› added 6 years ago

177

TIL that poisonous food substances are the reason we find bitter taste unpleasant. Our taste buds evolved associating bitter taste to poison because most of the poisonous wild fruits are bitter & nutritious ones, sweet. The feature which protected us for centuries is now causing major health-risks.

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NXvae TIL Finnish babies’ first bed is often a cardboard box. The government sends all expectant mothers a box with baby supplies, and the box includes a small mattress at the bottom meant to stay in the box.
Ypg9Z TIL that Kodak discovered the US was testing atomic weapons due to problems appearing on their consumer film. Kodak was worried about their product and profits ultimately striking a deal with the US Government in order to get schedules and maps of future tests in exchange for Kodak's silence.
Mede0 TIL that in 1998, during an economic crisis in Russia, teachers in western Siberia were being paid with vodka. The decision came about after attempts to pay them with toilet paper and funeral accessories 'provoked indignation'; other workers were offered bikes, cabbages and bras as payment.
pY64p TIL that a group of owls is called a parliament of owls and a group of lemurs is called a conspiracy of lemurs
6Eb8Z TIL about Gordon, or "Whipped Peter", an enslaved African American. The pictures of his scourged back provided Northerners with visual evidence of brutal treatment of slaves. Abolitionists distributed the pictures throughout the United States and internationally to show the abuses of slavery.