› added 6 years ago

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TIL that in Star Trek, Captain Kirk's phrase "You have the conn" has its origins in early battleships dating as far back as the 1860s; these ships were built with conning towers. A conning tower is a raised platform on a ship or submarine from which an officer in charge can issue commands.

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6kL8 TIL when Argélico Fucks, a retired Brazilian footballer, left FC Porto and joined the rival S.L. Benfica, the headline on Eurosport.com read “Fucks off to Benfica”
Po0e TIL that the Turkish F-Keyboard was designed using studies on bone and muscle anatomy of the fingers and letter frequencies in the Turkish language. With this scientific preparation, Turkey has broken 14 world records in typewriting championships between 1957 and 1995
0wKQp TIL that Christianity became the state religion of the Roman Empire in the 380s, when Emperor Theodosius banned Pagan rituals and holidays, disbanded the Vestal virgins, extinguished the Sacred Fire, destroyed the Temple of Apollo at Delphi and put an end to the Ancient Olympic Games
M7Jla TIL of wind catchers, an architectural technology dating back to 500BC Iran to passively cool buildings. Air is drawn in and out of these tall spire like structures through large slotted openings at the top. A stream of water underneath provides evaporatively cooled air which rises through the space
P1ZVZ TIL that, on gaining power, the Nazis immediately targeted the civil service with a 1933 law to improve “professionalism” by expunging non-Aryans and political opponents. This law was a key reason why Einstein fled to America.