› added 3 years ago

64

TIL about Ziph’s Law which says that frequency of any word is inversely proportional to its rank in the frequency table. The word “the” is the most used word in English, the second most used word is used 1/2 that amount, the third 1/3, and so on. This is true not just for English but all languages.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

E1vGx TIL there is a dialect of Arabic that isn't naturally spoken anywhere, but which is understandable to all speakers of Arabic. While people from Egypt, Iraq, Sudan, Yemen or Syria might not understand each other, they can understand the same news report.
ZD7a TIL John Rabe, a member of the Nazi Party, prevented the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians at the hands of the Japanese by setting up a refugee zone under the Nazi flag.
W1bL TIL a man once saved a baby from a dumpster only to discover he was the father
eYVg TIL Hooters in China is known as “American Owl Restaurant”
8aEgZ TIL that China experienced an episode of mango hysteria in 1968. Upon receiving them as diplomatic gifts, Mao had them distributed across the country where songs, poems, rallies and altars were built in the mangoes’ honor. A dentist was even executed for comparing a mango to a sweet potato.