› added 9 years ago

87

TIL Olympic medals used to be given for “Town Planning”

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via reddit.com

p8grp TIL the speed and direction of your computer mouse is measured in a unit called the Mickey, which is equal to the smallest movement your cursor can make on a computer screen
gMMpW A circumhorizontal arc often called a fire rainbow, is an optical phenomenon in which an ice halo forms by hexagonal, plate-shaped ice crystals in high-level cirrus clouds. The halo is so large that the arc appears parallel to the horizon, hence the name. When the sun is very high in the sky, sunlight entering flat, hexagon-shaped ice crystals get split into individual colours just like in a prism.
YbrP TIL that penicillin was formally discovered when Alexander Fleming did not tidy up some petri dishes filled with bacteria before going on vacation. A penicillin spore then spontaneously landed in a petri dish and caused enough damage to the bacteria for Fleming to notice this when he came back.
5YO4p TIL that Facebook builds shadow profiles of people who never even signed up. They do this from users who upload their contact books, which includes phone numbers, email addresses, nicknames, photos, addresses, notes, and any other info stored in the contact record.
4k86g TIL that the fungus Ophiocordyceps unilateralis (zombie fungus) doesn't control ants by infecting their brain. Instead it destroys the motor neurons and connects directly to the muscles to control them. The brain is made into a prisoner in its own body