 hours to 24 hours; in this period the Earth-Moon system has lost 17% of its rotational energy.

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LLZ0 TIL that Nelson Rockefeller, once vice President of the United States, died at age 79. of a heart attack rumoured to be caused during sex with his assistant. The New York Magazine quipped: “Nelson thought he was coming, but he was going”
VMNjm TIL that "baby on board" stickers aren't just suburban mums being themselves, it's actually for emergency services to know to look for a baby in a crash
1a9Er TIL that the film Eurotrip was filmed entirely in Prague, Czech Republic. (Scenes in the US were at the International School of Prague; the Paris railway station was actually Prague railway station; Vatican City was actually Prague's National Museum)
R7gQQ TIL that the International Space Station ran on a 20MHz Intel 80386SX CPU from 1988 & was upgraded in August with a commercial off-the-shelf computer. The station orbits Earth & sees a sunrise once every 92 minutes. Soon after the upgrade, it will have a computer that can keep up.
nWJx7 TIL that in olympic wrestling, ref can give wrestler a penalty, if they decide that the wrestler is giving "less than total effort". "Both wrestlers are required to always give an all-out effort. Wrestlers showing less than total effort are considered "passive.""